approaches the city by the Northgate leading out to Thanet, for it is the most uninteresting way, lined on the one hand by military barracks and on the other by a dull river-side suburb. It is true that as a military station Canterbury first comes into history in the time of the Roman occupation, but the barracks of to-day are wanting in beauty themselves, and have not about them the glamour of the old and but half known. It is a city of many churches, of many "hospitals" and almshouses, of narrow byways, of quaint houses and of illimitable traditions; a city set amid hills, amid woodlands and hopfields; a city in which past and present join hands without anything jarring in the alliance. It is true that Canterbury's latest historian has suggested that motors-"those throbbing, noisy, evil-smelling machines"-should be left outside the city, as their presence is "a vulgar and irreverent anachronism." But the view is that of the zealous antiquarian, who forgets that a city is not only a kind of object for a national museum, but a living entity, and that it is in the freshness of life, in its adaptation to, and reconciliation with, the spirit of the time that a place like Canterbury at once excites our reverent admiration and compels our affection. In the days of the Pilgrims few folk reached the confines of the city unless on foot-if they rode thither they dismounted when the Angel Steeple of the Cathedral came in sight, and so, no doubt, it might be thought that chaises, carriers' waggons and coaches successively were "anachronisms," to say nothing of the railway, but that, it is true, is without the limits of the ancient walls, yet these various improvements in locomotion have not harmed the city. When motorists, remembering the showman's nearness to success in his desire to demolish the West Gate, wish the old streets widened and straightened, it will be time enough to protest against vulgarity and irreverence. To object to their admission to the ancient thoroughfares is worse than objecting to the illumination by gas and electric light of the venerable buildings that were anciently lighted by torches and candles. Kent has long been famous as a cricketing county, and "Canterbury week," at the beginning of August, is so notable a feature of the season that it cannot but be amusing to some readers to recall a great contest that once took place here. About a hundred and fifty years ago one James Love, whose enthusiasm for the game was greater than his genius as a poet, 62 CRICKET IN KENT CHAP. wrote "An Heroic Poem " on cricket, which he concluded prophetically with "And now the Sons of Kent compleat the Game, And firmly fix their everlasting Fame,” showing clearly enough that he knew the county would, in 1906, establish its position as champion. In July, 1773, however, it was the noblemen and gentlemen of Kent and Surrey who met in the neighbourhood of Canterbury in friendly rivalry, and the three days' match roused considerable interest, though Kent, it must be confessed, made but a bad second, as we see from the account given in the Kentish Gazette: "The following is a List of the Noblemen and Gentlemen Cricketers, who played on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday last in Bourn-Paddock, Surry against Kent, for Two Thousand Pounds: Those marked thus В were bowled out; C catched out. The third Duke of Dorset, who did yeoman service on behalf of the county which, as plain Mr. Sackville, he had represented in the House of Commons and of which he was Lord Lieutenant, is remembered in the cricketing field as a member of the Hambledon Club, and as one of the committee that drew up the original laws of the M.C.C. Sir Horace Mann was Sir Horatio Mann, of Bishopsbourne, "the King of Cricket," who did not succeed his more distinguished uncle, the British Envoy at Florence, in the baronetcy until 1786. The match moved a contemporary rhymester, J. Duncombe, to tell the story of "Surrey Triumphant, or the Kentish Men's Defeat," in a lengthy ballad parodying "Chevy Chase." The poet ascribed the defeat of the Men of Kent to their playing the match in harvest time : "God prosper long our harvest-work, An ill-tim'd cricket match there did To bat and bowl with might and main The hay may rue, that is unhous'd The active Earl of Tankerville An even bet did make, That in Bourn paddock he would cause, To see the Surry cricketers Out-bat them and out-bowl. Who sent his Lordship present word, The Surry Earl, not fearing this, This game did last from Monday morn For when Bell Harry rung to prayers, Their husband's woful case that night Did many wives bewail, Their labour, time, and money lost, But all would not prevail. Not only is the metropolitical city the most obvious centre of interest in Kent, but it is also a centre from which radiate highways and byways full of beauty and crowded with interest. Within a few miles we may visit scenery of the most varied character, from the quiet woods of the north and west to the clayey "cliffs" of the Thames estuary, from the wide marshlands where the Stour once met an inlet of the sea east of Fordwich to the bare stretches of chalk downs where the ancient Watling Street crosses the heights that lie between here and Dover. Starting in Canterbury it will be found that the highways which, roughly speaking, bisect the city from north to south, and again from west to east, are the London to Dover and Maidstone to Margate roads, and any one of these four main routes out of the city offers its attractions to the lover of country life and scenery no less than to the seeker after old-time lore. A few miles from Canterbury in any direction by these roads, or by that which leads to Sandwich, or by the ancient Stone Street which goes due south, and has (on the map) all the apparent straightness which we are taught to associate with the old Roman ways, but which seems to the pedestrian or cyclist like a switchback on a grand scale, takes us amid varied hilly and well-wooded scenery, broad stretches of hop-lands and of farmfields. All around are small villages each dominated by its grey stone or flinty F |