Mr. Ward, who was a Bank of England director, was also invincible at picquet.
From Mr. Pycroft's supplement to The Cricket Field, his Cricketana, 1865, I take some remarks on Lord Frederick Beauclerk, and indeed on all of these four friends: 'Lord Frederick Beauclerk is the greatest name in cricket. He was a frequent attendant at Lord's, either as a player or a looker-on, for nearly sixty years. A vivid description of his Lordship, as the very picture of life, activity, and spirits, has more than once crossed our mind as a sorry contrast, when, in his declining days, he appeared at Lord's only in his brougham, and always, as it seemed, with a lady-nurse at his side, looking a striking illustration of the strong man becoming weakness at the last.
'Neither can we forget, as another illustration of sic transit, that at Lord's in 1859, when some exciting match was being played, one of Mr. Ward's old friends being heard to remark to us, "Poor Ward is now about his last, dying of a diseased kidney—very painful." Whereupon, some distinguished young players of the day remarked, "Ward—who's Ward"?
'Lord Frederick's batting was certainly not superior to Mr. Budd's; his fielding, usually at short-slip, was not as good. Indeed, as to Mr. Budd, Clarke said he remembered him the best fieldsman he had ever seen, having played against him at Nottingham, when Mr. Budd caught nine at middle-wicket. But, nevertheless, Thomas Beagley, no doubt, spoke the general feeling of the players of his day, when he said that Lord Frederick would have been the first chosen. Caldecourt said the same.
'Lord Frederick was the best bowler of his day at Cambridge, but was not there distinguished as a bat. The story is that the Earl of Winchelsea, seeing him bowl at Cambridge, brought him out at Lord's. In batting, his lordship was a very easy, graceful player, formed on the model of Beldham. He played thirty-five seasons, and yet scored so well up to the last, that his average was the highest on record.
