If more than four candidates offer for play, five or six may form a table; if there are more than six, the selection of the table must be made by cutting, as at Whist. _=CUTTING.=_ The four persons who shall play the first game are determined by cutting, and they again cut for the deal, with the choice of seats and cards. The player drawing the lowest card deals, and chooses his seat; the next lower card sits on his left, and so on, until all are seated. Twelve deals is a game, at the end of which the players cut to decide which shall go out, as at Whist. It is usual to count the deals by opening the blade of a pocket-knife, which is placed on the table by the player on the dealer’s right. When it comes to his turn to deal, he partly opens one blade. When he deals again he opens it entirely, and the third time he closes it; that being the third round, and the last deal of the game. [Illustration: FOURTH DEAL. EIGHTH DEAL.
=_ The names of the four players should be written at the head of each score-card, and as there is no trump turned in memory duplicate, the third and seventh columns can both be used for the numbers of the players that are partners, and the sixth column for the N & S gains. When the match is finished, a tabulation of the tricks lost or won by each player will readily show which is the winner. In the illustration which we give, No. 3 finishes plus 6; No. 4 plus 2; No. 1 minus 4; and No. 2 minus 4. [Illustration: MANHATTAN WHIST CLUB Table No. 31 May 1896 1. Chinery 3.
=_ If the superfluous card is found in the crib, and the non-dealer had the short hand, the dealer may reckon all the combinations he can make in the six-card crib; but if it was the dealer who had the short hand, the superfluous crib is void. If the crib contains a superfluous card, both the players having their right number, the non-dealer pegs two holes for the evident misdeal, and the crib is void. If both players have their right number, and the crib is short, it must be shown for what it is worth; but the non-dealer pegs two holes for the evident misdeal. _=Irregular Announcements.=_ There is no penalty if a player announces a wrong number as the total of the cards played, provided he does not peg an erroneous fifteen or thirty-one. If the following player does not correct the announcement, but plays and adds to it, the error cannot be rectified. If any holes are pegged for an erroneous announcement, the adversary may demand that they be taken down again, and may add the number to his own score. _=Miscounting.=_ If a player over-counts his hand, crib, or play, and pegs the points erroneously claimed, his adversary may call attention to the error, demand that the superfluous points be taken down again, and may add them to his own score as penalty. Should a player neglect to peg the full value of his hand, crib, or play, his adversary may add the neglected points to his own score, after pointing out the omission.
Many opportunities arise for leading the Ace first from a short suit, in order to secure a ruff on the second or third round. _=Second Hand Play.=_ If any card is led by the adversaries which the fourth hand cannot win, the second hand should cover it if possible; for unless he does so, his weakness will be exposed, and the suit will be continued. This is especially true of cases in which the second hand holds single honours, such as Jack and others, or Queen and others. Even the King should be played second hand in such cases, unless it is so well guarded that the Ace must fall before the King can be forced out. If the fourth hand can win the card led, it is seldom necessary to cover second hand. For instance: If the Jack of trumps is led, the dealer holding Q 9 7 4, and Dummy having A 6 3 2; there is no need to play the Queen. If the King is in third hand, such play would establish the Ten. If the King is with the leader, it or the Ten must make. If Dummy were second hand with the same cards, Jack being led, he should not play the Ace, for third hand must play the King to shut out the Queen.
| | 2.| -- | -- | -- | | 3.| -- | -- | -- | | 4.|For my lady s |Send a lady a |For my lady s | | |daughter. |daughter. |daughter. | | 5.| -- | -- | -- | | 6.| -- | -- | -- | | 7.| -- | -- | -- | | 8.
Drop Handkerchief This is a game similar to Cat and Mouse, but takes its name from the use of the handkerchief to start the pursuit. Various rhyming formulæ are used in some places. In Monton, Lancashire (Miss Dendy), no rhyme is used. The children stand in a ring. One runs round with a handkerchief and drops it; the child behind whom it is dropped chases the dropper, the one who gets home first takes the vacant place, the other drops the handkerchief again. In Shropshire the two players pursue one another in and out of the ring, running under the uplifted hands of the players who compose it: the pursuer carefully keeping on the track of the pursued (Burne s _Shropshire Folk-lore_, p. 512). The Dorsetshire variant is accompanied by a rhyme: I wrote a letter to my love; I carried water in my glove; And by the way I dropped it-- I dropped it, I dropped it, I dropped it, &c. This is repeated until the handkerchief is stealthily dropped immediately behind one of the players, who should be on the alert to follow as quickly as possible the one who has dropped it, who at once increases her speed and endeavours to take the place left vacant by her pursuer. Should she be caught before she can succeed in doing this she is compelled to take the handkerchief a second time.
| -- | -- | -- | |12.| -- | -- | -- | |13.|Washed her, dried her,| -- | -- | | |rolled her in silk. | | | |14.| -- |Wash you in milk, |Wash them in milk, | | | |clothe in silk. |clothe in silk. | |15.|Wrote name in glass | -- | -- | | |pen and ink. | | | |16.| -- |Write name in gold pen|Write names in gold | | | |and ink.
_=15.=_ The player has the power to _=huff=_, _=compel the capture=_, or _=let the piece remain on the board=_, as he thinks proper. _=16.=_ When a man first reaches any of the squares on the opposite extreme line of the board, it becomes a King, and can be moved backward or forward as the limits of the board permit, though not in the same play. The adversary must crown the new King, by placing a captured man on the top of it, before he makes his own move. _=17.=_ A player making a false or improper move forfeits the game to his opponent. _=18.=_ When taking, if either player removes one of his own pieces, _=he=_ cannot replace it; but his _=opponent=_ can either play or insist on the man being replaced. _=19.
(ii) But if the inferior force is not isolated (see (1) above), then each man of the inferior force kills a man of the superior force and is himself killed. And the player who has just completed the move, the one who has charged, decides, when there is any choice, which men in the melee, both of his own and of his antagonist, shall die and which shall be prisoners or captors. All these arrangements are made after the move is over, in the interval between the moves, and the time taken for the adjustment does not count as part of the usual interval for consideration. It is extra time. The player next moving may, if he has taken prisoners, move these prisoners. Prisoners may be sent under escort to the rear or wherever the capturer directs, and one man within six inches of any number of prisoners up to seven can escort these prisoners and go with them. Prisoners are liberated by the death of any escort there may be within six inches of them, but they may not be moved by the player of their own side until the move following that in which the escort is killed. Directly prisoners are taken they are supposed to be disarmed, and if they are liberated they cannot fight until they are rearmed. In order to be rearmed they must return to the back line of their own side. An escort having conducted prisoners to the back line, and so beyond the reach of liberation, may then return into the fighting line.