good-naturedly make allowance both for the desultory character of my records, their unfinished and hasty sketchiness, and also for my now and then retracing my steps, to include some circumstance which, at the time of writing, had escaped my memory. For instance, I should have chronicled the era when the old-fashioned wicket of two stumps was changed to three—a decided improvement, seeing that it multiplied the chances to the batter of being bowled out, consequently increased the difficulty of his position, and thereby exalted his maintaining it for any length of time into the greater merit; for, under the old system, if the ball passed between the stumps, the batter was not considered out; under the improved system, such an event cannot happen, for the three stumps are not pitched at so great a distance from each other as to allow of the transit of the ball without knocking off the bail. This explanation is, of course, addressed only to the young and inexperienced player. The important reform in the game here alluded to took place, according to the best of my recollection, about the year 1779 or 1780. Since that time other entrenchments have been made upon the old constitution, which was the pride of our ancestors and the admiration of the whole community; but which, so far from contributing to its stability, will, in my opinion, if not retrieved, not only essentially change, but even destroy its character; let the patrician legislators and guardians of cricket-law look to it.
Before I proceed with my catalogue of the Hambledon Pantheon, it may be worth while to mention a circumstance connected with poor Noah Mann, the player named a few pages back. As it will tend to show the amenity in which the men of lower grade in society lived in those good old times
