Who's travelled many a mile with me
In half a hundred sorts of weather!
Once more to clasp your friendly hand,
To tramp along by Hope attended,
Dreaming of glances, drives, and cuts,
My Dear Old Girl, how truly splendid!

NET PRACTICE.

We had a fellow in the School
Whose batting simply was a dream:
A dozen times by keeping cool
And hitting hard he saved the Team.
But oh! his fielding was so vile,
As if by witch or goblin cursed,
That he was called by Arthur Style,
King Butterlegs the Worst!

At tea-time, supper, breakfast, lunch,
For many disappointed days,
We reasoned with him in a bunch,
Imploring him to mend his ways.
He listened like a saint, with lips
As if in desperation pursed;
Then gave three fourers in the Slips--
King Butterlegs the Worst!

'Twas after this the Captain tried,
In something warmer than a pet,
To comfort his lamenting Side
By pelting Curtice in a net.
Aware of his tremendous power,
The Captain used it well at first,
And peppered only half-an-hour
King Butterlegs the Worst!

But half-an-hour at such a range--
From such a Captain!--was enough
To work so prompt and blest a change
That Curtice ceased to be a muff.
When from his bed at last he came,
Where fifty bruises had been nursed,
He was no more a public shame,
Nor Butterlegs the Worst!

THE CATCH OF THE SEASON.

He was a person most unkempt,
And answered to the name of Cust.
He had a frenzied mass of hair,
A little redder than red rust,
And trousers so exceeding short
It looked as if by mounting high
They meant unceasingly to try
To change to knickers on the sly.

He was a person whom a Bat
Could view without the least distrust.
He caught me at the fifth attempt--
Imagine my profound disgust!
For if the ball had gone to hand
I had not felt the least unrest;
But, as it happened (Fate knows best!)
It struck him smartly on the chest.

I cannot tell you how he squirmed
And capered on the greensward there,
Until at last he took the ball
(Or so it seemed) from out his hair,
And meekly rubbed the coming bruise.
Thus was I humbled in the dust
Because of Albert Edward Cust.
Imagine my profound disgust!

Here's to the freckles and fielding and fun,
Here's to the joy that we ponder;
Here's to the Ga