played all the while with my
clenched fist."--He used frequently to ploy matches at Copenhagen House
for wagers and dinners. The wall against which they play is the same
that supports the kitchen-chimney, and when the wall resounded louder
than usual, the cooks exclaimed, "Those are the Irishman's balls," and
the joints trembled on the spit!--Goldsmith consoled himself that there
were places where he too was admired: and Cavanagh was the admiration
of all the fives-courts where he ever played. Mr. Powell, when he played
matches in the Court in St. Martin's Street, used to fill his gallery
at half a crown a head with amateurs and admirers of talent in whatever
department it is shown. He could not have shown himself in any ground in
England but he would have been immediately surrounded with inquisitive
gazers, trying to find out in what part of his frame his unrivalled
skill lay, as politicians wonder to see the balance of Europe suspended
in Lord Castlereagh's face, and admire the trophies of the British
Navy lurking under Mr. Croker's hanging brow. Now Cavanagh was as
good-looking a man as the Noble Lord, and much better looking than the
Right Hon. Secretary. He had a clear, open countenance, and did not look
sideways or down, like Mr. Murray the bookseller. He was a young fellow
of sense, humour, and courage. He once had a quarrel with a waterman at
Hungerford Stairs, and, they say, served him out in great style. In a
word, there are hundreds at this day who cannot mention his name without
admiration, as the best fives-player that perhaps ever lived (the
greatest excellence of which they have any notion); and the noisy
shout of the ring happily stood him in stead of the unheard voice
of posterity!--The only person who seems to have excelled as much
in another way as Cavanagh did in his was the late John Davies, the
racket-player. It was remarked of him that he did not seem to follow the
ball, but the ball seemed to follow him. Give him a foot of wall, and he
was sure to make the ball. The four best racket-players of that day were
Jack Spines, Jem Harding, Armitage, and Church. Davies could give any
one of these two hands a time, that is, half the game, and each of
these, at their best, could give the best player now in London the same
odds. Such are the gradations in all exertions of human skill and art.
He once played four capital players together, and beat them. He was also
a first-rate tennis-player and an excellent f