1744.1 "How Is It, Umpire?" The 1744 Laws of Cricket and Their Influence on the Development of Baseball in America

Last Monday afternoon, a match at cricket was play'd on our Common for a considerable Wager, by eleven Londoners, against eleven New Yorkers: game was play'd according to the London Method; and those who got most notches in two Hands, to be the Winners.1The earliest surviving laws of cricket are preserved on the edge of a handkerchief titled The Laws of the Game of Cricket. In small crowded text,…