July 5, 1911: Warwickshire drew with Surrey.

"The best laid plans of mice and men..." as Robert Burns so elegantly wrote.

Warwickshire have just played a marvellous match against Surrey, outclassing the browncaps with Frank Foster scoring what I am assured was the greatest double-century ever seen at Edgbaston. And I didn't see a single ball.

I have been in court these three days, the firm having been called to answer some nonsensical charges of child cruelty. The whole business beggars belief and makes you wonder what an insane, meddling, bully-boy, nanny state this country has become. It is nothing but sustained persecution of decent people simply trying to earn an honest living and feed their families and is all quite preposterous but our barrister has warned that Algernon junior, Algernon Junior II and even Algernina, bless her heart, could go to jail.

Most irksome of all, it spoiled my aspiration to see every day's play in this county season and, furthermore, made me miss a wonderful game.

On the first day, Warwickshire scored 501 as Foster put mighty Surrey to the sword. He hit 21 fours and three sixes in his 200 and, Sintard informs me, drove and cut with particular verve. He played only one false shot all day and that was when Nellie Herd dashed in front of the sight-screen wearing only a corset of cabbages.

The southerners do not like Foster and have said so and if there is one thing guaranteed to make Sir Frank blow hot it is criticism of he or his beloved county. He was, apparently, quite brilliant.

Surrey's reply was a remarkable effort. Jack Hobbs fell for just 13 when he edged a pull at Field and was caught by Tiger. Then they fell to 182 for nine and a two-day finish beckoned but old Hitch came in at number 11 and gathered 82. Strudwick (number ten) stuck at it for 45 and the tenth-wicket raised 130. Surrey were still far behind but it was to transpire that the time those tail-enders took up at the crease saved their team from defeat.

Warwickshire went in last night and today and made 206 for three, Tiger scoring 113, then set about bowling Surrey out. There was no chance of the La-di-da Gunner Grahams scoring 396 to win but could Warwickshire finish 'em off?

They couldn't. After two enthralling sessions Surrey finished on 270 for eight. Hayes, a man who always sells his wicket as dearly as Kinneir (that is he sells his wicket as dearly as Kinneir sells his wicket, not that he sells his wicket for the same price as that which Kinneir himself, as a person, would fetch), was unbeaten on 137. The spectators stood to applaud both teams from the field at the end, I am told, after a great match.

And all the time I was in the gallery at Birmingham Magistrates Court watching my sons and daughter and five of their foremen fending off outrageous charges from a nation-state which has evidently lost all reason.

We knew we were in for a rough ride right from the start when the prosecutor, a slick, portly operator by the name of Greatbatch, too clever by three-quarters if you ask me, stood up and introduced himself to the jury with: "Ladies and gentlemen. Imagine you are a small boy of nine years old. Or perhaps seven or eight. You are not well. You are hungry. You have been seized from home and you are frightened and lonely. You are taken to a strange place and physically pushed up a chimney which is still warm, if not hot, from recent use. To try to prevent yourself falling you try to cling to the chimney walls but cannot hold on because they are too hot and it is very painful. You scrape the skin off your arms and legs and you can't see anything not only because it is very dark up there but because there is more soot than air and the soot quickly gets under your eyelids, some to remain there and send you blind. You cry out for help but there is none, only orders to climb higher but you cannot because you are exhausted. You have worked for 14 hours this day and the day before and the day before that but when you can hold on no longer and scrabble and slip down so that your feet are within reach of the hearth, sharp pins are jabbed into the souls of your feet to force you back up..."

There was much more in this vein. And on this emotive blather, a very jaundiced view of the process of course, is the crown's case built.

This is the thanks that we, a highly-respected family business which has been serving the community for decades, receive in return for offering young people a career.

It truly makes one despair. Sadly it will consume my time for the next two weeks so I shall be unable to attend Warwickshire's matches at home to Northamptonshire from July 13 to 15 and, most dismayingly, against Sussex in the lovely town of Chichester from July 17 to 19. I hope to be available for the Gloucestershire match starting at Edgbaston on July 22, by which time the glorious 'Bear and Ragged Staff' might well be worrying the Big Six counties who have so far regarded the county championship title as their personal property.

Hopefully by then this court business will have been cleared up to our satisfaction. These are strange, troubled, worrying times. Algy junior is in a terrible state. I must say that Dilys has been an absolute tower of strength. She spoke brilliantly on the boy's behalf today. Really gave Greatbatch what-for. I am starting to wonder if some of these ladies might, in certain circumstances, be of an intellectual capacity to be entrusted with the right to vote.

Strange times indeed. "The best laid plans of mice and men..."

Ah well, as long as we have literature and cricket there is some sanctuary. Tonight I sat down, after reading one or two leaflets that Dilys has given me (rather interesting, I must say - I didn't realise quite how appallingly some of these brave suffragettes have been treated by the authorities) and adapted Burns' "To a Mouse" in the light of Warwickshire's emergence as potential champions.

To The Big Six.
Wee, sleekit, cow'rin, tim'rous beasties,
O, what a panic's in thy breastie!
Thou need na start awa sae hasty
Wi bickering brattle!
I wad be laith to rin an' chase thee,
And win the county championship.

I'm truly sorry Warwickshire's dominion
Has broken Nature's social union,
An' justifies that hoity-toity opinion
Which makes thee startle
At me, thy poor, earth born companion
An' fellow mortal!

I doubt na, whyles, but thou may thieve;
What then? poor beastie, thou maun live!
A daimen icker in a thrave
'S a sma' request;
I'll get a blessin wi' the lave,
An' never miss Frank Field's yorker.

Thy wee-bit pavilion, too, in ruin!
It's silly wa's the win's are strewin!
An' naething, now, to big a new dressing-room,
O' foggage green!
An' bleak close-season's win's ensuin,
Bathing area snell an' keen!

Thou saw the outfield laid bare an' waste,
An' weary winter comin fast,
An' cozie here, in your little coterie
Thou thought to dwell,
Till crash! Frank Foster's mighty Bears coulter past
Out thro' thy cell.

That wee bit heap o' leaves an' stibble,
Has cost thee monie a weary nibble!
Now thou's turned out, for a' thy trouble,
But house or hald,
To thole the winter's sleety dribble,
An' Billy Quaife's jockstrap.

But Mousie, thou art no thy lane,
In proving foresight may be vain:
The best-laid schemes o' mice an' men
Gang aft agley,
An' lea'e us nought but runs and wicket,
For Warwickshire's joy!

Thou are not blest, compared wi' me!
The present only toucheth we:
An' och! I orward cast my e'e,
On happy prospects for the second half of the season
An' forward, tho' I canna see
The Big Six's hittherto iron grip on the county championship loosening.