History of Cricket.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume XLVI, Issue 252, 28 October 1904, Page 4

History of Cricket.

The St. James' Gazette says that, though cricket may be traced back to the time of King Edward 1., the game, as we know it, is proved to be of modern origin by the implements in use in it. The first description of the wicket was about 1700, when it consisted of two stumps a foot high and a foot broad, with a bail placed acrosa them oni top. Beneath and. between the stumps a bole was dug, and to run a man out the ball had to be placed in it. To prevent himself being run out, the batsman had to ground his bat in thlis hole. Just about 200 years ago this primitive wicket was improved. The two stumps were raised to a height of 22ia, and planted only 6in apart. The crease was cut in the turf, and not whitewashed on to it. In 1775 a third stump was aidded, because the straightest balls of the bowler went through the wicket without disturbing the bail. In 1798 the wicket was increased to 24in. high and 7in. broad. In 1816 it was heightened by 2in. In 1817 it assumed its present size—27in. high and Bin. broad. At the same tame the bail was divided into two halves. In the beginning of the eighteenth cmtury the but was only a hockey slick, curved at the bottom, and adupted for hitting ground balls. Gradually i't grew lieavier into the form of a crooked club, somewhat resembling an old-fashioned, curved butter-knife. The straight bat, ac- : cording to a vague statement by Nyrcn, came in some years after 1746. Eajch player practically shaped his bat according to his own fancy, though the HamMedon Club placed restrictions on the width. About 1800 Fennex first showed cricketers how to play forward. Until then no one had dreamt of reaching out to smother or hit a balho" its pitch. The new method materially influenced the form of the bat, but it does not seem to have finally assumed its blade-like shape with a central handle until about 1828, when Mr Felix inaugurated cutting and off-driving. Hatti/ig-glovee came in about 1825 when the introduction of round-arm bowling compelled the "batsman to protect his hands from rising balls.

jjiuua/LIUB i.uuua u tnu umng imna. Pads for the legs had then probably boon in use for some time. > The first balls were solid wooden spheres, about the size of a modern tennis-ball. In a print of " Miss Wicket," dated 1770, the ball is re--1 presented about the present size, ivi'tk heavy cross-eeams. The red hue of the modern ball is unique, and a trade secret. Various experiments have been made with other colours, green and brown cricket-balls havi ing been put on the market. In each c a se they have bom found wanting, for the standard shade of red is the exact complementary colour to the green of the turf No other tint is so easily followed by the eye against the background of grass. It is in the delivery of the ball, perhaps, that the modernity of cricket is most strikingly seen. Overarm bowling isl less than forty years o ld, and until 1827 anything but lobs was illegal. Until well after the middle of the eighteenth century bowling was little more than a fast trundling of the hall along the ground at the wicket. 'David Harris invented length bowling, or "three-quarter balls," as they were first called. Instead of howling the balls with half-a-dozen bounds and hops along tho ground, he pitched the ball threequarters of the length of the wicket, so that it cama to the batsiman and the stumps at one bound. About the same time the oil-break was invented. Twisting the ball in from leg seems to hove been known very early. To meet the new bowling, with its one, clear hop from wicket to wicket, the bat grew broader at the bottom. The attempt to introduce round-arm bowing was first made in 1790. It was forbidden, antd, despite constant efforts to use it, in 1816 the M.C.C. declared that "the ball must be delivered with the hand below the elbow." Not until 1828 was roundarm bowling logaliscd. For nearly thirty years later to bowl overarm was as illegal as throwing is now. li> 1845 them was a n emphatic reenactment of the law making all halls delivered with the hand ahove the shoulder no-balls. With the legalisation of overarm bowling in 1865 modem cricket began. I As early as 1774, when the first rules of the game were drawn up, provision was made for no-balls ; for getting the foot over the crease,; and byes. Wides were not recorded and penalised until 1828. Before then a bowler could bowl as mamy wiries a s he liked without losing runs for his side. Leg-dyes were first distinguished as such by the M.C.C. in 1850, though they had been reco'gniseti before m some parts of the country. i Vmpirss have been a necessity for nearly 200 years. Until well into the aighteentii century runs were recorded by cutting notches in a stick, I with *an extra deep notch for everv < tenth run. All the runs were notched together, and there was no keeping of individual scores. Until thirty years ago every hit was run out. 1 When Pr. Grace began playing there were no boundaries, and he remembers dashing through the crowd, knocking spectators aside, m pursuit of the ball. Spectators were thus frequently injured, and it was for their protection that boundaries with a standard four runs for a hit | to them were instituted. One thing alone in cricket is as it was in the crude beginning- 200 years ago. The wicket has always i been 22 yards long.