RUBICON BÉZIQUE.
"Rubicon" or "Japanese" Bézique is a modification of the ordinary game, which has for some years found much favour in Paris. In 1887, a code of
laws, which we append, was drawn up by a committee of the Portland Club, and Rubicon Bézique may now be regarded as the standard game.
Four packs, of like pattern and shuffled together, are used. The cards rank as at ordinary Bézique; but nine instead of eight cards are dealt, singly or by threes, to each player. There is no "turn-up," the first "marriage" scored determining the trump suit. If a "sequence" be declared and scored before any marriage, such sequence determines the trump suit.
The scores at Rubicon Bézique are as under:—
| Carte Blanche (a hand without a single court card)[[9]] | 50 |
| Marriage in plain suits | 20 |
| Marriage in trumps[[10]] | 40 |
| Sequence in plain suits | 150 |
| Sequence in trumps | 250 |
| Single Bézique | 40 |
| Double Bézique | 500 |
| Treble Bézique | 1500 |
| Quadruple Bézique | 4500 |
| Four Knaves (irrespective of suit) | 40 |
| Four Queens " | 60 |
| Four Kings " | 80 |
| Four Aces " | 100 |
The procedure as to playing and drawing is the same as at ordinary Bézique, save that the tricks are
left face upwards in a heap between the players until a brisque is played, when the winner of the trick takes them up, and turns them face downwards, near himself. The value of each brisque is ten points, but they are not scored till the close of the game, and in certain events (see post) may not be scored at all.
Only one declaration can be scored at a time, and that only (save in the case of carte blanche) by the winner of a trick; but if, on the cards exposed, the player has more than one combination to score, he may score whichever he prefers, at the same time calling attention to his further claim by saying, "And —— to score." A player is not bound to declare any combination, even when exposed upon the table, unless he thinks fit. If he is compelled to play a card of the combination before he has actually scored it, the right to score is at an end.
A card declared in a given combination may not again be declared in an inferior combination of the same class—e.g. a king and queen declared in Sequence cannot be afterwards made available to score a Royal Marriage. The same card may, however, be used in conjunction with a new card or cards to form, not merely a combination of the same kind, but the same combination over again.[[11]] Thus, if Four Queens have been declared, the player may play one of them, and, when he next wins a trick, add a fifth queen to the three left on the table, and again score four queens.