'Now, to cut the cards, a BEND is prepared for you to cut to—the middle is the best; and it is odds but you unwarily cut to it; if not, SLIP is the word; but if you have no opportunity to do that neither, then deal away at all hazards, it is but an equal bet that they come in your favour; if right, proceed; if otherwise, miss a card in its course, and it brings the cards according to your first design; it is but giving two at last where you missed; and if that cannot be conveniently done, you only lose the deal, and there is an end of it.
'But when A or B is to cut, they make it all safe; for then they make the CORNER-BEND, which any one that knows may cut to, a hundred times together.
'Piping at Whist. By piping I mean, when one of the company that does not play, which frequently happens, sits down in a convenient place to smoke a pipe, and so look on, pretending to amuse himself that way. Now, the disposing of his fingers on the pipe whilst smoking discovers the principal cards that are in the person's hand he overlooks; which was always esteemed a sufficient advantage whereby to win a game. There is another method, namely, by uttering words. "Indeed" signifies diamonds; "truly," hearts; "upon my word," clubs; "I assure you," spades. But as soon as these methods become known, new ones are invented; and it is most curious that two persons may discover to each other what sort of cards they have in hand, and which ought first to be played, many different ways, without speaking a word.'
There can be no doubt that the act of sorting the cards is capable of giving an acute observer a tolerably accurate idea of his partner's or either of his opponents' hands; so that where cheating is suspected it would be better to play the cards without sorting them. The number of times a sorter carries a card to a particular part indicates so many of a suit; your own hand and his play will readily indicate the nature of the cards in which he is either strong or weak.
I now quote Robert-Houdin's account of
CARD TELEGRAPHY.
Although there are 32 cards in the game of Piquet, all of them may be designated by twelve different signs, namely, eight for the nature of the cards, and four for the colours.
At Ecarte, the number of the signals is still less, as it is only the figures that require indication: but to make these indications it is necessary to execute a sort of pantomime, according to certain authors, such as blowing the nose, coughing, drumming on the table, sneezing, &c. Such evolutions, however, are totally unworthy of your modern Greek, and would soon be denounced as gross fraud. The signals which he employs are only appreciable by his confederate,—as follows:—
If he looks
1. At his confederate, he designates A king.