pitch, and I bowled slow, dead
on to the wicket every time; but the two men of the Inimitables who
began the batting on their side-men who have gained almost a European
reputation in the handling of the willow, and I wouldn't like to hurt
their feelings by mentioning their names now--seemed to play with us as
they liked, hitting the ball to every part of the ground, and scoring
threes and fours, and even sixes, in the most demoralising manner
possible. They hadn't been in a quarter of an hour when they passed our
miserable total, amidst the cheers of their own party--in which the
fickle Little Peddlingtonians now joined, and the blue looks of our
men--and it appeared as if their scoring would, like Tennyson's brook,
"go on for ever."

"We must put a stop to this," said Sidney, when seventy went up on the
scoring-board, "and change the bowling," which he did, by going on
himself at my end and putting one of the other visitors, who was also
supposed to be a dab with the ball, in the place of Tomkins.

For a time, this did a little good, as it stopped the rapidity of the
scoring; but after an over or two, the batsmen, neither of whom had been
yet displaced, began putting up the runs again, even quicker than they
had done with us; and the hundred was passed almost within the hour from
the time they started.

"By George, Limpet," said the captain, calling me to him out of the
field, "you must go on again at the upper end, changing places with that
chap. Try a full pitch, and we'll catch that long-legged beggar out;
he's so confident now that he would hit at anything."

Going on again, as Sidney had directed, I tried a full-pitched ball
after a short delivery or two, and the "long-legged beggar" skied it,
amidst the breathless suspense of our team.

Unfortunately, however, no one was there to catch it when it fell to the
ground a long way beyond cover-point, and the Inimitables scored six for
it--disgusting!

"That Atkins deserves to be expelled the club!" said the captain in a
rage. "He can't put on a bit of steam when it's necessary to use his
legs, although he could run Prester John out for a ball that wasn't
worth moving for. Play!" And the game went on again.

Giving my opponent another brace of short balls to take him off his
guard, I watched my opportunity again and treated him again to a full
one, which he skied, as before, to the same point.

This time, however, he did not escape scatheless. Young Blac