him, is more careful in his discrimination, according to my judgment as a grave historian.
According to Nyren, then, it was some time about or before 1746 that the stumps were both heightened and narrowed. From 1 foot they sprang up to 22 inches in height, and from 2 feet across they shrank to as httle as 6 inches in width. A bail crossed their tops, and a popping-crease was drawn for the grounding of the bat, to the great saving, as we cannot doubt, of the wicket-keeper's fingers. Still, however, unless Nyren was mistaken, there were not as yet but two stumps—virtually it is certain he was mistaken in declining to believe that the game ever was played with a wicket of 2 feet width, but that does not prove him wrong in another matter in which all the probabilities are in his favour.
We are not given any very clear reason for this change in the height of wickets, but we very quickly see its effects. Hitherto bowling had been all along the ground, the wicket being so low that it was almost necessary to bowl in this now derided fashion if it was to be hit at all. But a wicket 10 inches higher might have its bail taken off by a higher-rising ball, the higher-rising ball was found to be a more difficult one for the batsman to hit, the higher-rising kind of ball was thereby proved the best for the bowler's purpose; in a word, "length" bowling, as they called it— the bowling of good length balls, as we should say—was introduced.
And now, all at once, the position of the unfortunate batsman was found to be a very parlous one
