Luck and skill combined in about equal degrees make the principal charm of this game, which is a very simple one, and which in many respects resembles the game of marbles known as "Die Shot."
The game may be played equally well in-doors on a carpeted floor or out of doors on a lawn, or any other level surface. The materials required are a number of balls, and a larger ball shaped as a die with eight sides, numbered respectively 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8. The die is placed on the ground with the figure 8 downwards, and the players, each being supplied with a ball, bowl alternately at the die from some point at a distance from the die to be agreed upon. If the die is missed, nothing is scored, and in some places the player who misses pays one to a pool. If the die is hit, the player whose ball hit it scores the number on the side of the die which remains uppermost.
Under some rules each player puts a stake into a pool, and he who attains the highest score in a certain number of throws wins the pool. If, however, any player should succeed in turning the die so that the number 8 remains uppermost, he takes the pool at once, and a new game is then commenced.
German Billiards.
GERMAN BILLIARDS.
This is a game played with balls on a board on which is a complicated arrangement of pins, hoops, holes, recesses, and cups, the holes, recesses, and cups in which are variously numbered. The balls are propelled by means of a spring fitted into one side of the board, and the scores are in accordance with the numbers marked in the respective holes, recesses, and cups that the balls fall into after wandering through the many pins and hoops that are fixed all over the board.
HAT MEASUREMENT.
The practice known as Hat Measurement has sprung up owing to the fact that very few people either have but very little idea of the probable height of very common objects, or if they know the actual height in inches of those objects, are unable to demonstrate that height. The judgment is very frequently tested by asking the company present to mark on a wall about the height of an ordinary chimney-pot hat; and in the majority of cases, upon a hat being actually brought in, it will be found that the height marked is sufficient for at least a hat and a half.