must be said of, at any rate, two of Surtees' books, "Jorrocks" and "Sponge." But what can be said of the literature of cricket, and games generally? Nyren has written a simple, old-fashioned book that has a great charm about it; and in modern times we have the great name of Andrew Lang, who seems to me to combine every quality that a writer on cricket should have. But between those two writers, or at an interval of about fifty-five years, the literature of cricket may be said to be a series of records and one or two treatises, and some poems, few of which have any great merit, if the famous hymn sung to the praises of Alfred Mynn be excepted. The cricket novel of the level of Handley Cross has yet to be written, but there is no reason why the cricket Surtees should not arise; the description of an exciting match has been done, and admirably well, in a book for boys, which it is to be hoped the present-day youth read as all did thirty-five years ago—"The First of June;" and there are many forms of excitement in cricket matches, which could be brought in with great effect in a novel. The cricket literature of to-day has been of two kinds, the reminiscence
