a well-known game at cards, which requires great attention and silence; hence the name.

This game is played by four persons, who cut for partners; the two highest and the two lowest are together, and the partners sit opposite to each other: the person who cuts the lowest card is to deal first, giving one at a time to each person, till he comes to the last card, which is turned up for the trump, and remains on the table till each person has played a card. The person on the left hand side of the dealer plays first, and whoever wins the trick is to play again, thus going on till the cards are played out. The ace, king, queen, and knave of trumps, are called honours; in case any three of these honours have been played between, or by either of the two partners, they reckon for two points towards the game; and if the four honours have been played between, or by either of the two partners, they reckon for four points towards the game, the game consisting of ten points. The honours are reckoned after the tricks; all above six tricks reckoning also towards the game.

General Rules for playing the Game of Whist.—1. He who is to play first should lead from the strongest suit. If he has a sequence of king, queen, and knave, or queen, knave and ten, he may safely lead the highest of the sequence; but if he has five or six in number, he must begin with the lowest. He must always begin with the highest trump, by which he forces out the superior trumps, and can come in again, to make his strong suit.

2. He should never be afraid to play trumps when he has five in his hand, even of the smallest, although he may not have any good cards of any other suit.

3. With ace and king of any two suits, and only two or three small trumps, the aces and kings should be played out, in order to make as many tricks as possible; and having but two or three small trumps, he should never force his partner to trump, if he finds he cannot follow suit; but endeavour to throw the lead into his partner's hand.

4. He should in general return his partner's lead, unless he has some capital cards of his own.

5. As this game is played with the lurch, that is, to save half the stake, five points must be made before the game is out: he should not venture to play trumps when he is four of the game, unless he is very strong, having at least an honour and three trumps, or ace, king, and two small ones.

6. When the game is scored nine, at which stage the honours reckon for nothing, he should be still more cautious how he plays trumps, even if he is strong in hand, and give his partner an opportunity of trumping the adversaries suits, in case he is deficient in them.

7. If his adversaries are six or seven love of the game, he should play a forward or bold game, that he may have a chance, at the risk of a trick or two, to come up with them. If he has but three trumps and other good cards, he may play trumps, especially if he has a sequence, or queen, knave, and a small one.

8. He should always risk a trick or two when the game is much in his favour; because a new deal is of greater consequence to the adversary than one or two points are to him.

9. When the player finds there is a likelihood of either saving the game or his lurch, he should risk the odd trick; but if the game is five all, and he can make two tricks in his own hand, he should make them, in order to secure the difference of two points, which make the game near two to one in his favour.

10. A good player should begin with a small trump, when he has ace, king, and four small ones; for this reason, if his partner has a better trump than the last player, which is an equal wager but he has, he has a chance of fetching out all the trumps, by having three rounds of them.

11. The odds are always in his favour that his partner holds an honour; consequently if he has king, queen, and four small ones, he should begin with a small one.

12. When queen, knave, and four small trumps are dealt him, he should play a small one first, the odds being in his favour that his partner holds an honour; if he has knave, ten, and four small trumps, he should also begin with a small one, for the same reason.

13. If he has knave, ten, eight, and three small trumps, the knave should be played first, by which means the nine may be prevented from winning a trick, the odds being in his favour that three honours are played in two rounds.

14. If an honour is turned up against him on his left hand, and he has ten, nine, and eight, with two or three small trumps; when he is to play, he should play through the honours with the ten, which will force the dealer to play his honour to a disadvantage, if the dealer does not choose. chose to leave it to the option of his adversary whether he will pass it or not; but if he has six trumps of a lower denomination, and not ten, nine, and eight, and no honour turned up against him, he should begin with a small one.

15. In general, when he has two capital cards in trumps, and two or three small ones, he should begin with a small one, for the reason assigned in No. 12.

16. When he has ace, king, knave, and two small trumps, or even one small trump, by first playing the king, and putting the lead into his partner's hand, who will play a trump; judging him to have ace and knave, from his beginning with the king: in this case the knave should be finessed (A), nothing being against him but the queen.

17. If he has knave, ten, eight, and two small trumps, by playing the knave first, it is odds but in two rounds of trumps the nine falls, or he may finesse the eight when his partner returns trumps.

18. With five trumps of a lower denomination, he should begin with the smallest, unless he has a sequence of ten, nine, and eight; then he should begin with the ten.

19. When he has king, queen, ten, and one small trump, he must begin with the king, and wait for his partner's return of the trumps, in order to finesse the ten, by which means he may win the knave.

20. In order to prevent the ten from winning, when he has queen, knave, nine, and one small trump, he must begin with the queen. And in case he has knave, ten, eight, and one small trump, he should begin with the knave, that the nine may not win.

21. If he has ten, nine, eight, and one small trump, he should begin with the ten; thereby he strengthens his partner's hand, leaving it at his option to take it or not.

22. He should begin with a small one, when he has the ten and three small trumps.

23. If he has a good suit, and ace, king, and four small trumps, he must play three rounds of trumps, in order to secure his strong suit from being trumped.

24. When he has king, queen, ten, and three small trumps, he should begin with the king, because he has a chance of the knave's coming down in the second round: and to secure his strong suit, he should not wait to finesse the ten. If he should have queen, knave, and three small trumps, and some good suit to make, he must begin with a small one.

25. If he has knave, ten, eight, and two small trumps, with a strong suit, he should begin with the knave, in order to make the nine fall in the second round; but if he has knave, ten, and three small trumps, with a good suit, he should play a small one first.

26. With ten, nine, eight, and one small trump, provided he has a good suit, he should begin with the ten; by which means he may get the trumps out, and have a chance of making his strong suit.

The following observations will enable a player to know that his partner has no more of a suit which either of them has played. Suppose he leads from queen, ten, nine, and two small cards of any suit, the second-hand puts on the knave, his partner plays the eight; in this case, he having queen, ten, and nine, it is a demonstration, if his partner plays well, that he can have no more of that suit. By that discovery, he may play his game accordingly, either by forcing his partner to trump that suit, if he is strong in trumps, or by playing another suit. If he has king, queen, and ten of a suit, and he leads his king, his partner plays the knave; this also demonstrates he has no more of that suit. If he has king, queen, and many more of a suit, and begins with the king, in some cases it is good play in a partner, when he has the ace and one small card in that suit only, to win the king with the ace; for suppose the partner to be very strong in trumps, by taking the king with the ace, he gets the lead and trumps out, and having cleared the board of trumps, his partner returns his lead; and the ace being out, there is room for him to make that whole suit, which could not have been done if the partner had kept the ace. Suppose he has no other good card in his hand besides that suit, he loses nothing by the ace's taking his king; and if it should so happen that he has a good card to bring in that suit, he gains all the tricks which he makes in that suit by this method of play: as his partner has taken his king with the ace, and trumps out upon it, he has reason to imagine that his partner has one of that suit to return him; for which reason he should not throw away any of that suit, even to keep a king or queen guarded.

Method of playing when an honour is turned up on the right hand.—Suppose the knave is turned up on his right hand, and that he has king, queen, and ten; in order to win the knave, he must begin with the king; by which means, his partner may suppose him to have queen and ten remaining, especially if he has a second lead, and he does not proceed to play the queen.

Suppose the knave turned up as before, and he has ace, queen, and ten, by playing his queen, it answers the purpose of the former rule.

When the queen is turned up on his right hand, and he has ace, king, and knave, by playing his king, it answers the same purpose of the former rule.

In case an honour is turned up on his left hand, supposing he should hold no honour, he should play trumps through the honour as soon as he gets the lead; but if he should hold an honour (except the ace), he must be cautious how he plays trumps, because, in case his partner holds no honour, his adversity will play his own game upon him.

Method of playing the sequences.—The highest in sequences of trumps should be played, unless he has ace, king, and queen; and then he should play the lowest, which informs his partner of the state of his game.

When he has king, queen, and knave, and two small ones, which are not trumps, he should begin with the knave, whether he is strong in trumps or not, as he makes way for the whole suit by getting the ace out.

If he is strong in trumps, and has a sequence of queen, knave, ten, and two small cards of a suit, he should play the highest of his sequence; for if either of the adversaries should trump that suit in the second round, being also strong in trumps, he will make the remainder of that suit, by fetching out their trumps. When he has knave, ten, and nine, and two small cards of a suit, he may play in the like manner.

If king, queen, and knave, and one small card of any suit, is the case, whether strong in trumps or not, he should play the king; and when there are only four in number, the same method of play should be observed by inferior sequences.

When weak in trumps, he should begin by the lowest of the sequence, provided he has five in number, because if his partner has the ace of that suit he will make it. If he has the ace and four small cards of a suit, and weak in trumps, leading from that suit, he should play the ace. When strong in trumps, the game may be played otherwise.

(A) Finesse, is to play a small card which may win, keeping the superior card or cards to lay over the right hand adversary. How to make a sham, or win every trick.—Suppose A and B partners against C and D; and C to deal, A to have the king, knave, nine, and seven of hearts, which are trumps, a quart-major in spades, a tereo-major in diamonds, and the ace and king of clubs. Then suppose B to have nine spades, two clubs, and two diamonds. Also suppose D to have ace, queen, ten, and eight of trumps, with nine clubs, and C to have five trumps and eight diamonds. A leads a trump, which D wins, and D is to play a club, which his partner C is to trump; C leads a trump, which his partner D wins; D then will lead a club, which C will trump; and C will play a trump, which D will win; and D having the best trump will play it; after which D having seven clubs in his hand, makes them, so that he flams A and B.

How to play any hand of cards according to the nearest calculations of his partner's holding certain winning cards:

1. That he has not one certain winning card, is 2 to 1 2. That he has not two certain winning cards, is 17 to 2 But it is about 5 to 4 that he has one or both, or 32 to 25 3. That he has one card out of any three certain winning cards, is about 5 to 2 4. That he has not three certain winning cards, is about 31 to 1, or 681 to 22 5. That he has not two of them, is about 7 to 2, or 547 to 156 6. That he has not one of them, is about 7 to 6, or 378 to 325 7. That he holds one or two of them, is in his favour about 13 to 6, or 481 to 222 8. And about 5 to 2 that he holds 1, 2, or all three of them.

The use of these calculations is for a whist-player to play his cards to the most advantage. For instance,

As the first calculation is two to one that his partner does not hold one certain winning card.—Suppose then a suit is led, of which the second player has the king and a small one only, he should put on the king, because the odds are in his favour that the third player cannot win it. For the same reason, when he is second player, and to lead, he should play a king in preference to a queen, because it is two to one the ace does not take it; but it is five to four the queen will be taken by either ace or king, which may be in the third hand.

According to the second calculation, of its being five to four that his partner holds one certain winning card out of any two: If he has two honours in any suit, he can play to an advantage, knowing it is five to four in favour of his partner's having one of the two honours; and by the same rule, if he is second player, having a queen and one small card, by playing the queen he plays five to four against himself.

It is obvious, from the third calculation, which proves it to be five to two that his partner has one card out of any three certain winning cards, that he who plays the knave second hand, having but the knave and one small card of the same suit, must play five to two against himself, and discovers his game to a great disadvantage; for which reason, he should play the lowest of any sequence which he may hold in his hand, as the knave, if he has king, queen, and knave; the ten, if he has queen, knave, and ten, &c. By doing so, his partner has an opportunity of judging what card to play in that suit, according to the odds for or against him.

From the above calculation, if he has ace, king, and two small trumps, he is entitled to win four tricks out of six, provided he has four winning cards of any suit; or five tricks out of seven, if he has five winning cards of any suit; by playing two rounds of trumps, and taking out eight of them, it is five to two but his partner has a third trump; and if it should be so, he makes the tricks intended.