---

Contents. List of Illustrations (In certain versions of this etext [in certain browsers]clicking on the image will bring up a larger version.) (etext transcriber's note)

The Cricket of Abel, Hirst,
and Shrewsbury

EDITED BY

ILLUSTRATED WITH
THIRTY-FOUR PHOTOGRAPHS
BY
MASON AND BASEBE


NEW YORK
E. P. DUTTON & CO.
31, West Twenty-Third Street
1903


PRINTED BY KELLY’S DIRECTORIES LTD
LONDON AND KINGSTON.

{vii}

EDITORS’ PREFACE.

There appear to be hardly any beginners or habitual players who know howto profit by seeing experts at play and at work. The reason cannot wellbe that we do not look on at games sufficiently often! No, one reason isthat we have not been trained to observe with a view to personalexperimentation afterwards; and another reason is that there is verylittle time to catch and realise the different positions and movementsas they flash by. Hence the value of photographs, especially when theyare—as many of these thirty-four are—taken from behind: it is not easyto reproduce for ourselves the action as shown by an ordinary photograph(taken from in front), since it gives us everything the wrong way round.

But even photographs often fail to teach their lesson. The learner mustbe told how to teach himself from photographs. After which he will findit easy to teach himself from actual models, as soon as he knows justwhat to look out for—the feet and their “stances” and changes, and soon. It is to be hoped that these photographs, and the notes on them, andthe obvious inferences drawn from them, will train readers to studyvarious other experts besides these three, who are only a few out of ahost.

For the object of the book is not to tie any player{viii} down to any onemethod, but rather to set him on the track of independent research andself-instruction: to show him how to watch and see, and how topractise the best things that he sees, and what the best things are mostlikely to be. Not a single hint in these pages need be followed untilthe reader is convinced that what I advise is what most if not all greatplayers actually do, whether consciously or by instinct.

The volume is not intended to compete with the many excellent booksedited by those who themselves play the game well. It boasts of a largedebt to these classics, but having gathered hints from them it movesaway on altogether different lines. The best player is seldom the bestteacher of average beginners. On the prin

BU KİTABI OKUMAK İÇİN ÜYE OLUN VEYA GİRİŞ YAPIN!

Sitemize Üyelik ÜCRETSİZDİR!