If there be any gentleman amongst them, it is well— if not, it is so much the better. Your gentleman cricketer is in general rather an anomalous character. Elderly gentlemen are obviously good for nothing; and your beaux are, for the most part, hampered and trammelled by dress and habit; the stiff cravat, the pinched-in waist, the dandy-walk—oh, they will never do for cricket! [...]
No! a village match is the thing* — where our highest officer — our conductor (to borrow a musical term) is but a little farmer’s second son; where a day-labourer is our bowler, and a blacksmith our long-stop;* where the spectators consist of the retired cricketers, the veterans of the green, the careful mothers, the girls, and all the boys of two parishes, together with a few amateurs, little above them in rank, and not at all in pretension; where laughing and shouting, and the very ecstasy of merriment and good-humour prevail: such a match, in short, as I attended yesterday, at the expense of getting twice wet through, and as I would attend tomorrow, at the certainty of having that ducking doubled.
Abridged.
From Our Village (1824, 1904 edition) by Mary Russell Mitford (1787-1855). Originally published in Lady’s Magazine (July 31st, 1823).
* At this time, Mitford’s village was Three Mile Cross near Reading. The family had been there a little over three years, after moving from nearby Grazeley.
* Long stop is a fielding position on a cricket pitch. It is rarely used. The long stop stands on the boundary and directly behind the wicket-keeper, to police any balls the ’keeper may miss.