“Buff said ‘Baff,’
And gave me this staff,
And bade me not laugh
Till I came to his house again.”
Having thus spoken, the messenger leaves the room. While he has been delivering his speech, the company, however, endeavour to make him laugh, by asking him any absurd questions that may present themselves to their imagination. If they do not succeed in this, the emissary of the great Buff delivers himself of a more lengthy address:—
“Buff says ‘Baff’ to all his men,
And I say ‘Baff’ to you again;
But he neither laughs nor smiles
In spite of all your cunning wiles,
But keeps his face with a very good grace,
And carries his staff to the very next place.”
CONCERT.
A noisier game than this could scarcely be desired by the most boisterous of our young friends. The players having selected a “conductor,” seat themselves round him in a circle. The conductor now assigns to each a musical instrument, and shows how it is to be played. When all are provided with their imaginary instruments, the conductor orders them to tune, and by so doing, he gives each musician a capital opportunity for making all sorts of discordant noises. When the different instruments have been tuned, the conductor waves an unseen bâton, and commences humming a lively air, in which he is accompanied by the whole of his band, each player endeavouring to imitate with his hands the different movements made in performing on a real instrument. Every now and then the conductor pretends to play on a certain instrument, and the player to whom it belongs must instantly alter his movements for those of the conductor, and continue to wield the bâton until the chief player abandons his instrument. Should a player omit to take the conductor’s office at the proper time, he must pay a forfeit. The fun of this game greatly depends upon the humour of the conductor, and the adroitness with which he relinquishes his bâton and takes up the instruments of the other players.
CONSEQUENCES.
The first player writes an adjective on the upper part of a slip of paper, and then folds the slip so that the written word cannot be seen by the next player, who writes the name of a gentleman, real or imaginary, on the paper, which he passes to another after having folded it over again. The third player writes an adjective; the fourth, a lady’s name; the fifth, the name of a place; the sixth, what the gentleman said to the lady; the seventh, the lady’s reply; the eighth, the consequences; and the ninth, what the world said about the whole affair. One of the players now unfolds the slip and reads what has been written by the different persons engaged in the game, adding a few words to unite the disjointed members of the little narrative. As a specimen of the ludicrous result which arises from each player’s ignorance of what has been written by his companions, we give the following pathetic tale, in which the words and phrases printed in italics represent those written on the slip of paper:—“The ill-favoured Peter Wilkins met the adorable Jenny Jones in the silver mine of Potosi. He said to her, ‘Will you love me then as now?’ and she replied, ‘When did I refuse you anything?’ The consequences were, he drowned himself in the water-butt and she married the baker, and the world said, ‘Served them right!’” When there are only three or four players, the slip of paper is to be passed round from one to another until it is filled up. When the players are numerous, three or four slips may be commenced simultaneously by different persons.
CROSS QUESTIONS AND CROOKED ANSWERS.
This game will be best described by a short dialogue.