BY
NORMAN GALE
METHUEN AND CO.
36 ESSEX STREET, W.C.
LONDON
1894
Edinburgh: T. and A. Constable, Printers to Her Majesty
These Cricket Songs are dedicated to
all Rugby Boys in general, and
to John and William Denton
in particular
Four years ago the author of this book issued a slender volume of cricket songs. Seven of these are now reprinted; the rest are new.
The cricket ball, for the most part, is spoken of as a female. Once or twice the neuter gender is used. Varium et mutabile semper femina.
It is hoped that the introduction of the names of prominent players (and one critic) will cause no vexation.
Apologies are tendered to Mr. Moore and Mr. Shakespeare.
PAGE | |
In Spring | 1 |
Up at Lords | 3 |
Out | 5 |
Lay On | 8 |
Rub It In | 10 |
Buzz Her In | 12 |
A Colonist | 16 |
Lightning (Greased) | 18 |
Golf steals our Youth | 20 |
A Tomboy | 23 |
Advice Gratis | 25 |
Quinquaginta Annos Natus | 28 |
Star-Gazing | 30 |
O Bowler, Bowler | 31 |
The Church Cricketant | 34 |
Revenge | 36[xii] |
Chuck Her Up | 38 |
Two Critics | 41 |
Buttered | 44 |
Sparkling | 46 |
'Duck' | 48 |
On the Spot | 51 |
The Hope of Surrey | 53 |
Bombastes | 56 |
England v. Australia | 59 |
Cricket on the Hearth | 61 |
Dark Blue | 64 |
The Last Ball of Summer | 66 |
Printed by T. and A. Constable, Printers to Her Majesty
at the Edinburgh University Press
BY THE SAME AUTHOR.
In Verse.
Country Muse. In two volumes. (David Nutt.)
Orchard Songs. (Elkin Mathews and John Lane.)
In Prose.
A June Romance. (George E. Over, Rugby. The cheaper edition nearly ready.)
SOME CRITICAL OPINIONS.
'Dowsabella lives again and cowslips are in bloom.'—'A Fogey' in The Contemporary Review.
'There is a true country freshness in his lyrics,—birds sing and the breeze blows in them; his Clarindas and other country maidens have the rosy bloom of health and outdoor life, and his verse is musical and finished, and free from rustic affectations.'—Edinburgh Review.
'The verse of Mr. Gale, perhaps more truly and constantly than the verse of any of our younger living poets, stands the Miltonic test of poetry, in proving itself "simple, sensuous, passionate."'—From The Poets and Poetry of the Century.
Minor punctuation and printer errors repaired.