The last set was well fought out, for, although I began well and led at 3/1, Miss Rice won the next three games in succession and reached 40/30 in the following game. This was her last effort, as I ran out at 6/4, winning the Championship for the second time. I think it was one of the closest matches I ever played, and I see by Pastime that I only won 18 games to her 16, and 110 strokes to her 100, and I felt I was most lucky to win at all.
MRS. STERRY
(Champion, 1895, 1896, 1898, 1901, 1908)
Of course it goes without saying that my most memorable and exciting matches will all be those in which I have excelled or been the most distinguished person at the immediate moment! Let me just say that I am not going to give details of any match, as that is beyond my power and, I assume, of little interest to the reader.
Winning my first championship of the Ealing Lawn Tennis Club at the age of 14 was a very important moment in my life. How well I remember, bedecked by my proud mother in my best clothes, running off to the Club on the Saturday afternoon to play in the final without a vestige of nerve (would that I had none now!), and winning—that was the first really important match of my life.
Another great game will always be imprinted on my memory, and that was in 1894, the first year that the late Mr. H.S. Mahony and I won the All England Mixed Championship. We beat Mrs. Hillyard and Mr. W. Baddeley in the final. The excitement of the onlookers was intense, and never shall I forget the overpowering sensation I felt as we walked, after our win, past the Aigburth Cricket Ground Stand, packed to its limit. How the people clapped and cheered us! It was tremendous.