Ranji was "champion cricketer" of the year in 1896, and Punch indited an "Ode to the Black Prince" with a portrait by Sambourne. Yet the cricket world was not without its frictions and difficulties. In this year the professionals had claimed a higher rate of pay than the regulation £10 for taking part in matches against Australia, and Punch intervenes in a cartoon in which he gives Grace, Abel and Trott the toast of the Three F's—"Fair Play, Fair Pay and Friendliness." Punch a year earlier had congratulated the Committee of the Rugby Union on their decision that "Professionalism was illegal," thus showing their determination to "keep the ball out of the Moneygrub's sordid slime." But while he deplored the prospect of strikes and lock-outs in the cricket world, he clearly held that here, at any rate, the status of the professional was securely established and deserved considerate treatment. England won the rubber, rather unexpectedly, in 1896, and Punch singles out Grace, Peel, Hearne and Abel for special honour. The English visiting team were defeated in Australia in the winter of 1898, and Punch, in his "Eleven Little Reasons Why," genially satirizes those critics who tried to explain it away:—

Because of course they play cricket in Australia all the year round.

Because it was too hot for anything, and of course the English team were unaccustomed to the heat.

Because there was a chapter of accidents from the first, and everyone had bad luck.

Because the coin never would come down the right side on the top, and consequently the British could not go in first.

Because the ground got hopelessly out of order by the time that the first innings of the Australians was over.

Because the constant travelling and occasional fêting were enough to put everyone out of form.

Because there ought to have been more extra men to fill up the ranks on emergencies.

Because at least one admirable cricketer was left at home whose services on several occasions would have been invaluable.

Because the tea interval coming after the luncheon pause was confusing to the Mother Countrymen.

Because the glorious uncertainty of cricket is proverbial, and success may be deserved, but cannot on that account be always attained.

Lastly, and probably the right reason, because the other side had the better men.

Loving cricket as he did Punch was yet fully alive to the English tendency to think that success with the bat or ball qualified a man for anything, and made good capital out of a letter in The Times in 1899, in which the writer, "LL.B. and M.A., London," had written of the late Sir Michael Foster, then a candidate for the representation of the University in Parliament: "Michael Foster was a capital cricketer. He kept wicket for the first eleven.... No better candidate could possibly be found." I have elsewhere noted his reference to the clergyman who in the same year had declared that what his village really needed in a curate was "a good fast bowler with a break from the off." Towards the new type of cricketing journalist which emerged about the close of the century Punch was not exactly benevolent; the duplication of functions was remunerative, but could not conduce to impartial reporting when the writer was also a performer. In the last ten years of this period Punch's references to cricket are much less frequent, but we may note his excellent Latin joke in 1906 on the discomfiture of the Players at Lord's—urgentur ... longa Nocte, i.e. by long Knox, the famous amateur fast bowler. The triumph of Warwickshire—champion county in 1911—is commemorated in the cartoon, "Two Gentlemen of Warwickshire," with the ingenious legend:—

Mr. F. R. Foster (Captain of the Warwickshire XI): "Tell Kent from me she hath lost." (II Henry VI, iv, 10.)

William Shakespeare: "Warwick, thou art worthy!" (III Henry VI, iv, 6.)

Lord's and Ladies

Cricket was increasingly played by girls, but both at the beginning and the end of the period the female spectator left much to be desired. After the Oxford and Cambridge match in 1896 Punch wrote some verses on the attraction of "Lord's" for ladies, which end on a note of severe remonstrance:—

If, Phyllis, you your place must take

Between me and the wicket,

Don't chatter, and for goodness' sake