The Express.
London, England, 1868-06-06 00:00:00

13 PU8L13331/

EVERY EVENING.

r.:).,")0 .V. SATURDAY, JUNE 6.

I;i'.Kl T

A • neither Lord's nor the Oval was
c: ..w yr.terday, there were ample evidences at
Ir)th pl..ce.v of unabated interest in the national
A move; the spectators of tho " Gentlemen of
• • play at the former place wore a con-
aprinkling of compatriots who talked
v :t.;. g.•::ht! I.:.ogue of the mighty hits and famous
.n,4 h dtittlally made in the sistor-country, and
✓ aiThvided Mr. Hoses batting with a true
cilthusiasm. But the keenest lovers
• C. sport p.:r se were to ho seen
et. benches of the Oval. Sunburnt,
a. IF :th the brown of many matches, watchful,
,:lent, 41.1 critical, old, young, and middle-aged,
e:.tended in single line all round the enclo-
B 're. so, 1... my salient instances of intensity and
c,:m..mity of purpose. Stout farmers from Kent
• St.rrey ; men about town whose dress and
bearing savoured far more of the Park of Hyde
than Kennington ; old burgesses who vaunted the
hvel naiitiea of their favourite ground ; and keen-
eyed, stalwart muscular !ousts fellows whose

fisom beasme evenhadowed, i ff
adamity, it you accidentally stepped

tween them and their view of •1k•
were all to be found on the dark roma forms,
in the stand and resting plaosi attjaosen.
'heti the gathering at tho Oval was as characte)
istic of tho place as that at Lord's was the rover

The 22nd of this month and the 10th of nn
July are the anniverearies on which to see t
St. John's-wood ground in all its glory. The
Orford and Cambridge match, and the friendly
contest between Eton and Harrow, in which the
poet BYRON once played, both appeal to society
with its thousand complex motives of vanity,
ambition, and display, while the proceedings of
yesterday were interesting mainly to the lovers of
cricket and the friends of the people plying.
But let a random visit be paid to either of
the great grounds at any time during the
season and it win he strange if evidence,
either direct or indirect, be not found of the in-
tensely national character of cricket. Tho game
has never been successfully transplanted save by
colonists from the mother country ; and a face-
tious writer has insisted that "the Italians are
" too fat for cricket ; the French too thin ; the
" Dutch too dumpy ; the Belgians too bilious ;
" the Flemish too flatulent ; the East Indians too
" peppery ; the Laplanders too bowlegged; the
" Swims too sentimental ; the Greeks too lazy ;
" the Egyptians tee long iu the neck ; and
" the Germans too short in the wind."
The French for cricket is eewaitet, as an Eng-
lish gentleman discovered to his coat at Cannes
thin year. On hospitable thoughts intent ho
thought a cricket-ground would be acceptable to
the British colony, and purchased a field and pre
orders to have it rolled and made ready fur ball and
stumps by the season following. The gay colonists
migrated for the summer as is their custom, and
on their return • neat little table-land mound had
been put op in the middle of the cricket Geld.
This was smooth and level as a billiard-table and
only wanted mallets and hoops to be complete.
But it occupied the oentre of the ground, and
made any other game impossible. Croquet was
tho only pursuit the French workmen thought
feasible for Eton lads and University men, and
the introduition of cricket—at least into
the field specially bought for it—has been
delayed for twelve months. But this
blunder is less amusing than that fallen into
by tho amazed Parisians when the details of a
match botweenGreenwich veterans were translistod
by their daily journals. The " One-armed"
having completed their innings, ran the report,
the stumps (moignons) were drawn, whereupon
caf6s and boulevards rang with the barbarity of
English customs, in the enforcement of which the
stumps of tho One-armed were drawn as • penalty
for losing a match. Like other more important
English privileges the origin of cricket is lost in
remote antiquity. In vain do its enthusiastic ad-
mirers quote SPENSER

a handsome bat he held,
On which he leaned as oue of old
to prove the game was played in the poet's time.
The bat meant was doubtless a good thick walking-
stick, and had no more to do with cricket than
has the passage in Love's Labour Lost referring toi
" • marvellous good neighbour and a very ijood
" bowler." Tradition declares cricket to have
originated in Sasictsrlaits's time, but it is at
least significant that the only cricket mentioned
by the poet is the one idealised by Mr. DICKENS
as the harbinger of peace and happiness to the
hearth. It is on record, however, that the well known
THOMAS Kerr, Bishop of Bath and Wells, wielded'
• cricket bat when at Winchester School in 1050 ;
an Eton School bill, in the year 1688, contains
• charge of ninepence for a ram and bat ; and
Swtrr, writing in 1712, declared that the
original JOHN BULL nature came out when
Englishmen played at football or a cricket
match. It was some sixty years later that
the laws of the game were settled by the Duke of
DORSET and Sir Horace MANN, who played soon
afterwards on the side of Kent, in the famous
match with Surrey for 2,000/. a side. Cricket
had then for more than a generation become an ex-
CU= for gambling, and it is curious to read now the
sarcasms levelled at it by some contemporary
critics.

"The diversion of cricket," says a writer in
the Gentleotau'olllOgo:ioeof 1743, " may be proper
"at holydar time and in the country, but upon
" days when men ought to be busy in the neighbour-
" hood of a great city it is improper to a high de-
" gree, it draws numbers of people from their em-
" ployraenta, and many other evils it is tinneces-
" nary to enumerate. It is because it can be, and is
"played in the neighbourhood of a great city," that
cricket is so essentially valuable to men of
sedentary life, and it surely never was so
popular as now. The CrieLTlers' Poetet Boot
shows a list of engagements and matches to come,
to attend half of which would keep a man con-
stantly employed, and according to a useful little
handbook, The Theory cud Practice of Cikket, the
consumption of cricket•balls is so great in England
that one maker alone employs 35 workmen and
consumes 500 cow or ox-hides, and a ton and a
half of worsted every year. But these statistic's,
wonderful as they are, are not needed to prove the
nationality of the game.
" All England" is the title reserved for eleven
picked cricketers. " The Gentlemen of Eng-
" land" means the gentlemen who play cricket.
Cricket missionaries have been despatched from
our shores for the antipodes, and the All-
England eleven has lost and won in Australia.l
The aborigines now over here are proudly declared
to have been civilised in three short years by
cricket. Wherever Englishmen settle they play,
and to know the game thoroughly, and
to carry knowledge into practice is to
have an honourable and lucrative profession to
your hand. Who so popular as one of the famous
elevens on circuit ? Their visit to a country place
is a white spot in its annals, and the doughty
deeds of the twenty-two local players pitted against
them furnish talk for a generation. There are
little towns in the kingdom which having tasted
the glory of challenging and being beaten by All
England or " The United " rest on their laurels and
care notfor further triumphs. It is, perhaps, twenty
lyears since, and the vigorous band who came forth
so many Inidegrooms from the bedchamber, to
do battle, have been strangely dispersed. Some
are ruined, others have become rich, sonic have
sought their fortunes abroad, and others have
found theirs in the silent land which is
more distant ; but their names live, and
are lovingly intertwined with those of the
men they fought. There were giants on
the earth in those days says, in effect the narrator
who dwells on the magnificent proportions and
stately bearing of MYNN ; who talks of the agile
activity of the bronze-faced lightning-eyed Box,
whose fingers were of quite a zig,-zag pattern
through the frequency with which their joints
had been " put out " as well as the people
stumped ; or who quotes the merry laughter
and classic lore of the cheery, kind-hearted FELT;
whose passion for the noble game had led him to
Awake tue legitimate Ptolemies far its prAtige.

a ...I , •

and which telbs hardly upon►
Fund." Could not this bo made up, and a match
played for Auld Laug Syne by both acts, at Lord's
Or the Oval, to which those of yesterday would bo
issignificant, and which all England would flock
towel

,ABIES.
,)

Returning to Mr. Bright's Liverpool speeches,
the Times finds a fable with winch to illustrate its own
'rained* of Mr. Disraeli's policy 113 distinct from that of
Mr. Bright. The Lion, the Ms, sad the Fox, went
out hunting, and bye judicious combination of foram im-
pudence, and fraud frightened, circumvented, and killed a
poor stag. TM Lima requested the Am to divide Al
ca rom., which it prerecorded to do with judicial exactness.
A stroke of the Limed paw dimmed of the pawn ple ton,and
the Foe was requested to do it better. Taking • mouth-
ful, he gracefully assigned the remainder to the Lion.
" Yon are a sensible beast," the latter sold ; " may / ask
you where yen learnt your polished manners, and your
flue sense of propriety r The Fux pointed to the dead
Ms, LI the master in whets sehool he had become such a
Roe gentleman. It is as old story—As/moot as old am the
story of Mr. Bright'. wonderful achievement.. But there
is Mr. Disraeli. defence, and when lie basked who taught
him how to govern with no much success and so little
glory, he may point to the statue of the great conservative
statesman who carried the repeal of the eons laws.—
In other artistes,-Mse T;siee rklieukvi the statistics of Lord
Bobcat lioetagn as to the amount of education in Rog•
land, and treats of the new Freucli loan. Whatever
other praiser, it says, may be fairly bestowed on Friona
Imperialism, it is hardly possible even for its moat enthu-
elastic supporters to describe it as a cheap government.
The Deily Neve reviews last night's debate. Mr.
Aytoun it terms • most respectable and conscientious
mar-plot. fu the course of this *Miele it is observed that
the lukewarm and reluctant support which the Roman
catholic bishops of Ireland have given to Mr. Gladstone's
policy, shows that in their sagacious estimate the dire
establishment of the high church will prove injurious to
uttramontano ascendancy. They have men to hope]
for from the concessions to which Lord Mayo now
points as the means of establishing religions equality.
Mr. Bright at Liverpool ; the watt of interest which par-
liament shows in social and Mamie/ reforms ; and the Mut-
racteriatics of the Horsechow which Mooed last evening, I
are other topic. discussed in the Daily Newt.
The Bergh, continues to tax Mr. Gladstone with wasting
the time and discrediting the character of the Rome of
Common* ; and in another article takes credit on behalf of
• Mr, Dieraelfs government for having " declined to hand
over the catholic youth, bound hand and foot and gagged,
to the narrow•minded tmishiag of • clique of rammer'.
tone Whops."
The Pas* sue in • recent cue in the Court of Arches an
argument for the admission of the testimony of persons
arraigned in a criminal omit

The Star cannot believe that the House of Common,
I will meant to such e proposition as Mr. Lamont has put
on the notice paper—Tic., for the payment of Kr. Pyre's
eipenete by the state. If it does, the Jamaica Committee.
will, no doubt, feel it to be its duty to renew its appeal to
the country. The twelve hundred gentlemen who form
that committee, and who represent public opinion in a
far truer and broader sense than their opponents, are not
likely to allow a step of this kind to be taken without
making an energetic effort to prevent it.

The Prince and Primer of Wales, asoemposted by the
Crown Prince of Denmark, and attended by the Countess
of Macclesfield, Lieutenant-Colonel Koppel, and Captain
Lund, went yesterday to the morning performance at
the Haymarket Theatre in aid of the Royal Dramatis
College.
The Princess of Wales drove out in the afternoon, ac.
crenpanied by the Crown Prince of Denmark.
In the evening the Prince and Princess of Wales and the
Crown Prince of Denmark went to the Royal Italian Opera,
Covent Caudell.
Prince sad Princess Christian dined with the Doke and
Duchess d'Aumele, at Twickenham, on Thursday evening.
Despatches were received yesterday at the Colonial-
; office Item the Governor of Heligoland. Despatches were
seat to Use Governors of Ceylon, Hoag Kong, the Straits
battlements, Gibraltar, and Melte.

CABINET COUNCIL. —A Cabinet Council is ap-
Toioted te be Mid this (Raturdsy) afternoon, at
eke First Lord of the Treasury's official residence
en Downiug-street.
Field Marshal Lis Royal Highness the Duke of
Osetbehtse held • levee yesterday afternoon at the Hines
Czar& ' when nearly DO•thoere attended.

Muss Burdett Coutts entertained a distinguished
company hat evening at her residence in Stratton.street,
Piccadilly, at a twilled concert, comprising selections from
Handel and other popular composer..

The Gurciateri Chronicle says that the visitors
ea Whit-Monday to Kew-gardens for ereeeaal is num-
ber any previously recortied, being 30.777.

The recurrence of the anniversary dinner of the
Gardeners' Royal Benevolent Institution, takes place on
the 24th of the patent okenth, wader the presidency of
M. T. Baas, Req., M.P.

The Weekly Register rebukes " Catholic ladies "
fw wearing dresses with troths dragging a couple of yards
behind the wearer. On William' Bee, " when Father
Harper was delivering his final lecture for the month of
Mary, in Form-street, two ladies, clad in the height of
faohioe, entered the church dragging after each a train
reaching at least two yards behind. The material
of the dreams being silk, end the swing in the
walk—which seems imperative to carry off these
&miss in a becoming manner—being considerable,
the main made against the floor completely drowned tha
pamelier'e voice to each bench of hie hearers as the ladies
passed on. Nor is this the first time that this nuiaanco of
sweeping silk dresses has disturbed the devotions of per,
eons in the church, although whether from the same parties
or not we are unable to say. The church of Farm-street
is kept particularly clean, and to sweep its floor with ex-
pensive Bilk is certainly a work of supererogation, to say
nothing of it being a very useless piece of extravagance."
MR„. DISIAZLI AND THE ULTRAMONTAXEPARTY.—
The Tabietof to-day says :—" Wetly' our personalpreferenue
and partisanship to the conservative leader, who vindicates
an 1 maintains those conservative principles which are a
pert of our creed, and opposes and sterna the tide of those'
principles of liberalism which in our opinion threaten the
eubversiiin both of religion and of civil society. And, in
our opinion, he has at present a claim upon the good sill
oven of those Catholic, who differ from him and are
legitimately 'axioms to expel him from offloo, because
there le no doubt that he has washeasd his position and
exposed kisioalt to danger by sn attempt to carry oat a
p,licy SI conciliation and concession to the satholiss of
Ireland."

DEATH OF THE EARL OF SHREWSBURY AND TAL-
WT.—Henry John Chetwynd Talbot, 18th Earl of Shrews-
busy and 3rd Earl Talbot, died at Newbattle Abbey,
near Dalkeith, ea Thursday evening, at half-past sight
o'clock. His lordship arrived last week at Newbattle
Abbey on a visit to his son-in-law and daughter, the
Marquis and llarobioneas of Lothian. On Friday last the
earl was seised with an affection of t►e beset ; apd he
became so alarmingly ill, that on Sunday night Sir
WUllam Jenner, the Queen's physician, was stopped at
Cantairs en his way from Balmoral to London, in
order that his advice might In obtained regarding the
Earl's illness. Dr. .Termer accordingly went to Newbattle,
and expressed his belief that nothing serious was to be
apprehended from the attack. Dr. Jenner left Newbattle
on Monday; on Tuesday, however, the Earl of Shrewsbury
became worse, and Dr. Begble was summoned from Rain-
bmgh, when be pronounced the case hopeless. Viscount
Ingestre, M.P., joint his family at Newbattle on Monday,
in consequence of his father's illness. Dr. Madera', Un-
wed., the medical attendant of the Marquis of
Lothian, was in constant attendance at Newbettle after
the Earl of Shrewsbury became Ul ; and be re•
ported on Thursday afternoon that his lordship
was in a very low condition—death ensuing,
as we have said, later in the evening. Among the many
inquiries regarding the noble earl's health which were
made at Newbattle, none have been more regular or kind
than those made by his Royal Highness the Primo of
Wales. The Earl of Shrewsbury and Talbot has never
taken any very conspicuous part in party ore imperial
politics. The son of the second Earl Talbot, born at
logestre Hall (the Viscounty of Ingestre has been in the
family since 1781), he married in 1828 the eldest daughter
of the Marquis of Waterford, and in 1849 succeeded to the
title of Talbot and Ingests.. In 1868, the House of Lords
declared him entitled to the 'accession to the Earldom of
Shrewsbury, as the descendant of the second earl,
the grandson of Lord Chancellor Talbot (1733 to
1736); and in 1863 ha was also declared to be Lord High
Steward for Ireland. The late earl commanded the
Philomel at the battle of Navarino in 1827, and was made
• Via-Admiral on the retired list in 1861 ; he was •
Knight of the Order of St. Anne of Russia, and had re-
ceived the cross of St. Louis of France. His lordship,
after one or two temporary parliamentary experiences,
was returned for the city of Dublin in 1831, and subse-
quently, from 1837 to 1849, sat for South Staffordshire.
The late earl, who would In November have entered his
66th year, is succeeded by his eon Charles John, Viscount
Ingestre, who is about 40 years of age. He is • conserve-
I kiss.

TRIAL OF EXPLOSIVE COMPOUNDS. —Some COM-
pctitivo trills of explosive compounds were made yester-
day in the shooting-grounds attached to the museum of
fire-arms, Peckham-rye, before a committee of reference,
composed of Viscount Renelagh, Sir. Frank Reathoote,
and Mr. A. W. Arnold. It was considered that the diver-
sity of opinion existing as to the relative merit of gun-
powder, gun-cotton, gun-cloth, gun-felt, and gun-sawdust,'
as site and useful propellent agents, rendered it desirable
to ascertain the exact degree of merit attaching to each,
and especially the extent to which each might safely be
used in fowling-pieces. The proprietors of each kind
were consequently invited to submit samples for trial
yesterday. Four points were aimed at in the programme.
let. The establishment of a standard of merit, based on
the average results obtained from gunpowder of different
makers ; 2nd, comparisons as to pattern, penetration,
recoil, and general uniformity ; 3rd, the ascertaining of
the bursting charge of each explosive in barrels of uniform
strength which had first passed the proof-house test; and
4th, the degree of heat at which each would explode.
The Hut trial was with gunpowder. Six charges were
Bred, each containing three dn, of powder, with 1:,oz.
of No. 6 shot, the target being a pad of brown paper
sheets tacked together. The recoil averaged ;an
average of 251 sheets of paper were penetrated ; the
pattern, on the targets gave an average of 1021. The
trial of gun-cotton, which had been looked forward
to with considerable interest, did not come off
in consequence of the wrong cartridges being sent.
Schulse's granulated wood gunpowder (55 grains) gave an
average recoil of 64'16 ; pattern, 99i ; penetration, 27.1
Reeves's gun-felt (32 groins) gave recoil, 46i ; pattern,
85 2-3rda ; penetration, 211. Double and- treble charges
wire fired without injuring the gun-barrel. Further expo- I
timents showed that Sohulze's granulated wood gunpow-
der exploded at a heat of 310 degrees, and Reeves's gun-
' felt at 282 degrees. With shots at 60 yet*, Schulze's com-
pound (551 grabs') made a pattern of 38, and penetrated
11 sheds ; Bermes (36 grains) penetrated 9 sheets, and
I showed a pattern of 55. The previous shots were fired at
Pt Pa" The Isto 111111.1 114 Ow If**

..
THE EXPRESS, SATURDAY •:. :', ING, JUNE t1.15.'\-- ‘
Oa-
• . ••
-•••••
with" Buttliese ntithe ettaten dare do-- imirlorefa • did in 1755,
lite, ! t, : , I lilt "curt.
be- imam:re ci ity. con' - Ltrzype• laxly gut ry, • Theatre, boos bey
: ; , '•,, ' - , "'"
new ,Vittiy, sleeps gt HighgatOnd f ' in ifsrhad given a .. parts in a nap pima .
jru
to - . iiii0.....1. CASTES. Jews 3.
5, or great cemetery...drake min' genetld • t than-Trench omega; and would not be Itgetrased '- Thee Queen went out in the morning, accom-
In the marble in which het and bidl even when Aiertck abjectly pleaded that some ~ Prince I.eopold and rriZteete Beatrice ; and her
,cter- tell the simple story of a life ;itumped of the obnoxious persons were Swiss by birth, ma t 7 drove out Is the iftersoott, accompanied by
erse. out. The least satisfactory thing con- ,' and staunch Protestants in religion ! Princess Louise, and attended by the lion. Mrs. 11. Pon-
next necked 'with professional players, is the ecitismA Kerby.
I the which has recently divided them into two holies; ; The Duke of Marlborough bad the honour of dining
The and which tells hardly upon the " Cricketer's OUR CONTEMPOILLHED3. with the Queen sad royal tastily.
,ndly Fund." Coild not this be made up, and • match (THIS DAY.) The Prince and Primer of Wales, aeoesepanied by the