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26 is well to consider the great Australian bowlers; and the disastrous campaign in Australia in 1897-8.

Australian cricket is played on altogether different lines to English; for though the season is longer, yet, communication being difficult, matches are not played every day, as in England, and matches are played to a finish regardless of time. The climate is hot, and the wickets are very hard and easy—speaking of the three chief towns of Sydney, Melbourne, and Adelaide. As a general rule, therefore, to bat is easy, and to bowl difficult. Necessity, however, being the mother of invention, the Australian bowlers turned their heads to account, and the result has been a revolution in the game. The early giants among Australian bowlers were Boyle, Spofforth, and Palmer. Boyle was a slowish bowler, excellent of his class, but not strikingly different from English bowlers of an earlier date—Caffyn, for instance. But Spofforth and Palmer were reckoned fast, and Spofforth was the first of fast bowlers who,