While returning your partner's suit is generally a wise thing to do, you should be careful to act as far as possible upon the good old maxim of playing through the strong hand up to the weak one.
It it soon learned by experience that the safest
places in which to call are as first or last player, while a long way the most dangerous place is when you are the second player. Many a second hand that seemed at first sight of almost commanding strength has been cut up by a clever or lucky initial lead.
There are two varieties of the game that must be just mentioned before dismissing the subject. These are Solo Whist for five players, and Solo Whist for three players.
Where the table consists of five, one man stands out every round, the person chosen being he who sits to the dealer's right. The person standing out neither pays nor receives on that round.
Solo Whist for three players is not quite so simple. There is in this no proposal and acceptance, the solo being the lowest call. There are two very good ways of playing, the best being to throw out the twos, threes, and fours from the various suits, and to turn up the fortieth card as trump, but not regarding that card as belonging to any individual. The tricks, of course, consist of three cards each. The other plan is to play with three suits only, leaving the fourth suit out altogether. The former method, however, makes the more scientific game.[[43]]
VINGT-UN.
Vingt-Un derives its name from the fact that each player aims at making, by the cards he holds, "twenty-one." Any number may play. The full pack of fifty-two cards is used. After they have been duly shuffled and cut, the dealer[[44]] distributes one card, face downwards, to each of the other players (whom we will call the punters), and one to himself. The punters look at their cards, and each places on, or beside his card, the coin (or counters representing coin) he proposes to stake. A maximum and minimum stake are usually fixed beforehand, and a prudent player will make a practice of always