This game is played on slates by school-children. The accompanying [diagram] is drawn on the slate, and a certain figure (generally twenty) is agreed upon as “game.” There are two players, one takes noughts [O], the other crosses [X]. The three places drawn on the slate above the diagram are for the players each to put down marks or numbers for the games they win, the centre place being for “Old Nick,” or “Old Tom.” The object of the game is for each player to occupy three contiguous places in a row or line with either noughts or crosses, and to prevent his opponent from doing so. The diagram is of course empty when play begins. One player commences by putting his mark into either of the vacant places he prefers, the other player then places his in another, wherever he thinks he has the best opportunity to prevent his opponent getting a “three,” and at the same time to get a three himself; then the first player plays again, and so on alternately until all the squares are occupied, or until one of the players has a “three” in line. If neither player gets a “three,” the game is won by “Old Nick,” and one is scored to his name. In the diagram the result of the game is shown when won by “Old Nick.” Whichever player first wins a game adds “Old Nick’s” score to his own. In some games “Old Nick” keeps all he wins for himself, and then most frequently wins the game.—London (A. B. Gomme).
See “[Corsicrown],” “[Kit-Cat-Cannio],” “[Nine Men’s Morris].”
Nur and Spel
A boys’ game in Lincolnshire, somewhat similar to “[Trap Ball].” It is played with a “kibble,” a “nur,” and a “spell.” By striking the end of the spell with the kibble, the nur, of course, rises into the air, and the art of the game is to strike it with the kibble before it reaches the ground. He who drives it the greatest distance wins the game.—Halliwell’s Dictionary.
Strutt (Sports and Pastimes, p. 109) describes this game as “Northern-spell,” played with a trap, and the ball is stricken with a bat or bludgeon. The contest between the players is simply who shall strike the ball to the greatest distance in a given number of strokes. The length of each stroke is measured before the ball is returned, by means of a cord made fast at one end near the trap, the other being stretched into the field by a person stationed there for that purpose, who adjusts it to the ball wherever it may lie.
In a work entitled the Costumes of Yorkshire this game is described and represented as “Nor and Spell.” The little wooden ball used in this game is in Yorkshire called the “Nor,” and the receptacle in which it is placed the “Spell.” Peacock (Manley and Corringham Glossary) gives “knur,” (1) a hard wooden ball, (2) the head. Addy (Sheffield Glossary) says “knur” is a small round ball, less than a billiard ball. It is put into a cup fixed on a spring which, being touched, causes the ball to rise into the air, when it is struck by a trip-stick, a slender stick made broad and flat at one end. The “knur” is struck by the broad part. The game is played on Shrove Tuesday. Brogden (Provincial Words of Lincolnshire) gives it under “[Bandy].” It is called “Knur, Spell, and Kibble” in S.-W. Lincolnshire.—Cole’s Glossary.
The following letter relating to this game is extracted from the Worcestershire Chronicle, September 1847, in Ellis’s edition of Brand:—“Before the commons were taken in, the children of the poor had ample space wherein to recreate themselves at [cricket], nurr, or any other diversion; but now they are driven from every green spot, and in Bromsgrove here, the nailor boys, from the force of circumstances, have taken possession of the turnpike road to play the before-mentioned games, to the serious inconvenience of the passengers, one of whom, a woman, was yesterday knocked down by a nurr which struck her in the head.”
Brockett says of this game, as played in Durham: It is called “Spell and Ore,” Teut. “spel,” a play or sport; and Germ. “knorr,” a knot of wood or ore. The recreation is also called “Buckstick, Spell, and Ore,” the buckstick with which the ore is struck being broad at one end like the butt of a gun (North Country Words). In Yorkshire it is “Spell and Nurr,” or “Knur,” the ore or wooden ball having been, perhaps, originally the knurl or knot of a tree. The Whitby Glossary also gives this as “Spell and Knor,” and says it is known in the South as “Dab and Stick.” The author adds, “May not ‘tribbit,’ or ‘trevit,’ be a corruption of ‘three feet,’ the required length of the stick for pliable adaptation?”