I was standing, and I
fielded it.

"Bowl," said he.

I did not wish to do so, but it was impossible to disobey. And, as I
prepared to bowl, the silence became eloquent again. The new man,
the eleventh-hour bowler, was measuring himself with Radley. I
realised that my first ball teased him. My second laid his leg-stump
on the ground. A yell of joy showed to what a height the spirits of
the crowd had risen. But mine sank in proportion: I should never
bowl him out twice in one day....

The bell rang, and the field was cleared.

All over the ground there was an anticipatory silence, which made
the striking of the school-clock sound wonderfully loud. Then an
ovation greeted Lancaster, as he led his classic team on to the
ground.

The Masters had won the toss, and the two, who were to open the
batting, left the pavilion amid applause, and assumed their places
at the wicket. Lancaster placed his field, bowled a lightning ball,
and splintered an old Oxonian's middle stump.

Here was excitement! Delirious boys prophesied that eight years'
defeats would be wiped off the slate by the school's dismissing the
Masters for a handful of runs, scoring a great score, and then
dismissing them again, so as to win an innings victory. But stay!
Who is this coming in first-wicket-down? Not Radley? Yes, by
heaven, it is! He has come to see that no rot sets in. Now, Honion,
you may well spit on your hands. A laugh trembles its way round the
spectators, as Lancaster places his men in the deep field. He is
ready to be knocked about.

The first over closes for ten, all off Radley's bat, two fours and a
two. The new bowler, White, deals in slows, and the scoring partakes
of the nature of the bowling. But the outstanding fact of that over
is this: that Radley hit the last ball with terrific force along the
ground, and it was so brilliantly fielded and thrown in that it
scattered the stumps before Radley, who had started to run, could
reach the crease. Suddenly, crisply, half a thousand mouths snapped
out the query: "How's that!"

"_Out._"

With great good-humour Radley continued his run a little way, but in
the direction of the pavilion. Boys stood up and clapped
frantically, not a few seizing their neighbours and pummelling them
with clenched fists on the back. Pennybet, sitting beside Doe, shook
hands with him and with a couple of undemonstrative old gentlemen,
whom he had never seen before. They seemed a little overawed, as he
wrun