These latter try to slip behind the couple and throw their weight on the joined hands to separate them without being first touched or ticked; and if they sunder the couple, each of the severed ones has to carry one home on his back. Whoever is touched takes the place of the toucher in the linked couple (_Legends of Lancashire_, p. 138). The modern name of this game is Prison Bars (_Ibid._, p. 141). There is also a description of the game in a little tract called _Barley Breake; or, A Warning for Wantons_, 1607. It is mentioned in Wilbraham s _Cheshire Glossary_ as an old Cheshire game. Barnes, in his _Dorsetshire Glossary_, says he has seen it played with one catcher on hands and knees in the small ring (Hell), and the others dancing round the ring crying Burn the wold witch, you barley breech. Holland (_Cheshire Glossary_) also mentions it as an old Cheshire game.
He places them on one side, and picks up the three other dice, throwing them over again. If the second throw produced another six, it would be placed with the first pair, making a triplet, and the two remaining dice would be thrown again. Whatever they produced would be the final value of his hand. The player is not obliged to throw again, if he is satisfied with his first or second throw; neither is he obliged to leave any pairs or triplets. A player getting two small pairs on the first throw may put either or both of them back in the box again if he chooses. In throwing for drinks or cigars, it is usual to throw _=horse and horse=_; that is, if several persons are in the game the highest man on each round goes out, ties shake it off immediately, one hand each. After it gets down to two men, they shake for the best two out of three hands, and if each wins a hand they are horse and horse, and throw a third to decide it. The last person to throw on each round follows his lead, throwing the first hand on the next round. TEN PINS WITH DICE. Any number can play, and the score sheet is ruled off for ten frames, just as in ten pins.
SEC. 2. The dealer must leave the trump card face up until it is his turn to play to the first trick; he must take the trump card into his hand and turn down the trump slip before the second trick is turned and quitted. SEC. 3. When a deal is taken up for overplay, the dealer must show the trump slip to an adversary, and thereafter the trump slip and trump card shall be treated as in the case of an original deal. SEC. 4. After the trump card has been lawfully taken into the hand and the trump slip turned face down, the trump card must not be named nor the trump slip examined during the play of the deal; a player may, however, ask what the trump suit is. SEC.
_=Calling.=_ Those solos are easiest which are declared by the eldest hand, or by the dealer; the hardest being those called by second hand. The safest solos are those called on trump strength; but average trumps and winning cards in the plain suits are more advantageous if the caller is not eldest hand. To call a solo on plain suits alone, with only one or two trumps, is extremely dangerous; and a solo called on a single suit must have at least five or six good trumps in order to succeed. _=PLAYING.=_ When a call has been made entirely upon trump strength, it is much better to make tricks by ruffing, than by leading trumps. There is little use for a solo player to hold a tenace in trumps, hoping it will be led to him. If he has good suits, he should make sure of two rounds of trumps by leading the Ace. When the solo player is depending on the plain suits for tricks, and has one long suit, he should make what winning cards he has in the other plain suits in preference to leading trumps, for his only danger is that his long suit will be led often enough to give his adversaries discards in the other suits. If a proposal was made before the solo was called, it is better for the solo player to sit on the left of the player that proposed.