_=A GRAND.=_ B bids; both Vorhand and Hinterhand pass, and B announces a Grand, with the following cards:-- [Illustration: 🃛 🂫 🂻 🃑 🃁 🃊 🃎 🂡 🂭 🂩 ] The play is given in the margin. In a Grand the four Jacks are the only trumps. A has the first play, and as he leads through the player, he begins with his long suit, of which he knows that the Ace alone is out, and it may be in the skat. If the player has the Ace, C will probably trump it. If the player has not the Ace, it is just possible that he will not trump the Ten. C, leading up to the player, opens his short weak suit. At trick 3, C knows that A must have the Ten of hearts, or he would not fatten with the Ace. As this shows that A can stop the heart suit, C guards the spades and lets all his hearts go. B loses a very strong Grand, which must have been successful if C had had one club, or if A had led anything but the club Ten.
She sighed, near me. I divorced my husband, my own darlin Billy, she said. There s no divorce in Heaven. Tough, I said. I thought _I_ was her darlin Billy. Talk about Double-think! Will you miss never having a man again? I mean, once you ve been a wife-- I added, letting it drift off. God has been good to me, she said out of the dark. He let me see my own future, that he would give me a husband again. That was a curve. Isn t that an even worse breaking of vows? I said.
If one side goes out by cards, the other cannot score honours. Thirteen tricks taken by one side is called a _=slam=_, and it counts 6 points. Twelve tricks is a _=little slam=_, and it counts 4. Either of these must be made exclusive of revoke penalties. _=RUBBERS.=_ The rubber is won by the side that first wins four games of ten points each; and the winning side adds 8 points to its score. _=SCORING.=_ The game score should be kept on a whist marker, using the four large keys on one side for single points, and the single large key on the opposite side for five points. The three small keys are used to show how many games of the rubber have been won by that side. [Illustration: TWO GAMES WON, AND 2 POINTS SCORED ON THE THIRD.
Nothing is scored until the end of the hand, when each side reckons and claims its points. In order to avoid disputes there should be a previous understanding as to what points go out first in a close game. In the absence of any agreement to the contrary, the points count out in the following order:--Cards first, then Spades, Big Cassino, Little Cassino, Aces, and Sweeps. If the Aces have to decide it, the spade Ace goes out first, then clubs, hearts, and diamonds. If the sweeps have to decide it, only the difference in the number of sweeps counts, and if there is none, or not enough, the game is not ended, and another deal must be played. It is better to agree to _=count out=_ in twenty-one point Cassino; each player keeping mental count of the number of cards and spades he has taken in, together with any “natural” points. The moment he reaches 21 he should claim the game, and if his claim is correct he wins, even if his adversary has 21 or more. If he is mistaken, and cannot show out, he loses the game, no matter what his adversary’s score may be. If neither claims out, and both are found to be, neither wins, and the game must be continued to 32 points, and so on, eleven points more each time until one player claims to have won the game. _=Suggestions for Good Play.
One player cannot win two prizes. In case of ties for the gold stars, the accompanying red stars decide it; if that is also a tie, the player with the fewest number of green stars wins; and if that is still a tie, the players must cut for it. The hostess decides the hour at which play shall cease, and is the referee in all disputes. MILITARY EUCHRE. The hostess arranges each table as a fort, with a distinguishing flag and a number of small duplicate flags. The partners who sit East and West progress round the room from table to table, and play one game of five points at each, no lone hands allowed. The winners of each game get a little flag from the losers as a trophy. By the time the E and W pairs have made the circuit of all the tables and got home again, the game is ended, the victors being the fort that has captured the greatest number of flags. RAILROAD EUCHRE. Railroad Euchre is the name given to any form of the four-handed game in which every expedient is used to make points rapidly.
Jamieson says a number of pebbles are spread on a flat stone; one of them is tossed up, and a certain number must be gathered and the falling one caught by the same hand. See Checkstones, Fivestones. Church and Mice A game played in Fifeshire; said to be the same with the Sow in the Kirk. --Jamieson. Click Two Homes opposite each other are selected, and a boy either volunteers to go Click, or the last one in a race between the Homes does so. The others then proceed to one of the Homes, and the boy takes up his position between them. The players then attempt to run between the Homes, and if the one in the middle holds any of them while he says One, two, three, I catch thee; help me catch another, they have to stay and help him to collar the rest until only one is left. If this one succeeds in getting between the Homes three times after all the others have been caught, he is allowed to choose the one to go Click in the next game; if he fails, he has to go himself.--Marlborough, Wilts (H. S.
_=SCORING.=_ The last card played, the total number of points made by each player are put down on the score sheet, or marked on a cribbage board, and if neither player has reached 100 points, the deal passes to the one who was elder hand on the last deal. The order of scoring should be carefully observed, in order to determine which goes out first, and whether or not a player is lurched. Carte blanche, The Point, Sequence, Quatorze or Trio, Repic, Points for Leading or Winning, Pic, the Odd Trick, Capot. If one player reaches 100 before his adversary has reached 50, it is a _=lurch=_, and counts a double game. _=Abandoned Hands.=_ If a player throws down his cards, he may still take them up again, unless he or his adversary have mixed their cards with the discards, or with the remainder of the talon. _=SUGGESTIONS FOR GOOD PLAY.=_ The chief points for the beginner are good discarding, and taking advantage of tenace positions in the play, so as to secure the count for cards, which is often important. _=Elder Hand.
For instance: The score is 4 to 3 in favor of Vivant and Mort. They win the first seven tricks, which makes them game; but they do not cease playing. If they succeed in gaining eleven tricks out of the thirteen, they win a game of 9 points, instead of 5. As already observed, Vivant loses or gains double the value of the points in each hand. In the three-handed game this must be so; but in my opinion it would be a great improvement in the four-handed game to allow the player sitting out to share the fortunes of the Vivant, as in Bridge, and in many German games of cards, notably Skat. _=SLAMS.=_ The two great differences between French and English Dummy are that honours are not counted in Mort, and that a special value is attached to slams. A slam is made when one side takes the thirteen tricks. These must be actually won, and cannot be partly made up of tricks taken in penalty for revokes. Players cannot score a slam in a hand in which they have revoked.
The stars were different. The Sun was immeasurably far behind. Even the nearest stars were barely in contact. This was good Dragon country, this open, nasty, hollow kind of space. He reached farther, faster, sensing and looking for danger, ready to fling the Lady May at danger wherever he found it. Terror blazed up in his mind, so sharp, so clear, that it came through as a physical wrench. The little girl named West had found something--something immense, long, black, sharp, greedy, horrific. She flung Captain Wow at it. Underhill tried to keep his own mind clear. Watch out! he shouted telepathically at the others, trying to move the Lady May around.
Ties cut again; but the new cut decides nothing but the tie. _=STAKES.=_ If there is any stake, it is for so much a game. Rubbers are never played. _=DEALING.=_ Each player has the right to shuffle the pack, the dealer last, and the cards are then presented to the pone to be cut. At least four cards must be left in each packet. Beginning on his left, the dealer gives six cards to each player, three on the first round, and three more on the second round, turning up the next card for the trump, and leaving it on the remainder of the pack. If this card is a Jack, the dealer counts one point for it immediately; but if any player is found to have an incorrect number of cards, and announces it before he plays to the first trick, the Jack cannot be counted, as it could not have been the proper trump. In _=Pitch, or Blind All Fours=_, no trump is turned.