ENGLAND, PAST AND PRESENT
1770—1900.
(After reading Nyren's Young Cricketer's Tutor)
But for an hour to watch them play,
Those heroes dead and gone,
And pit our batsmen of to-day
With those of Hambledon!
Our Graces, Nyrens, Studds, and Wards,
In weeks of sunny weather,
Somewhere upon Elysian swards,
To see them matched together!
Could we but see how Small withstands
The three-foot break of Steel,
If Silver Billy's 'wondrous hands'
Survive with Briggs or Peel!
If Mann, with all his pluck of yore,
Can keep the leather rolling,
And, at a crisis, notch a score,
When Woods and Hearne are bowling!
No doubt the Doctor would bewitch
His quaint top-hatted foes,
Though, on a deftly chosen pitch,
Old Harris bowled his slows;
And Aylward, if the asphodel
Had made the wicket bumpy,
Would force the game with Attewell,
And Stoddart collar 'Lumpy'
When Time of all our flannelled hosts
Leaves only the renown,
Our cracks, perhaps, may join the ghosts
That roam on Windmill Down,
Where shadowy crowds will watch the strife,
And cheer the deeds of wonder
Achieved by giants whom in life
A century kept asunder.
'The ball is over, gentlemen.'