of which did we ever look like winning-five on their home ground and three in England. They were admittedly favoured by dry and fiery wickets, both in Australia and on this side, but then all winners need a certain amount of luck, and no serious cricketer pretends that these brilliant victories were mere luck. There were too many of them.

Test Match
Cricket

THE two last Test Matches (Manchester, July 23rd to 26th, and the Oval, August 13th to 16th) were drawn-the wicket suiting our batting better, and the English team, for the first time, playing real Test Match cricket, though in view of the resourcefulness of the Australian Eleven it would be rash to assume that we should have won either match had it been played out. We have learnt a good deal from our Australian visitors, whose prowess is after all an eloquent tribute to the Mother-country. It is obvious that to retrieve the "ashes" we shall have to take the matter as seriously as do the Australians, who leave little to chance and study every department of the game, while Mr. Armstrong's captaincy can only be described as genius. It is futile to pit scratch and constantly shifting elevens against a team that is continually playing together, every member of which knows exactly where to go and what to do. Again, the management of the Australian bowling was almost as material a factor in its success as the skill and prodigious pace of the bowlers. Another feature was their amazing fielding and the certainty with which they held catches, whereas our men gave too many lives to dangerous batsmen. But the most valuable Australian asset is probably the match-playing temperament—the lack of "nerves," the wonderful power of recovery from any tight place and the ability of any of their tailless team to get runs when they were most wanted. These great-hearted cricketers and fine sportsmen have been most welcome visitors during a period of acute political and industrial depression. They have "gingered" up English cricket and given our cricketers something to think about. When next we meet them, we shall have profited by the lessons of 1920-21, and our men

should have a better chance. The Australians on their side should cultivate a less overloaded programme, as some of their county matches `degenerated into farce and even provoked controversy.

Pros and
Cons

THERE are complaints among the apprehensive that we take our sports and games too seriously, that we are so preoccupied with Test Matches and other contests as to neglect the more serious business of life. We are warned that, thanks to our frivolity, other nations are getting ahead of us. There is undoubtedly some force in this criticism, just as there is something to be said on the other side. We do nothing by halves, and no small portion of the population are primarily interested in sport or games, to the exclusion of subjects in which as taxpayers and ratepayers they should take an interest. Cricket, football, racing, boxing were never more popular than to-day, while many other games reckon their votaries by the thousand. Nevertheless, when the call came like a thief in the night seven years ago amusements were ruthlessly discarded, and during four cruel years "flannelled fools" and "muddied oafs" showed the world of what good stuff they were made. With the advent of the Armistice and the passing of the emergency, the love of distraction and amusement of all kinds resumed its former sway, and is now in fuller blast than ever. Many persons are playing who ought to be working, and who may be preparing a precarious future for themselves. On the other hand, this intense keenness in all classes for games is one of the most integrating influences in these disintegrating days, providing as it does a powerful antiseptic against such infections as Bolshevism. Would England be any "forarder " were Englishmen more political and less sporting ?-many miners were more interested in the Test Matches than in their own strike! The bad side of this national idiosyncrasy is that it permits professional politicians to acquire unchallenged control of public affairs, while the population generally are looking on at cricket or at football. How they abuse this power is writ large across the country.

Middle-aged "Grousers"

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A MIDDLE-AGED spectator," who shrewdly hides his identity under the vague designation "Old Etonian,' indulges in the customary diatribe (Times, August 3rd) against the younger generation, of which we confess to be growing somewhat weary. He admits that the youth of the present day, like their forerunners, are generous and loyal; they are gentle and kind-hearted; they are full of spirit and pluck," but "there is one great difference. More than ever before in the history of youth do they defy discipline and worship independence. More than ever do they brush aside experience and do exactly as they please." This judgment, we are told, is the result of recent visits to the Universities, of "watching cricket matches, and of meeting the younger men in private houses and at tennis and golf." Their misdemeanours are set out seriatim by their self-appointed censor, whose complaints bear a striking resemblance to the strictures of other middle-aged "grousers " who periodically pronounce the country to be going to the dogs because their progeny are inferior to themselves. According to "Old Etonian," some of our youths "when they are talking to other persons, including people older than themselves, never take their pipes out of their mouths. When they are asked to lunch with hostesses in London, many of them appear in undergraduate clothes and flannel collars. When they are in London, they never dress for dinner except in cases of absolute necessity. They often associate with very odd friends, and with female companions of these odd friends." But there is something still worse than these outrages in the eyes of "Old Etonian "-whom we suspect to be a golfer-actually these young degenerates are showing an increasing toleration and fondness for lawn tennis . a number . who might have been entirely to 'pat-ball,'

fine cricketers, devote themselves and while Australia triumphs on the cricket field, the youth of England wanders from county to county and from tournament to tournament in pursuit of the trophies and the tea-parties of this effeminate game." So much so that "if an older friend ever dares to point out any of these

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things to them in a friendly and bantering way, the answer is always the same: 'You are the most dreadful snob we ever met. We intend to do exactly as we like." We can conceive young men regarding their mentor as talking rot," because it is rot to suggest that present-day Etonians wander from county to county in pursuit of trophies, tournaments and tea-parties, but we cannot imagine them calling him a "snob" when he is only very foolish.

"Oxonian" v.

OTHER old fogies-though not all-followed "Old Etonian's" lead and belaboured the boys and girls of the present day in the columns of The Times as boys and "Old Etonian" girls have been belaboured by old fogies of previous ages. Some of the younger fogies were indisposed to take this, chastisement lying down, retaliating in vigorous prose. For instance, "An Oxonian " declared in The Times (August 5th) that during the fateful years 1914-18 the younger generation learnt in France and elsewhere to rely on themselves. They saw then, and their belief has since been strengthened by later events, that the middle-aged who ran the war from home suffered vicariously and not directly for their mistakes. As a result their respect for their elders is not strong." There is some force in this uncompromising observation. The war was made in Germany on Prussian inspiration in accordance with Prussian dogma, which regarded war as a biological necessity. But middle-aged Britons bear a heavy burden of responsibility for allowing this country to be governed by politicians who could not or would not see what stared them in the face, while their abject attitude towards the Kaiser convinced that Potentate that whenever the crisis came and Germany's hour sounded, peace-loving Britain would be "too proud to fight." The brunt of the fighting made inevitable by the pre-war blindness of " Old Etonians" and similar mugwumps-who believed everything which Lord Haldane and the Daily Telegraph told them concerning Germany's pacific intentions-fell on the younger generation, who paid a terrible price for the criminal folly

of their elders, who, monopolizing as they did all political power, necessarily monopolize the blame for England's unreadiness in August 1914. Can we be surprised that on emerging from the hell of war the young men were exasperated to find the same "duds" who had blundered into war and mismanaged the war, to say nothing of ruining the peace, still in the seat of authority with the apparent approval of, or at any rate the acquiescence of, "Old Etonians," many of whom are quite content that the country should be indefinitely saddled with Coalition politics and Coalition politicians, so long as they and their friends share the spoils of office and so-called "honours." Can we wonder that "Oxonians " no longer go nap on "Old Etonians' " judgment of men and things, or that they should be occasionally restive under such omniscience?