Page:Once a Week Volume 8.djvu/726

 718 this etymology be condemned. “Danger, n. f. (danger, Fr.) of uncertain derivation. Skinner derives it from damnum; Menage from angaria; Minshew, ' (') death, to which Junius seems inclined.” Let the impartial reader judge between the great critic and the simple solution afforded by the story which I tell as it was told to me.

save the lass of Aben-Hall! She hath my bleeding heart in thrall; For one glance of her eyes so blue, Some deed of danger I would do; For one kiss of her lips so fine, I’d shed my blood like German wine!

She hath no castles by the sea, Or belted knights on bended knee; She hath no gems or jewels rare, Or any gold except her hair; But she shall be a minstrel’s bride, And tune his harp at evening-tide!

The high-born dames, in silk and fur, Shall turn their heads to look at her; The proudest maidens of them all Shall praise the lass of Aben-Hall; The king, upon his golden throne, Shall sigh to call the maid his own!

And he shall send her jewels rare, To have a ringlet of her hair; And make her Lady of the Land, To kiss her white and bonnie hand; But she shall be a minstrel’s bride, And tune his harp at evening-tide!

upon a time—that magic period of our childish romances and fairy tales—gentlemen attired in knee-breeches and cocked-hats, and ornamented about the head with pigtails, might have been seen dotting the surface of a village-green or heath, on which were placed two little skeleton hurdles of two feet wide and a foot high, at a distance of two-and-twenty yards asunder. The materials which were provided for their amusement were the skeleton hurdles aforesaid, two rude clubs of about the size and weight of the levers with which artillerymen work the heavy guns, and a small hard ball of a size and weight now unknown. This was the cricket of our forefathers about 120 years ago, and from this rude beginning of a sport which much depended on gambling for excitement, and which was by no means unmixed with quarrelling, our great national game has sprung up, and acquired not only a firm growth in every part of England, but has overrun our English possessions in all parts of the world.

When our troops were at Scutari, en route for the Crimea, we read with much amusement the remarks of the solemn Turks who, for the first time, witnessed an English cricket match. Of course they thought we were a nation of maniacs; but that impression is common amongst people who do not understand us. The wonder of the first batch of Russian prisoners, as we heard, was no less great at beholding two Elevens quietly playing a match in the English lines whilst the guns were booming in Sebastopol, though probably they are more accustomed to the sight now, as the English Cricket Club at St. Petersburg is under the especial patronage of the Grand Duke, and very popular with the Russian aristocracy.

Reverting to the cricketers of old, our attention has been called to cricket past and present by the publication of the first three volumes of Lillywhite’s “Cricket Scores and Biographies,” which contain the history of cricket and cricketers from the early days of Lord Sackville, Lord Tankerville, the Duke of Dorset, Sir Horace Mann, and many others of those brave men who lived before the Agamemnons of our times, down to 1848, when Pilch, and the Mynns, and old Lillywhite, Hillyer, Box, Guy, Mr. Felix, Mr. Taylor Wisden, J. Lillywhite, Hinkly, Dorrinton, Hawkins, Box, and the many other cricketers of that period, were in their prime, and the game was brought to a perfection which, in the opinion of many good judges, has never been excelled in quality, though it is an undoubted fact that we can count our good cricketers now by hundreds, instead of by the score.

It is pleasant, in turning over the pages of Mr. Lillywhite’s book, to know that the first materials were collected by old Lillywhite, the celebrated bowler, who first brought round arm-bowling to perfection, and who, with the enthusiasm of a thorough cricketer, determined to bequeath a legacy to his successors, which would perpetuate the history of the game. Most worthily has the author of the book laboured to carry out his late father’s ideas. Mr. F. Lillywhite, in conjunction with his brothers,—all of whom gain their living in the cricket-field—appears to have ransacked all the reliable authorities, and to have received the assistance of all the best men in England in compiling the present work. The subject of cricket is so large, that anything like a critical review of the book would occupy far too great a space for this periodical, so we must content ourselves with harmlessly pirating a sketch of the game, principally from Mr. Lillywhite’s work.

As regards the origin of the game, there appear to be as many opinions as there are antiquarians; but the most generally received idea is, that the game of “tip-cat,” which children play in the streets of our towns, was the origin of cricket. Mr. Bolland, in his “Cricket Notes,” urges this theory with great zeal. He traces the game of “tip-cat” to a double game of “cat” played by eleven of a side and a notcher; and he argues that in the same way as the old puritanical sign of “God encompasseth us” has grown into the “Goat and compasses,” the “Bacchanals” into the “Bag o’ nails,” and the like, so the game of cross-wicket has grown into cricket.

So little was the game understood in the year 1743, that we find an article in the “Gentleman’s Magazine” (quoted by Mr. Lillywhite) abusing the game, as then played, on the ground of its taking