The first thing is, to have the bat always pointed back to the wicket, as in _fig. 1._ page 115; thus you will drop down on the ball, and have all the time and space the case admits of. If the bat is not previously thrown back, when the ball shoots the player has two operations,--the one, to put the bat back: and the other, to ground it: instead of one simple drop down alone. I never saw any man do this better than Wenman, when playing the North and South match at Lord’s in 1836. Redgate was in his prime, and almost all his balls were shooting down the hill; and, from the good time and precision with which Wenman dropped down upon some dozen shooters, with all the pace and spin for which Redgate was famous--the ground being hardened into brick by the sun--I have ever considered Wenman equal to any batsman of his day. The second thing is, to prepare for back play with the first possible intimation that the ball will require it. A good player descries the enemy, and drops back as soon as the ball is out of the bowler’s hand. The third--a golden rule for batsmen--is: expect a good length to shoot, and you will have time, if it rises: but if you expect it to rise, you are too late if it shoots. THE BAIL BALL.--First, the attitude is that of _fig. 1._ The bat thrown back to the bails is indispensable for quickness: if you play a bailer too late, short slip is placed on purpose to catch you out; therefore watch the ball from the bowler’s hand, and drop back on your wicket in good time. Also, take the greatest pains in tracing the ball every inch from the hand to the bat. Look hard for the twist, or a “break” will be fatal. To keep the eye steadily on the ball, and not lose it at the pitch, is a hint even for experienced players: so make this the subject of attentive practice. The most difficult of all bailers are those which ought not to be allowed to come in as bailers at all, those which should be met at the pitch. Such over-pitched balls give neither time nor space, if you attempt to play them back. Every length ball is difficult to play back, just in proportion to the ease with which it could be covered forward. A certain space, from nine to twelve feet, before the crease is, to a practised batsman, so much _terra firma_, whereon pitching every ball is a safe stop or score. Practise with the chalk mark, and learn to make this _terra firma_ as wide as possible. THE DRAW is so called, I suppose, because, when perfectly made, there is no draw at all. Look at _fig. 2._ The bat is not drawn across the wicket, but hangs perpendicularly from the wrists; though the wrists of a good player are never idle, but bring the bat to meet the ball a few inches, and the hit is the natural angle formed by the opposing forces. “Say also,” suggests Clarke, “that the ball meeting the bat, held easy in the hand, will turn it a little of its own force, and the wrists _feel_ when to help it.” This old rule hardly consists with the principle of meeting the ball.