If he draws out of turn, he must restore the card improperly drawn, and if it belongs to his adversary, the player in error must show his own card. If both draw the wrong cards there is no remedy, and each must keep what he gets. If the loser of any trick draws and looks at two cards from the stock, his adversary may look at both cards of the following draw, and may select either for himself. If he chooses the second card, which his adversary has not seen, he need not show it. If, on account of some undetected irregularity, an even number of cards remain in the stock, the last card must not be drawn. The winner of the trick takes the last but one, and the loser takes the trump card. _=OBJECTS OF THE GAME.=_ The aim of each player is to reach 1000 points before his adversary, and the one first reaching that number, and announcing it, wins the game. Points are scored for _=dix=_, _=melds=_, the _=last trick=_, and for _=cards=_, which are the counting cards in tricks won. _=Melds.
* * * * * The girl was a mess. Some women have no style because they don t even know what it means. Courturiers have taught them all to be lean and hungry-looking. This chicken was underfed in a way that wasn t stylish. They call it malnutrition. Her strapless gown didn t fit her, nor anybody within twenty pounds of her weight. She was all shoulder blades and collarbones. I suppose that a decent walk would have given her _some_ charm--most of these hustlers have a regular Swiss Movement. But this thing had a gait that tied in with the slack way her skirt hung across her pelvic bones and hollered White Trash! at you. I wasn t much flattered that she had tried to pick me up.
| | | | | | | +------+ +-----+ +-----+ +-----+ ] When three play, the cards are dealt in much the same manner; two separate hands of six cards being given to each player. When four, five, six, seven, or eight play, the cards are dealt in rotation from left to right until the pack is exhausted, the last card being turned up for the trump. When five or seven play, either the spade 6 must be thrown out of the pack, or the thirty-sixth card must be shown, after the dealer has turned the thirty-fifth for the trump. When eight play, all four sixes are deleted. The deal passes to the left, each player dealing in turn until the game is finished. The general rules with regard to irregularities in the deal are the same as at Whist. _=STAKES.=_ When stakes are played for, they are for so much a game. Rubbers are not played. It is usual to form a pool, each player depositing the stake agreed upon, and the winner taking all.
If the leader wins it, he gets the one extra. If each player wins six tricks, there is no further scoring; but if either player wins the _=odd trick=_ he adds to his score ten points for _=cards=_, in addition to all other scores. If either player wins all twelve tricks, which would be the case in the example hand just given as an illustration, he adds to his score forty points for the _=capot=_; but this forty points includes the scores for the last trick and for the odd trick. A card once laid on the table cannot be taken back, unless the player has renounced in error. There is no _=revoke=_ in Piquet, and if a player has one of the suit led he must play it. If he fails to do so, when the error is discovered the cards must be taken back and replayed. _=REPIC.=_ If either player is able to reach 30 by successive declarations, beginning with the point, all of which are admitted by his adversary to be good, he adds 60 to his score, making it 90 instead of 30, and this is irrespective of what his adversary may have in minor or inferior combinations. The important thing to remember in repic is that declarations always count in regular order, carte blanche taking precedence of everything; then the point, sequences, and quatorze or trio. Suppose elder hand to hold the following cards:-- ♡ K Q J 10 9; ♣ A K Q; ♢ A Q 9; ♠ Q.
It sometimes happens that a player with the Ten may be fourth hand on a suit of which he has none; or he may catch the Ten with a small honour if it is used in trumping in. The partnership games offer many fine opportunities for playing the Ten into the partner’s hand, especially when it is probable that he has the best trump, or a better trump than the player on the left. In calculating the probabilities of saving the Ten by trumping in, it must be remembered that the greater the number of players, the less chance there is that a suit will go round more than once, because there are only nine cards of each suit in play. Many players, in their anxiety to catch the Ten, overlook the possibilities of their hands in making cards, the count for which often runs into high figures. Close attention should be paid to the score. For instance: A wants 4 points to win; B wants 10; and C wants 16. If A can see his way to win the game by cards or small honours, he should take the first opportunity of giving C the Ten; or allowing him to make it in preference to B. As the Ten counts first, cards and honours next, B may be shut out, even if he has the Jack. _=LAWS.=_ There are no special laws for Scotch Whist.
Mr. Newell (_Games_, p. 124) gives a version sung in the streets of New York, and considers it to be a relic of antiquity, a similar round being given in _Deuteromelia_, 1609. Jowls A game played by boys, much the same as Hockey, and taking its name, no doubt, from the mode of playing, which consists in striking a wooden ball or knorr from the ground in any given direction with a sufficiently heavy stick, duly curved at the striking end.--Atkinson s _Cleveland Glossary_. It is also given in _Yorkshire Glossary_ (Whitby). See Bandy, Doddart, Hockey. Jud A game played with a hazel nut bored and run upon a string.--Dickinson s _Cumberland Glossary_. Probably the same game as Conkers.
M. Let me (or leave me ) look at your hands, child. Why, they are very dirty. E. D. I will go to the well and wash them. She goes to the corner, the Ghost peeps up, and she rushes back, crying out-- Mother! mother! I have seen a Ghost. M. Nonsense, child! it was only your father s nightshirt I have washed and hung out to dry. Go again.
2nd. Leading from the longest suit, in order that higher cards may be forced out of the way of smaller ones, leaving the smaller ones “established,” or good for tricks after the adverse trumps are exhausted. This is called the _=long-suit game=_. 3rd. Trumping good cards played by the adversaries. This is called _=ruffing=_. When two partners each trump a different suit, it is called a _=cross-ruff=_, or _=saw=_. 4th. Taking advantage of the _=tenace=_ possibilities of the hand by placing the lead with a certain player; or by avoiding the necessity of leading away from tenace suits. For example: A player holds A Q 10 of a suit, his right hand adversary holding K J 9.
It is started by two players who stand opposite each other, the ball lying between their two sticks. They first touch the ground with their hockey-sticks, then they touch or strike their opponents stick. This is repeated three times. At the third stroke they both try to hit the ball away. The ball may only be played by a hockey-stick, and a goal is gained when the ball is played between the posts by the opposing party.--Barnes (A. B. Gomme). (_b_) In Ross and Stead s _Holderness Glossary_ this game is described under the name of Shinnup. Robinson (_Mid Yorkshire Glossary_) gives it under Shinnops, a youth s game with a ball and stick, heavy at the striking end, the player man[oe]uvring to get as many strokes as possible and to drive the ball distances.
When all three have refused, each a different suit, the end game becomes a question of generalship, and the preservation of one or more commanding cards, with which to control and place the lead, is usually the key to the situation. A player who has no high cards for the end game, unless he is quite safe, is almost certain to be loaded in the last few tricks. _=TWO-HANDED HEARTS.=_ Before opening the hand, the player should carefully consider what suits are safe and what are dangerous. It is usually best to preserve the safe suits and to lead the dangerous ones, which you should clear your hand of, if possible. It is a great advantage to have a missing suit, and equally disadvantageous to have a number of a suit of which your adversary is probably clear. If a card of a missing suit is drawn, it is usually best to lead it at once, so as to keep the suit clear; but in so doing, be careful first to place the card among the others in the hand, or your adversary will detect that it is a missing suit. The lead is a disadvantage if you have safe hearts; but toward the end of the stock, from which cards are drawn, it is an advantage to have commanding cards, with which you can assume the lead if necessary. There is some finesse in determining whether or not to change the suit often in the leads. If you have a better memory than your adversary, it may be well to change often; but if not, it may assist you to keep at one suit until afraid to lead it again.
It may be observed that each of these is twice the amount of the next lower. When misère partout is played, the person winning the largest number of tricks is the only loser, and he must pay each of the other players the difference between the number of his tricks and theirs in red counters. The number of red counters lost will always be found to be three times the number of tricks taken, minus the number of tricks not taken. For instance: A wins 4 tricks, three times which is 12; from which he deducts 9, the number he did not take, and finds his loss to be 3 red counters. Again; A wins 7 tricks; three times which is 21; minus 6 tricks not taken, a net loss of 15. No matter in what proportion the other tricks may be divided between the three other players, this total payment will always be found correct. For instance: A wins 6 tricks; Y 2; B 5; and Z none. A loses 6 x 3 = 18-7 = 11, of which he gives 4 to Y; 1 to B; and 6 to Z. If two players tie for the greatest number of tricks taken, they calculate their losses in the same manner; but each pays only half the total. For instance: A and Y each take 5 tricks; B taking 1, and Z 2.
It might be imagined that a card exposed in dealing, if dealt to Mort, would make no difference, as all his cards will presently be exposed. But the laws give the opponents of the dealer the option of either allowing the deal to stand, or having a new deal, or calling it a misdeal. According to the French laws, if there is any discussion in progress with regard to the previous hand or play, the dealer may lay aside the trump card, face down, until the discussion is finished. If this law prevailed in America, I think the trump would very seldom be turned immediately. _=STAKES.=_ In Mort the stake is a unit, so much a point. It may assist players in regulating the value of the stake to remember that six is the smallest number of points that can be won or lost on a single game, and that thirty-seven is probably the highest, although fifty, or even a hundred is not impossible. The average is about twelve. The same customs as at whist prevail with regard to outside betting. The Vivant must pay or receive double, as he has to settle with each adversary.
=_ Should a player think he can take all seven tricks without any partners, he may bid _=ten=_, which would outrank a bid of seven; but such a bid must be made before seeing the widow. If a player thinks he can win all seven tricks without either widow or partners, he may bid _=twenty=_, which is the highest bid possible. When twenty is bid the cards in the widow must remain untouched. _=Playing.=_ The successful bidder has the lead for the first trick. The general rules for following suit, etc., are the same as in ordinary Euchre. The bidder takes in all the tricks won by himself and his partners, and one of the adversaries should gather for that side. If a player on either side _=revokes=_, the adversaries score the number bid, and the hand is abandoned. _=Scoring.
119, 137, gives two versions of a courtship dance which are not unlike the words of this game, though they do not contain the principal incidents. Northall, in his _English Folk Rhymes_, p. 363, has some verses of a similar import, but not those of the game. W. Allingham seems to have used this rhyme as the commencement of one of his ballads, Up the airy mountain. (_d_) The game is clearly a marriage game. It introduces two important details in the betrothal ceremony, inasmuch as the huddling and cuddling is typical of the rude customs at marriage ceremonies once prevalent in Yorkshire, the northern counties, and Wales, while the making of the pudding by the bride and the subsequent eating together, are clearly analogies to the bridal-cake ceremony. In Wales, the custom known as bundling allowed the betrothing parties to go to bed in their clothes (Brand, ii. 98). In Yorkshire, the bridal cake was always made by the bride.
If a player is found to have too few cards after the draw, he may still play and count all he can make, but he cannot win a capot, because he has no card for the last trick, which must be won by his adversary. _=The Stock.=_ If a player looks at one of his adversary’s cards in the stock before or during the draw, he can count nothing that hand. If he looks at a card left in the talon after the draw, which he is not entitled to see, his adversary may call a suit from him as many times as he has seen cards. If a card of the talon is accidentally exposed, the player to whom it would naturally belong may demand a fresh deal. _=OBJECTS OF THE GAME.=_ In order to understand the principles that guide players in discarding, the objects of the game must first be explained. There are three classes of counting combinations at Piquet, and the player that holds the better of each class, scores it. These combinations are: Point; Sequence; Fours and Triplets. _=The Point=_ is the suit having the greatest pip value, reckoning the Ace as 11, court cards as 10 each, and the 10 9 8 7 at their face value.
Let the rules as to gun-fire be as they are now, but let a different projectile be used--a projectile that will drop down and stay where it falls. I find that one can buy in ironmongers shops small brass screws of various sizes and weights, but all capable of being put in the muzzle of the 4 7 guns without slipping down the barrel. If, with such a screw in the muzzle, the gun is loaded and fired, the wooden bolt remains in the gun and the screw flies and drops and stays near where it falls--its range being determined by the size and weight of screw selected by the gunner. Let us assume this is a shell, and it is quite easy to make a rule that will give the effect of its explosion. Half, or, in the case of an odd number, one more than half, of the men within three inches of this shell are dead, and if there is a gun completely within the circle of three inches radius from the shell, it is destroyed. If it is not completely within the circle, it is disabled for two moves. A supply waggon is completely destroyed if it falls wholly or partially within the radius. But if there is a wall, house, or entrenchment between any men and the shell, they are uninjured--they do not count in the reckoning of the effect of the shell. I think one can get a practical imitation of the effect of rifle-fire by deciding that for every five infantry-men who are roughly in a line, and who do not move in any particular move, there may be one (ordinary) shot taken with a 4 7 gun. It may be fired from any convenient position behind the row of five men, so long as the shot passes roughly over the head of the middle man of the five.
The opener of the jack pot has exactly the same chance, and if both of you draw cards a hundred times under those circumstances, he will beat you in the long run, to say nothing of the other players who may come in and beat both of you. It is therefore evident that in backing tens against openers, it is four to one against your beating the openers to begin with, and if you do beat them the odds are still against your winning the pot. If there were five players, and the jack pots were all equal in amount, you would have to win one pot out of five to make your investment pay. Can you make this average when your original pair will not beat openers? There are three principles with regard to the draw that should never be lost sight of: (1) An average go-in hand is a hand which will win its proportion of the pools, according to the number playing, taking all improvements and opposition into account. This can be demonstrated to be a pair of tens. (2) The draw is much more valuable to a weak hand than to a strong one, and weak hands will improve in much greater proportion than strong ones will. For instance: The chances for a player to improve by drawing to a pair of Queens are one in three and a half. He may make two pairs, or triplets, or a full hand, or four of a kind. The chances of improvement for a player drawing to two pairs, say Eights up, are only one in thirteen. This consideration leads players to adopt two lines of play: To bet all they intend to on two pairs before the draw, in order to prevent weaker hands drawing cards and improving; or, to discard the smaller pair in order to increase their chances of improvement.
How many miles to Hebron? Three score and ten. Shall I be there by midnight? Yes, and back again. Then thread the needle, &c. The game is also described in _Notes and Queries_, iv. 141, as played in the same way as above, and the writer adds there are subsequent evolutions by which each couple becomes in succession the eye of the needle. Howly A street game played by boys in a town, one of them hiding behind a wall or house-end, and crying Howly to the seekers.--Atkinson s _Cleveland Glossary_. See Hide and Seek. Huckie-buckie down the Brae Children in Lothian have a sport in which they slide down a hill, sitting on their hunkers (Jamieson). The well-known custom at Greenwich is probably the same game, and there are examples at Tumbling Hill, a few miles from Exeter, at May Pole Hill, near Gloucester, and other places.
Playing high cards to the best advantage, so as to secure the best results from such combinations as may be held. This is the basis of all _=systems of leading=_. 2nd. Leading from the longest suit, in order that higher cards may be forced out of the way of smaller ones, leaving the smaller ones “established,” or good for tricks after the adverse trumps are exhausted. This is called the _=long-suit game=_. 3rd. Trumping good cards played by the adversaries. This is called _=ruffing=_. When two partners each trump a different suit, it is called a _=cross-ruff=_, or _=saw=_. 4th.
_=False Angles.=_ In playing bank shots it is sometimes necessary to make the object ball come back from the cushion at a smaller angle than the natural one. Some players imagine this can be done by putting side on the cue ball, but such is not the case. It is accomplished by striking so hard that the ball buries itself in the cushion, the result of which is that the angle of reflection is less than that of incidence. It is possible to drive an object ball to the rail at an angle of 60 degrees with such force that after crossing the table twice it will come off at a perfect right angle from the cushion. This is a very useful shot in banking for the side pockets, and also in playing for the 1 or 4 pin at Pin Pool. The following _=LAWS=_ for Fifteen-Ball Pool are copied, by permission, from the 1908 edition of the rules published by the Brunswick-Balke-Collender Co. _=1.=_ The game of Fifteen-Ball Pool is played with fifteen balls numbered from one to fifteen, respectively, and one white ball not numbered. The latter is the cue-ball, and at the opening of the game, the player plays with it from within the string at the head of the table, at any of the numbered balls, and afterward as he finds it on the table, his object being to pocket as many of the numbered balls as he can, the number on each ball he pockets being scored to his credit; so that not he who pockets the largest number of balls, but he whose score, when added up, yields the largest total, wins the game.