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Rh been obliged to play grand bowling before the heavy roller and mowing machines were invented, became more proficient than players do now, except the four players mentioned before. Batsmen get demoralised when the wicket plays tricky. They never get hurt now, but I remember Grace on Lords, about 1869, against Freeman and Emmett, getting a tremendous crack on the elbow, and how the crowd cheered when he drove the next ball for six. Big scoring is all very well, but it is not the whole of cricket. I may be wrong, but I think I see a decadence, not because of less skill, but because the old balance has been rudely disturbed. It is not possible to make bowlers good enough to get bats out on hard wickets for reasonable scores, so as to make it possible for matches to be finished always in three days, and tolerably often in two days, such as Fenners, Brighton, and many others.

Of course, Grace is by far the greatest batsman of all time; but no cricketer ought ever to forget that no county has, during the