=_ Sometimes 1,000 points is a game, as in pinochle, and the first player to call out wins if he is correct; if not he loses. Sometimes in three or four-hand, it is agreed to play some number of deals divisible by four, usually 12 or 16. These are indicated by cross marks on the slate, each arm representing a deal. The two players with the higher scores at the end of the hand each rub off a mark and the one who is first to rub off all his marks is the winner, or the last to wipe off is stuck, according to agreement. Any one failing to get as many as 21 points in meld and play is set back a mark. TWO-HAND JASS. When only two play, the game closely resembles American pinochle, the winner of each trick drawing a card from the top of the stock, the loser drawing the next one. All melds are made immediately after winning a trick and before drawing from the stock, only one meld at a time being allowed. It is not necessary to follow suit to anything until the stock is exhausted, after which all melds cease and the second player to each trick must win it if he can, but the jack of trumps still has the privilege of renouncing if a plain suit is led. PATIENCE POKER As its name implies, this is a form of solitaire, but it may be managed so as to provide a pleasing competition for any number of players.
Many American players who use the English language in bidding by figures, still adhere to the German names for the suits and positions at the table. _=CARDS.=_ Skat is played with a pack of thirty-two cards, all below the Seven being deleted. The rank of the cards differs according to whether the players are attempting to win or to lose tricks. If the object is to win tricks, it is known as a “game;” if the object is to lose, it is called a “nullo.” In nullo the cards rank in their natural order; A K Q J 10 9 8 7, the Ace being the highest. In the various “games,” the four Jacks are always the best trumps, and are known as _=Wenzels=_. The other cards follow the usual German rank; A 10 K Q 9 8 7, the Ace being the highest in plain suits. The German names for the cards are as follows;--_=Jack=_: Wenzel, Bauern, Bube, Jungen, or Unter. _=Ace=_: As, or Daus.
=_ There are no suitable counters for Scotch Whist, and the score is usually kept on a sheet of paper. _=PLAYERS.=_ Any number from two to eight may play. When there are five or seven players, the spade 6 must be removed from the pack. In some places this is not done; the thirty-fifth card being turned up for the trump, the thirty-sixth shown to the table, and then laid aside. _=CUTTING.=_ Whatever the number of persons offering for play, the table is formed by cutting from the outspread pack for partners, seats, and deal. When two play, the one cutting the lowest card has the choice of seats and cards, (if there are two packs). When three play, the lowest deals, and chooses his seat and cards. The next lowest has the next choice of seats.
The survivor of the first two must either say, “Yes,” to the offers made by Hinterhand, or pass. The final survivor then announces his game. It is usual for the last one to pass to signify that he is done by pushing the skat cards toward the survivor, indicating that they are his, and that he is the player. If a player is offered a game equal to his own he may still say, “Yes;” but if he is offered a better game, and still says, “Yes,” he runs the risk of being compelled to play. The old German way of bidding, adopted at the Skat Congresses in Altenburg, Leipzig and Dresden, was to bid in suits; a bid of club Solo outranking one of spade Solo, no matter what it was worth. This has long been obsolete, the objection to it being that a player might get the play on a game of much inferior value. A player with a spade Solo, six Matadores, and schneider announced could offer only a spade Solo, without mentioning its value, and although his game was worth 99, he could be outbid by an offer of Nullo, which was then worth only 20. This is contrary to the spirit of the game, which requires that the person offering the game of the greatest value shall be the player. The rank of the bids in the old German game was as follows, beginning with the lowest:-- Frage, in the order of the suits. Tourné, in the order of the suits.
The various counting combinations in Cribbage may arise in two ways. They may be formed by combining the cards played by one person with those played by his adversary; or they may be found in the individual hand or crib after the play is over. In the latter case the starter is considered as part of each hand and crib, increasing each of them to five available counting cards. _=Pairs.=_ A pair is any two cards of the same denomination, such as two Fives or two Queens, and its counting value is always the same, 2 points. _=Triplets=_, usually called Pairs Royal, Proils, or Prials, are any three cards of the same denomination, such as three Nines. Their value is the number of separate pairs that can be formed with the three cards, which is three, and the combination is therefore always worth 6 points. The different pairs that can be formed with three Nines, for instance, would be as follows:-- [Illustration: 🂹 🃙 🂹 🂩 🃙 🂩 ] _=Fours=_, sometimes called Double Pairs Royal, or Deproils, are any four cards of the same denomination, such as four Fours, and their counting value is the number of separate pairs that can be formed with the four cards, which is six. The combination is therefore always worth 12 points. The different combinations of four cards, arranged in pairs, is as follows:-- [Illustration: 🂴 🃔 🂴 🂤 🂴 🃄 🃔 🂤 🃔 🃄 🂤 🃄 ] Whether the foregoing combinations are formed during the play of the hand, or found in the hand or crib after the play is over, their counting value is exactly the same.
| -- | -- | |11.| -- |All fine ladies | | | |ashamed to be seen. | |12.| -- | -- | |13.| -- | -- | |14.|Washed in milk, |Wash em in milk, | | |dressed in silk. |dress in silk. | |15.| -- | -- | |16.| -- | -- | |17.
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The score-card should be folded down the middle during the overplay, so that the original scores cannot be seen. It is even better to use a new card. _=Foster’s System=_ of playing two pairs at one table, which was used at all the matches for the Utica Trophy, in which one pair from a club challenged the pair that held the trophy for another club, consisted in having an umpire to transpose the suits between the original and the overplay of the deals. The trays containing the hands were sent in to the umpire’s room, and he had an extra pack of cards, from which he duplicated each hand of thirteen cards as he took it out of the pocket to which it belonged, but changed the suits, making clubs trumps instead of hearts, etc. This system was found to do away with the memory part of the game, it being very difficult to recognize a hand unless it had some startling feature. Coupled with the present practice of throwing out all hands in which there is found to be a suit of more than six cards, and dealing it over again, Foster’s system for two pairs is the best so far suggested. _=Eight Individuals.=_ This form of contest is seldom used, because players dislike the continual changing of position, and the delay in arriving at the results of the score. It would require seven sets to exhaust the combinations; and at each table two hands should be dealt, played, and exchanged with the other table in the set, before the players change positions. This would require 28 hands to complete the match.
When the scores are not known, there is nothing but luck to guide one, unless a person has a very good memory, and knows which players are probably behind. _=Leading.=_ If the successful bidder wants 6 or 7 tricks, and holds the Joker, he should lead it at once. If he has not the Joker, he should begin with a low trump, and give his partners a chance to play the Joker on the first round. If the leader cannot exhaust the trumps with one or two rounds, it will sometimes be to his advantage to lead any losing card he may have in the plain suits, in order to let his partners win the trick if they can. In playing alone, it is absolutely necessary to exhaust the trumps before opening a plain suit. Partners should avail themselves of the methods common to four-handed Euchre to support one another in trumps and plain suits. The discard should invariably be from weakness if the player is the bidder’s partner; and from strength, if opposed to him. _=EUCHRE FOR FIVE PLAYERS.=_ This is practically the same as the seven-handed game, but the pack is reduced to 28 cards, all below the Eight in each suit being deleted.
As Frage is no longer played on account of its small value, if the player takes both the skat cards into his hand at the same time, without showing them, his game must be a Gucki Grand, unless he has previously announced that it is a Gucki Nullo. His game announced, he lays out any two cards he pleases for his skat, so as to play with ten only. If the player turns over either of the skat cards, his game is limited to a tourné. If he turns a Jack, he may change to Grand, but not to Grand Ouvert. Neither schneider nor schwarz can be announced in any game in which the skat cards are used. A tourné player must lay out two skat cards to reduce his hand to ten cards. If the player neither turns over nor takes into his hand either of the skat cards, he may play any of the suit Solos, Grand Solo, Grand Ouvert, Nullo, or Null Ouvert. He may announce schneider or schwarz in any Solo. Any player looking at the skat cards before the beginning of the play is debarred from bidding that deal, and is penalised ten points in the score. In addition to this penalty, either of the other players may demand a fresh deal.
| -- | -- |You shall have a | | | | |drake. | | 21.| -- | -- | -- | | 22.| -- | -- | -- | | 23.| -- |All sorts of colours | -- | | | |lying by his side. | | |[8.]|We ll all go roving. | -- | -- | | 24.| -- | -- |You shall have a young| | | | |man. | | 25.
Should a player be found during or at the end of a hand to be a card short, all the others having the right number, and all having played to the first trick, he shall be compelled to take in the last trick. 18. If a player leads or plays two cards to a trick, he must indicate the one intended, and leave the other face up on the table. Any card exposed, except in the proper course of play, or any card named by the player holding it, must be left face up on the table. 19. A player must lead or play any exposed card when called upon to do so by any other player, provided he can do so without revoking. He cannot be prevented from playing an exposed card, and if he can so get rid of it, no penalty remains. 20. If a player leads out of turn, a suit may be called from him when it is next his proper turn to lead. This penalty can be enforced only by the player on his right.
=_ The Germans call this Wimmeln, or “swarming” the points together in one trick. It is always advisable to get rid of Tens in this way, or Aces of suits in which you hold both Ace and Ten; but it is bad play to fatten with the Ace of a suit of which you have not the Ten, unless the trick wins the game from the player, or saves a very probable schneider. The following _=Illustrative Hands=_ will give the student a very good idea of the manner in which the various forms of the game are played, showing the difference in the play of a Tourné, Solo, and Grand. _=A TOURNÉ.=_ A, Vorhand, has refused ten with the following cards, Hinterhand having passed without a bid:-- [Illustration: 🃛 🂻 🂺 🂾 🃑 🃞 🃁 🃇 🂪 🂩 ] A concludes to play a Tourné, and turns the heart ♡ Q, finding the ♢ King in the Skat. He lays out the ♠ 10 and ♠ 9 in the Skat, and expects to make 12 points; a heart Tourné, with one Matadore. The play is given in the margin. A is the player, and is also Vorhand, with the lead for the first trick. Hearts are trumps. A TOURNÉ +---+-------+-------+-------+-----+ | | A | B | C | A | | | | | |wins.
If the third hand plays before the second, the fourth may play before the second also. If the fourth hand plays before his partner, third hand not having played, the trick may be claimed by the adversaries, regardless of who wins it; but the player who actually wins it leads for the next trick. If a player has a card of the suit led, and neither follows suit nor plays a trump, it is a _=revoke=_; and, if detected and claimed by the adversaries, neither the player in error nor his partner can score any points that hand; but the hand may be played out to prevent the adversaries from scoring everything. If an adversary of the bidder revokes, the bidder’s side scores all points it makes, regardless of the number bid. For instance: A has bid nine; and Y revokes. A-B make eight only, which they score, Y-Z scoring nothing. When a player renounces, his partner should ask him if he is void of the suit. If any player abandons his hand, the cards in it may be exposed and called by the adversaries. The practice of throwing down the hand as soon as one renounces to trumps, cannot be too strongly condemned. All _=exposed cards=_, such as cards dropped on the table; two or more played at once; cards led out of turn; or cards named by the player holding them, must be left face up on the table, and are liable to be called by the adversaries, unless they can be previously got rid of in the course of play.
Y accepts him, and the pair win only nine tricks. Each pays 135 counters to the adversary sitting next him, and then they make up 135 more between them for the pool. Asking for a partner is not a popular variation of the game, and is seldom resorted to unless the successful bid is very low, or has been made on a black suit. If the adversaries of the caller declare to pay, before playing to the second trick, they can save nothing but possible over-tricks. The pool goes with every successful play. If the single player is unsuccessful, he does not double the pool, as in Boston, but pays into it the same amount that he loses to each adversary, over-tricks and all; so that he really loses four times the amount shown in the table. At the end of the game, or on the twelfth hand, if the caller does not succeed, he pays the pool as usual, and his adversaries then divide it amongst themselves. The _=Suggestions for Good Play=_, etc., are given in connection with Solo Whist and need no further amplification for Boston de Fontainbleau. The _=Laws=_ vary so little from those used in the regular game of Boston that it is not necessary to give an additional code, either for Fontainbleau or for French Boston, which follows.
Addy (_Sheffield Glossary_) gives the first two lines as a game. He says, The first horse in a team conveying lead to be smelted wore bells, and was called the bell-horse. I remember when a child the two first lines being used to start children a race (A. B. G.). Chambers (_Pop. Rhymes_, p. 148) gives a similar verse, used for starting a race:-- Race horses, race horses, what time of day? One o clock, two o clock, three, and away; and these lines are also used for the same purpose in Cheshire (Holland s _Glossary_) and Somersetshire (Elworthy s _Glossary_). Halliwell, on the strength of the corrupted word Bellasay, connects the game with a proverbial saying applied to the family of Bellasis; but there is no evidence of such a connection except the word-corruption.
--_Shropshire Folk-lore_, p. 525. Cache-pole The game of Tennis. --Jamieson. Caiche The game of Handball. Thocht I preich nocht I can play at the caiche. I wait thair is nocht ane among you all Mair ferilie can play at the fute ball. --Lyndsay s _S. P. Repr_.
King o the Castle One boy is chosen as King. He mounts on any convenient height, a knoll, or dyke, or big stone, and shouts-- A m King o the Castle, An fah (who) ll ding (knock) me doon? The players make a rush at the King, and try to pull him down. A tussle goes on for a longer or a shorter time, according to the strength of the King and his skill in driving off his assailants. The boy that displaces the King becomes King, and is in his turn assaulted in the same way. The game may go on for any length of time. Another form of words is-- I m the King o the Castle, An nane can ding me doon. --Keith (Rev. W. Gregor). Other words sung by the Scotch children are-- I, Willy Wastle, Stand on my castle, And a the dogs o your toon Will no drive Willie Wastle doon.