I thanked my new acquaintances, but the thing was impossible, as I had never played Euchre, and therefore knew nothing about the game, beyond the few points I had picked up while watching them.
“That ar awkward,” said the pork-dealer. “Ain’t we nohow able to get up a set? Come, Mr Chorley—I believe that’s your name, sir?” (This was addressed to the gentleman who had risen.) “You ain’t a-goin’ to desart us that away? We can’t make up a game if you do?”
“I should only lose if I played longer,” reiterated Chorley. “No,” continued he, “I won’t risk it.”
“Perhaps this gentleman plays ‘whist,’” suggested another, alluding to me. “You’re an Englishman, sir, I believe. I never knew one of your countrymen who was not a good whist-player.”
“True, I can play whist,” I replied carelessly.
“Well, then, what say you all to a game of whist?” inquired the last speaker, glancing around the table.
“Don’t know much about the game,” bluntly answered the pork-dealer. “Mout play it on a pinch rayther than spoil sport; but whoever hez me for a partner ’ll have to keep a sharp look-out for himself, I reckon.”
“I guess you know the game as well as I do,” replied the one who had proposed it.
“I hain’t played a rubber o’ whist for many a year, but if we can’t make up the set at Euchre, let’s try one.”
“Oh! if you’re goin’ to play whist,” interposed the gentleman who had seceded from the game of Euchre—“if you’re going to play whist, I don’t mind taking a hand at that—it may change my luck—and if this gentleman has no objection, I’d like him for my partner. As you say, sir, Englishmen are good whist-players. It’s their national game, I believe.”