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252 bowlers are particularly fond of returning the ball hard to the wicket after they have fielded it. It does not succeed in running a man out once in a thousand times, it often enables a run to be got by an overthrow, and it uselessly troubles the wicket-keeper. A batsman is next door to an idiot who is got out by such means, and we shrewdly suspect that it is often done to secure the applause of an unthinking mob.

This is an art which the above-mentioned critics lament as having died out. It may be suspected that they missed as

many catches as the present generation, but still the present generation miss more than they ought. All fine country fields catch the ball close to the body, and rightly so, because the eye is more in a line with the ball, and with the hands in the position shown in fig. 1, not in the way shown in fig. 2. If a young player begins in the wrong way, he will miss one or two and get nervous. It is worth remembering that folios of rules will never make a nervous field keep hold of a country catch. Cold hands are a frequent cause of failure, but loss of confidence and the disorganisation of the nervous system is the commonest reason, and a constant prayer of many a cricketer is to be spared a high catch.