Page:Cricket (Hutchinson, 1903).djvu/504

376 local umpire had been engineering his opponents out in the most courageous way. But to everybody's astonishment, when a confident appeal was made against the last man on the side, he gave him "Not out." Struck by this sudden conversion, a friend asked him what the meaning of it was. "Well," he said, "if I'd a given 'im out, they wouldn't 'a stayed to loonch, and my father does the caterin'"!

In one of the keenest matches I ever took part in (it was on the 16th of August 1902, and we won by four runs), two men of the opposite side were batting, one a very fair bat, and dangerous when set, the other a dubious quantity at all times. The bowler sent down a fast one to leg which the wicket-keeper failed to stop, and both men started for a bye. Meanwhile, short slip, backing up, had stopped the ball, and threw the near wicket down, while both men were apparently in the middle of the pitch. The good batsman refused to go, and the indifferent one apparently held no views on the subject, but stayed where he was, while the two umpires (I blush to record it) gave, almost unasked, an opinion favourable to their respective sides. Party feeling was running high, but I never allow any discussion in the field, and it was properly left to the umpire at the end where the wicket had been broken to give a decision. Unfortunately, it was their umpire, and the weak batsman had to go! And it was a fair decision. There was obviously a doubt, and he gave his own side the benefit of it. Who could do more? But we had our