The M.C.C. men took the field--O. T. Blackwell, by the way, had shrunk
into a mere brother of the century-making A. T.--and the two School
House representatives followed them. An amateur of lengthy frame took
the ball, a man of pace, to judge from the number of slips. Norris
asked for 'two leg'. An obliging umpire informed him that he had got
two leg. The long bowler requested short slip to stand finer, swung his
arm as if to see that the machinery still worked, and dashed wildly
towards the crease. The match had begun.

There are few pleasanter or more thrilling moments in one's school
career than the first over of a big match. Pleasant, that is to say, if
you are actually looking on. To have to listen to a match being started
from the interior of a form-room is, of course, maddening. You hear the
sound of bat meeting ball, followed by distant clapping. Somebody has
scored. But who and what? It may be a four, or it may be a mere single.
More important still, it may be the other side batting after all. Some
miscreant has possibly lifted your best bowler into the road. The
suspense is awful. It ought to be a School rule that the captain of the
team should send a message round the form-rooms stating briefly and
lucidly the result of the toss. Then one would know where one was. As
it is, the entire form is dependent on the man sitting under the
window. The form-master turns to write on the blackboard. The only hope
of the form shoots up like a rocket, gazes earnestly in the direction
of the Pavilion, and falls back with a thud into his seat. 'They
haven't started yet,' he informs the rest in a stage whisper.
'Si-_lence_,' says the form-master, and the whole business must be
gone through again, with the added disadvantage that the master now has
his eye fixed coldly on the individual nearest the window, your only
link with the outer world.