If a nine is led, and you hold king and one small one, play king. The leader must have opened an ace suit (either ace, queen, ten, nine, or ace, knave, ten, nine), assuming him to have led from a suit of four cards. The same applies if you hold king, nine, and eight is led.
If a medium card is led from a suit of at least four cards, three being higher than the card led, and you hold cards that (together with the leader's cards) make up a sequence, cover with the lowest card you can. For example:—The original lead is an eight. You (second hand) hold ace, king, ten, with or without small ones. If the lead was from queen, knave, nine, eight, as is most probable, and the ten is put on, it will win the trick.
Again: the original lead is a seven. You hold ace, queen, knave, eight. If the seven is the lowest of a four card suit, the lead must have been from king, ten, nine, seven. Therefore, the eight put on will win the trick.
The same applies, if the leader of an ace follows with a medium card. For example:—Ace is led originally. The next lead of an American Leader is, say, the eight. You had originally king, queen, ten, four, and you played the four to the ace. The leader must hold knave, nine and small. You should, therefore play the ten. And, observe, the play would be the same, if the second lead of a player who does not follow the American system were the seven, as then he must hold knave, nine, eight.
If a small card is led, and you hold an honour and a small card, pass the trick as a rule; for by putting on the honour you expose your weakness, and enable the original leader to finesse against you on the second round. The principal general exception to playing a small card second hand, is when the circumstances of the hand cause you to seize any chance of getting the lead, as when you want to stop a lead of trumps, or to lead trumps yourself. Then it is often right to play a high card second hand, when unsupported by another high card.
Also, in trumps, if king or queen is turned up, and you hold it singly guarded (i.e., if you have only one other trump), it is generally advisable to put on the turn-up, second hand. And if you hold king or queen, singly guarded, and a superior honour is turned up to your right, you should play the king or queen.
In the second round of a suit, if you have the winning card, you should—in plain suits—generally put it on second hand, subject to a finesse that will certainly be successful; but in trumps there are many cases in which you should not, especially if you have numerical strength in trumps, and a good hand besides. Your winning trump must make, and, by passing the second round, you perhaps enable your partner to win with a third best trump—or even a smaller one—yourself retaining the command.
If, when led through in the second round of a suit, you conclude from the previous fall of the cards that the second best card is to your right, it is sometimes advisable to put on the third best. You thus save your partner's hand if he holds the best. For instance: if knave is led in the first round, and your partner (then second player) puts on king, which wins the trick, it is clear (if the ten is your best) that your partner has the ace, for the third player could not win the king, and the leader could not have led from ace, knave. If your right-hand adversary afterwards returns the suit through you, you should put on the ten in order to save your partner's ace.
