being of that day that there was anything wonderful in it. Now to be able to play, say, first a ten, and then a deuce intentionally-to do so by accident does not obtain quite so much Kudos-is considered what an honest man used to be considered in my younger days. N.B.-Always signal with your highest card, pause before you play it, then put it down with an air, if possible have a special corner of the table reserved for it, and as soon as the trick is turned asked to see it. I am aware the difficulty is almost superhuman, so much so that it is becoming customary to mention at the time to your partner that you have actually done so. "Partner, it shall be attended to " is the usual formula. Whatever the result may be, no blame rests with you; you, at any rate, are free from all selfreproach.

It is an odd thing when swindling is colossal, policies imperial, firms smashing on a scale previously unknown, when the stakes at Whist are hourly becoming bigger and bigger, that the play should be going back to that Jewish period when they tithed the mint and the cummin, and neglected everything else. Mint has its uses, it is all very well in pea soup, it is not bad with lamb, some people meanly attempt to disguise mutton with it, but that fines herbes are omelettes is a damnable doctine and position, and it is a monstrous error to imagine that they are the only ingredients required for dinner: minute absurdities, useful to a few assorted members of the United Whist Club, who know everything, have come in some extraordinary way to be looked upon as the be-all and end-all of the game by the general public who know nothing, and the end is Chaos. After this Jeremiad, you would naturally suppose that I should sing with the poet,

Παντα γελως, και παντα κόνις, και παντα το μηδεν,
Παντα γαρ ἐξ ἀλογων ἐστι τα γιγνόμενα;

Crying woe is an exploded witticism, that apostrophe to Emma is out of date, and the subject of it has long been superseded by Miss Lee. Still I don't despair of the republic; like all monomaniacs I have an infallible specific, though there has been no real improvement in Whist since the time of Matthews, and though I believe there never will be as long as the most pernicious custom of allowing a man to look at the last trick exists; if that were done away with there would be more general improvement in a week than there has been in all these years. PEMBRIDGE.

P.S.-I omitted one advantage to be derived from signalling with three small trumps and a short suit, signal! I have seen an astute friend of ours, by this means, induce the adversaries to force him to make all his trumps. This coup is not recommended for general consumption, but only on the supposition that you are playing the best Whist, which, as "J. C." says, is, when you thoroughly know your men.

CONSIDERATIONS WHICH MAY ASSIST IN THE AVOIDANCE OF BICKERING AT THE WHIST TABLE.

I suppose that all the writing in the world would not put a stop to the unpleasant remarks and exhibitions of temper which are the too frequent concomitants of card playing. Still it may be useful to bring forward certain considerations which, if deflected, may tend to prevent these unpleasantries, and surely if they were to be prevented or greatly mollified even only in one instance, the writing of volumes would be sufficiently justified.

Now the first consideration that ought, I think, to occur to a whist player at the end of a hand, in which, according to his view, his partner may have made even the grossest blunder, thereby re-losing the game and perhaps also the rubber, is the irrevocable nature of the matter. The thing is past;

it is over; it is done with. Nothing can alter it. It is absolutely irrevocable, and nothing that can be said can make the slightest difference. Then why say anything? Well, I think the player reasons thus. It is true that what is done cannot be undone; but then, if I point out to my partner his error, perhaps he will avoid it in future. Now I think this is a mistake. If a player does not perceive his error himself, and himself makes up his mind that henceforth he will be more careful and avoid the error, all the lecturing in the world will fail to do him any good. He will probably be flurried and worried, and be more likely to make another mistake than if nothing had been said.

A further point should also be borne in mind, and it is this. I take it that whatever card, or in whatever way your partner played, he so played because he thought it was the best thing to do, and the most likely to win. Did a man ever deliberately play badly on purpose to lose? Bearing in mind, then, this consideration, what right have you to pitch into your partner on a sort of assumption that he really tried to lose or did not try to win? The effect of so doing is frequently to cause him to play badly afterwards. A player of weak judgment in a critical position will often play very well in an ordinary position; but after he has been remonstrated with for playing what appeared to him-after probably some consideration-the right card, he will hesitate to trust his judgment when very likely he has come to a correct conclusion on a subsequent occasion, and will play badly entirely in consequence of the remarks to which he has been subjected.

Again, a player should bear in mind his own mistakes, and should remember that if the partner he has is

inferior to him, he may presently find himself the partner of a superior player, and may require all the forbearance which a short time previously he did not extend to another.

Then, again, the Whist player should remember that inequality, as regards the goodness of the players, is as much an order of nature as inequality in the capacities of persons with whom he has to do in everyday life, and it is one of the conditions under which he sits down to play that he takes the partner chance gives him, and it is really childish to sit down deliberately to play under certain well-known and clearly accepted conditions, and then to become peevish when what is exceedingly probable under these conditions happens.

In conclusion, I will only add this observation-that it is a good thing for the purpose respecting which I have been writing to try and get ingrained in your mind that to pitch into your partner at Whist is as bad and H. M. P. unpolitic, and I may say as impossible a thing to do as it would be to revoke.

WHIST POINTS SINCE CLAY.

To the Editor of THE WESTMINSTER PAPERs.

SIR, Certain points respecting the play at Whist have arisen since Clay wrote his treatise, others have been passed over by him, and others are treated by him in a way that requires some further comment or elucidation. I propose to make some few observations on two or three of such points.

In the first place, with reference to "asking for trumps." Assuming you take Clay's rule-by which, however, a great many modern players refuse to be bound-for your guide, that is to say, you only ask for trumps when you have four trumps, two honours, or five trumps, one honour, with other cards in your own or your partner's hand, making a trump lead desirable, are you justified in considering that you are acting on that rule if you ask for trumps when your partner has an honour cut him, and you have four trumps and one honour, or five trumps without an honour? The point may occur in connexion with many rules or practices on the subject that may by any particular player have been adopted. As far as I am concerned I think the modification in the rule I have been commenting on should be recognized.

Again, Clay lays it down that if your partner plays a ten, second player, on a low card led, and the next round drops a small card, you must not consider that he has asked for trumps, because the ten may be the regular play—from knave, ten, and another. Now this, I think, requires some modification in statement, for why should I be deprived of signalling for trumps in a case where it might be most important for me to do so, when the suit in which I could ask happened to consist of the ten and a small card only? My partner might have the knave, or it might fall during the two rounds; and in either case, my partner would see that I had played an unnecessarily high card. I think, therefore, the point should be stated as follows:-Your partner playing second hand, on a low card led, a nine, ten, knave, or queen, and afterwards playing a small card, does not ask for trumps, unless you know that the ten, knave, queen, or king, is not in his hand. If you know this, then your partner has clearly asked for trumps.

I do not refer to the king and another, as so many players consider it proper in this case to put on the king second hand; and there are other objections to asking with such a suit. Here, however, I may perhaps remark, that after the conclusive demonstration given by Mogul in the Field some years back, it is surprising that it is still considered right in trumps to play the king second player when the hand has only king and another, and that this is certainly one of the points in respect of which the rule of Clay should not only be amended but reversed.

Clay says too that you cannot ask for trumps except in the first round of a suit, otherwise, he remarks, there would be an end to playing false cards, which he declines to say should never be played. Now I think this statement is too absolute, for trumps may very well be asked for with small cards late in the hand, and whether you should ask or not with higher cards is a question of judgment depending upon your estimate of the partner you are playing with.

Another point not referred to by Clay, but treated in part by Cavendish, is the question which card you should play when you play back your adversaries' lead. In the case of your partner's lead, you return the higher of two cards left, and the lowest of three. Should this rule be followed in playing back your adversaries' lead? For the purpose of enabling your partner to count your cards following this rule is useful; but when the card would be a strengthening card for the adversary, to return it would seem to be playing the adversaries game, and I think therefore that no universal rule such as that respecting the return of your partner's lead should be made on the subject, but the point must be left to the player's discretion.

Again the language used by Clay in laying down the rule respecting the card to return to your partner has led, and still continually leads, to much misapprehension. Clay says return your partner the highest card when you had originally three of the suit, and the lowest when you had originally four or more of the suit. In conse

quence of this statement many players after discarding or trumping, still return their partner the lower of the two cards left in their hands because they had originally four cards of the suit. This is clearly wrong, and the rule is more accurately stated by Cavendish. Clay should have said when you have at the time you return your partner's lead two cards of that suit, return the higher; and when at the time in question you have three or more return the lowest.

From observation in play it has occurred to me that with Queen and two small cards it is inexpedient when second player to cover, but this point requires more consideration than I have just now time to give to it, and I should be glad if any of the readers of THE WESTMINSTER PAPERS would go into the question, and state the conclusion they come to. Yours, &c., H. M. P.

To the Editor of “ THE WESTMINSTER PAPERS."

DEAR SIR,-The answer in the November number of “Tнe WestminstER PAPERS," as to the chances of a player holding the four honours does not seem to be quite accurate.

12'11'10'9 5150°49′48

11'3 " 17'5'49'4

X

4 4'11
But the chances
13 17 5 49
and the chance of his not

9x

1173

and the

13 17'5'49'4'

77

or

216

nearly.

The chances of the dealer turning an honour and then holding the other three are of the dealer having four honours when he has not turned up one = turning an honour. His chance therefore of not turning an honour and holding four dealer's total chance of holding the four honours = 13'17 5 49 10+) 13175 49 4 17'5'49'4 16660 And the odds are 215 to 1 against him. The chances of a non dealer holding four honours are as you say: or 377 to 1 against him. The chances of the dealer having four by honours when it is seen that he has turned an about, or between 93 and 94 to 1 against him.

1775'49

4'11 honour=

The chances before the cards are dealt that one of the four players will have four honoursor 78 to 1 against it.

Yours, &c.

44

17 5 49 4165 94

EXPORTED, 1876.-20,109 dozen packs, value £5,444. 1877 (To all Countries not particularised).31,897 dozen packs, value £5,014.

The stamp duty paid on playing cards for home use was £14,139 135. 3d. for the year ending 31st March, 1878.

LA REVUE DES ARTS ET DU SPORT.*

WF have received the first number of a French illustrated journal devoted to games and sporting matters. The subjects treated of include Whist, Chess, and Draughts, but there is not sufficient serious matter in the Whist department to require criticism. The authors introduce themselves on the stage and walk off again, and we have no means of judging their acting powers. The problem we cannot understand. It is stated that 2 of Hearts (trumps) is led; second player follows with the 8. The third hand is given as follows :—

܀܀܀

and the question is how ought third hand to play. We confess we cannot see the point and we shall await with some curiosity the explanation thereof.

The Chess, under the control of Herr Rosenthal, is sure to be good.

DRAMATIC NOTES.

On the 6th of last month died Samuel Phelps, the greatest actor of his day, the most enterprising manager-so far as regards the works of Shakespeare-the stage has perhaps ever known, and a man who, in his public and private life, was an ornament to his profession. To say less than this would be doing scant justice to a man who for many years, by his acting and his managerial work, exercised over young and ardent playgoers, amongst whom the present writer was proud to number himself, a fascination equal to, and perhaps greater than that felt by the youthful enthusiasts of to-day for Mr. Irving. Excellent indeed as Phelps was of late years in his occasional appearances on the stage, though loss of vigour and difficulty of memory were easily apparent to those who had known and admired, and, maybe, half-worshipped him in older days, it is by the memory of his acting at Sadler's Wells, and before that time, that he will be rightly estimated as the legitimate successor to the long line of stage kings, and as being unquestionably superior to any actor now upon the stage. There are some critics who, whilst allowing the excellence of his comic impersonations, decry his tragic efforts, forgetting that even if he was better in comedy than in tragedy, he was yet superior in his tragedy to any of his contemporaries. Nor will his fame rest on his acting alone, for as manager of Sadler's Wells he showed his devotion to Shakespeare, and his zeal for the greatest of dramatists by producing thirty-one out of the thirty-seven plays attributed to the bard. All these plays were presented in a fitting manner as regards acting, scenic accessories, and correctness of costume; and when we consider the toil, the research, the difficulties of management involved in these achievements, in addition to the mental strain caused by the impersonation of the chief character in each play, we stand amazed at the strength, courage, and versatility of the man who performed such wonders, we feel that in his double capacity of actor and manager the stage has perhaps never known his equal, and we ask ourselves whether justice was done to him when alive, and whether he did not deserve at his death a more national recognition than fell to his lot. It is true that Phelps did not lay himself out for popular applause, and that an actor, who has, to some extent, outlived his fame, is soon forgotten by the world at large; but this very modesty, coupled with his well-ordered life, contrasted as it is with those of some of his great predecessors, might surely have ensured him on the one hand a more outspoken praise from Shakspearian scholars and commentators, and on the other hand some publicly-expressed thanks of those who are always talking of a reformed stage. No man that ever lived did more than Phelps to make the stage a public benefit, but we cannot call to mind that his name was ever mentioned at a Church Congress, either by attackers of the stage in qualification of their censure, or by defenders of it, to strengthen their defence. The Saturday Review, which professes to be an exponent of art, literature and science, can find room for an article on the paltry, pitiful Rousby-Bandmann case, but has not even chronicled the death, and is absolutely silent as to the career, of an actor who lived a clean life, and did more, in a practical way, to bring Shakespeare within the intelligence of the masses than the whole body of commentators put together. Equally silent is the Spectator. Can it be true that in matters of art the press is ruled by cliques fashionable, and "sweetness and light" cliques, and that as Phelps ignored these during his lifetime, the literary press-the Athenæum excepted-ignores him at his death. His funeral was attended by a single dramatic critic of any note,

* De Riviere & Co.: Paris.