FOOTBALL AND CRICKET 299 



Football is cultivated at Kingsclere, and the stable 

 boys are proficient at the game. It is astonishing 

 with what pluck and skill the least of them will tackle 

 opponents twice their weight. When they can secure 

 the services of Barry Porter, the trainer's youngest 

 son and a player with a county record — in the county 

 of his adoption, Surrey — they feel strong enough 

 to confront a team of the best. Occasionally a 

 big match is played at Kingsclere — Ewell against 

 Newbury, for example — and then as a matter of 

 course the players are entertained at Park House. 

 There is an annual cricket match between Mr. 

 Lloyd Baxendale's and John Porter's elevens, and 

 as good men contend the rigour of the game is 

 maintained, and the battle is worth seeing. Men like 

 Emmett and 'the demon bowler,' Spofforth, have 

 figured in the Porter team, in which, also, that 

 formidable amateur — almost as good with bat and 

 ball as he was in the pigskin when he sported silk, 

 1 Bobby' I' Anson, invariably takes a hand. John 

 Porter and Robert I'Anson are very old friends. It 

 may be doubted whether any public character in the 

 sporting world has been oftener described, or with 

 more contrasted results, than John Porter. The occa- 

 sion of one of those cricket matches was seized by 

 one of the portrait-painters — in pen and ink — to 

 sketch a likeness ; but that example of free and 

 easy limning was surpassed by another artist who 

 wrote as follows: ' Now, as when he was qualifying 

 for the business, Mr. Porter is just the same quiet 

 little man, with the subdued manner, and the calm, 



