Page:The Cricket Field (1854).djvu/288

264 XXI. "With ball in hand." The same hand.

"Bat (in hand);" that is, not thrown.

XXIII. "If the striker touch." This applies to the Nottingham case better than Law XX.; but neither of these laws contemplated the exact offence. A ball once ran up a man's bat, and spun into the pocket of his jacket; and as he "touched" the ball to get it out of his pocket, he was given out. The reply of Mr. Bell on the subject was, the player was out for touching the ball—he might have shaken it out of his pocket. This we mention for the curiosity of the occurrence.

XXIV. Or, if with any part of his person, 8c.

A man has been properly given out by stopping a ball with his arm below the elbow. Also a short man, who stooped to let the ball pass over his head, and was hit in the face, was once given out, as before wicket.

"From it;" that is, the ball must pitch in a line, not from the hand, but from wicket to wicket.

Much has been said on the Leg-before-Wicket law.

Clarke and others say that a round-arm bowler can rarely hit the wicket at all with a ball not over-pitched, unless it pitch out of the line of the wickets. If this is true, a ball that has been pitched straight "would not have hit it;" and a