His [Viv Richards] demeanour at such moments has been described as insouciant, but regal might be nearer the mark. The downward curve of the fine nose, the level gaze, the wide expressive mouth within the handsome beard - all combine to indicate that if he ever went after the role of an emperor, the price of the second favourite a the audition would be 33-1 and drifting.
H. McIlvanney, 'Black is beautiful' (1985), R. Guha (ed.), The Picador book of cricket (2001), 202
To young eyes, quickest to perceive the things that make cricket, Miller is as an Olympian god among mortals. He brings boys' dreams to life He is the cricketer they would all like to be, the one who can hit more gloriously and bowl faster than anybody on earth. When Neville Cardus called him a young eagle among crows and daws Miller was not a champion playing out of his class; sharing the field were him were the elect of the world's two greatest cricketing countries, Bradman, Hammond and bearers of other famous names, Compton and other men of personality
Masculine as Tarzan, he plays lustily. Style suffuses his cricket with glowing power, personality charges it with daring and knocks bowling and convention sky-high.
R. Robinson, 'Touch of a Hero' (1951), R. Guha (ed.), The Picador book of cricket (2001), 126
Another factor which contributed to the falling demand [for sherry] was the changing moral attitude towards drink. By the 1880s Victorian smugness and philistinism were reaching their peak; the Salvation Army had been beating its drums for years and saving souls from the torments of alcohol; Dick Turner had long since coined the word 'teetotal' and the exponents of that ghastly creed were preaching misery throughout the land; pious faces could be seen every Sunday leaving tin tabernacles to threaten publicans with eternal damnation. There were, of course, a few of the enlightened, but Saintsbury's influence lay still in the future and G.K. Chesterton was far too young to compose the rimes of The Flying Inn. The naughty nineties were hardly in sight, and when they did come they bright young things only thought of champagne.
J. Jeffs, Sherry (6th edition, 2016), 74
During the regicide disgrace of the Protectorate, sherry suffered a short-lived eclipse but this arose more as a result of matters in Spain than from the change of government in England. During the Civil War and afterwards the nobility, who had been the greatest buyers of wine, could no longer buy it on their accustomed scale. Some were exiled and others impoverished. Although the Puritans detested drunkenness and gluttony, they had no objections to drinking in moderation. The awful heresy of teetotalism was not to emerge for another three hundred years. ... But the beginnings of the Commonwealth coincided with the start of years of terrible plague in Jerez which resulted in the disruption of the wine trade for over two decades.
J. Jeffs, Sherry (6th edition, 2016), 24
All his [Columbus'] efforts, his intrigues with the Church and the monarchy, his triumphs and disappointments, the elaborate preparations for his voyages, the voyages themselves, all were centred on Andalusia. From Andalusia he gathered his forces, and many of the men came from the Sherry towns. He set forth from Sanlúcar de Barrameda on his third journey, to discover the island of Trinidad in 1498, and Sanlúcar was soon established as a major port for the new American trade; it was the port from which Pizzaro set sail twenty-five years later on his way to conquer Peru. Alvar Nuñez Cabeza de Vaca, who discovered Florida, was the son of a Jerez wine grower.
J. Jeffs, Sherry (6th edition, 2016), 12
In the book Lord Clark, as he became, described his life (1903-1983) as 'one long, harmless confidence trick', a reference to what he called his freak aptitude, apparent from the age of 9 or 10, for responding authoritatively to works of art.
He profited from this, he told me, because most English people didn't 'give a blow about art' and considered it sissy. So when they met someone who could speak with confidence and enthusiasm about paintings and sculpture, they were prepared to listen - 'to save themselves trouble'.
M. Barber, 'Not your typical courtier', Slightly Foxed 77 (2023), 81
Alexander the Great needed four months to capture Multan in 325 BCE, and was hit by an arrow that nearly killed him. It took Ben Stokes three and a half days, despite a touch of flu. By presiding over victory in perhaps the region's most ancient city, he achieved what no cricketing general from English shores ever had - a second successive Test win in Pakistan, and the chance of a whitewash.
D. Wilson, 'Pakistan v England: second test', L. Booth (ed.), Wisden Cricketers' Almanack (2023), 411
