mistakes which need only be mentioned to be avoided.
One great difficulty, we observed, consists in correct discrimination of length and instantaneous decision. To form correctly as the ball pitches, there is time enough, but none to spare: time only to act, no time to think. So also with shooting, driving, and various kinds of exercises, at the critical moment all depends not on thought, but habit: by constant practice, the time requisite for deliberation becomes less and less, till at length we are unconscious of any deliberation at all,—acting, as it were, by intuition or instinct, for the occasion prompts the action: then, in common language, we "do it naturally," or, have formed that habit which is "a second nature."
In this sense, a player must form a habit of correct decision in playing forward and back. Till he plays by habit, he is not safe: the sight of the length must prompt the corresponding movement. Look at Fuller Pilch, or Mr. C. Taylor, and this rule will be readily understood; for, with such players, every ball is as naturally and instinctively received by its appropriate movement as if the player were an automaton, and the ball touched a spring: so quickly does forward play, or back, and the attitude for off-cut or leg-hit, appear to coincide with, or rather to anticipate, each suitable length. All this quickness, ease,
