Long Whist had long been known in France, but it was not a popular game in that country. Hoyle has been several times translated into French. Whist was played by Louis XV., and under the first Empire was a favorite game with Josephine and Marie Louise. It is on record ("Diaries of a Lady of Quality," 2nd Ed. p. 128), that Napoleon used to play Whist at Würtemburg, but not for money, and that he played ill and inattentively. One evening, when the Queen Dowager was playing against him with her husband and his daughter (the Queen of Westphalia, the wife of Jerome), the King stopped Napoleon, who was taking up a trick that did not belong to him, saying, "Sire, on ne joue pas ici en conquérant." After the restoration, Whist was taken up in France more enthusiastically. "The Nobles," says a French writer, "had gone to England to learn to Think, and they brought back the thinking game with them." Talleyrand was a Whist player, and his mot to the youngster who boasted his ignorance of the game is well known. "Vous ne savez pas le Whiste, jeune homme? Quelle triste vieillesse vous vous préparez!" Charles X. is reported to have been playing Whist at St. Cloud, on July 29, 1830, when the tricolor was waving on the Tuileries, and he had lost his throne.
It is remarkable that the "finest Whist player" who ever lived should have been, according to Clay, a Frenchman, M. Deschapelles (born 1780, died 1847). He published in 1839 a fragment of a "Traité du Whiste" which treats mainly of the laws, and is of but little value to the Whist player.
Before leaving this historical sketch, a few words may be added respecting the modern literature of the game. So far as the present work is concerned, its raison d'être is explained in the preface to the first edition. How far it has fulfilled the conditions of its being, it is not for the author to say. It was followed, however, by three remarkable books, which call for a short notice.
In 1864, appeared "Short Whist," by J. C. (James Clay). Clay's work is an able dissertation on the game, by the most brilliant player of his day. He was Chairman of the Committee appointed to revise the Laws of Whist in 1863. He sat in Parliament for many years, being M.P. for Hull at the time of his death, in 1873.
In 1865, William Pole, F.R.S., Mus. Doc. Oxon, published "The Theory of the Modern Scientific Game of Whist," a work which contains a lucid explanation of the fundamental principles of scientific play, addressed especially to novices, but of considerable value to players of all grades. In 1883, Dr. Pole issued another volume, called "The Philosophy of Whist." This is an essay on the scientific and intellectual aspects of the modern game. It is divided into two parts, "The Philosophy of Whist Play" and "The Philosophy of Whist Probabilities," the latter having been strangely neglected since the publication of Hoyle's "Essay towards Making the Doctrine of Chances Easy" (1754).
These books exhibit the game both theoretically and practically, in the perfect state at which it has arrived during the two centuries that have elapsed since Whist assumed a definite shape and took its present name.
FOOTNOTES:
[41] "The author of this treatise did promise if it met with approbation, to make an addition to it by way of Appendix, which he has done accordingly."—Hoyle.
[42] Authorised as revised and corrected under his own hand.—Hoyle.