This week’s poem is another by Francis Thompson and celebrates one of our national rain dances: cricket (our other rain dances being Wimbledon and the village fete). It’s also a nod to last weekend’s win for England against New Zealand at Lord’s.

As the run stealers flicker to and fro,
To and fro:
O my Hornby and my Barlow long ago!
Francis Thompson (1859—1907)

Poem 219. At Lord’s

It is little I repair to the matches of the Southron folk,
Though my own red roses there may blow;
It is little I repair to the matches of the Southron folk,
Though the red roses crest the caps, I know.
For the field is full of shades as I near a shadowy coast,
And a ghostly batsman plays to the bowling of a ghost,
And I look through my tears on a soundless-clapping host
As the run stealers flicker to and fro,
To and fro:
O my Hornby and my Barlow long ago!

It's Glo'ster coming North, the irresistible,
The Shire of the Graces, long ago!
It's Gloucestershire up North, the irresistible,
And new-risen Lancashire the foe!
A Shire so young that has scarce impressed its traces,
Ah, how shall it stand before all-resistless Graces?
O, little red rose, their bats are as maces
To beat thee down, this summer long ago!

This day of seventy-eight they are come up north against thee
This day of seventy-eight long ago!
The champion of the centuries, he cometh up against thee,
With his brethren, every one a famous foe!
The long-whiskered Doctor, that laugheth the rules to scorn,
While the bowler, pitched against him, bans the day he was born;
And G.F. with his science makes the fairest length forlorn;
They are come from the West to work thee woe!

It is little I repair to the matches of the Southron folk,
Though my own red roses there may blow;
It is little I repair to the matches of the Southron folk,
Though the red roses crest the caps, I know.
For the field is full of shades as I near a shadowy coast,
And a ghostly batsman plays to the bowling of a ghost,
And I look through my tears on a soundless-clapping host
As the run stealers flicker to and fro,
To and fro:
O my Hornby and my Barlow long ago!

This poem is Thompson’s recollection of a cricket match he had seen long before, when he was a passionate spectator of the sport. Near the end of his life, a friend invited him to watch Middlesex play Lancashire but instead of going he wrote this fond memory of watching Doctor W.G. Grace and his brother Fred (G.F. is George Frederick Grace) play for Gloucestershire against the new county team of Lancashire in 1878. Thompson was a Lancashire man from Preston and a keen spectator of the game, though not a player.

The red roses refer to the county emblem for Lancashire which we also remember as one of the sides in the Wars of the Roses (the white rose of Yorkshire being the other side). W.G. Grace’s important role in defining the rules of cricket is noted (“The long-whiskered Doctor, that laugheth the rules to scorn”) and the opening batsmen for Lancashire are also name checked: Albert Hornby and Richard Barlow.

It is interesting that Hornby also exercised his talents on the Rugby Union field and played in Blackburn Rovers’ first ever football match; Barlow was also an umpire and football referee while Grace played football for Wanderers F.C. In an age of amateurs, Grace and Hornby were wealthy and therefore free to choose their sports at will but Barlow had started his adult life as a printer’s compositor and then worked in an iron foundry before becoming a professional cricketer.

I like this poem because Thompson evidently recalled this cricket match vividly: his passion for that long-gone day is still very clear now through his verse and the imagery reminds me of the flickering images shown by an early film projector.

The poem has inspired three cricket memoirs: The Field is Full of Shades by Gerald Martineau, Red Roses Crest the Caps by Eric Midwinter, and Field of Shadows by Dan Waddell.

To and Fro

Poem 219. At Lord’s

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