veteran not given to rash assertions—states, "He was absolutely the best all-round cricketer I ever played with." Note that Mr. Booth actually participated in first-class cricket—fine steady bat that he was—until 1887, and still keeps up his interest in the game. To collaborate with these three were Messrs. H. M. Marshall, A. W. T. Daniel, H. M. Plowden, an excellent slow bowler, and W. Bury, "who never missed a catch." Truly was it said that the 1862 eleven was not surpassed until that of 1878. It will be noted that Cambridge was now enjoying the era of the Lytteltons, G. S., the second brother to Lord Cobham, coming up in 1866, and showing wonderful nerve in a trying finish in the following year. It was then the turn of the Light Blues to win for four successive encounters. Much of this was due to the great command of that eccentric free-lance Mr. C. A. Absalom over the ball. He was outside all laws of cricket convention, among other ethics of his being that a half-volley on the leg stump was the best delivery with which to attack a fresh batsman. Altogether he took one hundred wickets for 14 runs each as an undergraduate, and twenty-two wickets for 247 runs in his three encounters with Oxford. Of course he was utterly unorthodox as a bat too, but his hard hitting produced quite a respectable figure in the average-sheet of the Light Blues. Of his acrobatic agility in the field, it is safe to say that never will its like be seen again.
Slightly senior to him was Mr. C. E. Green, the father of Essex cricket, and hardly had he gone
