Quadrille, she told me, was her first love, but Whist was the soldier game—that was her word. It was a long meal; not like quadrille, a feast of snatches. One or two rubbers might co-extend in duration with the evening.
A grave simplicity was what she chiefly admired in her favourite game; there was nothing silly in it, like the nob at cribbage—nothing superfluous. She even wished that Whist were more simple than it is, and saw no reason for the deciding of the trump by the turn of the card. Why not one suit always trumps?
In square games (she meant Whist), all that is possible to be allowed in card playing is accomplished.
No inducement could ever prevail upon her to play for nothing. She could not conceive a game wanting the spritely infusion of chance, the handsome excuses of good fortune. Man is a gaming animal, and his passion can scarcely be more safely expended than upon a game at cards, with only a few shillings for the stake.
It is needless to say that Sarah Battle's dislike to play Whist for nothing is not by any means generally shared by Whist players. Those who cannot play the game for its own sake and for the interest which they take in it had better not play it at all.
SHORT WHIST.
This is unmistakably nothing more or less than ordinary Whist cut in half; therefore it is almost unnecessary to say much about it, because the principles of the game are just the same as those which have been given at length for the playing of Long Whist.
It is said that it was first introduced at Bath by Lord Peterborough, who, fearing he was about to incur some heavy losses, thought he might sooner be relieved of his suspense if he could contrive to shorten the game. Even now, although it may not be so popular as it once was, it still possesses a great attraction for many players, who are of opinion that the awarding of points for honours (which are not held as the result of play, but simply because they are dealt out to the players holding them) introduces an element of mere accident into the game, which they think does not add either to its interest or to its claims as a scientific amusement. Five points constitute the game in Short Whist, the rubber being reckoned as two points.
Honours are never called, but are always counted, except at the point of four.