W.G. Grace — 'Cricket'

Leslie Ward ('Spy') presents W.G. Grace, England's supreme Victorian cricketer, in full whites: ribbed pads, red sash, striped Marylebone Cricket Club cap, batting gloves clutched in one hand and the handle of a bat tucked under his arm. The caption is simply 'Cricket' — the man was the game. Ward's caricature exaggerates Grace's famous dense black beard and stocky, barrel-chested frame, making him appear almost more beard than man, a trick that affectionately underscores his bull-like physical authority. There is no ethnic caricature here; Grace was an English national institution, and Spy treats him with broad warmth rather than satire. The plate ran as Men of the Day No. 150 and was popular enough to be reprinted twenty-one years later, a rare editorial acknowledgement of enduring celebrity.