Not until Monday, May 27, 1878, did the English public take any real interest in Australian cricket, though in 1877 in their own country the Australians had defeated Lillywhite’s eleven on even terms. Prior to this date four English teams had visited Australia, but their doings, though recorded in the press, did not interest the cricket community at home. The Australian players met with in the Colonies were no doubt learning from the English teams they had seen and played against, but the idea that they were up to the standard of English first-class cricket seemed absurd; and to a certain extent this estimate was justified by the records of the English visitors. In 1862 H.H. Stephenson, Surrey player and huntsman, took out twelve professional players to the Colonies under the auspices of Messrs. Spiers and Pond. They played twelve matches against eighteens and twenty-twos, won six, lost two, and drew four. In 1864, two years later, George Parr took out a team, which played sixteen matches against twenty-twos, and was not beaten at all. In 1873 Mr. W.G. Grace visited the antipodes at the request of the Melbourne Cricket Club; his eleven played fifteen matches, all against odds, won ten, lost three, and drew two. In 1876 James Lillywhite followed, and it was during this tour that the Australians first won a match on equal terms. Lillywhite’s team played Australia on March 15, 16 and 17, 1877, with the result that Australia won by 45 runs. This match was noteworthy for another reason. C. Bannerman made 165 for Australia, and was the first amongst Australian batsmen to score a hundred against English bowlers. Now, though English cricketers had been beaten on even terms as recently as 1877, the fact seemed to have been lost sight of at home in 1878, and when the first Australian eleven that ever visited England arrived early in the latter year, it never occurred to anyone that it could have any chance of actually storming the citadel of English cricket with success. On May 27, 1878, English cricket and its lovers received a serious shock, as on that day, in the extraordinarily short space of four and a half hours, a very fair team of the M.C.C. were beaten by nine wickets. The famous English club was certainly well represented, seeing that W.G. Grace, A.W. Ridley, A.J. Webbe, A.N. Hornby, Shaw, and Morley did battle for it. Gregory’s team, as the Australians were called, had a very successful season, beating, in addition to M.C.C., Yorkshire, Surrey, Middlesex, Leicestershire, Sussex, Gloucestershire, and a bad eleven of the ‘Players,’ and being beaten by Nottingham, the Gentlemen of England, Yorkshire, and Cambridge, the latter the most decisive defeat of all.

The British public were surprised at these results, especially as it had expected so little from the visitors. Many of the lower classes were so ignorant of Australia itself, to say nothing of the cricket capabilities of its inhabitants, that they fully expected to find the members of Gregory’s team black as the Aborigines. We remember the late Rev. Arthur Ward ‘putting his foot into it’ on this subject before some of the Australians. One day in the pavilion at Lord’s, the writer, who had been chosen to represent the Gentlemen of England against the visitors in a forthcoming match, was sitting beside Spofforth watching a game, in which neither was taking part. Mr. Ward coming up, accosted the writer, ‘Well, Mr. Steel, so I hear you are going to play against the niggers on Monday?’ His face was a picture when Spofforth was introduced to him as the ‘demon nigger bowler.’ Gregory’s team, in the writer’s opinion, contained four really good bowlers: Spofforth, Boyle, Allan, and Garrett, and two fair changes in Midwinter and Horan, but as batsmen they were poor when compared with England’s best.

Charles Bannerman was a most dashing player, his off-driving being magnificent, and Horan and Murdoch were fairish batsmen. Murdoch then was very different to the Murdoch of 1882 and 1884; but the rest were rough and untutored, more like country cricketers than correct players. Had this team come to England in a dry instead of a wet season, it would probably have had a very different record at the end of its visit. Spofforth, Boyle and Garrett were most deadly to the best batsmen on the soft, caked wickets they so often had to assist them; and the Australian batsmen, with the rough crossbat style which distinguished the majority, were just as likely to knock up fifteen to twenty runs on a bad wicket as on a good one. Nothing brings good and bad batsmen so close together as bad wet seasons. When Cambridge University met them the match was played on a hard true wicket, the Australian bowling was thoroughly collared, and none of the eleven, except Murdoch, C. Bannerman, and perhaps Horan, showed any signs of being able to play correct cricket on a hard ground.

Gregory’s team, however, had a wonderfully stimulating effect on English cricket. Their record taught us that the Australians could produce men to beat most of the counties, and who might, after a year or two of experience, play a very good game with a picked team of England.

In 1880 W.L. Murdoch brought over a Colonial team to England. The close of the season showed that in the eleven-a-side matches, Derbyshire, Yorkshire, Gloucestershire, and a good eleven of the Players of England had been beaten, while only two matches had been lost: Nottingham succeeded in winning by one wicket, and England by five wickets. This latter match was the first in which a picked team of England did battle against the Australians, and the excitement was intense. It was most interesting, and will be ever memorable for the splendid innings of W.G. Grace and W.L. Murdoch, who made 152 and 153 respectively, the latter being not out. England’s first innings was 420, Australia’s 149; the latter followed on, and when the last man, W.H. Moule, came in there were still wanting 32 runs to save the innings defeat. Moule played a stubborn game with his captain, and put on 88 for the last wicket. How England lost five wickets on a goodish wicket in getting 57 runs will never be forgotten. The writer had taken off his cricket clothes at the end of the Australians’ second innings, thinking all would soon be over; but cricket is a strange game, and he soon had to put them on again. The result of the first pitched battle between England and Australia, though a win of five wickets for the former, was a marvellous performance on the part of the Australians; indeed, seeing how far they were left behind on the first innings, it was one of the best things ever done at cricket to get so near the victors at the finish, especially as the wicket on the last innings was not to be found fault with. It should also be mentioned in fairness to the Australians that their best bowler, Spofforth, was prevented by an accident from taking part in this match.

The next team that visited England was in 1882, and was again under the captaincy of W.L. Murdoch. On this occasion G. Giffen, S.P. Jones, and H.H. Massie were introduced to the British public for the first time. As this eleven succeeded in defeating England, and was perhaps the best that ever represented the Colonies, we record the names:—A.C. Bannerman, J.M. Blackham, G.J. Bonnor, H.F. Boyle, P.S. McDonnell, W.L. Murdoch, G.E. Palmer, F.R. Spofforth, T.W. Garrett, T. Horan, and the three new players above mentioned. The result at the end of the season was: Matches played, 38: won, 23; lost, 4; drawn, 11; Nottingham beaten once, Lancashire once, Yorkshire three times, the Gentlemen of England once, and Oxford University once. The four defeats were by Cambridge University, the Players of England, Cambridge Past and Present, and the North of England. This team played the second pitched battle between Australia and England on Monday, August 28, and after the close finish and creditable display made in 1880 against England by worse players, the match created the most intense excitement. The Australians went first to the wickets, which were very sticky, and were all disposed of for 63. England topped this by 38. Prior to the beginning of Australia’s second innings, a heavy shower deluged the ground. Going in on the wet cutting-through wicket, Massie hit the incapacitated bowlers all over the field, and when the first wicket fell for 66 had scored 55 out of that number. With the exception of Murdoch and Bannerman, nobody else troubled the English bowlers, and the ground rapidly drying and caking, the whole side were disposed of for 122. The Englishmen wanted 85 to win, and when the score was at 51 for one wicket, it seemed as if the game were over. Spofforth, however, was bowling splendidly, and the wicket had become most difficult. He was bowling over medium pace, coming back many inches, and often getting up to an uncomfortable height. The English batsmen could do nothing with him, and, after the keenest excitement, the game ended in a well-won victory for the Australians by 7 runs. Though this defeat was a great blow to the English representatives, there were none who grudged Australia her success, which was obtained by sound and sterling cricket. We think there is no doubt that the 1882 team was better than the next one in 1884. In 1882 they had as bowlers Boyle, Spofforth, Palmer, Garrett, and Giffen; in 1884 they had Spofforth, Palmer, Boyle, Giffen, and Midwinter, but they had lost Garrett. The ’82 team contained two excellent batsmen in Horan and Massie, whose absence was not sufficiently compensated for by Scott and Midwinter. Murdoch, Horan, Giffen, Blackham, were all likely to make runs, while Massie, Bonnor, and McDonnell often succeeded on the worst wicket in making mincemeat of any bowling.

In 1884 W.L. Murdoch again brought over an Australian team to England, and played thirty-two matches, winning eight and losing seven. This time it was decided by the English authorities not to allow the fame of English cricket to depend on the result of one match only, but on the best of three, and accordingly three matches were arranged to be played between England and Australia, one at Manchester, the second at Lord’s, and the third at the Oval. The first, at Manchester, was seriously interfered with by the weather. Rain prevented any play on the first day. England began to bat on a sodden wicket and made 95, and Murdoch’s team responded with 182. England had now a difficult task to prevent being beaten, but at the end of the match were 92 runs on, and one wicket to fall. This was doubtless a draw in favour of the Australians, but still a hundred runs on a bad wicket against the flower of English bowling take a lot of getting, and it must be remembered that a month before the Australian team were all disposed of for 60 on a sticky wicket by Peate and Emmett. The second match was at Lord’s, and was the only one of the three that was finished. England won easily by an innings and 5 runs. The earlier teams of the Australians never appeared to advantage at Lord’s. The later ones, however, have done better on that ground. The third match, at the Oval, was a memorable one. The Australians won the toss, went in on a perfect wicket, and made the terrific score of 551: McDonnell 103, Murdoch 211, Scott 102. This was a truly great performance, and it was remarkable that every member of the English team tried his hand with the ball, by far the most successful having been the Honourable A. Lyttelton with the analysis of four wickets for 19 runs. England made 346 first innings, in which was a magnificent display from W.W. Read of 117. In the second innings England made 85 for two wickets, and thus required 120 runs on a true wicket with seven good batsmen to save the single innings defeat.

The next team that visited England was in 1886, H.J.H. Scott being the captain. This is memorable as the first Australian team in England that did not contain W.L. Murdoch. Several unknown men now made their appearance, W. Bruce, E. Evans, J. McIlwraith, and J.W. Trumble, but this was undoubtedly less successful than any of the previous teams. Their season’s record showed: Matches played, 38; won, 9; lost, 7; drawn, 22. Here again, as in 1884, England v. Australia was to be played at Manchester, Lord’s, and the Oval; but it is unnecessary to give an account of these three matches. It will suffice to say that at Manchester England won by four wickets, at Lord’s by an innings and 106 runs, and at the Oval by an innings and 217 runs.

The sixth Australian team visited us in 1888, and as W.L. Murdoch had at that time practically retired from first-class cricket, the captaincy devolved upon that sterling hitter, P.S. McDonnell. This team, though including some excellent players at all branches of the game, cannot be considered equal in merit to that of 1882. Three representative matches were again arranged, as in 1886. The first was played at Lord’s upon a wicket deluged with rain, and the Australians won in a small-scoring match by 61 runs. They won on their merits as the game was played, and the English batsmen on that occasion deserved to lose. On a most difficult wicket, and against C.T.B. Turner and J.J. Ferris’s bowling, they poked and scraped about, and seemed utterly unable to realise what each Australian batsman had done, viz. that to make runs under such circumstances the bat must be used vigorously. Though the Australians here scored their second success since 1878 in England in a representative match, the supporters of England were in nowise satisfied that the Australians had the better side. Two really good bowlers their opponents had in Turner and Ferris, but no one else on their side had any pretensions to being called first-class in this department of the game. Their batting, taken as a whole, was weak—McDonnell, of course, was a fine player, but the rest could not be compared to our best English batsmen. Then their fielding was hardly up to the standard of previous colonial teams. Altogether the English side did not fear the result of the next two matches if played under ordinary conditions of weather and luck. The second match, at the Oval, resulted in a win for England by an innings and 137 runs, and the third, played at Manchester, in another win for the same side by an innings and 21 runs. The feature of the season’s cricket played by this side was the bowling of C.T.B. Turner and J.J. Ferris. Turner’s analysis was remarkable—314 wickets for 3,492 runs, giving the excellent average of 11·38. This bowler is undoubtedly entitled to take rank amongst the really great bowlers of this generation of cricketers. J.J. Ferris, though he met with wonderful success this season (1888), was never in the same class as C.T.B. Turner.

The next Australian team that came to England was in 1890, and W.L. Murdoch, after five years’ absence from first-class cricket, consented to once again act as captain. The result of this trip was anything but a success from a cricket point of view, and indeed the team was not competent to cope with England’s best. Six of this team made their first visit to England, viz. Messrs. Charlton, Gregory, Walters, Barrett, H. Trumble, and Burn. The batting of this team was distinctly indifferent, though Murdoch showed on occasions he had not altogether lost his skill; he was not, however, the Murdoch of 1882. Messrs. Turner and Ferris again bore the brunt of the attack; they each took the same number of wickets during the tour, viz. 215. The former’s average was slightly the better of the two; how, in view of Ferris’s performances since 1890 in England, he managed to run Turner so close for the highest bowling honours will always remain a mystery. The first of the three representative matches England won by seven wickets at Lord’s. The feature of this match was that, though the Australians made 132 and 176 and the English team 173 and 137 for 3 wickets, there was not one bye scored to either side in the match. This is a wonderful testimonial to J.M. Blackham and G. McGregor, the respective wicket-keepers for Australia and England. The second match England v. Australia was played at the Oval, and a good game resulted in the defeat of the latter by two wickets; it was a close finish, and the Australians deserved great credit for so nearly defeating such a powerful side as represented England on that occasion. The third match, arranged to be played at Manchester, was never even begun owing to the incessant rain which deluged the ground on all three days.

In 1893 the eighth Australian eleven came over, and carried with it great hopes of their own countrymen. It had some good batsmen—Trott, Lyons, Bannerman, Giffen, Bruce, Graham, and Gregory, but none of them except Giffen could then compare with the best English bats, and Giffen, for some reason, has never done himself justice as a batsman in any of these trips. The bowlers were Turner, H. Trumble, Giffen, R. McLeod, Trott, and Bruce. Giffen at times bowled very finely, and Turner bowled well, but not so successfully as of yore. H. Trumble also proved himself to be an excellent bowler, but the combination was not strong enough, especially in a fine season, to win the rubber against England. Unfortunately only one of the three matches was finished, and this resulted in a win for England by an innings and 43 runs.

In 1896 the ninth eleven that visited England, under the leadership of Trott, proved a good side, far the best that had been over since 1884, and from this date the efficiency of Australian cricket began to rise, until at the time of writing (April 1898) it stands as high as it ever did. Before discussing this eleven it will be well briefly to review the result of five remarkable test matches played in Australia in the winter of 1895 and 1896 between Stoddart’s eleven and the Australians. Stoddart’s eleven was very good, but nobody could say that at that time it was the best that England could have sent. Grace, Jackson, Gunn, Storer, and Abel might with advantage have taken the places of Humphreys, Brockwell, Philipson, Briggs, and Lockwood; but still it was a good team, and it won three out of the five test matches.

Under any circumstances this must always remain a great feat, for each side possess a great advantage when playing in their own country, but on looking carefully into these five matches as a whole, it must be confessed that Stoddart must have been greatly helped by the selection and captaincy of the Colonists. Giffen’s view of his duties of captain was the very erroneous one that it was essential that he should be bowling at one end nearly the whole time. In the first match he bowled 118 overs, while Turner and Jones were only allowed to bowl 117 overs between them. In the second match he magnanimously did not go on in the first innings on a wet wicket, but made up for it by bowling 23 more overs than anyone else in the second innings, and in the last match he bowled while 236 runs were scored off him, and H. Trumble, who was on all wickets the best bowler in Australia, was only selected to play in one of the matches. Stoddart’s side, however, batted finely, and Richardson proved himself at that time to be far the best bowler in the world.

When they came to England in 1896 they brought Giffen, but wisely made Trott captain, and Hill and Darling showed symptoms of developing into the very high position they now hold, and the whole eleven proved themselves a difficult side to get out. Gregory, Darling, Hill, Iredale, Trott, Giffen, and Donnan all scored a thousand runs in the season, and Trumble, Jones, McKibbin, and Giffen each secured over a hundred wickets, and H. Trumble on all wickets was not excelled by any bowler in the two countries. The eleven played a safe game; there was no McDonnell or Lyons in the side, but they took a lot of getting out, though, as might be supposed in the case of a side where there was no hitter, they were weak on soft wickets.

Such was the situation when the last disastrous visit of Stoddart’s eleven took place in 1897 and 1898, and though the result of this tour is very recent history, it is so important and raises such misgivings for the future that it is well to consider it at some length.

In the first place no eleven has ever left England with so much of their countrymen’s confidence as this eleven of Stoddart’s. A great many thought that it was absolutely the best selection that could have been made. It is easy to be wise after the event, but even now it is not at all certain that the bowling could be improved, and this was the notorious weak spot of the eleven. In another part of this work is given a possible first eleven of England, but this selection is given, as far as the bowlers are concerned, with no great confidence, and the truth must sadly be confessed that unless we mend our bowling ways we shall very likely be defeated in our own country by the Australians in 1899. Up to the end of the first test match Stoddart’s eleven had a blaze of triumph in spite of the abnormal heat which knocked up more than one of our eleven. Stoddart had no doubt the worst of the luck in losing the toss three times in the first four test matches, but, unluckily, what many of us dreaded occurred in the last match—he won the toss and lost the match. MacLaren and Ranjitsinhji batted grandly, Storer, Hayward, and Druce passably, but the rest proved more or less a failure, while on Australian wickets against weak English bowling the batting of Darling and Hill was superb, and that of C. McLeod, Gregory, Iredale, Trumble, and Trott very good. But our team as a whole were not strong enough in batting to make up for our bowling weakness, and in a word the Australians thoroughly outbowled us.

The Australians in the first test match played the bowlers who had performed so well in England in 1896, with the addition of C. McLeod, but in subsequent matches they played Noble and Howell, and these two bowlers have the knack of variety in their bowling, and this, combined with the pace of Jones and the admirable steadiness and break of Trumble, made a combination of bowlers that on good hard wickets has never been surpassed. It is the future that troubles us; where are our bowlers? In old days we could get one first-class bowler a year out of Nottingham alone, but the supply seems to have come to an end; but from somewhere must come some bowlers of variety of pace, break, and head, or the old country must be content to take the lower room. But if 1899 should turn out to be a wet year a very different tale may have to be told.

Taking both countries, and excluding the Manchester match in 1890, abandoned on account of weather, fifty-one test matches have now been played, of which England has won twenty-six, fourteen in Australia and twelve at home, Australia nineteen, of which all but three were in Australia, and six have been drawn.

The leading averages in batting in all the series, in both countries, of test matches from 1880 to 1898 inclusive may prove of interest at this stage, but of course we exclude the players who only played in comparatively few matches, and we limit the number of innings to a minimum of twelve. The averages are as follows:—

Like all tables of averages the above is misleading. Players like Grace, Murdoch, and Shrewsbury played in the days when runs were not so easily got, and their performances may rank on a par with those of MacLaren, Ranjitsinhji, and Hill, and, of course, there have been many innings played against equally good bowling, but not in matches of England v Australia. No innings of greater merit has, however, been played than Murdoch’s innings of 153 not out against England at the Oval in 1880.

With regard to the merits of the English and Australian bowlers, we think there are few English cricketers who would deny that Spofforth is the best bowler ever seen on English grounds, at any rate in modern times, and yet the statistics show that he is not at the head of the average list.

The following is the list of the first twelve bowlers:—

Spofforth, although fourth only in the above table, was on the whole the greatest bowler, for many of his great feats were performed in other almost as important matches, and it must also be remembered that he never bowled for maidens; but the figures of Peel, who in test matches has bowled more balls than anybody, come up remarkably well, and considering the number of balls he bowled his record is an extraordinary one.

In addition to Spofforth, the Australians have had a wonderfully good lot of bowlers: Palmer, Garrett, Boyle, Allan, Evans, G. Giffen, and since 1886—when this chapter was first written—Turner, Ferris, and H. Trumble, and, as far as can be gathered from the disastrous tour of Mr. Stoddart’s eleven in 1897–8, Noble, Howell, and Jones. Although the previous remarks about Spofforth were written before Turner made such a wonderful record on our English grounds, we still think Spofforth the best of all the bowlers. It appears extraordinary at first sight that a country whose whole population does not exceed that of London should in the course of a few years have been able to develop such exceptional talent. We believe, however, that Australia will always possess excellent bowlers, for the following reason. In Melbourne, Sydney, and Adelaide, the chief nurseries of Australian cricket, the grounds are so excellent, and usually so hard and fast, that no bowler can possibly expect the slightest amount of success unless he possesses some peculiarity of style or action, pace or power, over the ball; mere pace and accuracy are of no avail. On the hardest and best wickets it must be laid down as an axiom that bowlers with change of pace and turn must form the bowling backbone of the future best eleven, and these qualities the young Australian cultivates with greater success than the English. In England the conditions are different, as, by reason of our variable climate, naturally weak bowling often becomes most effective. Young Australian bowlers have also ample opportunity for gaining experience and developing their skill, as there is in the colonies a very great dearth of the professional element. Members of the same club have to rely for their batting practice on the bowling of one another, and their bowlers come to acquire some of the peculiarities above mentioned that will strike terror into the hearts of their opponents in the next tie of the cup contests. These cup contests in Australia are an excellent institution, as professionalism is barred. They produce the greatest interest and excitement, and each club does its utmost to secure the much-coveted distinction of being premier club for the season. The Australian climate is a great aid to bowling and fielding. Its warmth and mildness prevent the rheumatic affections that so often attack the arms and shoulders of our players, and the Australians consequently retain their suppleness of limb and activity of youth longer than their English cousins. Nothing illustrates this better than the prevalence of good throwing amongst Australian fieldsmen. The every-day sight on our own grounds of a man who has thrown his arm out and can do nothing but jerk is almost unknown in Australia; even colonials who have passed their cricket prime and have reached the age of thirty-eight or forty can still throw with much the same dash as of old. In our county teams we find a woeful deficiency in this essential to good fielding; the cold and damp of our northern climate having penetrated into the bones and created a chronic and incurable stiffness.

One occasionally hears a really good cricket story in Australia. The following was vouched for as a fact by several leading members of Australian cricket, and was told me as illustrative of the skill and dash of some great fieldsman whom I have never had the good fortune to meet. This man was standing coverpoint one day—his usual place in the field. He was marvellously quick, sometimes indeed his returns were so smart that none could tell whether he had used his right or left arm. He was, however, apt at times to be sleepy and inattentive to the game. On one occasion he was in this state, and just as the bowler started to bowl he noticed his sleepy coverpoint standing looking on the ground with his back to the wickets. ‘Hulloa, there, wake up!’ shouted he. Quick as lightning turned the coverpoint, and seeing something dark dashing past him made a dart, and caught, not the ball as he had thought, but a swallow. Talk of Royle or Briggs after that!

Writing at the close of Mr. Stoddart’s disastrous tour, it must be said that if the Australians bring over a representative team in 1899 it will be looked forward to with the keenest interest. The 1896 lot did very well, and it remains to be seen whether in 1899, in matches limited to three days and on English wickets, our visitors can pull off the rubber in the three test matches. If they do they will receive the hearty congratulations of every true English cricketer; and at the present time of writing it looks as if they had a great chance of so doing, but if they are wise they will try and unearth another batsman of the stamp of McDonnell or Lyons.