3. Gleek. This game is alluded to twice by Shakspeare[170:D]; and from a passage in Cook's Green's Tu Quoque, appears to have been held in much esteem:—
"Scat. Come, gentlemen, what is your game?
Staines. Why, gleek; that's your only game;"[170:E]
it is then proposed to play either at twelve-penny gleek, or crown gleek.[170:F]
To these may be added, Gresco, Mount Saint, New Cut, Knave Out of Doors, and Ruff, all of which are mentioned in old plays, and were favourites among our ancestors.[170:G]
Tables and Dice, enumerated by Burton after cards, include some games unknown to the present day; such as tray-trip, mum-chance, philosopher's game, novum, &c.; the first is noticed by Shakspeare in Twelfth Night, and appears, from a note by Mr. Tyrwhitt, to have been a species of draughts[171:A]; the second was also a game at tables, and is coupled by Ben Jonson in the Alchemist with tray-trip[171:B]; the third is mentioned by Burton[171:C], and is described by Mr. Strutt from a manuscript in the British Museum.—"It is called," says the author, "'a number fight,' because in it men fight and strive together by the art of counting or numbering how one may take his adversary's king and erect a triumph upon the deficiency of his calculations[171:D];" and the fourth is introduced by Shakspeare in Love's Labour's Lost[171:E];—"it was properly called novum quinque," remarks Mr. Douce, "from the two principal throws of the dice, nine and five;—was called in French quinque-nove, and is said to have been invented in Flanders."[171:F]
The immoralities to which dice have given birth, we are authorised in considering, from the proverbial phraseology of Shakspeare, to have been as numerous in his time as at present. The expressions "false as dice[171:G]," and "false as dicers' oaths[171:H]," will be illustrated by the following anecdote, taken from an anonymous MS. of the reign of James the First:—"Sir William Herbert, playing at dice with another gentleman, there rose some questions about a cast. Sir William's antagonist declared it was a four and a five; he as positively insisted that it was a five and a six; the other then swore with a bitter
imprecation, that it was as he had said; Sir William then replied, 'Thou art a perjured knave; for give me a sixpence, and if there be a four upon the dice, I will return you a thousand pounds;' at which the other was presently abashed, for indeed the dice were false, and of a high cut, without a four."[172:A]
Dancing was an almost daily amusement in the court of Elizabeth; the Queen was peculiarly fond of this exercise, as had been her father Henry the Eighth, and the taste for it became so general, during her reign, that a great part of the leisure of almost every class of society was spent, and especially on days of festivity, in dancing.
To dance elegantly was one of the strongest recommendations to the favour of Her Majesty; and her courtiers, therefore, strove to rival each other in this pleasing accomplishment; nor were their efforts, in many instances, unrewarded. Sir Christopher Hatton, we are told, owed his promotion, in a great measure, to his skill in dancing; and in accordance with this anecdote, Gray opens his "Long Story" with an admirable description of his merit in this department, which, as containing a most just and excellent picture, both of the architecture and manners of "the days of good Queen Bess," as well as of the dress and agility of the knight, we with pleasure transcribe. Stoke-Pogeis, the scene of the narrative, was formerly in the possession of the Hattons:—