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that I have witnessed. The temptation really was very great,—too great by far for any poor man to be exposed to,—no richer than ten shillings a week, let alone harvest time. I never told you the way I first was brought to London. I was a lad of eighteen at this Hampshire village, and Lord Winchelsea had seen us play among ourselves, and watched the match with the Hambledon Club on Broad-halfpenny, when I scored forty-three against David Harris, and ever so many of the runs against David's bowling, and no one ever could manage David before. So, next year, in the month of March, I was down in the meadows, when a gentleman came across the field with Farmer Hilton, and thought I, all in a minute, now this is something about cricket. Well, at last it was settled, I was to play Hampshire against England, at London, in White Conduit-Fields ground, in the month of June. For three months I did nothing but think about that match. Tom Walker was to travel up from this country, and I agreed to go with him, and found myself at last, with a merry company of cricketers, all old men, whose names I had ever heard as foremost in the game—met together, drinking, card-playing, betting, and singing at the Green Man (that was the great cricketer's house), in Oxfork Street,—no man without his wine, I assure you, and such suppers as three guineas a game to lose, and five to win (that was then the pay for players) could never pay for long. To go to London by a wagon, earn five guineas three or four times told, and come back with half the money in your pocket to the ploug again, was all very well talking. You know what young folks are, sir, when they get together: mischief brews stronger in large quantities: so many