Page:Cricket, by WG Grace.djvu/70

 eight in the morning. In that way only could he continue the game he loved so well; and I remember we tried to follow in his footsteps in after years, at not quite so early an hour. He had the great qualities of perseverance and concentration, and he diligently impressed upon us the need for cultivating them.

I can remember his words now:

"Have patience, my boy; where there's a will there's a way; and there is nothing you cannot attain, if you only try hard enough."

My father and mother were married in the year 1831, and settled down in Downend, Gloucestershire, where they lived the rest of their lives. Downend is about four miles from Bristol, and was not a more important village sixty years ago than it is now. At the time my father made it the place of his labours, it was a small scattered village, and tourists when they travelled that way rarely paid it the compliment of staying long in it.

My father had to make his way in life, and was at the beck and call of every sick person within a radius of twelve miles. He had not an hour he could call his own. The early morning saw him riding six miles eastward; at midnight he was often six miles to the west.

There was not much time for cricket. The village had not a club of its own; so my father had to be satisfied with running into Bristol now and again, to look at the matches of the Clifton and Bristol clubs about the only two at that time within available reach.

My brother Henry, the eldest of the family, was born on the 3ist January, 1833. At eight years of age he was sent to school, and every time he came home would talk of nothing but cricket. My father realised that he would be compelled sooner or later to create time to help him, if he desired to keep in touch with him physically as well as mentally. He was strong