INDOOR AMUSEMENTS.
Of the indoor amusements of country people we get an idea from Vincent's Dialogue with an English Courtier, published in 1586. He says: "In foul weather we send for some honest neighbors, if haply we be with our wives alone at home (as seldom we are) and with them we play at Dice and Cards, sorting ourselves according to the number of players and their skill; ... sometimes we fall to Slide-Thrift, to Penny Prick, and in winter nights we use certain Christmas games very proper, and of much agility; we want not also pleasant mad-headed knaves, that be properly learned, and will read in divers pleasant books and good authors; as Sir Guy of Warwick, the Four Sons of Aymon, the Ship of Fools, the Hundred Merry Tales, the Book of Riddles, and many other excellent writers both witty and pleasant. These pretty and pithy matters do sometimes recreate our minds, chiefly after long sitting and loss of money."
"Slide-thrift," called also "slip-groat" and "shove-groat," is a game frequently mentioned by writers of the 16th and 17th centuries. Strutt, in his Sports and Pastimes of England, describes it thus:—
"It requires a parallelogram to be made with chalk, or by lines cut upon the middle of a table, about twelve or fourteen inches in breadth, and three or four feet in length: which is divided, latitudinally, into nine sections, in every one of which is placed a figure, in regular succession from one to nine. Each of the players provides himself with a smooth halfpenny, which he places upon the edge of the table, and, striking it with the palm of his hand, drives it towards the marks; and according to the value of the figure affixed to the partition wherein the halfpenny rests, his game is reckoned; which generally is stated at thirty-one, and must be made precisely: if it be exceeded, the player goes again for nine, which must also be brought exactly or the turn is forfeited; and if the halfpenny rests upon any of the marks that separate the partitions, or over-passes the external boundaries, the go is void. It is also to be observed that the players toss up to determine which shall go first, which is certainly a great advantage."
SHILLING OF EDWARD VI
Shovel-board, or shuffle-board, which some writers confound with slide-thrift, was also played upon a table with coins or flat pieces of metal; but the board was longer and the rules of the game were different.
In 2 Henry IV. (ii. 4. 206), when Falstaff wants Pistol put out of the room, he says to Bardolph: "Quoit him down, Bardolph, like a shove-groat shilling."
In The Merry Wives of Windsor (i. 1. 159), Slender, when asked if Pistol had picked his purse, replies: "Ay, by these gloves, did he ... of seven groats in mill-sixpences and two Edward shovel-boards, that cost me two shillings and twopence apiece." "Edward shovel-boards" were the broad shillings of Edward VI. which were generally used in playing the game. It has been suggested that Slender was a fool to pay two shillings and twopence for a shilling worn smooth; but it is possible that these old coins commanded a premium on account of being in demand for this game. The silver groat (fourpence) was originally used for the purpose, but the shilling, especially of this particular coinage, came to be preferred by players. Taylor the Water Poet makes one of these coins say:—
"You see my face is beardless, smooth, and plain,
Because my sovereign was a child 't is known,
When as he did put on the English crown;
But had my stamp been bearded, as with hair,
Long before this it had been worn out bare;
For why, with me the unthrifts every day,
With my face downward, do at shove-board play."
"Penny-prick" is described as "a game consisting of casting oblong pieces of iron at a mark." Another writer explains it as "throwing at halfpence placed on sticks which are called hobs." It was a common game as early as the fifteenth century, and is reproved by a religious writer of that period, probably because it was used for gambling.
Card-playing had become so general in the time of Henry VIII. that a statute was enacted forbidding apprentices to use cards except in the Christmas holidays, and then only in their masters' houses. Many different games with cards are mentioned by writers of the time, but few of them are described minutely enough to make it clear how they were played.
Backgammon, or "tables," as it was called, was popular in Shakespeare's time. He refers to it in Love's Labour's Lost (v. 2. 326), where Biron, ridiculing Boyet, says:—
"This is the ape of form, monsieur the nice,
That, when he plays at tables, chides the dice
In honourable terms."
"Tick-tack" was a kind of backgammon; alluded to, figuratively, in Measure for Measure (i. 2. 196): "thus foolishly lost at a game of tick-tack."
"Tray-trip" was a game of dice, in which success depended upon throwing a "tray" (the French trois, or three); mentioned in Twelfth Night (ii. 5. 207): "Shall I play my freedom at tray-trip, and become thy bond-slave?"
"Troll-my-dames" was a game resembling the modern bagatelle. The name is a corruption of the French trou-madame. It was also known as "pigeon-holes." Dr. John Jones, in his Ancient Baths of Buckstone (1572) refers to it thus: "The ladies, gentlewomen, wives and maids, may in one of the galleries walk; and if the weather be not agreeable to their expectation, they may have in the end of a bench eleven holes made, into the which to troll pummets, or bowls of lead, big, little, or mean, or also of copper, tin, wood, either violent or soft, after their own discretion: the pastime troule-in-madame is called."
In The Tempest (v. 1. 172) Ferdinand and Miranda are represented as playing chess; but there is no other clear allusion to the game in Shakespeare's works. It was introduced into England before the Norman Conquest, and became a favorite pastime with the upper classes, but appears to have been little known among the common people.