NEVER perhaps has the standard of play at billiards been higher than during the last few weeks. Stevenson and Dawson have surpassed themselves, and Diggle has not been very far behind them. The averages - a sure guide to the general quality of the play - have on some days been nothing less than astounding. I am told that one cause of the continued improvement on the part of players who might have been thought to have reached their highest point is to be found in the fact that the cloths on the tables were never so good as they are to-day. In some ingenious way the manufacturers have produced a cloth of peculiar fineness of texture, but which retains all the merits of the more substantial cloths in use a few years ago. Under existing conditions a genuine match for the championship between Stevenson and Daw- son with real stake-money of £250 a-side would be worth going hundreds of miles to see, but there is unfortunately not the slightest chance of such a treat being provided for followers of the game.