The Badminton Library
OF
SPORTS AND PASTIMES
EDITED BY
HIS GRACE THE DUKE OF BEAUFORT, K.G.
ASSISTED BY ALFRED E. T. WATSON
_BILLIARDS_
[Illustration:
A SCREW LOSING HAZARD.
]
BILLIARDS
BY
MAJOR W. BROADFOOT, R.E.
WITH CONTRIBUTIONS BY
A. H. BOYD, SYDENHAM DIXON, W. J. FORD, DUDLEY D. PONTIFEX, RUSSELL D.
WALKER, & REGINALD H. R. RIMINGTON-WILSON
[Illustration]
_ILLUSTRATED by LUCIEN DAVIES, R.I., and from PHOTOGRAPHS also by
numerous Diagrams and Figures_
LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO.
LONDON AND BOMBAY
1896
_All rights reserved_
_DEDICATION
TO
H.R.H. THE PRINCE OF WALES_
BADMINTON: _May 1885_.
Having received permission to dedicate these volumes, the BADMINTON
LIBRARY of SPORTS and PASTIMES, to HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS THE PRINCE OF
WALES I do so feeling that I am dedicating them to one of the best and
keenest sportsmen of our time. I can say, from personal observation,
that there is no man who can extricate himself from a bustling and
pushing crowd of horsemen, when a fox breaks covert, more dexterously
and quickly than His Royal Highness; and that when hounds run hard over
a big country, no man can take a line of his own and live with them
better. Also, when the wind has been blowing hard, often have I seen His
Royal Highness knocking over driven grouse and partridges and
high-rocketing pheasants in first-rate workmanlike style. He is held to
be a good yachtsman, and as Commodore of the Royal Yacht Squadron is
looked up to by those who love that pleasant and exhilarating pastime.
His encouragement of racing is well known, and his attendance at the
University, Public School, and other important Matches testifies to his
being, like most English gentlemen, fond of all manly sports. I consider
it a great privilege to be allowed to dedicate these volumes to so
eminent a sportsman as His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales, and I do
so with sincere feelings of respect and esteem and loyal devotion.
BEAUFORT.
[Illustration:
BADMINTON
]
PREFACE
A few lines only are necessary to explain the object with which these
volumes are put forth. There is no modern encyclopædia to which the
inexperienced man, who seeks guidance in the practice of the various
British Sports and Pastimes, can turn for information. Some books there
are on Hunting, some on Racing, some on Lawn Tennis, some on Fishing,
and so on; but one Library, or succession of volumes, which treats of
the Sports and Pastimes indulged in by Englishmen—and women—is wanting.
The Badminton Library is offered to supply the want. Of the
imperfections which must be found in the execution of such a design we
are conscious. Experts often differ. But this we may say, that those who
are seeking for knowledge on any of the subjects dealt with will find
the results of many years’ experience written by men who are in every
case adepts at the Sport or Pastime of which they write. It is to point
the way to success to those who are ignorant of the sciences they aspire
to master, and who have no friend to help or coach them, that these
volumes are written.
To those who have worked hard to place simply and clearly before the
reader that which he will find within, the best thanks of the Editor are
due. That it has been no slight labour to supervise all that has been
written, he must acknowledge; but it has been a labour of love, and very
much lightened by the courtesy of the Publisher, by the unflinching,
indefatigable assistance of the Sub-Editor, and by the intelligent and
able arrangement of each subject by the various writers, who are so
thoroughly masters of the subjects of which they treat. The reward we
all hope to reap is that our work may prove useful to this and future
generations.
THE EDITOR.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
INTRODUCTION 1
I. HISTORY OF BILLIARDS 6
_By Sydenham Dixon_.
II. IMPLEMENTS 55
_By Archibald Boyd_.
III. ELEMENTARY: ONE-BALL PRACTICE 104
_With Memorandum by Dudley D. Pontifex._
IV. MOTION, IMPACT, AND DIVISION OF BALLS: TWO-BALL PRACTICE 130
V. PLAIN STROKES, WINNING AND LOSING HAZARDS, CANNONS:
THREE-BALL PRACTICE 142
VI. ON THE ROTATION OF BALLS 189
VII. MISCELLANEOUS STROKES 215
VIII. THE SPOT STROKE 264
IX. SAFETY AND BAULK PLAY 283
X. BREAKS 300
_With Memoranda by Archibald Boyd and R. H. R. Rimington-Wilson._
XI. THE CHAMPIONSHIP AND THE THREE-INCH POCKET TABLE 362
_With Memorandum by Russell D. Walker_
XII. THE RULES OF THE GAME OF BILLIARDS 374
XIII. PYRAMIDS, POOL, AND COUNTRY-HOUSE GAMES 387
_By W.J. Ford_
XIV. MISCELLANEOUS NOTES 436
INDEX 447
_ILLUSTRATIONS_
(REPRODUCED BY THE SWAN ELECTRIC ENGRAVING CO.; WALKER & BOUTALL; P.
NAUMANN, AND G. H. FORD)
_PLATES_
ARTIST
A SCREW LOSER _Lucien Davis._ _Frontispiece_
CHOOSING A CUE „ „ _To face p._
48
PRELIMINARIES „ „ „ 108
OPENING THE GAME „ „ „ 133
A DISPUTED SCORE „ „ „ 148
IN OR OUT OF BAULK „ „ „ 190
THE LONG REST „ „ „ 264
A SERIOUS GAME: NURSING THE BALLS „ „ „ 300
A DIFFICULT STROKE „ „ „ 362
ARE THEY TOUCHING „ „ „ 386
A LADIES’ BATTLE „ „ „ 440
_ILLUSTRATIONS IN TEXT_
PAGE
MR. SAMSON’S SECTIONS OF A BILLIARD-ROOM 64, 65
AN OUTSIDE BILLIARD-ROOM 103
STRINGING. 106
AN EASY ATTITUDE 107
THE BRIDGE 109
USING THE REST 113
THE BRIDGE (_bouclée_) 129
INSTEAD OF LONG REST 148
HIGH BRIDGE FOR A CRAMPED STROKE 188
A PUSH STROKE 225
A PUSH (_bouclée_) 232
THE LEAP OR JUMP STROKE 252
WHEN PLAYER’S BALL IS NEAR A CUSHION 263
PREPARING TO PLAY BEHIND THE BACK: _the right way_ 314
PREPARING TO PLAY BEHIND THE BACK: _the wrong way_ 324
A NURSERY 349
PLAYING BEHIND THE BACK 360
A WINNING GAME 437
BILLIARDS
INTRODUCTION
Justification for the appearance of a volume on the game of billiards as
it is played early in 1896 is ample, for no treatise or manual exists in
which modern developments are considered. Though this is so, it does not
follow that the instruction in older works is unsound; much may be
learnt from some of them, specially about plain practice strokes, but
the science of playing breaks has been completely changed since they
were published. If, however, further warrant were needed, it is supplied
in the neglect of most players, whether professional or amateur, of
elementary facts concerning the motion of balls on a table; and this,
though ameliorated as regards professional players by constant practice
and observation, obstructs both classes more than they think in the race
for distinction. The best French players, from whom we have much to
learn, recognise that the closer and more intelligent the study of the
game, and the more nearly the implements reach perfection, the nearer do
scientific theory and actual practice conform. Hence in this book
considerable space is devoted to matters which may seem elementary and
self-evident, but which are really the bases of sound knowledge, and of
which amateurs (for whom the volume is primarily written) are for the
most part completely ignorant. When the behaviour of a ball under
various influences is described endeavour is made to use the simplest
language; mathematical terms not generally understood are as far as
possible avoided.
Several matters of importance to the game and in need of reform are
discussed, the opinions of experts, amateur and professional, being
occasionally quoted; sometimes opposite views are stated, and efforts
are made to consider duly those of all shades.
It is usual, and most of the contributors have not failed to conform to
the fashion, to insist on the fact that more can be learnt from a player
in an hour than from a book in a year, that an ounce of practice is
worth a ton of theory, or some similarly original sentiment. Certainly
no man can be made a billiard-player solely by the study of books any
more than skill in shooting, fishing, or other sport, can be so
attained; but much may be learnt from a good manual, both by a beginner
and by his instructor. By conforming to the arrangement of a book a
system of teaching will be followed, and this, if sound, must help
master and pupil.
The amateur who has played for years and acquired a bad style is more
difficult to assist; he is apt to find, whilst trying to correct faults
and to play breaks, that he has lost his old certainty, and scores worse
after than before instruction—a result which causes many to lose heart.
But there is no need to do so; the chance of improvement depends greatly
on modesty and perseverance, whilst the case is hopeless in proportion
to the presence of presumption and conceit. Some give in at this stage
and revert to their former methods, others more resolute persevere and
improve; but it is hoped that both classes will find this book of
service. Those who devote their whole attention to making the immediate
stroke will be assisted by the practice recommended; whilst the more
ambitious will find advice which may in time enable them to play real
breaks and thus derive fresh pleasure from the game.
Personal qualifications have so important an influence in billiards,
that too precise definition of the stroke to be played for is avoided.
What is the game for one person is not necessarily the game for another,
and each must use his own discretion. The qualities usually found in
fine players are good nerve, quick and sound judgment, resolution, and
temper under control, accompanied by fair sight, a fine touch, and
sympathy between eye and hand. Of these some are the gifts of nature and
cannot be acquired; others may be improved by careful training. Nerve is
little understood, but is strengthened by gaining certainty of play,
which creates confidence; yet there is always that which we cannot
explain, but may call the ‘personal equation.’ It is perplexing, but
must not be ignored, and persons of the most slender experience will
admit that they play better with one man than with another, though they
cannot always account for the fact.
Much care and time have been spent on the diagrams and figures, but
absolute accuracy is not to be expected; indeed, it cannot be attained,
for the size of the table must be limited by that of a page, whilst for
the sake of clearness the balls are shown on a larger scale, a
consequence being some imperfection in the delineation of their
indicated paths. In the final chapter many matters connected with
billiards are briefly noticed, amongst which are: the suitability of the
game for ladies; the French or cannon game, which possesses advantages
on account of the smaller size of table on which it is played; and the
duties of marker and referee. The observations about etiquette are
specially commended to the careful consideration of readers. It is
beyond doubt that the vastly inferior play of amateurs compared with
professionals is in no small measure owing to laxity in behaviour,
whereby attention is distracted from the game. If billiards is ever to
be played finely in ordinary clubs, as strict order must be maintained
as is usual in the card-room.
Obligations must be expressed to Mr. Boyd, Colonel Allan Cunningham,
R.E., Mr. Dudley Pontifex, and Mr. Russell Walker for assistance in
various ways; and to M. Vignaux, whose admirable manual of the French
game has been of special service. To a less extent the volume is
indebted to the works of Joseph Bennett and of other players; but beyond
all it owes much of whatever merit it may have to the assistance and
advice of Mr. R. H. R. Rimington-Wilson. It is indeed impossible to
overestimate the value of this aid, for his knowledge of the game and
practical skill are united to a singularly sound judgment, and his help
is enhanced by the kindness and courtesy with which it has invariably
been accompanied. Acknowledgment is further due to Messrs. Burroughes &
Watts and Messrs. Peall and Walder for practical help of great value.
The preparation of this manual was a difficult task which the writer
would not have attempted without the co-operation just acknowledged; and
readers are besought to recollect, if disposed to resent an air of
authority in giving advice, or a too evident want of respect for their
knowledge and skill, that on every question of importance the recorded
conclusions are the result rather of careful consideration by experts
than an expression of personal opinion.
Passing on from these preliminary observations and acknowledgments, it
should be at once said that no laborious compilation of the results of
research is here given on the subject of the origin of the game of
billiards, for the reason that this is obscure in the extreme. Many
attempts have been made to trace its ancient history, but little success
has resulted. In most books about it, reference is made to the
well-known quotations from Spenser and Shakespeare; whilst in ‘Modern
Billiards,’ the American text-book, the historian plunges deeper into
the mystery of the past, and tells how Cathire More, King of Ireland,
who died A.D. 148, left ‘fifty billiard balls of brass, with the pools
and cues of the same materials.’ Besides this, he refers to ‘the travels
of Anacharsis through Greece, 400 B.C.,’ during which a game which might
have been early billiards was seen.
We may, perhaps, safely assume that the game is of considerable
antiquity, a development from some primitive form played with balls on
the ground. It may, therefore, have been evolved simultaneously in many
countries, and have assumed minor differences as it grew older. Then, as
intercourse became easier, one country may have borrowed from another
what was thought desirable, with the general result that the
similarities of the games of various countries are greater than the
differences.
Undoubtedly, in 1896 the two great games are the English and the French,
and each is indebted to the other.
From the lawn or courtyard the game was promoted to a table indoors, the
bed was wooden, the cushions were stuffed with cotton, and there were
pockets. The balls, of ivory or of wood, were propelled by wooden maces
tipped with ivory, silver, or brass. Such a table is depicted in ‘The
Compleat Gamester,’ by Charles Cotton (1674). Improvement for a long
time after this date seems slow to those who contrast the strides made
during the last half of the nineteenth century. The first step of
importance was the substitution of the cue for the mace, and the
invention of the leather tip by Mingaud, a French player, who early in
the century was, it is said, imprisoned for a political offence, and
during his imprisonment made the important discovery. Next came the
application of chalk, with which Carr, who had some title to be called
the first champion player of England, is generally credited. He was,
moreover, a player of the spot stroke, in those days (about 1825)
probably a recent invention. Position was maintained by a screw back or
by follow, as the slow cushions did not admit of use after the modern
manner. Carr is referred to in the following chapter.
CHAPTER I
HISTORY OF BILLIARDS
BY SYDENHAM DIXON
Just as there were ‘brave men before Agamemnon,’ so, doubtless, were
there good billiard-players prior to Kentfield; but we hear very little
about them. One of the few whose name has been handed down to posterity
is John—generally known as Jack—Carr. He was originally marker for Mr.
Bartley, the proprietor of the billiard-tables at the Upper Rooms at
Bath. When business there was slack, Mr. Bartley and Carr used
occasionally to amuse themselves by placing the red ball on the centre
spot, and attempting to screw off it into one of the middle pockets
without bringing the red ball back into baulk. Such a stroke would be
easier under the conditions then existing of slow list cushions and
rough baize cloths than it is now, and for a long time Mr. Bartley was
the only person who could accomplish it. At last he confided to Carr
that he did it by striking his own ball upon its side. It seems pretty
clear, therefore, that Mr. Bartley was the inventor of the side stroke
and screw; but he appears to have made very little practical use of his
great discovery; whereas Carr, who soon outstripped his instructor in
proficiency at this particular stroke, turned his knowledge to excellent
account, and fairly astonished and mystified the frequenters of the
billiard-room at Bath by the ease and certainty with which he brought
off apparently impossible strokes. They were naturally anxious to learn
the secret, and, after Carr had artfully roused their curiosity to its
highest pitch by remaining obstinately silent on the subject for a
considerable time, he gravely informed them that his wonderful powers
were entirely due to the use of a certain ‘twisting chalk’ that he had
recently invented, and had then on sale. The demand for small pill-boxes
filled with powdered chalk at half a crown per box was naturally
enormous, and for a long time the wily marker reaped a rare harvest. If,
as some have supposed, this was the first introduction of the custom of
chalking the tip of a cue, the half-crowns were well invested; but,
unfortunately, the weight of evidence goes to show that chalk had been
in common use for this purpose for some time prior to Carr’s smart
stroke of business, and that he economically filled his valuable
pill-boxes by grinding up some of the chalk provided by Mr. Bartley for
the use of his customers.
What with the brisk sale of the famous ‘twisting chalk,’ and the immense
advantage that his knowledge of the power of screw gave him over all
rivals, Carr must have been making a great deal of money about this
time. Unhappily for his own prosperity, however, he was a desperate and
confirmed gambler, and all that he made out of ivory in one form was
lost through ivory in another. He never could resist ‘flirting with the
elephant’s tooth,’ and every shilling that he made was promptly lost at
hazard. At last, fairly tired out by incessant losses scarcely broken by
a single run of luck, and discontented with circumstances immediately
connected with his professional pursuits, he determined to leave England
and try his fortune in Spain. It might have been imagined that the
latter country would have proved anything but a happy hunting-ground,
and that the Dons, on falling victims to Carr’s powers of screw, might
have taken it into their heads to lay down their cues and to finish the
game with knives. However, the Bath marker was evidently an excellent
man of business, and the Spanish billiard-rooms proved veritable El
Dorados to him. He made a tour of the principal towns, and succeeded in
easily beating everyone with whom he played. The feats he performed by
means of the ‘side twist’—as the screw stroke was formerly termed—amazed
all who saw him play, and he managed to amass a considerable sum. Still,
the old passion was as strong as ever, and once more proved his
downfall. Spain was even more amply furnished with gambling-houses than
England, and, as Carr’s usual ill luck pursued him, all his doubloons
vanished even more rapidly than they had been acquired; he was compelled
to return home, and finally landed at Portsmouth almost in rags.
‘Whether’—to use Mr. Mardon’s own words, and it is to his excellent book
that I am indebted for much of my information as to these early
exponents of the game—‘players of those days were less particular than
persons of the present period is not for me to determine; but it is no
less strange than true that, even in so deplorable a garb, he no sooner
made his appearance at the billiard-table than he met with a gentleman
willing to contend.’ In the ‘gentleman willing to contend,’ Carr, in his
hour of direst need, must have found a very foolish person, for no man
of average sense would have lost seventy pounds to an individual whose
appearance loudly proclaimed that he did not possess the same number of
pence, and who, therefore, could not possibly have paid had the issue of
the games gone the other way.
The _dénouement_ of this little episode fully confirms this idea.
Quitting the room with the money in his pocket, Carr immediately
proceeded to get himself fully rigged out in ‘a blue coat, yellow
waistcoat, drab small-clothes, and top-boots.’ A little advice from the
local Polonius was evidently sadly needed; the attire was probably
‘costly’ and may have been ‘rich,’ but it was certainly ‘express’d in
fancy,’ and decidedly ‘gaudy.’ Arrayed in all this magnificence, Carr
paid another visit to the same billiard-room on the following day, when
he again encountered his victim. The latter being, according to Mr.
Mardon, ‘a fine player and devoted to the game,’ lost no time in
challenging the stranger to play. This match naturally resulted as the
other had done, and Carr again won a considerable sum. When play was
over the gentleman remarked that ‘he was truly unfortunate in having met
with, on succeeding days, two persons capable of giving him so severe a
dressing. Carr, making himself known, thanked the gentleman for the
metamorphosis his money had occasioned, and wished him a good morning.’
In 1825, Carr played a match against ‘the Cork Marker,’ at the Four
Nations Hotel, in the Opera Colonnade. The latter was considered a very
fine player in his day, and it is curious that no one seems to have
known his name, for he is invariably alluded to under this somewhat
vague designation. They played three games of 100 up, and, although Carr
won all three, he was evidently encountering a foeman worthy of his
steel, as ‘the Cork Marker’ reached 92 in the first game, and 75 in the
third. In the second, however, he only got to 49, as Carr suddenly
astonished the spectators by making twenty-two consecutive spot strokes.
This was naturally considered a most extraordinary feat, and, as an
offer was at once made to back Carr against all comers for a hundred
guineas a-side, he can fairly lay claim to being considered the first
champion of billiards, or, at any rate, the first whose claim to the
title rests upon anything like a solid foundation. Pierce Egan, in his
‘Annals of Sporting and Fancy Gazette,’ writes of him as the ‘father of
the side stroke;’ and though, as I have previously narrated, Mr. Bartley
was the discoverer of the stroke, Carr was undoubtedly the first man who
realised its importance and turned it to practical account.
I have been unable to satisfy myself whether Bedford and Pratt, two fine
players who flourished in the first half of the present century, were
contemporaries of Carr, or belonged to a somewhat later period; this,
however, is a matter of small consequence. According to Mr. Mardon,
‘each was celebrated for quietude of demeanour and elegance of style,’
and Bedford was ‘graceful and unassuming, excelling in winning hazards,
whilst all [strokes?] are made without apparent effort;’ his best break
was 159. The same author gives the following amusing anecdote of Pratt,
which will well bear repetition:
One evening, when most persons were enjoying their claret by the
fireside, a gentleman presented himself in the billiard-room, where
Pratt was seated alone. To a request whether he was desirous of
playing, he replied in the affirmative. The lights were placed, and
the parties took their stations at the table. ‘What game, sir, would
you wish to play?’ ‘I will play,’ replied the stranger, ‘the game of
100 up; and, as it is my desire that you should be rewarded for your
trouble, I will play for sixpence!’ The game commenced; and, after the
gentleman had once or twice struck the balls, he left his opponent’s
ball near the red, which, fortunately for Pratt, being on the spot, he
continued to hole in the two corner pockets four-and-thirty times,
beating his liberal antagonist a love game, 100 up!
To return, however, to Carr. His challenge was soon taken up by Edwin
Kentfield, of Brighton (better known as Jonathan); but Carr fell ill,
and the proposed match never came off. Kentfield then assumed the title
of champion, his claim to which was not disputed for four-and-twenty
years. There is no doubt that Edwin Kentfield, who died in 1873, was
very superior to most of his profession. He was a man of refined tastes,
passionately devoted to horticulture, with which he was thoroughly
conversant, and he had the shrewdness to see that the tables and all the
accessories of the game which were in use when he began to play were
very crude and imperfect, the tables having list cushions, wooden beds,
and coarse baize coverings. He spent many years in improving tables,
cushions, balls, cues, &c., and, thanks to his energy, and to the acumen
of Mr. John Thurston—the founder of the present well-known firm of
billiard-table makers, who thoroughly believed in Kentfield, and was
always ready to support his views and carry out his suggested
improvements—the old order of things was gradually superseded by rubber
cushions, slate beds, and fine cloths.
All the newest improvements were naturally to be found in Kentfield’s
Subscription Rooms at Brighton, the appointments of which were
wonderfully perfect, considering the date. In 1839 he published ‘The
Game of Billiards: Scientifically Explained and Practically Set Forth,
in a Series of Novel and Extraordinary, but Equally Practical, Strokes.’
In his well-written and modest preface, Kentfield alludes to the ‘many
alterations and improvements that have been successfully introduced, and
which have so greatly contributed to the state of perfection to which
this noble amusement has at length arrived.’ Compared with the tables
that were in vogue before Messrs. Kentfield and Thurston began their
improvements, their joint production did doubtless seem wonderfully
perfect; yet this extract reads curiously in 1896, in the face of the
extraordinary developments of everything connected with the game that
have taken place within the last ten or fifteen years.
Kentfield was acquainted with the spot stroke, and played it well,
considering the then existing conditions. He devotes a very short
chapter in his book to it, and describes four different methods by which
it can be made. There are now nine entirely different strokes which may
be brought into use in the course of a long spot break; but doubtless,
in his day, several of the varieties of the stroke were absolutely
impossible, owing to the comparative slowness of the tables. He did not,
however, approve of the spot stroke, nor consider it billiards, and on
this point was evidently of the same mind as the younger Roberts, who
has recorded his opinion that a constant succession of big spot breaks
‘would very soon kill the popularity and destroy the artistic position
billiards has attained.’ The thoroughly genuine nature of Kentfield’s
feelings on the subject may be judged from the fact that he caused the
pockets of the tables in his rooms at Brighton to be reduced to three
inches, in order to prevent spot strokes being made; and this, unless he
materially increased the charge for each game, must have meant a
considerable annual pecuniary loss to him. The table on which Kentfield
constantly played is thus described: ‘The table in the Subscription Room
is extremely difficult. It is, perhaps, the fastest in England, and has
pockets of the smallest dimensions (three inches). The spot for the red
ball is barely twelve inches from the lower cushion; the baulk circle
only eighteen inches in extent. On many tables the spot is thirteen
inches from the cushion; the baulk twenty-two.’ It seems singular that,
quite thirty years before the first championship table was manufactured,
Kentfield should have put up almost a fac-simile of it in his Brighton
rooms; but probably John Roberts, senior, saw it there, possibly played
upon it, and derived from it the idea of the table on which, in 1870,
the championship was decided.
It is almost impossible, after this lapse of time, to form any
trustworthy opinion as to the real strength of Kentfield’s game, and it
would be manifestly unfair to draw comparisons between him and any
player of more recent date than the elder John Roberts. Let us first
take the evidence of Mr. Mardon on the subject; and I may here remark
that Mr. Mardon’s book—which was a very great improvement on any of its
predecessors dealing with billiards—appears to have been primarily
written with the view of giving immortality to the author’s great game
of 500 up with a Mr. Porker. This was played in Kentfield’s rooms. Mr.
Porker, who conceded a start of 25 points, reached 495 to 475, and then
Mr. Mardon ran out. A break of 25, even at the end of a game, does not
seem such a very startling feat; still, it was evidently considered as
such in those days, and a diagram is given of each of the nine strokes
which were comprised in this historical effort. One or two of these were
somewhat singularly played according to modern ideas. In one of them,
for example, the red ball was near the left top pocket, into which it
was very easy to screw, and his opponent’s ball was nicely placed about
the middle of the table. Instead of making the losing hazard with a slow
screw, which would have just brought the red ball down to the white, and
left a capital chance of a good break, Mr. Mardon had a regular bang at
it, doubled the red ball right down the table and up again, and,
probably more by luck than judgment, finally left it almost in the jaws
of the right-hand top pocket. This, however, is ‘another story,’ and I
am keeping Mr. Mardon waiting an unconscionably long time in the
witness-box to give his testimony as to Kentfield’s abilities as a
player. He writes:
Were I to relate all the extraordinary performances of Mr. Kentfield
at the period when list cushions and pockets of large dimensions were
in vogue, the reader would imagine I was bordering on romance. On one
occasion, when playing the winning game, 21 up, Mr. Kentfield gave his
opponent 18 points, and won sixteen successive games. In playing the
winning and losing game, 24 up, he won ten games, his adversary never
scoring! The games were thus played: Mr. Kentfield, in playing off,
doubled the red ball for one of the baulk corner pockets, placing his
own ball under the side cushion. His opponent played to drop it into
the corner pocket, failed, and left on each occasion a cannon; that
was made, and the games were all won off the balls! At another time he
was playing the non-cushion game, 16 up. On going off he twisted his
ball into the corner pocket from the red and won in that manner six
games, his adversary not having a stroke! Desirous of ascertaining how
many games of 24 up could be played within the hour, he commenced the
task with a player of considerable eminence;[1] and they completed
thirty games within the specified time. Forty-seven games of 100 up
were also played in eight and a half hours. In a match that did not
exceed two hundred games, he beat his opponent eighty-five love games.
Even allowing that the ‘player of considerable eminence’ was out of
form, and that Kentfield had the table virtually to himself, 720 points
in an hour was amazing;[2] and even the longer test, which works out at
the rate of about 550 points per hour, does not compare at all badly
with the rate at which our best players score at the present day; so it
seems curious that a performer of such ability should have continued for
years playing games of 21 and 24 up, in which, as was almost sure to be
the case, his opponent frequently never had a stroke. When John Roberts,
senior, was fast coming into note as a great player, and people were
beginning to compare his powers with those of Kentfield, Mr. Mardon thus
expressed his opinion on the subject:
I have been given to understand, within the last few months, that Mr.
Roberts, superintendent of the billiard-rooms at the Union Club in
Manchester, is considered by his friends of that neighbourhood to be
equal to any player in England; and, in order to afford me an
opportunity of judging of his skill, balls have been placed in
situations of considerable difficulty, and I have been assured that
hazards thus presented came quite within his power of cue. I have also
been informed that, in playing a game of 100 up, his opponent, aware
of, and dreading, his ability, ran a coup at 96 love, hoping, by so
prudent and cautious a proceeding, to ensure winning the game. Mr.
Roberts, playing from the baulk circle, twisted into one of the corner
pockets from the ball upon the spot, and made from a break so
unpromising 102 points from the red ball alone! Admitting, however,
this information to be correct, still, wonderful and surprising
execution does not constitute either a sterling or a successful
player; and when I take into consideration the advantages to be
derived from playing the game called ‘One pocket to five,’ and learn
that Mr. Kentfield has played upwards of fifty thousand games with one
gentleman alone, I cannot but imagine that an experience so great,
united with his matchless skill, must not only elevate him above all
other players, but fully entitle him to the paramount laudatory
remarks with which his name will be found to be associated. When I
call to mind, and reflect upon, the wonderful execution displayed
while playing the commanding game over the table, and the game of one
pocket to one pocket _commanded_, I have no hesitation in saying that
on such occasions his power of cue has gone beyond what even the
imagination could embrace. I have seen him, like a man inspired,
accomplish stroke after stroke, hazards and cannons, against which I,
with my knowledge of the game, would have laid fifty to one! From his
cue I have witnessed that which I am confident I shall never see
again; and, although luminaries may shine forth in other spheres, Mr.
Kentfield, the electric light of mine, must, I think, dim their lustre
and keep them in the shade.
The only other witness I shall call is John Roberts, sen., who has left
on record his opinion that Kentfield ‘played a very artistic game, but
possessed very little power of cue. He depended on slow twists and fancy
screws, and rarely attempted a brilliant forcing hazard. He gave misses,
and made baulks whenever they were practicable, and never departed from
the strict game.’ This was not written until many years after all
rivalry between the two men had ceased, and may, therefore, probably be
accepted as a calm and unprejudiced opinion. At first sight it is
difficult to reconcile the entirely opposite views of Mr. Mardon and
Roberts with regard to Kentfield’s power of cue. The truth probably lies
between the two extremes, for the former’s judgment may have been
slightly warped by intense admiration for his idol, whereas Roberts was
possibly comparing Kentfield’s power of cue with his own, which was
almost phenomenal. The highest break that Kentfield ever made was one of
196, and his best spot break 57 consecutive hazards. It may be taken for
granted that neither of these breaks was made on his three-inch pocket
table; nevertheless, they may still be regarded as very excellent
performances. If, however, there are diverse views as to Kentfield’s
powers as a player, I have only been able to discover one opinion as to
his merits as a man. Whether or not we may feel inclined to accept the
dictum that genius is ‘an infinite capacity for taking pains,’ I think
there is little doubt that Edwin Kentfield was a genius at billiards,
whilst in other respects it is quite certain that he set a brilliant
example to the players who followed him.
During the last few years of Kentfield’s long and peaceful career, the
fame of John Roberts was rapidly growing, especially in and near
Manchester, and it became evident that at last, for the first time for
four and twenty years, the champion would be called upon to defend his
title. Roberts was born about 1815, and, as is bound to be the case with
a really great player, had a cue in his hand long before he was tall
enough to reach the table properly. Indeed, he was only nine years old
when he began to play upon an old-fashioned table by Gillow, with a
wooden bed and list cushions. This was at the old Rotunda, Bold Street,
Liverpool, and he showed such remarkable aptitude for the game that in
six months he could give points to most ordinary players. His precocious
ability appears to have been unknown to his father, until one day the
two played three or four games together, and the youngster won by many
points. Instead of being delighted with this display of juvenile talent,
the old man, who was possibly a bad loser, concluded that his son must
have been devoting far too much time to the game, and, lacking the
shrewdness to perceive the possibilities that lay before so skilful a
lad, apprenticed him to a carpenter. The boy stuck to this trade for a
couple of years; but his passion for billiards remained as strong as
ever, and at the end of that time he ran away, thenceforth devoting
himself entirely to what was unquestionably his proper vocation. His
first engagement was as marker at Oldham, and it is evident that he must
have improved very rapidly while there, for he could not have been more
than fourteen years old when he played home and home matches with
‘Pendleton Tom,’ a professional player with considerable local
reputation, and beat him in both. When he left Oldham he obtained a
situation in Glasgow, and in 1844 played a match against John Fleming, a
well-known billiard-table maker of that day, for 100_l._ a-side; and
here he met with his first reverse of any importance. They were playing
500 up, and when the game was called ‘485 all,’ Fleming tried for a
cannon and missed it, but fluked a six stroke and went out. Roberts then
defeated Tom Broughton of Leeds, and this appears to have been his last
match of any note during his sojourn in Glasgow. This ended in 1845,
when he became manager of the billiard-rooms of the Union Club at
Manchester, a position which he retained for seven years. This was very
fortunate for him, as he no doubt had far more opportunities for
practice than he had ever previously enjoyed, and it was while there
that he learnt the spot stroke. The popular idea that he invented the
stroke is, of course, an entire fallacy, for Kentfield, Carr, Pratt, and
others were in the habit of playing it. It was taught to Roberts by Mr.
Lee Birch, a member of the Union Club, who had seen it played in London,
and, being one of the best amateur players of the day, soon mastered it
to the extent of being generally able to make a dozen or fifteen
consecutive hazards. It is curious, by the way, how many amateur players
attain this standard of excellence and never get any farther. If a man
can habitually make this number of spot strokes, nothing but steady
practice is required to enable him to make runs of fifty, seventy, a
hundred, or even more; yet not one in a thousand has the resolution or
perseverance to take this necessary practice. With Roberts it was
entirely different. He at once realised that the stroke must give an
enormous advantage to any man who could play it with something like
certainty. For six months, therefore, he devoted himself almost entirely
to it, and spent hundreds of hours at the top of the table.
When a man who united a natural genius for the game with indomitable
perseverance thus set himself to master a particular stroke, there could
be only one result, and I should fancy it was then—strong in the
confidence engendered by his ability to play this deadly stroke—that he
first conceived the idea of bearding Kentfield in his den, and
challenging his long-undisputed supremacy. Mr. Mardon’s account of the
first meeting of the rivals is as follows: ‘Arriving in Brighton,
Roberts called on Kentfield. He informed him at once, in a manly,
straightforward manner, who he was, and expressed a desire of playing a
friendly game. He neither sought disguise nor secrecy, and would
willingly have shown the strength of his game to all who might have
approached. Kentfield, on the other hand, was very desirous of avoiding
publicity, and, taking Roberts into an adjoining room, locked the door
and began a game.’ Then follow a few more lines in Mr. Mardon’s usual
rather high-flown style, the meaning of which, translated into the
vulgar tongue, is that Roberts speedily discovered that his opponent was
not really doing his best. This did not at all suit the man who had come
from Manchester on a voyage of discovery, and Mr. Mardon tells us that
he thus expressed his opinion on the subject: ‘This, Mr. Kentfield,
cannot be your game; to play such as this I can give forty in a hundred.
If you are withholding your powers for the purpose of obtaining a bet, I
am willing to recommence the game and to play you for five pounds.’
Those who knew the elder Roberts intimately may possibly accept this as
the general purport of his remarks, but will entirely decline to believe
that he did not express himself in far more vigorous and forcible
language. As, however, Mr. Mardon states that the door of the room was
locked, and that no one was present excepting the two principals, he
could only have written his account of the scene from hearsay, and it
differs considerably from Roberts’s own version of the interview. This,
given in ‘Roberts on Billiards,’ runs as follows:
I remember perfectly my first meeting with Kentfield, better known as
‘Jonathan.’ It was in the beginning of 1849, at Brighton, where I went
on purpose to see him play. On entering his rooms I met John Pook, the
present proprietor of the Cocoa-tree Club, who was at that time his
manager. After sending up my name, Kentfield came in and inquired my
business. I told him that I was admitted to be the best player in
Lancashire, whence I had come to find out if he could show me
anything. He inquired if I wanted a lesson. I told him I did not, and
asked him how many in 100 would be a fair allowance from a player on
his own table to a stranger, provided they were of equal skill. He
replied ‘15;’ I told him I thought 20 would be nearer the mark, but I
was contented to try at evens. He said: ‘If you play me, it must be
for some money;’ on which, not to be frightened, I pulled out a
100_l._ note, and told him I would play him ten games of 100 up for
10_l._ a game. He laughed, and said I was rather hasty; and eventually
we knocked the balls about, and then commenced a friendly 100 on level
terms. He had the best of the breaks, and won by 40. In the second
game I pulled out a few north-country shots and won by 30, but he
secured the third. Then he put down his cue, and asked if I was
satisfied he could beat me. I said: ‘No; on the contrary, if you can’t
play better than this, I can give you 20 in 100 easily.’ He replied:
‘Well, if you want to play me, you must put down a good stake.’ I
asked how much, and he answered 1,000_l._ I said: ‘Do you mean
1,000_l._ a-side?’ Upon which he told me he thought I was a
straightforward fellow, and he would see what could be done. He then
sent Pook back to me, and I explained to him how things stood. He
replied: ‘You may as well go back to Lancashire; you won’t get a match
on with the governor.’
Accepting Roberts’s version of this historical meeting, one is forced to
the conclusion that, if one of the two was not trying to win, it
certainly was not Kentfield; for when a man loses two games out of three
on level terms, and then calmly tells his victorious opponent that he
can easily give him 20 in 100, it is certain that the loser must have
been keeping a very big bit up his sleeve. Evidently Kentfield was fully
alive to this, for all efforts to get him to make a match proved
fruitless.
The fact of the matter undoubtedly was that Kentfield, who was many
years the senior of the pair, felt that the coming man was too strong
for him, realised that he had everything to lose and very little to gain
by risking a contest, and preferred the title of ‘retired champion’ to
that of ‘ex-champion.’
John Roberts, therefore, attained the first position in the world of
billiards in 1849, and the following year, whilst he was still manager
of the billiard-rooms at the Union Club, Manchester, played a great
match of 1,000 up with Starke, an American. The latter was a remarkably
fine nursery cannon player, and, getting the run of the balls in the
early part of the game, reached 600 to 450, thus securing a formidable
lead. Then it was that Roberts first reaped the reward of all the time
and patience he had expended on the practice of the spot stroke. Wisely
abandoning the all-round game, he devoted his energies to getting
position at the top of the table; a break which included thirty-nine
consecutive ‘spots’ took him to the front again, and another fine run of
thirty-six red hazards gave him an easy victory. In a letter to ‘Bell’s
Life’ on the subject of this match, one of the best contemporary judges
of the game gave it as his opinion that ‘Kentfield showed good judgment
in declining a match with Roberts, for, had they played upon a neutral
table, he would have been defeated to a certainty.’ Even Mr. Mardon
completely altered his mind with regard to the respective merits of the
two players, and to his second profession of faith he probably remained
steadfast until the day of his death; for, as comparatively recently as
the early part of 1874, he wrote a letter to the ‘Sporting Life’ on the
subject of billiards, in which he strongly maintained the superiority of
old John over his son, William Cook, and Joseph Bennett.
It is doubtful whether, at the period of which I am now writing, the
title of champion was of much pecuniary value to its possessor. He could
only get an occasional match for money by giving a very long start,
whilst such things as exhibition games seem to have been of very rare
occurrence. In glancing over the files of ‘Bell’s Life’—the only
sporting paper then in existence—of some forty years ago, one cannot
fail to be struck with the way in which billiards is practically
ignored; in fact, it was some time before I could find any allusion to
the game. At last, in the issue dated February 22, 1852, I discovered
the following announcement: ‘A silver snuff-box will be given by the
proprietor of the Shakspere’s Head, Wych Street, Strand, to be played
for by eight of the best players in London, on Tuesday next, at six
o’clock. A gentleman from the country will be in attendance to play any
man in London for from 25_l._ to 50_l._ the same night.’ The most rigid
examination of the issue of the following week—in those days sportsmen
had to content themselves with one sporting paper, which came out once a
week—failed to discover the smallest record of the doings of ‘eight of
the best players in London’ on that Tuesday evening, and the destination
of the silver snuff-box might have been for ever lost to posterity but
for the appearance of the following challenge: ‘Mr. John Dufton will
play Mr. Farrell, the winner of the snuff-box at the Shakspere’s Head,
Wych Street, on Tuesday last, a match at billiards, from 100 to 1,000
up, for 10_l._ or 20_l._ a-side. Money ready any evening at the
above-named place.’ It is probable that the challenger was a relation of
the well-known William Dufton, ‘tutor to the Prince of Wales,’ as he
always proudly styled himself, though I must candidly confess that I had
never previously heard either of him or of Farrell, entitled as each may
have been to rank amongst the eight best players in London. It was not,
however, the battle for the snuff-box that interested me. I was anxious
to know how the countryman fared on his adventurous crusade, and had a
suspicion that he may have turned out to have been no less a personage
than the champion himself, this being just the sort of little joke that
John Roberts always enjoyed. However, my curiosity on this point had to
remain unsatisfied, and I ceased to be surprised that it should be so
when I found that in the same issue of ‘Bells Life’—which in those days
was supposed to devote a good deal of its space to events of general
interest other than sporting—the death of Tom Moore, the sweetest singer
Ireland ever produced, was dismissed in exactly five lines!
In this same year (1852) Roberts resigned the management of the
billiard-rooms at the Union Club, which he had held for seven years, and
took the Griffin Hotel in Lower Broughton, a suburb of Manchester. Soon
after this he played two more matches with Starke at the American game,
each of them being for 100_l._ a-side. It is noteworthy, as marking the
rapid manner in which he had ‘come on’ in his play, that whereas, only
two years previously, Starke had played him upon even terms, and at one
stage of the game looked very much like beating him, it was now thought
good enough to back Roberts to give a start of 300 in 1,000. This proved
rather too big a concession; nevertheless, little mistake had been made
in estimating the respective merits of the two men, for in the return
match, in which the start was reduced to 275, the champion won very
easily. The billiard history of the next few years is singularly
uneventful, and there appear to have been few players good enough to
have any chance with Roberts, even when allowed a long start. He,
however, did not retain the Griffin Hotel very long, and, after leaving
it, took billiard-rooms in Cross Street, Manchester. He must have been
living there in 1858, when he played a match with John Herst in Glasgow,
in the course of which he made a break of 186, which included a run of
55 consecutive spot strokes. Herst was a brilliant winning hazard
striker, and played in very pretty and finished style. Great things were
expected of him, and there is every reason to suppose that these
expectations would have been realised, but he died almost at the outset
of his career. In 1861 Roberts at length left Manchester, to become
lessee of Saville House, Leicester Square, and he had not been there
many weeks when he played a match with Mr. Downs, an amateur, to whom he
conceded a start of 700 in 1,000. In the course of this game, which he
won by 93 points, he made two very fine breaks of 195 (53 ‘spots’) and
200 (64 ‘spots’), and scored his thousand points in 2 hours 11 minutes,
an excellent performance, notwithstanding the fact that he must have had
the table virtually to himself. A rather curious episode occurred in the
course of this game. Mr. Downs, in lieu of giving the customary miss at
the beginning of the play, ran a coup, expecting that Roberts would give
a miss, and very probably calculating that, with his big start, to give
three and receive one was really judicious. The champion, however,
instantly grasped the situation, and, without a moment’s hesitation,
played hard at the red, and sent it and his own ball flying to the other
end of the room. In those days there was no penalty for knocking a ball
off the table, so Mr. Downs’s carefully calculated and promising scheme
of running a succession of coups and receiving a series of misses was
summarily nipped in the bud. It was at Saville House in March 1862 that
Roberts made his famous break of 346, mainly composed of a series of 104
spot hazards. William Dufton was his opponent, and Roberts won the game
in the remarkably fast time of an hour and three-quarters. This break
was more than a nine days’ wonder, and never before or afterwards did
Roberts make 300 off the balls in public—a feat that is now well within
the compass of plenty of men who do not play well enough to get a couple
of engagements per season in exhibition matches.
Two of the most prominent players in the ‘fifties’ and early ‘sixties’
were Alfred Bowles and Charles Hughes. Roberts considered the former to
be the best player he ever met, and records that ‘no one yet has ever
held me at the points as Bowles used to do.’ The points alluded to were
300 in 1,000; but it must not be forgotten that these remarks were
written before William Cook, John Roberts, jun., and Joseph Bennett had
come to the front. I never saw Bowles play until he challenged the
younger Roberts for the championship and suffered an easy defeat. This
was in May 1870, when the Brighton man had possibly seen his best day.
He played a steady, old-fashioned game, but was hopelessly out-classed
by young John, and, though he could play the spot stroke well, of course
he had no opportunity of doing so on a championship table. From what I
saw of the play of the two men, I should unhesitatingly place Charles
Hughes before Bowles; but it would be ridiculous, with the very limited
opportunities I had of forming an opinion, to oppose my judgment to that
of Roberts; and certainly the results of two matches that were played in
the early part of 1864 point strongly to the superiority of Bowles. In
January of that year Roberts gave Bowles 300 in 1,000 for 100_l._
a-side—in those days 100_l._ a-side meant 100_l._ a-side, not that each
man went through the solemn farce of staking his money, and received it
back again at the end of the game, whatever the result might be—and was
beaten by 109 points; whilst, two months later, the champion conceded
Hughes 350 in 1,000, and beat him by no fewer than 243 points. There can
be no doubt, however, that Hughes improved wonderfully between the date
of this match and 1869, when he sailed for Australia. The weak point in
his game was an irresistible inclination to go out for fancy cannons. He
would be apparently well set for a really good break when he would
neglect a comparatively simple shot for some elaborate cannon off three
or four cushions, which he would either just miss or perhaps bring off,
with the result of leaving the balls in an almost impossible position
for a further score. He was gradually, however, getting over this
propensity towards the close of his career, and undoubtedly played a
very good game indeed at the time that he left England. Just prior to
sailing he ran into the last three of a great professional handicap
which took place at the ‘Nell Gwynne,’ Strand, in which, together with
Cook and Roberts, jun., he started at scratch, whilst the champion owed
50 points, and, as there were as many as forty players engaged, this was
a capital performance. He also won a handicap of 200 up, which was
played to celebrate the opening of the Bentinck Club, upon the site of
which the Vaudeville Theatre now stands. In this he received a start of
30 points, the champion owed 20, whilst his son and Cook had 20 each.
The best thing he ever did, however, was accomplished in the last game
he played in England. He sailed from Liverpool, and, as Roberts had gone
down to see him off, the pair took advantage of the opportunity to play
1,000 up at the ‘Golden Lion,’ Deansgate, Manchester. Roberts, as usual,
gave a start of 300, and had reached 736 against 794, when Hughes went
out with a break of 206, which included 62 consecutive ‘spots.’ Being
asked to finish the break, he added 21 more red hazards, and this 269
was a bigger run than anyone had put together since the champion had
made his famous 346 about seven years previously. I can find no record
of Hughes’s achievements in Australia, but he did not long survive his
arrival in that country. As has been the case with too many other fine
players, he lacked the resolution and strength of mind to take proper
care of himself, and the lavish colonial hospitality which was thrust
upon him at every turn speedily killed him.
In the limited space at my disposal it is manifestly impossible to
follow the game closely, year by year, and I think the better plan will
be to give a sketch of all the principal players, including some account
of the most important matches that have taken place since 1870, at
nearly all of which I have been fortunate enough to have been present.
In ‘Roberts on Billiards,’ which was written towards the close of the
author’s twenty-one years’ tenure of the championship, he names Charles
Hughes, John Herst, Joseph Bennett, William Cook, and John Roberts,
jun., as candidates for the title of second-best player, and adds,
‘probably the two best are William Cook and my eldest son.’ The first
and second I have already dealt with; the other three, who kept the
championship entirely between them during fifteen years, naturally
demand more extended notice, as their doings really form the greater
part of the history of billiards from 1870 onwards. Before coming to
them, however, it will be better to dispose of what Roberts terms the
third class, in which he includes William Dufton, L. Kilkenny, W. D.
Stanley, W. E. Green, George Mulberry, Alfred Hughes, George Davis, W.
C. Hitchin, Tom Morris, Harry Evans, and John Smith, ‘to any of whom I
have been in the habit of allowing 350 in 1,000.’ Of these, I never saw
Stanley—who, I fancy, was an elder brother of D. Richards and S. W.
Stanley—Mulberry, Davis, Hitchin, or Smith play, and will not,
therefore, write anything about them. With respect to Dufton, I feel
bound to say that, in my opinion, he was a much overrated man. As I saw
him perform for the first time in 1866, when it is possible that he may
have been going off, I should have hesitated to write so plainly, had
not my view of his lack of ability been fully confirmed by one who
constantly played with him, and for whose judgment I have the highest
respect. His long ‘jennies,’ on the making of which his reputation
almost entirely rested, are now easily within the compass of any
professional player, and he would never have made the name he did but
for confining his play almost entirely to exhibition games with Roberts.
These exhibition matches would naturally have lost much of their
attraction if the champion had invariably won, so Dufton had his share
of successes, and came to be regarded as being able to play Roberts with
350 points in 1,000; whereas it is perfectly certain that a start of
half the game would not have brought them together when the scratch man
was doing his best. L. Kilkenny kept pace fairly well with the
remarkable development of the game that took place between 1870 and
1880, and managed to hold his own with a reasonable start from the
rising stars. He possessed little power of cue and no brilliancy of
execution, but played a sound, steady game, and, before spot-barred
games became so universal, could generally be relied upon for a pretty
good run of ‘spots’ when he obtained a favourable position. Deprived of
the strongest part of his game, however, he soon fell out of the ranks.
Alfred Hughes was a player of no class compared with his brother
Charles, and Tom Morris, a left-handed man, with a somewhat flashy
style, was only moderate. Harry Evans, on the contrary, was a thoroughly
sound performer, who played an excellent all-round game, and, if he did
not go out for gallery strokes, seldom or never missed an ordinarily
simple one. Soon after his arrival in Australia he suddenly came out as
quite a phenomenal spot stroke player, though he had never so
distinguished himself in England, and he held the championship of that
colony for many years, till quite recently deprived of it by Charles
Memmott.
About 1866 John Roberts, jun., William Cook, and Joseph Bennett began to
draw away from the ruck of billiard-players, and it did not require much
foresight to predict that old John would shortly find a dangerous rival
or two, though it was difficult at the time to believe that anyone would
have the temerity to meet him upon even terms. In the October of that
year a great four-handed match took place, the champion and Dufton
attempting to give 200 in 1,000 to Charles Hughes and Joseph Bennett for
200_l._ a-side, an attempt in which they failed lamentably, being beaten
by no fewer than 344 points. Though Hughes scored 497 points during the
game, whilst Bennett only contributed 281, the major portion of the
credit of the victory must be given to the latter, who, by the way, is
the only surviving member of the quartet. Always remarkable for his fine
generalship and wonderful knowledge of the game, Bennett never displayed
these qualities to more advantage than on this occasion. He played in
front of Roberts, and, although he made a few breaks of twenty or
thirty, his sole mission was never to allow the champion a fair opening.
Directly he had a stroke which it was not three to one on his making, he
at once abandoned the break, and either put down the white and left a
double baulk or else gave a miss. Roberts’s game, in fact, was so
utterly cramped from start to finish that it was a remarkable feat on
his part to make 488 points during the evening. In the meantime Hughes
was thoroughly enjoying himself. Having only Dufton to follow him, and
well knowing that it did not much matter what sort of a game he left on,
he went out for everything, brought off all sorts of fancy cannons, and
scored the fastest of the party. Poor Dufton’s show was a very
lamentable one. From the style of game that Hughes was playing, he
naturally left any number of good openings, but all that Dufton could
total during the evening was 136. By Bennett’s clever strategy the
four-handed match was virtually reduced to a single-handed battle
between Hughes and Dufton, and this could only have had one result, even
had they played upon level terms.
It was at the end of 1868 that William Cook and John Roberts, jun.,
between whom there was destined to be such keen rivalry for the next
twelve or fifteen years, played their first match for money, Cook being
at that time just nineteen years of age and his opponent two years
older. The match took place at the Bentinck Club, and produced a very
large amount of speculation. It is quite needless to give any
description of the game, which Roberts won by 92 points, but it is
noteworthy that his best breaks—at the all-in game, be it
remembered—were 120 and 99, whilst Cook’s highest effort only reached
92. This contrasts very curiously with the state of affairs early in
1896, when, in a spot-barred game of 1,000 up, it would be quite safe to
back a player of the calibre of D. Richards or H. W. Stevenson to make
three breaks of upwards of a hundred each. In spite of this defeat,
Cook’s friends did not lose faith in him, and, in his inmost heart, I
believe that Roberts, sen., always rated Cook’s play at a higher level
than that of his son. I remember having a chat with the old man on this
subject at the Bentinck Club. Young John had just beaten Cook pretty
easily in their heat of the handicap with which the opening of the club
was celebrated, and this, coupled with his recent success in the match
just referred to, led me to remark that there could be little doubt as
to who would be future champion. ‘I’m not so sure of that,’ said the
veteran with a shake of the head; ‘we’ve not seen the best of Cook yet.’
Before the end of that year his opinion was amply justified. In March a
return match was played, in which, though the breaks on both sides were
very small, Cook beat Roberts, jun., by 323 points, and when the former
began playing again after the summer recess the improvement he exhibited
was simply extraordinary. His beautiful delicacy of touch was more
striking than ever, and he ‘nursed’ the balls with even more than his
old skill; but in his anxiety to secure position he did not so
frequently miss the immediate stroke, which had formerly been the weak
point in his game. Then he had attained a proficiency in playing the
spot stroke that entirely eclipsed anything that had previously been
witnessed in this line, and three times in one week, with young Roberts
as an opponent, he made upwards of three hundred off the balls. Two of
these breaks—351 at the Royal Hotel, Dale Street, Liverpool, and 359 at
the Prince of Wales’s Hotel, Moss Side, Manchester—beat the champion’s
346, which for seven years had been considered quite unapproachable.
After this, Cook seldom played two games of 1,000 up without making a
break of 300 in one of them, and left his old rival, John Roberts, jun.,
completely in the rear. There could only be one end to this series of
remarkable performances, and in the autumn of 1869 Cook issued a
challenge to play the champion, on or before January 1, 1870, a game of
1,000 or 2,000 up, level, for 500_l._ a-side. Some little time elapsed
before the two men came to terms, and it was decided by a committee of
the leading players of the day that matches for the championship should
be played on a table with three-inch pockets, and with the spot 12½
inches from the top cushion, instead of 13¼ inches, the then customary
distance. As Cook was a member of the committee which decided on this
radical alteration in the table, it seems strange that he did not
protest strongly against a measure which nearly every expert at once
realised must deprive him of the strongest feature of his game—the spot
stroke—but the reason was that he apparently did not realise the fact.
Cook was then barely twenty-one years of age, but he ought to have had
sufficient experience to have saved him from such a mistake. Before he
had been playing on the new table for an hour, his error must have been
brought home to him in very unpleasant fashion.
Just as the great battle at Farnborough between Sayers and Heenan was
read about and eagerly discussed by all sorts and conditions of men who
had previously professed the greatest disgust for prize-fighting, so the
match between the veteran and his pupil excited intense interest, even
amongst people who could scarcely define the difference between a
winning and losing hazard. The Prince of Wales was present at St.
James’s Hall, and, as no such scene had ever previously been witnessed
at a billiard match, and may never be seen again, I need not apologise
for reproducing part of a sketch of the memorable night contributed by
myself at the time to one of the last numbers of the famous old
‘Sporting Magazine,’ which ceased to exist at the end of 1870:
For the last five or six years the champion has made no very long
break nor any great number of successive ‘spots,’ whilst his son,
Joseph Bennett, and Cook, especially the last-named, have frequently
put together a very big score off the balls. People at last began to
realise the idea that the title of ‘second-best player in England’
would not long satisfy one or two of the colts, and were not
altogether surprised when Cook challenged his old master for 500_l._
a-side. Roberts took a long time to reply to this cartel, and it was
believed that another walk-over would take place—for as yet there had
never been a match for the championship; but at length he made up his
mind for one effort to retain his place, and they agreed to play on
February 11. Prior to that day a meeting of the leading professionals
was held. Rules were drawn up for future contests ... and some
important alterations were made in the construction of the tables to
be used in matches for the championship, with what results we shall
presently see.
The match was played in the large concert room at St. James’s Hall.
Just before eight o’clock the spectators settled down into their
places, and the scene was a truly remarkable one. The table, which
looked very small in such a huge hall, was of course placed in the
centre, and, about three yards from it, a cordon was formed by a
scarlet rope, so that a ‘clear course’ was secured for the combatants,
even if ‘no favour’ could not be guaranteed. Outside this rope the
tiers of benches began, and sloped up to the galleries. Every seat was
occupied, and the galleries themselves accommodated a very large
number of spectators, many of whom had provided themselves with opera
glasses, anew concomitant to a billiard match, but a very necessary
one on this occasion. Shortly after eight o’clock the calls of ‘time’
became very loud and impatient, and, with a view of creating a
diversion, someone who appeared to have the chief management of the
affair began to weigh the balls. He spun out this operation in very
clever fashion, and kept the people quiet for nearly ten minutes; but
at last they grew tired of seeing him hold up the scales, and remain
immovable, apparently wrapped in astonishment that the balls should
exactly balance each other, and the noise became worse than ever. At
length the two men appeared, without their coats, and apparently
‘eager for the fray.’ They were received with uproarious applause,
which seemed to delight Roberts immensely.
At the beginning of the game caution prevailed, and the tight pockets
puzzled both men.
At 127 Cook made six ‘spots,’ the longest run of the evening; but the
new-fashioned table seemed to have quite destroyed his pet stroke. The
red ball required to be played with the greatest care, or it did not
go in, and, owing, we imagine, to the change in the locality of the
spot, it seemed almost impossible to secure position for the second
stroke, even if the first came off. Both men had several tries at it;
but they could make nothing of their old friend, and the last half of
the match was practically played ‘spot hazard barred.’ The contrast in
the style of the two was very noticeable, Roberts’s being as clumsy
and awkward as Cook’s was pretty and elegant, the latter playing, as
someone near us observed, ‘a very genteel stroke.’ The men were very
level at about 450, and then the champion got in, with Cook’s ball and
the red almost touching each other, and quietly dribbled them down the
table, making six or seven very pretty cannons in succession. He
followed this up with a regular ‘gallery’ stroke, potting the red at
railroad pace, and making a cannon off two or three cushions, which
brought down the house. A break of 22 by Roberts made his score 494
against 495. The announcement of ‘517 all’ produced great cheering;
however, 44 and 49 by Cook soon placed him in front again, and, as
soon as he passed 600, there was a short interval.
The men soon came back, Roberts decorated with a cross, ‘wearing it
for the last time,’ as one of Cook’s backers grimly remarked. A
magnificent ‘all round’ 80 took the young one to 785. The knowledge of
strength shown in this break was truly wonderful, and there was a thin
‘loser’ in it which even Roberts felt compelled to applaud. There was
soon a gap of a couple of hundred points between them, and the
champion kept looking up mournfully at the figures at the end of the
hall. He never lost heart, however, and, laying himself down to his
work, began to creep up again. Cook’s score stood still for some
little time, and the old man’s backers got very excited. Roberts now
made 62, his longest break during the game, and two or three other
good runs brought him close to Cook, whom he passed, the score being
called 1,041 to 1,037 in favour of Roberts: but a 31, finished with a
double baulk, placed Cook well in front again, and, when his score
stood at 1,133, he made a horribly fluky cannon, and ran right out,
with a succession of the easiest and prettiest strokes we ever saw, a
winner by 117 points.
Here I prefer to take leave of John Roberts, sen.; for, although he
occasionally played in public for several years after, he never again
exhibited anything approaching his best form. It almost seemed as though
he had wound himself up for one great effort to retain his supremacy,
and that he never recovered from the consequent reaction: added to which
he was then fifty-five years of age, and had consequently seen his best
day. In his prime he was a man of extraordinary strength of
constitution, and performed several feats of endurance which probably no
professional player of the present day could approach. Perhaps the most
remarkable of these was accomplished in 1846, when he had rooms in
Glasgow, and an amateur, who was in the habit of frequenting them, made
a match to play him on the following conditions: Roberts was to concede
sixty points in each hundred, mark the game, hand the rest, spot the
red, take the balls out of the pockets, &c., and in fact do the work of
both player and marker. They were to continue playing until one of them
stopped voluntarily or through exhaustion; but I have been unable to
ascertain whether or not they were allowed to eat and drink during the
progress of the match, though the probability is that there were no
restrictions in this respect. The stakes were ten shillings per game:
whoever gave in first was to forfeit 25_l._ and all claim to anything he
might have won. Roberts was at that time in full play, and doing strong
work round the table for several hours in each day; but his opponent
could not have been far behind him in this respect, and must have been a
remarkably game man into the bargain, for he struggled on for
forty-three consecutive hours before Nature gave way, and he fainted
from exhaustion. In that time no fewer than 125 games were played, and
Roberts won a good stake, every penny of which he had certainly earned.
Differing entirely from Kentfield in this respect, he possessed
extraordinary power of cue and a wonderfully strong wrist, which enabled
him to perform all sorts of curious feats, such as knocking both balls
off the table and making them reach the end of a long room before
touching the floor. His worst fault was a too flashy style of play, and
I shall always believe that he would just have beaten Cook in the great
match for the championship if he had kept himself a little quieter
during the game; but he could not resist incessantly chaffing his
friends, chalking bets on the floor, &c. Comparison between Roberts’s
form and that of the leading players of the present day would be most
unfair to the old man. Had he lived fifty years later than he did, and
enjoyed all the advantages of the improvements that have been made in
the accessories of the game, as well as the opportunities that leading
players enjoy of constant practice, it is certain that he would have
been found right in the front rank. He had a real genius for the game,
and was a great player.
Immediately after winning the championship Cook had a very busy time of
it. He played John Roberts, jun., the best of twenty-one games of
pyramids, the result being that, after they had won nine games each,
Roberts secured the next two and won the match, which virtually decided
the championship at pyramids. Then Cook toured for a few weeks, and, in
the course of an exhibition game with S. W. Stanley at Totnes, made the
hitherto unparalleled break of 512. On April 14, 1870, just two months
after he had wrested the championship from the elder Roberts, Cook lost
it to Roberts, jun. The length of the game was wisely reduced from 1,200
points to 1,000, and Cook was beaten by very nearly half the game. This
is one of the few contests for the championship that I did not witness,
and I have never been able to understand the result; for, although
Roberts won by 478 points, and scored his thousand in three hours and
four minutes, which was the fastest time recorded for a
three-inch-pocket table until the last match ever played for the
championship fifteen years later, a 47 was the best break he made during
the whole evening! Of course, it must be remembered that the winner had
the table virtually to himself, for Cook must have been utterly and
hopelessly out of form. Six weeks later, Alfred Bowles, of Brighton, a
contemporary of Roberts, sen., challenged the winner. It is probable
that Bowles, though I believe he is still alive, had then passed his
best day, for the result of his plucky challenge was disastrous. He
played a good, sound old-fashioned sort of game, devoting himself
chiefly to runs of losing hazards in the middle pockets, but had not the
smallest pretensions to meet a man of the class of Cook or Roberts on
even terms, and never possessed the least chance all through the game.
The next challenger, however, was of very different calibre, and the
battle between Roberts—as I have now taken leave of the father, it is
needless to constantly repeat the distinguishing ‘junior’—and Joseph
Bennett was about the most obstinately contested of the entire series.
It lasted for four hours and three-quarters, and Bennett, with repeated
safety misses and double baulks, at last fairly wore down his formidable
opponent, and won by 95 points. Thus ended 1870, a truly remarkable
year, which not only witnessed the first match ever played for the
championship, but in which the title was actually held by four different
men.
To trace the progress of the game minutely from this point to the
present time, and to attempt even to mention the principal matches that
have been played, would occupy too much space, and I must, therefore,
content myself with giving slight sketches of the chief players from
1870 to 1895, alluding to a few of the most remarkable matches. At the
earliest possible moment—the two months which were allowed when the
conditions governing contests for the championship were drawn up—Roberts
played a second match with Bennett, and had no difficulty in regaining
his title, as he won by 363 points in the very fast time of three hours
twenty-two minutes. Cook was the next challenger, and, although he only
got home by 15 points—a really nominal victory—this was the beginning of
his marked superiority to any other player, and for exactly four years
all efforts to wrest the championship from him proved futile. On
November 29, 1872, during an exhibition match at his rooms in Regent
Street, he made the previously unheard-of break of 936, which included
no fewer than 262 consecutive spot hazards. This break was, of course,
made on an ordinary table. From 1871 to 1875 was undoubtedly the very
zenith of Cook’s career. During those four years he stood right out by
himself, and could defeat all comers on any class of table. The
strongest point of his game was unquestionably his wonderful delicacy of
touch. Brilliant forcing hazards, and winning hazards made at railroad
speed, so irresistibly fascinating to the gallery, possessed little
attraction for him, and he was the first man who seemed fully to realise
what might be done by delicately nursing the balls and bringing them
together, time after time, with perfect strength. Even when at his best,
however, he was never too consistent a player; there were occasions when
he was completely ‘off,’ and, if he happened to be caught on one of
these days, quite a second-rate performer could beat him easily. His
personal popularity was simply unbounded, and it would have taken a
remarkably strong nature to have resisted all the temptations to which
he was exposed. No man ever lost a finer chance of an exceptionally
brilliant and successful career. He must have made much money, but when
the end came, it found him penniless. I have no wish, however, to dwell
on his weaknesses, amiable as most of them were; rather let me record to
his credit that no professional billiard-player has ever possessed a
higher character for unimpeachable honesty, and that, in his prosperous
times, he was never known to turn a deaf ear to appeals for assistance.
It is quite time, however, to introduce the third and only other man
that ever held the championship cup presented by the leading
billiard-table makers in 1870. I refer, of course, to Joseph Bennett,
who is three or four years older than Roberts, and was playing in public
before either Cook or his great rival. He rapidly acquired a wonderful
knowledge of the game, for he was barely eighteen when he was engaged at
Leeds to play and teach. During his stay there he played his first
important match. It was with W. Moss; the game was 1,000 up for 100_l._
a-side, and Bennett won by upwards of 500 points. Possibly this success
induced him to turn his thoughts Londonwards again; at any rate, he
shortly afterwards returned there. His first metropolitan match was with
Dufton; then he played a couple with Herst, winning one and losing the
other: but it was the great four-handed match in which he and Charles
Hughes so decisively beat old Roberts and Dufton that first brought him
into prominent notice.
Whether Bennett, as a player, was ever quite the equal of Cook or
Roberts it is unnecessary to discuss here. He beat each of them in turn
for the championship, and can well afford to rest contented with that
record. In early life Bennett’s health was indifferent, and his nervous
and highly strung temperament was by no means in his favour. One of his
peculiarities was that, when in training for a championship or other
important match, he would never play with anyone, but invariably shut
himself up in a room alone, and played one ball against the other, or
simply practised one or two special strokes by the hour together. His
contention was that a man required all his nervous energy for the match
itself, and ought not to waste any of it in practice. There was,
doubtless, something in his theory, for few men have ever shown to more
advantage ‘in the pit;’ and it was sheer pluck and determination that
enabled him to defeat Cook for the championship, as his opponent held a
long lead when within a couple of hundred of home. A very severe
accident in the summer of 1881 caused Bennett to resign the
championship, and, though he completely recovered from its effects, he
wisely gave up playing in public. He will be better remembered as a
teacher than as a player, for he has virtually devoted his whole life to
instruction, and with remarkable success.
In December 1873 Messrs. Burroughes & Watts promoted the first of a
series of handicaps, with which they afterwards became so much
identified. The important effect that these handicaps had upon the game
is scarcely calculable, and, thanks to the liberality of the promoters,
several players who afterwards took prominent positions, but might
otherwise never have been heard of, were first introduced to public
notice. These handicaps gave such men exactly the chance they needed.
The following sixteen players took part in this handicap:—W. Cook, J.
Roberts, jun., Joseph Bennett, T. Taylor, F. Bennett, S. W. Stanley,
Harry Evans, W. Dufton, J. Roberts, sen., T. Morris, A. Hughes, John
Bennett, L. Kilkenny, Alfred Bennett, G. Collins, and Stammers. It was
won from scratch by Cook, who beat Kilkenny (130 points start)—the heats
were 500 up, all in—in the final, winding up with a splendid break of
428; and this appears to be a favourable opportunity for giving brief
sketches of some of the players who took part in it, six or seven of
whom are no longer living.
‘Master’ Stanley, as he was always designated in print for the first
year or two after he began to play in public, was certainly one of the
most precocious youths that ever handled a cue, and could not have been
more than sixteen when he began to take his own part in good company.
The spot hazard was the strongest point of his game, and I shall never
forget the style in which he used to dash round the top of the table,
getting ready to play the next stroke long before the red ball had
reached the pocket. When it failed to drop in, even if it was a couple
of inches wide of the pocket, his invariable look of blank astonishment
was intensely comic.
Tom Taylor came forward about 1872, just at the time that Stanley was
becoming well known, and many were the hotly contested battles between
them. Never were two lads more evenly matched. Stanley was a shade the
better of the pair at the spot stroke, but Taylor was a little superior
all round the table. Tom, like most billiard-players, had a pet stroke.
When he had opened a game with a miss in baulk, and his opponent had
followed with the answering miss under one of the side cushions, he
would invariably play at the red ball for the cannon off two cushions,
and bring it off three times out of four. This is a stroke that is never
played nowadays, and yet, when unsuccessful, it rarely leaves anything
on, which is more than can be said of the cannon off the white ball, the
customary game at present. A gamer player than Tom Taylor was never
seen. No matter what the state of the score might be, he never ceased
struggling; to be apparently hopelessly in rear only seemed to improve
his play, and from time to time he would pull a game out of the fire in
really marvellous fashion. With the exception of Roberts and Collins,
Taylor is the only one of the sixteen players in the great handicap at
the Guildhall Tavern in December 1873 who is playing regularly in 1896.
Fred, Alfred, and John were all younger brothers of Joseph Bennett.
John, although he occasionally took part in handicaps, was a player of
no class, and died in November 1886; but Fred and Alfred worthily upheld
the family reputation as billiard-players some twenty years ago, though
they seldom now play in public.[3] It is difficult to say which was the
better of the two when they were in their prime, for both played the
spot well and were good all round; but perhaps Fred was the more
brilliant, and might have taken a high position if he had been fonder of
the game, and devoted himself more assiduously to it.
L. Kilkenny was another remarkably sound exponent of the game as it was
played twenty years ago. He, too, was good on the ‘spot,’ and when this
stroke went out of fashion it practically killed his game; for Roberts
and Richards, neither of whom ever liked the stroke, are the only two of
the old school who are playing better now than they did in the
‘seventies. Kilkenny was about the last man that would have been taken
for a professional billiard-player; indeed, clad in correct clerical
costume, he would have made a model country vicar. He was always
exceptionally quiet, unassuming, and well-behaved, and ought to have
done well; but for some reason or another he missed his chances and died
in poverty.
George Collins always played quite a game of his own. I have seen him
make numerous long runs of spot strokes, but they were invariably put
together in the most unorthodox style. His own ball was rarely within
eighteen inches of the red, and he would incessantly leave himself the
most difficult hazards, which he brought off again and again in the most
marvellous fashion. In a spot break of 300 he would have to play more
awkward shots than Taylor or Stanley would leave for themselves in ten
breaks of the same number, and very much the same thing was noticeable
in his all-round play. He would constantly succeed in ‘gallery’ shots,
but never seemed to trouble himself as to where the balls would be
placed after the stroke; and his apparent lack of any knowledge of
playing for position was a fatally weak point in his game. It was
magnificent, but it was not billiards, and in his best day Collins
always played the game of an exceptionally good amateur rather than that
of a professional. Of late years he has had comparatively little
practice, and has naturally fallen off in consequence.
As long as he remained in England, Harry Evans was always recognised as
a sound third-rate all-round player, who was practically of no use on
the ‘spot,’ and it was a great surprise to all who had known him over
here when, soon after he had settled down in Australia, he gained great
fame as a spot stroke player, made some really remarkable breaks, and
held the championship there for many years; indeed, it is only
comparatively recently that he was deprived of it by Charles Memmott.
With the exception of Roberts, sen., Tom Morris was many years older
than any other player who took part in the first great handicap. His
game was indifferent, as was that of A. Hughes and Stammers.
Early in 1874 the first agitation against the spot stroke took place,
though it was not until twelve or thirteen years later that the stroke
was virtually abandoned. It occasioned a good deal of surprise when the
final heat of the first spot-barred handicap lay between Taylor and
Stanley, two players whose game was popularly supposed to depend almost
entirely upon their proficiency in the spot stroke. Yet there was really
nothing remarkable about this result, for there is a great deal of truth
and good sense contained in a letter from Stanley, which was published
in ‘Land and Water’ about a couple of months before the handicap was
played. In it he wrote: ‘I believe, as a rule, it will be found that the
best player at the spot stroke is the best player, after a time, at the
all-round game. To play the spot stroke well requires great patience, a
great deal of practice, and a great amount of nerve. Now, anyone who can
combine all these is sure to be a good all-round player.’ Cook paid a
visit to America in 1874, where he was ill advised enough to tackle
Rudolph at the cannon game, with the inevitable result; still, it was
impossible to regret that he had taken the trip, for he brought back
with him the American system of handicaps, which at once became so
popular in this country that scarcely a dozen really important handicaps
on the old ‘knock-out’ principle have been played in the last twenty
years. It seems hardly necessary to explain that, in an American
handicap, each player has to meet every one of the others, and the
winner of the largest number of games takes the first prize. The immense
advantage of this system is that the element of luck is as nearly as
possible eliminated, and that, presuming the play to be fair and
straightforward all through, the best man on the handicap terms will
win. Messrs. Burroughes & Watts took up the experiment warmly, and
presented 100_l._ in prizes. I formed one of the committee appointed to
frame the handicap and to arrange the order of play, and I well remember
the difficulty we had over the latter task, which will be fully
appreciated by anyone who has attempted a similar one. It must be
remembered that, as this was the first affair of the kind which had
taken place in England, we had no precedents to guide us, and though it
may seem very simple to arrange a list of eight men, so that each shall
play against a different opponent on every one of seven days, let anyone
who has had no experience in the matter sit down with a pencil and paper
and try it. The handicap was as follows: Cook, Roberts, and J. Bennett,
scratch; Taylor, 100 points start; Stanley, 120; Timbrell, 140; Kilkenny
and A. Bennett, 160. William Timbrell has not previously figured in
these pages, and may be dismissed in a very few lines. He was a
Liverpool player, who had already been credited with, and to the best of
my belief actually did make, a break of 893, which included a sequence
of 296 ‘spots.’ On his own table in Liverpool he may occasionally have
done great things, which, however, he failed to repeat in London. The
moment he began to play in public every atom of nerve seemed to leave
him, and on the numerous occasions on which I saw him play he never
showed even third-rate form. Roberts and A. Bennett tied for first prize
with five games each, and in playing off the former secured a very easy
victory.
On May 24, 1875, Cook lost the championship, which he had held for
exactly four years, to Roberts, and the match was a very noteworthy one,
as it marks the turning-point in the careers of the two men. Up to that
period Cook had been generally considered rather the better of the pair,
but from the date of this match Roberts asserted his superiority, which
became more and more marked in each succeeding year. In 1876 D.
Richards, an elder brother of S. W. Stanley, ran second to Cook in an
American Tournament. Richards is the _doyen_ of all the professional
players before the public in 1896, and is a fine player. As in the case
of Roberts, increasing age only appears to improve his game, and there
is not the smallest doubt that when he had reached his ‘jubilee’ he was
playing infinitely better than he had ever done in his life. Nursery
cannons form the strong point of his game, and he certainly plays them
beautifully and with remarkable delicacy of touch, though it must be
admitted that no one makes more use of the push stroke than he does.
About the most noteworthy events of 1877 were two matches on a
championship table between Joseph Bennett and Tom Taylor, both of which
the latter won, though only by twenty-seven and twenty-one points
respectively. Bennett had gone very much off in his play just about that
time, or Taylor would not have been matched with him on even terms, and
in the following year the two were both handicapped to receive a start
of 150 in 500 from Cook in an American Tournament that was played at the
Gaiety Restaurant. One of the eight men engaged in it was Fred Shorter,
who had a start of 200, and had done very little previously. Never did a
young player so suddenly make a reputation, and some of his performances
during the tournament were most extraordinary. In his heat with Joseph
Bennett, the latter gave a miss in baulk, Shorter followed by placing
his ball under one of the side cushions, and Bennett went out for a
cannon, which he missed by the merest hair’s breadth. This left a nice
game on for Shorter, who speedily worked his way to the top of the
table, and went clean out with the spot stroke, thus winning a love
game. There is a little story relating to this heat which must be fairly
well known, but is good enough to bear repetition. Of course, the game
only lasted about a quarter of an hour, and, as we were going out of the
room an old gentleman, desiring, I suppose, to make what he considered a
soothing remark to the beaten man, said: ‘How do you do, Mr. Bennett?
You did not seem quite in your usual form to-day.’ This to a man who had
only been allowed two strokes—with one of which he gave a miss in baulk,
and with the other as nearly as possible brought off a most difficult
cannon—was almost too much. I shall never forget the expression of
Bennett’s face, but language failed him to make a suitable reply.
Shorter did not treat Cook quite as unkindly as this; still, the latter
only scored twelve when he played his heat with the new man on the
following day, and most of the other players in the tournament were
served in somewhat similar fashion.
A consequence of his beating Taylor was a match which I arranged between
them, Shorter to receive 200 in 1,000. An incident that occurred early
in this game gives an excellent idea of Shorter’s coolness and
self-possession. One of his friends was seated next to me at the
spot-end of the table, and thoughtlessly struck a match to light a cigar
without watching for a favourable opportunity to do so. Shorter had just
worked his way to the spot, and the sudden flash catching his eye caused
him to miss the pocket by about six inches. He came round to us and said
quietly, ‘Please don’t do that again; I can get on the “spot” whenever I
like, and stay there as long as I like, still it isn’t worth while to
throw away a chance.’ This was no idle boast, for when the game stood at
444 to 152 in his favour he put his opponent’s ball into one of the top
pockets with a brilliant stab shot from baulk, and, his own remaining in
perfect position behind the red, he ran right out, winning the match by
848 points. His break of 556 was for many years the largest made in a
match for money. On being asked to continue it, he ran it up to 636,
including 207 consecutive spot hazards. Just at that time I firmly
believe that Shorter had no equal on an ordinary table; indeed, I
offered to match him to play Cook 1,000 up, level, if the latter would
stake 500_l._ to 200_l._, but the proposal was politely declined.
Unfortunately, Shorter’s prospects of ever attaining a position at the
head of his profession were marred by the fact that he had no liking for
the game. It was the most difficult thing in the world to get him to do
any practice. When he afterwards took part in tournaments, his first two
or three games were generally devoted to playing himself into form, so
that his big breaks towards the end of the week came too late to give
him any chance of success. His constitution was never a strong one, and,
as he could not be persuaded to take any reasonable care of himself,
symptoms of consumption showed themselves in 1884. A voyage to Australia
was recommended as the best chance of saving his life, but the remedy
came too late, and he died at Deniliquin in August 1885. On a match
between Roberts and Timbrell at the Gaiety Restaurant, Timbrell
receiving 300 in 1,000 and winning by 449 points, it is not necessary to
dwell. It was played on an ordinary table, spot stroke in, but Roberts
never made more than 35 off the balls, whilst Timbrell’s best break was
73.
The year 1879 was remarkable for the first appearance in London of
William Mitchell. The ‘Sheffielder,’ as he has always been called,
though, as a matter of fact, he was born in Derbyshire, had long been
known in the provinces as a player of exceptional ability; but few were
prepared for the form he showed on the occasion of his London _début_ in
an American Tournament at the Royal Aquarium, Westminster, when he won
six consecutive games and took the first prize. This he followed up by
securing another tournament at the Baynard Castle, and then he was taken
on a provincial tour by Joseph Bennett, in the course of which he made
many very remarkable breaks. Four years later, in a match of 3,000 up
with Cook for a stake of 1,000_l._, Mitchell at last cut Shorter’s
record in a money game with a brilliant 739 (55 and 189 ‘spots’). Prior
to this, however, when practising at Brighton, he had made a break of
1,839, composed almost entirely of 612 consecutive spot strokes. This
was generally discredited at the time, but subsequent events showed
Mitchell to be well capable of such a performance. When at his best,
Mitchell never played a long game without making two or three
four-figure breaks, and it was probably his own fault that Peall
eventually became his master at the ‘all-in’ game. He played the ‘spot’
at a tremendous pace, and has never had an equal in one particular
stroke—that of going all round the table and regaining position. A
somewhat delicate constitution has always been against him, but his
gameness is quite on a par with that of Roberts and Taylor. There has
never been a more brilliant hazard striker; and, strange as it appears,
considering that for many years the spot stroke was the backbone of his
game, he was always seen to great advantage on a three-inch pocket
championship table. When at his best, his all-round game is always a
singularly free and attractive one to watch, and few players could
surpass him in a push-barred game.
It was in 1880, the year after Mitchell had taken London by storm, that
his great spot stroke rival, W. J. Peall, made his first appearance as a
professional. Rumours had long been flying about as to the big breaks he
was in the constant habit of making when playing as an amateur, and his
appearance at the Royal Aquarium in an all-in American Tournament was
watched with great interest. He and R. Wilson received the limit of 175
points start in 500 from Joseph Bennett and W. Mitchell, who were at
scratch. Peall, however, disappointed expectation at first, though
playing sometimes brilliantly in exhibition games. He did not show to
advantage when a stake was at issue, but in time he acquired confidence.
In May 1884 he won an exhibition game with Mitchell at the Aquarium in
four breaks exclusive of his initial miss, scoring 1,000 points in
forty-four minutes, which still remains the fastest time on record.
Later in the same month the same pair were giving an exhibition game at
Cambridge, and Peall made a wonderful break of 1,989, which included 548
consecutive spot strokes, though as all of this break, with the
exception of the first 411, was made after the game was over, it is
questionable whether it should be counted as a record. Fortunately for
Peall, he can well afford to dispense with this 1,989; for at the Royal
Aquarium, on November 5 and 6, 1890, he completely eclipsed it with a
phenomenal break of 3,304, all made inside the game, and comprising runs
of 93, 3, 150, 123, 172, 120, and 400 spot strokes. I have no hesitation
in giving these records of breaks made almost entirely on the ‘spot,’
for though the tables on which most of them were made may have been
comparatively easy, there is no sort of doubt that the breaks were
genuine in other respects. With spot-barred breaks, however, the case is
very different, and I prefer to write very little about them. In matches
where no money has really been at stake, although each party to them had
solemnly deposited his 50_l._, or 100_l._, or 200_l._, as the case might
be, it was clearly to the interest of each man to have as many big
breaks made as possible, for the reports of these were likely to improve
the ‘gate.’ Most of these big spot-barred breaks are composed largely of
nursery cannons, and some of these long runs of nursery cannons which
are credited to different players were never really made at all. Either
a cannon was scored which was not made, a very difficult thing for a
marker to detect, considering the express speed at which some
professional players rattle up these ‘nurseries,’ or the player, when
his ball was in contact with one of the others, calmly proceeded with
his run of close cannons, instead of having the red and his opponent’s
ball spotted and playing from baulk. This is something of a digression,
but it seemed necessary to explain why I have written so little about
‘records.’ They are easily to be ascertained by anyone who is interested
in them, and can be taken for what they are worth. From these great
performances of Peall’s it may be easily gathered that his nervousness
had entirely left him, and, after he had once acquired confidence, there
never was a more consistent and trustworthy performer. Whatever any of
us may fancy Mitchell _might_ have done, there is no getting away from
what the latter has actually accomplished, and, as a spot stroke player,
he has never had an equal. For a long time past he has been ready and
willing to meet anyone at the ‘all-in’ game, and is entitled to call
himself champion of English billiards. It might have been imagined that
the virtual disappearance of the spot stroke would have completely
disposed of his pretensions to a place in the front rank, but, so far
from this being the case, he was for a considerable period second only
to Roberts as a spot-barred player. Short stature has always precluded
the possibility of his being a very stylish player, but the extreme
deliberation which rather detracted from his play years ago has to a
great extent disappeared. His name has always been associated with all
that is honourable and straightforward, and no member of his profession
is more universally and deservedly respected.
No match for the championship had taken place for nearly three years and
a half when Joseph Bennett challenged either Roberts or Cook to play for
it. The former waived his claim and left Cook to meet Bennett on
November 8, 1880. This match was one of the most interesting and
exciting I ever witnessed. Bennett, who was favoured with a good deal of
luck in the early part of the game, did not fail to take the fullest
advantage of his opportunities, and, at the interval, held a lead of 122
points, a very big advantage indeed on a small-pocket table. The
interval, however—like luncheon time in an important cricket match—often
used to produce a marked change in the aspect of affairs, and soon after
resuming play Cook put in a fine break of 107, passed his opponent at
795, and entered the last hundred with a substantial lead. The contest
then seemed all over, but Bennett, playing up with any amount of
coolness and resolution, won by 51 points. This was about the first time
that I noticed unmistakable signs of Cook’s nerve failing him; he missed
two or three easy strokes just when points were most wanted, and I doubt
if he was ever quite the same player again.
Cook and Roberts sailed for India immediately after this match, and
Taylor at once challenged Bennett for the championship. The match came
off on January 12 and 13, 1881, at St. James’s Hall, and though, soon
after starting, Bennett made a break of 125, the highest that had then
been recorded in a match for the championship, Taylor stuck to him in
his usual dogged fashion, and was only beaten by 90 points. Shorter was
the next aspirant, but failed to make good his final deposit, so Bennett
received forfeit. An off-hand match, however, for 25_l._ a-side took
place between the two on the table on which they ought to have played
for the championship. Bennett, who conceded a start of 100 in 1,000, was
defeated by 193, and as he soon afterwards met with the unfortunate gig
accident to which I have previously alluded, this was about his last
appearance as a player, all his energies being subsequently devoted to
teaching. I must not omit to mention that in September of this year,
during an exhibition game with Alfred Bennett, Cook made a spot-barred
break of 309, the longest then on record. It was without the semblance
of a fluke, and was a far finer performance than it looks to be on
paper, for the ‘top of the table game’ was then unknown, and it was put
together by open play all round the table.
In January 1882, Cook, for the first time, took points from Roberts, who
gave him 500 in 5,000, all in, for 500_l._ a-side, and won by no fewer
than 1,658 points; the winner’s best break was 430 (5, 11, and 107
‘spots’). A return match was played for a similar stake at Newmarket
during the July week, and was witnessed by the Prince of Wales and a
large and aristocratic company. This time Cook’s start was increased to
750, and he won by 918. His highest break was one of 412; Roberts had
two consecutive runs of 653 and 395.
Very early in 1883 John North, who possessed a high reputation in Wales
and the western counties, made his first appearance in London. This was
in a spot-barred American Tournament at the Albert Club, and a more
trying ordeal for a comparative novice cannot well be imagined, for, as
is very truly stated in ‘Billiards, by W. Cook,’ in allusion to North’s
_début_:
It is comparatively easy to perform in an ordinary tournament or
match, where the least noise or interruption to the player is
instantly checked; ... but billiards at the Albert Club is a different
thing altogether. Betting on the game, and often on individual
strokes, is carried on without let or hindrance, and that a stranger
to London should have displayed consistently good form under such
trying circumstances was conclusive evidence that he had plenty of
nerve and self-possession.
North won this tournament, but it cannot be said that he has ever
fulfilled his early promise. Fit and well, and at his best, he is an
undoubtedly fine player; but his style, never a pretty one, becomes
terribly ugly and jerky when he is out of form. Towards the close of the
year 1883 Roberts offered to give any man in the world 500 in 5,000,
all-in, or 200 in 3,000 spot barred. There was no response, and I only
mention the fact to show how the status of certain players has altered
in the last ten years. Few people would now care to pit Roberts against
Peall on even terms at the all-in game; whereas his supremacy at the
spot-barred game, to which he has entirely devoted himself, is so
complete, that his offer of such a start as 200 in 3000 reads almost
ludicrously.
[Illustration:
CHOOSING A CUE.
]
At the end of the year J. G. Sala, a Scotch player of considerable
repute, appeared in London for the first time in an American Tournament.
On his day he was a fine spot stroke player; indeed, his feat of making
186 consecutive screw back red hazards into the same pocket remained a
record for years, when it was completely wiped out by Charles Memmott,
who made 413 similar strokes in succession in a match in Australia. Sala
was, however, by no means strong at the all-round game. In 1884 Roberts
took a company consisting of Mitchell, Taylor, Shorter, North, Collins,
White, Coles, and Sala for a provincial tour, and organised tournaments
in Birmingham, Sheffield, Leeds, Liverpool, and Manchester, where some
really magnificent play took place. Writing the names of these players
reminds me that I have said nothing of Harry Coles and Fred White. The
former originally came from Birmingham, and made no particular mark for
some years after arriving in London, though he was always regarded as a
sound and consistent player. Perhaps his form was never rated quite as
highly as it deserved to be, for there was nothing in the least ‘flash’
about his style, and he never appeared to be playing nearly as well as
he really was, in this respect being the exact opposite of Richards. The
virtual abolition of the spot stroke, however, gave him his opportunity,
and he improved very rapidly indeed, until about 1892, when I saw him
make upwards of 500 off the balls, twice within a few days at the
Aquarium, he was playing a really fine game, and only wanted a short
start from players of the class of Peall and Dawson. Nearly twenty years
ago White was regarded by some few people as a promising youngster, but
for a long time his health was very indifferent, and never gave him a
real chance of doing himself justice. When he became stronger he played
brilliantly for a brief period, making spot stroke breaks of upwards of
a thousand on two or three occasions in matches; but as he depended
almost entirely on the spot stroke, and was very weak as an all-round
player, little or nothing has been seen of him of recent years, though
it is gratifying to know that he has done exceedingly well in pursuits
unconnected with billiards.
It may be interesting to record that the first game of 10,000 up ever
played was begun at the Aquarium on May 24, 1884. It was between Roberts
and Peall, ‘all in,’ and the latter, who received a start of 2,000, won
by 589 points. Once started these long games became very popular. They
were soon extended to as many as 24,000 up, which took no less than a
fortnight to play, and the spot stroke was invariably barred. I am not
sure that the change was a judicious one, for it is by no means so
interesting to witness a couple of hours’ play in the middle of a long
match, with one of the players possibly hopelessly in the rear, as it is
to see a game begun and finished at a single sitting. The last matches
ever played for the championship took place in 1885, when Roberts
defeated Cook and Joseph Bennett in turn, each game being 3,000 up. The
champion at this time was suffering from an attack of rheumatic gout,
which prevented him from touching a cue for a week prior to the match
with Cook, and made it very difficult for him to hobble round the table;
but he won by 92 points. Bennett suffered defeat by more than half the
game. It is only fair to state that Bennett was so unwell that he could
scarcely hit a ball on the first and second days, but the one-sided
nature of the contest was in a great measure atoned for by the splendid
exhibition given by Roberts. He made breaks of 155 and 147, the largest
ever put together in a match for the championship; and also scored
sixteen successive spot strokes, the largest consecutive number ever
made in a championship match. A notable ‘all-in’ match of 15,000 up on
even terms between Roberts and Mitchell was played in February 1886;
Roberts, who certainly had the better of the luck, winning by 1,741
points. His longest breaks were 693 (230 spot strokes), 544 (179), 616
(88 and 104), 722 (230), and 716 (47 and 184). Mitchell’s highest
efforts were 745 (244), 601 (197), 969 (321), and 532 (175). The result
was particularly instructive, as it showed that, though Mitchell was at
his very best just then, and in full practice at the spot, whereas
Roberts had not played the stroke in public for months previously, the
champion was still able to assert his supremacy at the all-in game. In
the following week Roberts and Peall began a six days’ spot stroke
match. The conditions were that they should play four hours per day,
each man to place his ball where he chose at the beginning of a break,
and the highest aggregate scorer at the end of the week to be the
winner. Peall had matters all his own way from the outset, and
eventually totalled 16,734 against Roberts’s 11,925; it was a terribly
wearisome affair and attracted very few spectators. Later in the year
Peall challenged Roberts to play 15,000 up, all in, on even terms, and
as Roberts declined the offer then, and whenever it has been renewed,
Peall, as already remarked, has certainly been entitled to claim the
championship at English billiards ever since that date.
Since 1886 genuine matches for money have gone greatly out of fashion,
and we have had to content ourselves with battles for more or less
fictitious ‘purses,’ varied by an occasional tournament. The great
feature of the past few years has been the wonderful play of Roberts,
who, although he was born on August 15, 1847, has made greater
improvement during the past few seasons than any of the younger players,
and was never better than he is at present. Everyone who is interested
in the game must have seen him play, and one visit to the Egyptian Hall
will give a better idea of his inimitable skill than pages of
description.
The young players who have come most prominently to the front since
about 1888 are Hugh MʻNeil, Charles Dawson, Edward Diggle, H. W.
Stevenson, and William Spiller. At one time MʻNeil, who is a left-handed
player, was generally regarded as the ‘coming champion.’ He was the
first to grasp something of the champion’s style, and certainly played
the ‘top of the table game’ better than any of his contemporaries.
Roberts had a very high opinion of him, and long ago said that he ‘would
be a splendid player if he would only keep steady.’ A very severe
illness unfortunately obliged the young Scotchman to give up playing for
a long period. Dawson’s improvement was rapid, and well maintained for
several seasons. His form is generally very consistent, and would be
even more so if he were less sensitive when luck seems to be against
him. Diggle is now generally regarded as one of the most promising of
the younger men. He is by no means a pretty player, and does not appear
to have the least idea of making a bridge, sometimes playing through his
forefinger, sometimes between his first and second finger, and in
various other extraordinary fashions; but, bridge or no bridge, he keeps
on scoring. Stevenson is by far the youngest of the professional
players, being still under age at the time of writing, and there are
great possibilities before him, for he has a beautiful delicate touch,
strongly resembling William Cook in that respect. It has been amply
proved during the season of 1895–6 that Spiller only needed the
requisite public practice to make him a fine player, and, though he
performs in somewhat loose and haphazard style, he continually runs up
long breaks. Nor must I forget Charles Memmott, a remarkably game and
capable performer, and equally good at the all-in or spot-barred game.
J. P. Mannock is a player who would have come into prominent notice long
ago had he appeared more in public.
The game is just now in a somewhat curious state. It was never so
popular in clubs, and where there was one house possessing a private
table a dozen years ago, there are now twenty; but the public support of
billiards is fitful. There is no doubt that exhibition matches have been
terribly overdone during the last few seasons, and some genuine battles
are sadly needed to revive the fading interest in the doings of
professional players. It may, I think, be taken for granted that the
push stroke—which has been abused to such an extent that a big cannon
break is only put together by means of a number of glaring fouls—is
doomed. Probably, indeed, the table of the near future will have smaller
pockets with the spot a little nearer to the top of the table than it is
at present. There will then be no occasion to bar any fair stroke, for
such gigantic breaks from the spot stroke as have been made by Peall and
Mitchell would be a sheer impossibility. The barring of any fair stroke
makes the game a bastard one, and I feel certain that an alteration in
the tables, such as I have indicated, would make billiards far more
interesting to watch than it is at present, and would, therefore, prove
of the greatest benefit to professional players.
* * * * *
The history of the development of the modern game of billiards is
scarcely complete without reference to the games between Roberts and
Frank Ives, the American champion, because the capabilities of the
cannon game, even on a table with pockets, were so conclusively shown.
Since then, cannons have played a conspicuous part in most long
spot-barred breaks; and although cushion nurseries with the aid of the
push stroke are so open to objection that some restriction is probable,
yet it is certain that as pockets are made more difficult, cannons will
become more important. Indeed, this would seem to lead ultimately to the
adoption of the cannon game and the abandonment of pockets; a
consummation to be regretted, for winning and losing hazards are
attractive features in the English game.
In the summer of 1893 the champions met at Knightsbridge and played on a
table with 3¼ in. pockets and with balls 2½ in. in diameter. At first
Roberts had the advantage, but afterwards Ives cornered the balls,
making 1,267 cannons in a break of 2,539, and 402 cannons in a break of
852, and won with ease. At the end the game stood, Ives, 6,000; Roberts,
3,821.
Neither player could be expected to show his best form under the
circumstances, for compromise in the matter of tables and balls cannot
be satisfactory; but the power and control possessed by Ives were a
revelation to most of our experts. Putting the great break on one side,
he was easily able to run up very long scores by means of a series of
cannons played almost perfectly, without the push stroke or suspicion of
a foul, and with but slight recourse to the _massé_.
During December 1895 Eugene Carter, another American player, has been
giving exhibitions at the Argyll Hall, and those who are capable of
judging cannot fail to have realised from his performances how important
the cannon is likely to be in the English game of the immediate future.
To the various professionals who have been mentioned the names should be
added of Green, the veteran Scotch player, who has often performed very
well in London, and whose game is sound, if old-fashioned; and of Lloyd,
who won the first prize at the Association Tournament held in December
1895, after a most determined struggle with Peall. The games during this
tournament were played spot and push strokes barred.
More detailed notice of John Roberts and his remarkable breaks[4] would
have been made here were he not so frequently alluded to in other parts
of the book, for the history of the modern game is mainly the history of
his career and that of his father. The elder revolutionised the game by
the cultivation of the spot stroke, whilst the younger has advanced its
interests by virtually abandoning that mode of play. Each of them for
long was without a rival on even terms, and the respect entertained for
the play of the younger Roberts is, we trust, evident by the references
elsewhere to his opinions and practice.
CHAPTER II
IMPLEMENTS
BY ARCHIBALD BOYD
No game in the world is so absolutely dependent on all its various
accessories as billiards. Cricket can still be played, and played well,
although the pitch may be not quite first-rate, and a bit of rough
ground is not fatal to a golf links; but if the room be not large and
airy, if the table be ill kept, the cloth unbrushed or badly stretched,
the balls foul, and the cues ill cared for, the skilful player at
billiards will be reduced to the level of an ordinary performer, and
anything like a decent break will be out of the question. It is,
therefore, of paramount importance that all the implements connected
with the game should be of the very best kind, and in the very best
order.
Before dealing seriatim with the various subjects, it is with pleasure
that I acknowledge the great assistance that Messrs. Burroughes & Watts
and Messrs. Thurston & Co. (I place the firms in alphabetical order)
have cheerfully given me—assistance without which I could not have hoped
to carry out my allotted task, and with which, I fear, I have hardly
done justice to the time and trouble they have ungrudgingly expended
upon me. I have also to thank Messrs. Wright & Co. for the drawings of
the Standard Association Pockets which appear amongst the remarks on
tables.
THE ROOM
To begin with, a room of convenient proportions must be found to
accommodate the table. Good play is severely handicapped by an
unsuitable room, and the essential points of a good room are worthy of
careful consideration. That it must be large and airy goes almost
without saying, yet, self-evident as this may seem, it is a point which
is too frequently overlooked, not only in private billiard-rooms, but
also in rooms where exhibition matches are constantly being played.
Amateurs, in general, are more directly interested in the rooms of clubs
and private houses, concerning which there are some points which cannot
well be disregarded.
And, first, as to club-rooms.
Although in these the architect has, as a rule, a free hand, yet in far
too many cases the comfort of the spectator (and, as a natural
corollary, the freedom of the players) is sadly neglected. It is most
important for the players’ sake that spectators should be comfortably
seated at a reasonable distance from the table. No man can play his best
if he has constantly to turn round and look for a place for his foot
amongst a crowd of friends; still less when he is haunted by the fear
that the butt of his cues may at any moment come into collision with a
whisky-and-soda. The older architects, as a body, seemed to consider
that if the room was twenty-four feet long by eighteen feet broad, ample
accommodation was provided, forgetting that the platforms, upon which
the seats are placed, take up a great deal of the spare space. So that
one frequently finds, in an apparently large room, that certain strokes
cannot be played without placing a foot upon the platform. At one club
an ingenious architect, ably abetted by an unwary committee, ran some
hot-water pipes _in front_ of the platform, and so near to the top of
the table did they extend, that the well-known hazard from the top
pocket off the spot became exceedingly difficult, because a player was
obliged to rest one foot upon these rounded pipes, which afforded, at
the best, a precarious foothold. It is of the utmost importance that the
player should have plenty of room _all round_ the table.
Another matter of importance is the position of the door. Do what you
will, somebody is sure to come in ‘on the stroke,’ and, therefore, the
more the door can be kept out of the line of sight the better.
Obviously, the worst place for the door is at the top of the
table—_i.e._ directly facing the player as he plays from baulk—the best
place is at the bottom, and, if possible, away to the side.
In a large and modern room a light screen with peep-holes may be
advantageously placed inside the door, which should be fitted so as to
open and shut silently. By this means an inevitable nuisance may be
brought within manageable limits.
[Illustration:
Fig. 1
]
The position of the fireplace is also important. A flickering light in
the eyes of the players interferes seriously with good play; therefore,
if possible, the fire should never be at the top of the table. Wherever
it may be, it is well to cover the outside of the pocket facing it with
green cloth, so that the light may not shine through the pocket.
The Committee of the Oriental Club have kindly permitted me to introduce
a plan of their large room as an excellent example of what a club-room
should be (fig. 1). As will be seen in the plan, the door is well out of
the way, the seats are roomy and comfortable, capable of seating, say,
fifty spectators, and—most important of all—plenty of space is left for
the player all round the table. The skylight is a special feature; in
most rooms its elevation is something like the annexed sketches (figs. 2
and 3).
[Illustration:
Fig. 2
]
[Illustration:
Fig. 3
]
A private house billiard-room need not be so large as a club-room, but
it is essential that it should be as airy as possible, and—a most
important point—it ought, if possible, to be the usual smoking-room of
the house, so that it may be regularly inhabited. If this point is
neglected, and the room is intended solely for billiards, a time may
come when it may be left severely alone for two or three months, and the
cushions will probably suffer from cold and want of play. If, however,
the room be made comfortable and attractive, it will be constantly lived
in, and the cushions kept at an equable temperature. Besides, the fact
of the table being at hand and ready will of itself induce more play.
All this, of course, means that at one end or other of the table there
must be considerably more than the regulation six feet. If one is going
to build, thirty or thirty-two feet for length, and twenty feet for
breadth, will give plenty of space for billiards and smoking, and be
more satisfactory in the long run than a room twenty-four by eighteen at
the outside.
[Illustration:
Fig. 4
]
If the plan of the house precludes the possibility of a room of this
size, it should be remembered that very excellent billiard-rooms of
corrugated iron, lined with felt and match-boarding, can be put up
alongside a house if the requisite space can be found for them. It is
also worth while to remember that thirty feet by twenty feet looks a
very small plot when measured on the lawn, so that many a disused and
forgotten corner might serve as a site for a noble billiard-room.
Such a room Mr. W. H. Fowler, the well-known amateur, has erected in
Taunton by the side of his house. It is thirty-four feet by thirty-three
feet, and is roughly of this shape (fig. 4).
The system of ventilation seems so excellent that, at my request, Mr.
Samson, the architect of the room, has kindly sent me drawings which are
shown under ‘Ventilation,’ and which will, no doubt, make clear what is
obscure in this description.
[Illustration:
Fig. 5
]
The skylight is fitted with an exhaust cowl; and the chimney has a
special ventilating flue. For cold weather, two gas-stoves of the modern
hygienic type are connected with the gas-pipes, and keep the room warm
enough at night to save the cushions from the effects of the severest
frost. As they have come triumphantly out of the ordeal of the Siberian
winter of 1894–95, it is fair to assume that outside rooms of this type
can be thoroughly protected from cold with very little trouble.
The recesses on each side give ample room for smoking, whist, or
writing; and the horizontal beams of the framework naturally lend
themselves to the function of bookshelves, so that a variety of tastes
may be satisfied. The cost of such a room would be about 300_l._
As a type of an indoor room I append a rough sketch of Mr. A. Gibbs’
room at Tyntesfield, which embodies the same principle—viz. that it is
an exceedingly comfortable room for smoking and writing. It is covered
with a high-arched roof, so that it is always cool (fig. 5).
One can thus see that the addition of a recess or a few feet in length
at once renders the room habitable and convenient.
I do not, of course, wish it to be supposed that the foregoing plans
necessarily represent the best billiard-rooms of their kind in the
country; they happen to be rooms with which I am familiar, and I have
introduced them as illustrations merely of the principle that _comfort_,
both for players and spectators, is a very important factor in the
encouragement of good play. Every reader can, out of his personal
experience, suggest to himself examples of comfortable rooms, both
public and private, as good as, and possibly better, than those I have
sketched.
VENTILATION
One of the most difficult and most important problems in connexion with
billiard-rooms is the subject of ventilation, particularly where the
electric light is used. If gas be the lighting agent, the heated air can
generally be drawn off by means of an exhaust cowl over the skylight;
but these cowls are apt to cause a leak in the skylight fittings, and
must, therefore, be erected with great care. Where the electric light is
used, a small sunlight gas-burner at the bottom of the exhaust tube
helps to generate a hot upward current.
Tobin tubes in the corners of the room, carried well up eight or nine
feet from the ground, are valuable allies in admitting fresh air; but
one great objection to them is that they usually pour the cold current
upon the unprotected heads and necks of the spectators. Small boards
(say six inches in height) to fit against the bottom of the windows make
capital practical ‘Tobins;’ for the lower sashes can be pushed up a
couple of inches without going clear of the board, and fresh air comes
into the room between the sashes. Skylight sashes are not of much use,
for they can only be used in fine weather, and they rarely fit tight
enough to keep out really heavy rain. If we turn back for a moment to
the drawing of the Oriental Club skylight, we shall see that it is a
good fine-weather type. The sashes pivot on their middles and admit
plenty of air, and as the coaming[5] is unusually high (more than two
feet), the danger of rain splashing off the flat roof through the bottom
of the sashes is sensibly reduced.
[Illustration:
Fig. 6
]
Mr. Samson, the architect of the County Club at Taunton, and also of Mr.
Fowler’s room, very recently showed me a system of ventilation which he
had introduced into the Club billiard-room with absolute success. Fully
realising the difficulty of keeping rain out and letting air in with a
skylight of the ordinary type, he decided to carry the skylight the
whole length of the room, so that the sashes which open at one end are
far removed from the table. The skylight is of the ordinary section
(fig. 6), and in order to avoid undue glare he has fitted the space
between the coamings with horizontal sashes of ground glass, sliding one
on another in such a way that the amount of light can be easily
regulated by the marker. At one end of the skylight two vertical sashes
(of the full width of the skylight) are fitted, one being above the
coaming, the other in the wall below the coaming, so that it can be
opened whether all the horizontal sashes be closed or not. At the other,
or fireplace end of the skylight, two large gratings are fixed, one (as
at the opposite end) above, the other below the level of the base of the
skylight, communicating with a flue in the chimney, which is, of course,
kept warm by the heat of the fire. Thus a powerful exhaust is working at
one end of the room, while as much or as little fresh air as is required
flows in at the other. I append a rough sketch, which may, perhaps, tend
to make the description clearer (fig. 7).
[Illustration:
Fig. 7
]
The two great advantages of his plan seem to me to be, first, the risk
of water on the table is greatly diminished; second, no matter how cold
it be, some air can be admitted, and some can be sucked out, although
the skylight may be completely shut by the closing of all the flat
sashes.
[Illustration:
Fig. 8.—Mr. Samson’s Sections of a Billiard-room (32′ × 24′)
]
[Illustration:
Fig. 9
]
In all rooms, the heating apparatus, whatever it may be, should be
absolutely under the control of the players. Most of us have experienced
the nuisance of hearing a fire noisily poked by a chilly spectator just
in the middle of a good break; and, apart from the strain on the nerves
that such interference with play causes, the question of the heat alone
is one that the players should be allowed to settle for themselves.
Spectators sitting near a window are apt to forget that a temperature
which to them feels merely comfortable may be well-nigh intolerable to a
player constantly on the move and exposed to the heat and glare of the
lamp.
On such an important point as ventilation it is well worth while, if
building a new room, to consult a competent architect. It may save many
a headache afterwards.
LIGHTING
A considerable choice lies before the owner of a room. He can have
electric light, or incandescent gas, or albo-carbon, or ordinary
burners, or oil lamps.
If he is in the country, with no gas light and no electric light
installed, he must of necessity fall back upon oil. Mineral oil is
generally used, and the lamps made for the purpose appear to answer very
well. One word of caution is, however, necessary. The lamps should only
be put in the brackets _when required_, and should be removed
immediately the play is over, so as to minimise the chance of oil being
spilt upon the cloth. For the same reason the containers should be most
carefully wiped before being put into the brackets, and with _constant_
care of this kind no harm need happen to the table.
Glass chimneys, whether for oil or gas, are a constant source of danger.
If one should break, the pieces of glass are apt to cut or scorch the
cloth. They must, therefore, be very carefully handled. Chimneys of talc
are now supplied, which are in every way to be preferred to the glass
ones.
Of the various kinds of gas light the incandescent appears to give the
most pleasant for play. The burners for this light are now fitted with a
‘bye-pass,’ which is a tiny flame never to be extinguished. With this
fitting, when the gas is gradually turned on it ignites from the small
leader on the bye-pass and the mantle gradually glows without a sudden
shock. By this means the life of a mantle is much prolonged. If the
light should be fitted without the ‘bye-pass,’ the greatest care and
caution must be observed in lighting up. A spirit torch should be used,
and the gas should not be turned full on at once or the mantles will
soon be destroyed. It will be found advisable to hold a tray or
something of the kind under the spirit torch when lighting up, to
prevent any of the hot spirit falling on the cloth.
Albo-carbon lights are not often seen now. With the best attention we
are told that they are absolutely inodorous, but, practically, owing to
carelessness or what not, in most rooms where I have seen them used I
have found a disagreeable smell.
The old ring burner (which has the merit of simplicity) is seldom used,
because of the tremendous heat which it generates. One good burner of
modern type under each shade ought, with fairly good gas, to be
sufficient for all purposes. It will save a great deal of gas as
compared with the ring burner, and will cause fewer headaches.
Of the electric light little need be said. The globes are of the
ordinary pattern, and the lights should be 32–candle-power;
16–candle-power is not strong enough to light up the corner pockets, if
the usual 6–light bracket is used, and it is an easy matter to shield
the eyes by putting silk fringes at the bottom of the shades. It is
advisable to have three or four spare globes in readiness in case of a
break, and care must be taken to avoid touching the lights with a cue.
If a glass does break, it will fly into thousands of pieces, and cover
the table with fine particles of glass, which are troublesome to clear
off without injuring the cloth.
_Note by Major Broadfoot_
The question of a good light on the table during the day is of great
importance. For all persons daylight is probably healthier than the best
system of artificial light; whilst for those whose breathing
arrangements are delicate, and they, unfortunately, are many, daylight
play may be almost obligatory. The main difficulty has been to provide a
weather-tight skylight, and Mr. Boyd has given excellent hints and
advice on the subject. It is, however, worthy of consideration whether
the skylight should not be abandoned in favour of a sound roof, the
light being admitted at the sides and ends of the room; at a height
above the floor sufficient to prevent the glare and shadows which result
from ordinary side lights. Several advantages are obvious. The roof
should be more weatherproof, the room less liable to be overheated in
sunny weather, the frame which carries the lighting apparatus would cast
no shadow on the table, whilst, when daylight is waning and artificial
light is required, the struggle for supremacy between the two, resulting
in a most objectionable dark spot directly under each shade, would be
avoided. Each of these considerations is of much importance, and an
intelligent engineer or architect would have little difficulty in
designing an arrangement to meet them. The idea may be gathered from
above sketch (fig. 10).
[Illustration:
Fig. 10
]
The heat in most skylighted rooms is unendurable in summer.—W. B.
TABLES
It would, no doubt, be very satisfactory if all the tables throughout
the kingdom were of one uniform pattern, and more than one attempt has
been made to bring about this desirable state of things. But such
efforts have not been successful because the owners of the many thousand
tables already in existence are naturally unwilling to spend money in
alterations. And, again, individual tastes will constantly tend to
develop typical differences.
The question of the size of the pockets first reached an acute form at
the time when the championship was being frequently played for between
Messrs. J. Roberts, jun., W. Cook, and Joseph Bennett.
The deadly effect of the spot stroke on a large pocket table was clearly
recognised, and fears were already entertained that unless some radical
alteration were made, all-round play would become neglected, and that
the public would soon weary of watching a single stroke indefinitely
repeated.[6]
A committee of the leading players thereupon decided that in future all
matches for the championship should be played upon a table with pockets
three inches at the fall of the slate, with the billiard spot a little
nearer to the top cushion, and with a smaller =Ｄ=. This last alteration,
looking to the fact that the deliberate intention of the committee was
to discourage, if not kill, the spot stroke, seems curiously illogical.
If the spot is to go, something must be encouraged in its stead;
obviously, all-round play must be developed. Why, then, cramp in any way
the latitude up till then given to a player when playing from hand?
[Illustration:
Fig. 11
]
The subsequent history of the pockets is an interesting commentary on
the labours of the committee. As they had expected, the spot stroke soon
failed to draw, and for exhibition purposes it is, in 1895, as dead as
Julius Cæsar. But the tight pocket failed to gain popularity. Here and
there a more than usually gifted amateur erected one for his own
amusement; in one or two instances an enterprising billiard-room
proprietor, who had other tables to fall back upon, tried one for an
experiment. But these tables are and must be, for all time, _caviare_ to
the general. The reduced =Ｄ= has never found a place on ordinary tables,
so that the result of the committee’s work is that the spot has gone,
and the championship match, if there ever be one, must be played with
the three-inch pocket.
[Illustration:
Fig. 12
]
Quite recently another attempt to secure uniformity has been made by the
Billiard Association. Their committee, recognising the fact that the
public would have nothing to say to a tight pocket, and taking a 3⅝-inch
pocket as a fair average size, caused templates to be made of those
dimensions, and decided that tables made with pockets accurately fitted
to the aforesaid templates should be called ‘Standard Association
Tables.’ In two minor respects these pockets differ slightly from what,
for want of a better word, we may call ‘ordinary’ pockets—first, the
shoulders of the cushions are struck with a rounder curve; second, the
outer edge of the fall of the slate at the middle pocket falls slightly
within the inner line of the cushion, as shown in fig. 11, where A A is
the line of the cushion, C the cloth, and P the middle pocket. From this
sketch it will be seen that the difficulty of middle-pocket jennies is
sensibly increased.
[Illustration:
Fig. 13
]
Drawings of the Championship pockets (figs. 12, 13) and the Standard
Association pockets (figs. 14, 15) are here inserted in order that the
reader may compare them for himself. The drawings of the Championship
pockets are taken direct from the templates in the possession of Messrs.
Burroughes & Watts, and those of the Standard pockets from templates the
property of Messrs. Wright & Co.
An intending purchaser has, then, to decide for himself whether he will
have a Standard pocket table; an ordinary 3⅝-pocket table (and in this
case the pockets of different makers will vary slightly in size and
shape); or, lastly, a 3–inch pocket Championship table.
[Illustration:
Fig. 14
]
[Illustration:
Fig. 15
]
Whichever may be the pattern selected, the purchaser, if he is really
fond of the game, ought to get a good table well up to ‘club’ quality.
If money is no object, elaborately carved tables can be bought up to
300_l._ or so; but for the purposes of _billiards_ all the carving is
unnecessary. Let the bed be a thoroughly strong one, the slates of the
best quality, the cushions according to the maker’s best pattern, the
cloth the best of its kind, and the woodwork plain.
A plan of a billiard-table is given on p. 75, in order that the terms
used in connexion with the table may be fully set forth; it is drawn on
the scale shown below-⁹⁄₂₀ in. = 1 ft.
[Illustration:
Fig. 16
]
ORDINARY TABLE
(i) Billiard spot 12¾ in. from face (or nearest point) of the top
cushion.
(ii) _Radius_ of semicircle of =Ｄ=, 11½ in.
(iii) Baulk-line, 29 in. from face of bottom cushion.
CHAMPIONSHIP TABLE
(i) 12½ in. (ii) First 9½ in. then 10 in. (iii) 28 in.
It is essential to the true running qualities, as well as to the lasting
qualities of the table, that the frames (which few people ever see)
should be exceedingly strong, thoroughly well seasoned, and accurately
levelled. The slightest warping of these frames is fatal to the
preservation of the table, and they are made, for this country at any
rate, of the most carefully selected red deal. If the table is intended
for the tropics, mahogany or teak should be used. As soon as the frames
are bolted to the legs (which, by the way, are erected on an absolutely
level base), they are carefully trimmed over with a long plane, and,
until the straight-edge fairly meets the frames all over, in whatever
direction it may be tried, the bed is not ready for the slate.
[Illustration:
Fig. 17
]
Slates come from the Penrhyn or Aberdovey quarries, as the case may be.
Some makers prefer one quarry, others another. After they have been
rough-hewn to size and thickness, they are passed through a planing
machine, which reduces the surface to a rough level. They are then put
into another machine and cut to size, each slate being now 2⅖ feet wide
and 6 feet 1½ in. long. Then the five slates[7] necessary to make a
table bed are laid together upon a solid level bed, and ‘floated’ with
coarse sand; then fine sand is used, and yet finer, till the face is
brought to a polish. Meanwhile, every inequality is carefully tried
down, so that before the slates leave the ‘banker,’ as it is called, the
straight-edge must touch them fairly all over.
* * * * *
_References to Diagram_
B, B, B, B. Bed of table.
Cushion 1. Top cushion.
Cushion 2. Right top side cushion.
Cushion 3. Right bottom side cushion.
Cushion 4. Bottom cushion.
Cushion 5. Left bottom side cushion.
Cushion 6. Left top side cushion.
D. The =Ｄ=.
L, L. Baulk-line.
P^1. Left top pocket.
P^2. Right top pocket.
P^3. Right middle pocket.
P^4. Right bottom pocket.
P^5. Left bottom pocket.
P^6. Left middle pocket.
_p_, _p_, _p_, ..., Pocket plates.
S^1. The spot, or the billiard spot.
S^2. Pyramid spot.
S^3. Centre spot.
S^4. Left spot of the =Ｄ=.
S^5. Centre spot of the =Ｄ=.
S^6. Right spot of the =Ｄ=.
* * * * *
[Illustration]
Holes are bored in the sides of the slates and metal dowels leaded into
one side, as shown in the sketch (fig. 17), so that each slate may fit
into the next, and then large holes are drilled out on the underside of
the slates and steel nuts leaded in to take the long screws which fasten
the cushions firmly to the slates (fig. 18).
[Illustration:
Fig. 18
]
On the underside of each slate a bevel about two inches wide is made, in
order that a chisel may be slipped between the slates to separate them
when dismantling a table; and if one is far away from professional
assistance, and is obliged to take down a table according to one’s own
lights, it is well to look carefully for this bevel, and it may save
many a cracked slate.
Various thicknesses are used, from, say, 1⅛ inch up to and over two
inches, the general principle being that, the thicker the bed is, the
quieter the balls run. But, as in most other things, there is a
reasonable limit, because the weight of the slates increases so
enormously with the increased thickness, that beyond two inches in
thickness they become very difficult to handle, and the risk of damage
in transport is more than proportionately increased.
Therefore, one may call two inches a reasonable maximum, and 1⅝ in. a
fair minimum for the thickness of slates.
CUSHIONS
No part of the table has undergone such radical changes in the last
forty years as the cushion. Billiard-players of even twenty-five years’
experience are already beginning to forget the miseries they endured in
the early days in endeavouring to make a respectable shot from under the
old high cushions, and a school of billiard-players is rapidly growing
up who will never realise the difficulties their fathers encountered.
I am permitted by the courtesy of Messrs. Burroughes & Watts to insert
four drawings from ‘Billiards Simplified,’ which show the difference of
the stroke from under the cushion—fig. 19 in 1826; fig. 20 in 1837; fig.
21 in 1869; fig. 22 in 1895.
The more the player’s cue is elevated from the horizontal, the more
difficult it becomes to direct the course of the ball, and with the old
high cushions it was no easy matter for an ordinary player whose ball
was tight under the cushion to hit another ball at the length of the
table.
But it is not only for the reduction in the height of the cushions that
we have to thank the makers at the present time. The early rubber
cushions were exceedingly sensitive to cold, and unless the greatest
care and trouble were taken with them they became hard, untrue, and
useless; and if they were once allowed to get ‘frozen,’ as it was
called, they never regained their original elasticity. Five and twenty
years ago it was the exception and not the rule to find a country-house
table worth playing on; now, thanks to modern improvements, no one need
despair of keeping his table in excellent order.
[Illustration:
Fig. 19
]
[Illustration:
Fig. 20
]
Vulcanite specially prepared was at one time recommended for
country-house cushions. But although cushions of that material were
unaffected by frost, they were slower and deader than ‘native’ rubber
cushions, and soon became unpopular. The makers have at last found a way
of preparing cushions so that with ordinary care they can be kept true
and fast in all weathers, and it is possible, and indeed usual, to play
in the country with the same kind of cushions as are used in the leading
London clubs.
[Illustration:
Fig. 21
]
The manufacture of these cushions is a delicate piece of work; but one
may say generally that the rubber is applied to the backing in thin
strips, one ‘pasted’ on the top of another with some liquid preparation
of india-rubber similar to, if not the same as, the stuff one uses to
mend a hole in wading-stockings.
[Illustration:
Fig. 22
]
For those who wish to go deeper into the subject, a day at the Patent
Office Library and a careful study of the various patents obtained by
the principal makers with reference to the manufacture of cushions will
prove an interesting piece of research, and will place the scientific
reader in possession of information which for obvious reasons could not
properly be included in the present work.
As we write, rumours of a pneumatic cushion ‘which is to supersede all
others’ are widely current in the billiard world; but when one remembers
the number of fair-seeming patents that have never got further than the
Patent Office Library aforesaid, it would be premature to express any
opinion upon the cushions until they have been thoroughly submitted to
the two practical tests of time and play.
CLOTHS
The bulk of the cloth comes from Stroud, although a good deal is
manufactured in Yorkshire, and the finest quality is passed through two
steel rollers, while a sort of knife like a mowing machine removes a
considerable part of the long nap. This is the kind of cloth that one
sees upon the tables used for exhibition matches. It would be unsuitable
for a club because, having a comparatively short nap, it would soon be
rubbed smooth and bare by the incessant play, and the brushing and
ironing such play involves. For country houses, however, it is the very
thing. The short nap which renders it unsuitable for clubs makes it
easily manageable in a private house; it requires a minimum of ironing;
and even if the table be left to itself for some time, there will be no
staring nap to be seen when next the table is used.
For clubs the next quality, with longer nap, is more useful; more
brushing and more ironing are required, but the cloth is better fitted
to resist the everlasting friction of the player’s hands and the
incessant brushing that becomes, owing to the chalk from many cues, an
almost hourly function.
And here, notwithstanding all that has been said and written about the
subject, let me say that the ironing in club-rooms is in most instances
very much overdone. It is not altogether the marker’s fault; members
complain that the table is running slow, and on goes the iron as a
matter of course, generally far too hot. Nearly every marker will tell
you that the iron is no use unless it is thoroughly hot; what he means
is, that he cannot get the glaze upon the cloth without it; but the
proper answer is that nobody wants, or ought to want, the glaze, and
that it is directly detrimental to scientific billiards. The cooler you
can use the iron and keep the table in order, the better for the life of
the cloth and the better for the club play.
At the seaside, or in any damp climate, constant ironing becomes a
necessity, in order to thoroughly dry the cloth, but even under such
circumstances there is no necessity to scorch it.
A good cloth can be told by the feel only; it should be firm and
leathery, closely woven, and not too elastic.
In such an important matter as a cloth, however, a purchaser would be
well advised to place himself unreservedly in the manufacturers’ hands,
and leave the selection to them.
TO ERECT A TABLE
Having fixed upon a suitable foundation (and for this a competent
architect should be consulted), stand the legs up in the places they
will occupy; fit the frames (which are all numbered) into the mortices,
and screw the frames to the legs with the long bolts provided for the
purpose.
At this stage it will be well to set about levelling, _before_ the
weight of the slates comes upon the bed, and if you get your wedges in
now, you can more readily knock them a little further when the table is
completely put together than if you had left them to be inserted last of
all.
Having thus got the bed level, lift the slates on carefully, and lay
them on the bed an inch or two apart. Place the centre slate accurately
in position, slide the next one up against it, and enter the dowels of
the one into the corresponding holes of the other fairly and squarely;
proceed in like manner with the other slates till they are all joined.
If there be any cracks in the upper edges of any of the slates, fill
them in with plaster of Paris.
Lay on the cloth, taking care that the right side is uppermost, that the
nap runs from what is to be the bottom of the table towards the top, and
that the cloth is square to the table. Go to the top of the table, drive
in a couple of tacks,[8] and then go to the bottom of the table, pull
the cloth tight, and drive in two more tacks on the middle line. Then
stand at one of the middle pockets, pull the cloth a little towards you,
and tack it lightly on each side of the pocket; next go over to the
opposite middle pocket, pull the cloth tight and tack it as before. Then
at each of the middle pockets in succession take a good handful of cloth
and a good pull and tack what you get underneath the pocket. Smooth out
the cloth over the fall of these pockets, but do not at present trouble
about a wrinkle or two, as they will be smoothed out later. Get somebody
to hold the cloth firmly at the middle pocket, and go yourself to the
corner pocket and pull along the side of the table, using considerable
strength; proceed in like manner with the other corner pockets. If all
this has been done carefully, neatly, and firmly, the cloth ought to be
well stretched the length and breadth of the table. The amateur will
find the greatest difficulty in getting the cloth to lie smooth along
the sides and ends of the table, and especially at the fall of the
pockets, for the cloth must be humoured so as to come fair over the
pockets without creasing. This is a work of time, trouble, and
neat-handedness; you must not hurry; take plenty of time, plenty of
tacks, and by degrees success may be attained.
Covering the cushions with cloth is such an exceedingly difficult and
delicate operation that it should not be attempted by an amateur; very
few workmen can cover a cushion as it should be covered, and, therefore,
it is useless to describe the operation. It will be found prudent to
order the makers to cover the cushions before sending them out; indeed,
some clubs abroad have two sets of cushions, so that while one set is in
use the other may be in England for repairs.
And now to put the cushions on the table. Take care that you have each
one in its proper place (the cushions will be all numbered); fit them
all firmly on so that the holes in the woodwork exactly coincide with
the holes in the slates; push in the bolts and screw them _all_ up
_hand_ tight. _Don’t_ screw one as tight as you can at first, or you
will strain the cushion and the nut, but when you have got them _all_
fairly tight, set them up with the brace as tight as your strength will
allow, taking care that each is similarly treated. With modern steel
cushions it must be remembered that slots have to be dealt with instead
of holes, and therefore the position of the cushions must be carefully
measured, or one pocket will be larger than another.
Having screwed up the cushions quite tight, fit in the pocket plates and
pass the long thin screws up from below through the woodwork of the
cushions and screw all tight. (Some modern cushions are fixed with what
are called invisible pocket plates; these have to be put into the
cushions before the latter are fixed). Modern pockets are made with
holes at the side closed by an india-rubber ring, so that the balls can
be taken out without putting the hand into the pockets. These are an
improvement on the old pattern, for the shoulders of the cushions will
last longer and will not be pulled out of shape.
It now only remains to get the table quite level. Work the level about
and correct any slight errors by slightly jacking up the low part, and
by pushing the wedges under the nearest legs further home. Rather
under-compensate at first, because if you overdo the thing at all, you
will find yourself obliged to go on overdoing it till your table is
eventually raised appreciably above the regulation height, which should
be 2 ft. 8 in. from the floor to the cloth, _not_ to the top of the
cushions.
If obliged to put up or superintend the erection of the lighting
apparatus, remember that the flame is generally three feet from the
cloth.
One more word of advice. If you can secure an expert to erect your
table, never do the work yourself; but if you cannot command such aid,
the foregoing hints may be of service.
The spots should be of thin court plaster, and should be carefully stuck
on the places shown in the diagram, p. 75.
Pipeclay, white chalk, black chalk, or a lead pencil can be used for
marking a baulk-line; and, whichever you select, remember to mark the
lines lightly or the cloth will soon become grooved and damaged.
Pipeclay, which is the least likely to damage the table, has the
drawback that it very easily rubs out, and, in consequence, involves
constant ruling, so that, on the whole, a lead pencil carefully and
lightly used can be recommended.
If the table be a Championship one, the position of the afore-mentioned
spots and lines requires modification, as shown on p. 73.
BRUSHING AND IRONING
It is impossible to overestimate the value of continual and regular
brushing. With one of the finest quality cloths, unless the climate be
damp, once or twice a week at the outside will be enough for the iron,
_if the brush_ is used as it should be. At the conclusion of play the
brush should _always_ be used freely and at once, so that all the chalk
marks may be removed before they are rubbed through the cloth. Remember
always to use the brush _with the nap_—that is, from the bottom towards
the top of the table.
To iron a table properly, place the iron at A C (fig. 23), and then take
it steadily along the table from A to B. _Lift it off_; then go back to
the bottom again; put the iron down at C E, and take it along the table
from C to D. Then go from E to F; and finally from G to H. Proceed then
in a similar manner with the other side of the table. Avoid as much as
possible letting the iron come into contact with the cushion.
It will be observed that the iron in the sketch is put down diagonally,
the reason being that if, when ironing the breadth next to the side
cushion, the iron comes in contact with the shoulder of the middle
pocket, it will slide on harmlessly and not damage the cushion. If it
were held squarely, the sharp edge of the iron might cut the cloth of
the cushion.
_Bear well in mind_ that if at any time the cloth is turned end for end,
the brushing and ironing will have, as before, to go with the nap, and
will, therefore, start from the top end of the table and proceed towards
the bottom.
[Illustration:
Fig. 23
]
Let the iron be too cold rather than too hot. It is easy to go over the
table a second time, and after a little experience the proper
temperature will become known. If the cloth be once scorched it will
never be satisfactory. Therefore:
Rule 1.—Never put an iron on the cloth until you have _practically_
satisfied yourself that it is not too hot.
Rule 2.—_Never iron an unbrushed cloth._
UNDERSIZED TABLES
Tables can be bought 10 ft. by 5 ft., 9 ft. by 4½ ft., and so on down to
6 ft. by 3 ft. There are also combination tables which serve as
dining-tables as well, and they seem to answer very well in small
houses.
For the earnest student a so-called ‘spot stroke’ table 6 ft. by 3 ft.,
which is really a section of the top of a full-sized table, made after
the fashion of the sketch (fig. 24), will afford an immense amount of
amusement and practice; for, in addition to the ‘spot,’ the top of the
table game, ‘rail’ cannons, &c., can be practised. The pattern of the
spot stroke table is a matter of fancy and cost; the side A, B, C need
have neither cushion nor pocket.
[Illustration:
Fig. 24
]
If the small tables do not satisfy the ambition of the player, he has
yet another course open—viz. to get a French table, and seriously study
the cannon game in all its phases; and signs are not wanting that this
beautiful game, as it is becoming better known, is finding favour with
advanced players.
It may not be generally known by the vast army of people who rent
furnished houses for a few months at a time that billiard-tables can be
hired from the leading makers by the week or the month, the rate being
from, say, 2_l._ 2_s._ to 3_l._ 3_s._ a month, with a small payment in
addition to cover erecting and dismantling. Lighting and all fittings
are, of course, included in the above charges, and thus, without the
expense of purchase, a billiard-table can be brought within anyone’s
reach.
Before leaving the subject of tables, an ingenious modification of an
old arrangement whereby the balls are automatically returned from the
pockets to the baulk end of the table may be mentioned. It has been
patented by Messrs. Orme & Sons, and will be found a convenience where
no marker is kept, specially in practising losing hazards from baulk.
For spot, or top of the table play, it is inconvenient; but the drawback
of having to return to baulk for the ball after each hazard may be
remedied by placing a plug or false bottom into each top pocket (failing
anything better, a pocket handkerchief will do), so that the ball may be
removed in the usual way. Mr. Rimington-Wilson has devised a mode of
meeting this difficulty, and Messrs. Orme have acquired the right to use
his patent.
BALLS
Balls are made of various substances, generally of ivory, the standard
diameter for the English game being 2¹⁄₁₆ inches.
Every practical billiard-player is painfully aware of the difficulty
that exists in procuring a really satisfactory set of ivory balls. I
propose, therefore, first to touch on their manufacture, then on their
treatment, and finally to offer a suggestion or two as to their purchase
and preservation.
It is said that only one kind of tusk, that of the female elephant, is
suitable for ball-making; and the size of the tusk, again, is closely
regulated by the size of the ball required; for it is important that as
little as possible of the outside of the ivory should be pared away.
As the tusk comes into the workshop, the upper part (which is hollow)
and the hard point are sawn off, leaving the piece from A to B (fig.
25). This is generally sawn into five blocks, each of which will
eventually become a ball; these blocks are roughed out and turned into
approximately spherical shape and left for about a year to season,
before they are touched again, in order that the inevitable shrinking of
the grain may proceed naturally and slowly.
Now, the ball from end B is closer in the grain than the ball from end
B, and therefore they will differ in weight; and as it is most important
that the three balls should be of equal weight, no small trouble is
experienced, after finishing, in finding three that will pass the test
of the balance.[9] If five sets can be got out of a hundred balls, the
makers are satisfied, and even then perhaps only one set will be up to
match standard.
When one considers the cost of ivory, the time and delicate work
involved, and the scarcity of sufficiently skilled workmen, it is small
wonder that a good set of balls is an expensive luxury.
[Illustration:
Fig. 25
]
If balls are to last well, much care must be taken of them; but
unhappily their ordinary treatment at a club is too severe for their
delicate constitution. In many cases they are put upon the table as soon
as they arrive from the makers, before they have had time to get
acclimatised to the change of temperature, and, as full-sized balls are
sure to seem heavy after balls that have been once or twice adjusted,
the heaviest cues in the room are brought to bear upon them with
literally crushing effect.
Now, as the turners have removed a little of the hard outer surface, the
newly exposed surface ought to have time to harden; and, further, ivory
is very susceptible to changes of temperature, sensitive to damp, and
needs acclimatisation in its new home, to enable it to withstand the
shock of collision without cracking. The leading players, when they get
a really good set of balls, never think of playing a hard shot with them
until many days, or even weeks, are gone by. Every day they take them
out and gently tap them along with nursery cannons and quiet little
strokes, until they are sufficiently seasoned to stand the shock of a
long game; hence their balls last much longer than club balls.
Anyone who has served on the billiard committee of a London club may
remember how his life has been made a burden to him by the never-ending
complaints of members on the subject of balls. He might reasonably
reply: ‘Gentlemen, the matter rests mainly with you; if you are
determined to have good balls, you must make up your minds that they are
to receive good treatment.’ But how that much-to-be-desired arrangement
is to be ensured I confess I cannot say. The balls are common property,
and must be as much at the service of those who know nothing and care
less about the game (save as a means of whiling away an hour or two) as
of the limited few to whom the difference between good and bad balls
means a great deal.
Some clubs adopt the principle of paying a leading firm so much per
annum (like a subscription to a lending library), upon the understanding
that the firm is to change the balls as often as the club likes. This
system is a bad one for makers and clubs alike. There is no inducement
to the makers to send their _best_ balls to be subjected to the severe
ordeal of everyday club play. Rather do they prefer to keep such balls
for customers who are able to take the greatest care of them; and it
follows that makers, having from the nature of things only a few of the
very best sets, cannot be blamed if they send more moderate articles to
take their turn in the ‘lending library’ arrangement.
The following is, I think, a better system. Several sets of balls are
bought _in the rough_ to start with, with the date of their purchase
marked on a label attached to each set. These balls are then hung in a
net under the table and left undisturbed for one, two, or three
years—the longer the better; they are then adjusted and hung up again;
after another interval a set is again adjusted, made ready for play,
and, finally, having been kept for, say, another fortnight or three
weeks, is put upon the table. At the same time another set to take its
place is bought in the rough, and, as every set in turn is brought into
use, another rough set is purchased. By this means there are always
eight or ten sets seasoning in the particular temperature for which they
are required.
Every good system has its weak point, and the weak point of this one is,
that it is essential to its success that the set which comes back from
adjustment is the identical one which was sent. I do not suggest that
the leading makers would knowingly make a mistake of this kind; on the
contrary, I know as a fact that great care is taken in the turning shop
to prevent any such accident; but one set of balls is very like another,
and it is quite possible that an unintentional change might take place.
However, with a view to render such an accident impossible, one firm, at
any rate, willingly allows the man in charge of the balls to stay in the
shops while they are being adjusted, so that he can take them away with
him as soon as they are finished.
If neither of these systems is adopted, the best plan is to buy the
balls for the ensuing billiard season in the early summer, when little
or no play is going on, and keep them in the room seasoning until they
are wanted in the autumn. Any time and trouble expended on their careful
selection will be amply repaid before the year is out, because the balls
so selected will have hardened up, and will be less liable to crack than
others bought a few days before they are required for regular use.
Balls purchased from, or adjusted by, a first-class firm should not
require to be tested for size and weight, because they have been
accurately gauged (fig. 26) and weighed before they are sent out; but a
rough-and-ready test may be useful if one finds oneself about to play in
an out-of-the-way corner of the country, and one half suspects the
presence of the inevitable pool ball. Place the three balls in a line
touching one another and one of the cushions, and then lower the eye
till the line of sight becomes a tangent to the top of the balls and the
top of the woodwork of the cushion; by this means irregularity in size
is easily detected. If you suspect the balls to be foul, set up balls 2
and 3 touching; note the exact spot on cushion where 3 should hit—viz.
that indicated by the prolongation of a line through the centres and
point of contact.
Then play the plant with ball 1 and note deviation. If in doubt whether
balls or table be in fault, reverse the stroke; go to the opposite end
of the table and play back over the same line. Good lines to select are
the diagonals which are the longest on the table.
[Illustration:
Fig. 26
]
‘How can you tell a good ball?’ is a question that is often asked, and
the late Mr. Frank Buckland answered it as follows. ‘The test is this:
the ball is rolled gently along a billiard-table till it stops of its
own accord. If at that moment it falls either to one side or the other,
it is useless to the player; if, on the contrary, it remains motionless
on the same line on which it was originally projected, it is allowed to
pass muster.’ Such a test, however, would be too much for 99 balls out
of 100. First, ivory is not like Whitworth steel; it is a substance of
varying density, and even if by the skill of man it could be turned into
_an absolutely perfect_ sphere, it is hardly likely that the centre of
gravity of each piece would coincide with the centre of the sphere;
secondly, in order to make the experiment at all satisfactory, the table
should be absolutely level, the cloth perfectly new, free from dirt, of
the finest quality, and most carefully stretched; and, lastly, the ball
must be struck _exactly_ on its vertical centre line. Each of these
conditions presents some difficulty in attainment; to combine them all
is well-nigh impossible.
Every ball, to speak generally, will fall over a little, and it may be
due to the failure of _any one_ of the above conditions. Therefore, it
is safer to say that the less a _truly struck_ ball changes its
horizontal axis the better ball it is. For the owner of a private table,
I should say the safest way to get a good set is to ask a first-class
professional player, whom he can trust, to make the selection; of course
he would have to pay a good price, but he will no doubt thus get a
better set than he himself could choose. If he should in this way become
the fortunate possessor of a good set, he ought to lock them jealously
away, only to be produced when he finds an adversary that he can trust
with them; and he will find it good policy to keep another set for
ordinary use.
Ivory is getting increasingly scarce, and everything seems to point to
the fact that as time goes on good balls will become still more costly,
and more difficult to procure; and one is led to the conclusion that the
next generation will have to find some substitute, or leave billiards to
millionaires. Many attempts have been made in the last few years to get
over the difficulty, and composition balls of various substances have
from time to time been placed upon the market; but the earlier kinds
have not found much favour—first, because they were believed to be
explosive; secondly, because they did not possess sufficient elasticity;
and, lastly, because they showed a tendency to soil, and pick up any
dirt they might happen to pass over.
About the year 1893 or 1894, however, a new composition called Bonzoline
made its appearance. The makers claim for it that it is heavier
(specifically) and _more_ elastic than ivory, and, as far as observation
at present goes, their claim seems to be well founded. Whether bonzoline
will stand the wear and tear of everyday work as well as or better than
ivory it would be premature to offer an opinion, but these balls have
_at least_ the merit of cheapness: 31_s._ 6_d._ compares very favourably
with 3½, 4, or 5 guineas for a set of balls; so that, even if they do
not last so long as ivory (and I do not say they do not), a purchaser
would not be very much out of pocket thereby. One thing is certain, that
they run very truly at first, and time will soon show whether they can
be depended upon for endurance. They certainly do not appear to be
explosive; they seem less affected by changes of temperature and damp
than ivory; but they have the same facility for picking up dirt that the
older kinds had. I cannot, however, find that washing them in tepid
water injures them in the slightest degree. For pool and pyramids they
represent an enormous saving in money.
They ‘come off’ at a slightly different angle to ivory—that is to say, a
shade ‘squarer.’ With No. 1 strength the difference is inappreciable,
but as forcing strength is reached it becomes more apparent; but in the
most extreme cases it is not much, and easily provided for—indeed, with
some sets it hardly exists. I am aware that there is a very general
impression amongst amateurs that the difference is very great, ‘enough
to ruin one’s game;’ but, for all that, it is largely a matter of
imagination, and the very objectors forget that ivory sets vary
considerably in the same sort of way, so that each new set wants a
little knowing.
As I write I hear that somebody in Sweden has brought out at Stockholm
some billiard balls of hollow cast steel. According to ‘Chambers’s
Journal’ for March 1895, they are said to be of the same weight as
ivory, and about a quarter of the price; they are also said to be
turned, and the thickness of the skin is given as about ¹⁄₁₆ in.
Nothing apparently is mentioned as to their elasticity, and I cannot
find that anyone here has seen or tried them.
CUES, HALF-BUTTS, RESTS, ETC.
Cues should be made of old and carefully-seasoned wood; ash being
generally used. There are three kinds—(1) plain cues; (2) French butted;
(3) English butted.
The first kind are of course the cheapest, but, being made of ‘self’
wood throughout, they have more tendency to warp, and their balance is
not so finely adjusted; hence one seldom sees an advanced player using a
plain cue. Of the second and third kinds, the French butt is solid, the
English butt is veneered on, and, therefore, if a light cue is required,
a French butt cannot be selected.
In making the French butt the ebony is sawn in two =Ｖ=-shaped cuts, and
the ash is cleared out, so that when the cue and the butt are driven
together, with hot glue run in, an exceedingly tight joint is made,
which never comes adrift.
In making the English butt, two broad and two narrow tapering pieces of
ebony, mahogany, or other hard wood, are glued to the sides of the ash
cue which have been squared off to receive them, and when the glue has
thoroughly set the whole butt is planed down into shape, sand-papered,
and polished. The above sketch may give a clearer idea of the process
(fig. 27).
[Illustration:
Fig. 27
]
At first sight the preparation of what one may call the shaft of the cue
seems simple, and a little ordinary planing all that can be required;
but this is very far from being the case; indeed, the whole secret of
successful cue-making lies in the careful manipulation of the ash shaft.
Every piece of ash, generally speaking, will have a soft spot or two in
it; and if the wood were planed carelessly all round without reference
to these weak spots, the shaft would warp to a certainty, for every
piece of wood has a tendency to cast towards the centre of the tree from
which it was cut; therefore, the maker humours the wood and planes more
from the hard grain and less from the soft, so that they may be made to
balance one another; and then, if there be still a slight tendency to
warp in any direction, the piece of butt _on the opposite side_ will be
made a trifle longer, so that it may have a little more leverage in
counteracting the warping tendency. No doubt there are perfectly true,
straight-grained pieces of ash, but they are very rare, and a leading
cue-maker has told me that he doesn’t come across more than two or three
in a year. All the rest require special treatment, and about three out
of every dozen that come in from the seasoning shop have to be rejected
as hopeless as far as cues are concerned, though they may serve for
rest-handles or for dowels.
When the cues are finally turned out as finished articles, a purchaser
will find a considerable range in weight, balance, size, shape of butt,
and size of top to select from, showing that individual fancy is an
important factor in the case. There is no magic in any particular
weight, or in any particular shape or kind of grip. What a player
fancies, he will play best with, and he will soon get accustomed to a
particular pattern, which he ought to adhere to steadily.
Cues vary from 14 oz. in weight to 18 oz. and even 20 oz., and I have
seen a few of over 20 oz.; but, speaking generally, 16 oz. to 16½ oz. is
a very usual weight. Peall plays with a very light cue, about 14 oz.
Roberts uses one weighing about 16 oz. Good results can, therefore, be
produced with widely varying weights, and a player can suit himself.
With a very heavy cue the ‘touch’ is likely to be coarse; but I have
seen an amateur make over twenty spots with a cue of over 20 oz.
With regard to the top, its diameter varies from ³⁄₁₀ in. to ⁶⁄₁₀ in.
for English cues, and within fair limits a medium-sized top is more
easily and certainly used by ordinary players than a very fine one.
TIPS
Tips are now always made abroad, and are supplied in boxes of assorted
sizes, so that a purchaser is sure of finding some the size he requires.
It is essential to good play that the cue should be well tipped; and the
process of tipping has been so often described in existing works on
billiards, that everyone _ought_ to be able to tip a cue for himself.
The golden rule to be observed is that the top of the cue must be
_absolutely flat_, and the tip should fit the top as closely as
possible. If the tip is a well-fitting one, it should be warmed (and the
top of the cue also), and stuck firmly on with cue cement. There is an
ingenious little clamp to be bought, which holds the tip tightly until
the cement has set. After the cement is fixed, the tip should be gently
hammered until it is flat, and any overhanging leather or cement must be
carefully removed, first with a knife and then with sand-paper. _Avoid
touching the cue_ itself with the sand-paper, if possible; and you will
find it a good plan to wrap a piece of paper round the cue while you are
rubbing the tip. If the cue be much scratched, the wood will begin to
‘stare’ and feel rough in the fingers. Nothing is so bad for the cue as
the common amateur trick, at the commencement of play, of rubbing the
cue from the tip, say two feet down, with coarse sand-paper. Players say
they do it to clean the cue; but the best way to do that is to get a
damp cloth and wipe the cue well, and then rub it hard with a dry one.
By this means your cue will be very clean, slip well through the bridge,
and acquire a fine, hard polish, so that it will feel much the same in
damp as in dry weather.
[Illustration:
Fig. 28
]
Some players do not feel neat-handed enough to undertake the tipping of
a cue; for them I would recommend a little brass plate with three spikes
in it, which screws into the top of a cue shaped as in fig. 28. If the
cues in a country house are so fitted, anyone can put a tip on in a
couple of minutes. You have merely to put the tip on the spikes and
gently hammer it home.
[Illustration:
Fig. 29
]
Another device is to fit the cue-top with a brass screw socket, into
which a screw with a flat top is screwed, and the tip is fixed on the
movable screw (fig. 29). The advantage of this plan is, that a player
may have three or four screws all duly tipped, and as one tip wears out
he simply takes out the screw and screws in another. For country-house
visiting this, combined with a screw-jointed cue (fig. 30), makes a
player quite independent of local cues and local tips, especially as
with a jointed cue he can have a spare top joint.[10]
Another simple arrangement is the ivory top fitted with a screw, as
shown in fig. 29.
[Illustration:
Fig. 30
]
After long service a cue will wear away at the top. It is worth
remembering that such a cue need not be discarded, as it can easily be
restored to its original condition. The usual remedy is an ivory top,
but a better one is to get the cue spliced or fitted with a screw,
according to the illustration (fig. 31). Whichever plan may be adopted,
the great thing is to pick an _old_ seasoned bit of ash, nothing being
better than a piece of an old cue with a good straight grain. By
adopting this plan, the top can be made as large as may be desired, and
a good bit of wood in the most delicate part of the cue is ensured.
[Illustration:
Fig. 31
]
The writer has a cue with a single splice, which has been in work for
years, and is so well put together that even at this time it is
difficult to find the joint; but, on the whole, he ventures to think
that the double splice is stronger and neater.
HALF-BUTTS
Half-butts and long-butts, on account of their length, have to be made
of pine for lightness’ sake, and little need be said about them. They
are cumbrous things, and a disagreeable necessity.
It is a good plan to wipe the upper end of the butt _every day_ with a
damp cloth, and then with a dry one, because they always collect a
quantity of dirt, and are apt to run stickily through the rest. If these
butts were not varnished, but well polished with boiled oil, they would
be much pleasanter to play with.
RESTS
Rests are now usually made in the shape of a diagonal cross, the upper
drawing of fig. 32, the old-fashioned pattern being very seldom seen.
[Illustration:
Fig. 32
]
The chief objection to the cross pattern is that it is troublesome to
manipulate in the neighbourhood of the cushions, and some years ago
Messrs. Burroughes & Watts brought out a rest which gets over the
cushion difficulty very cleverly. As will be seen in the annexed drawing
(fig. 33), the height can be regulated at will, and a _firm_ rest on the
cushion can be made. For some reason or other this rest has never become
popular, and the cross-shaped rest still holds the field.[11]
[Illustration:
Fig. 33
]
That a perfect rest is still to be invented I firmly believe. A point
that has never yet been met is, that the friction over the bridge of the
human hand is of a quite different character to that over a brass or an
ebony cross-piece, and so a cue on a rest seems to run away from a
player.
CHALK
Chalk is worth attending to carefully. The most familiar kinds are the
square blocks done up in green paper and the cylindrical pieces in
cardboard cases. These last are turned straight out of a solid block,
and are, therefore, not free from grit and other impurities; the more
gritty they are the more destructive are they to the cue-tips. The
square blocks are sawn from more carefully selected chalk, and are for
that reason to be preferred to the cylindrical pieces. They should be
dry and powdery, for a greasy chalk is not to be depended on, and it
will soon make the cue-tip shiny. In fact, the great secret of chalk is
to have it _dry_.
Attempts have been made from time to time to grind down the chalk to
powder and again consolidate it; but, as foreign substances must be
introduced in order to make the powder stick together and become hard
enough to withstand the friction of cue-tips, the result has usually
been rather a greasy mixture.
There can be little doubt that if our chemists were to go into the
matter seriously they would soon give us a smooth and yet biting
‘chalk.’
Within the last few months a French firm have brought out some
greenish-blue ‘chalk,’ called St. Martin chalk, which reminds one of the
old green Thurston chalk one used to see thirty years ago. This new
preparation seems to hold the ball very well, and does not make such a
mess of the table as the old white; it is not poisonous; but—there is
always a but—it is very expensive.
MARKING BOARD
A good marking-board is essential to the comfort of the players, and the
ordinary pattern, as shown in fig. 34, leaves little to be desired. Long
games, however, of 400 and 500 up are not uncommon in private rooms in
these days, and it would be a slight improvement if some means of
scoring _hundreds_ were introduced. I should think two slides similar to
the pool slides, with 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 underneath, placed above
or below each scoring-roller, would meet the case (fig. 35).
[Illustration:
Fig. 36
]
There is another pattern still fairly common which is always a nuisance,
for sooner or later a mistake is sure to be made as to the twenties
(fig. 36). One or other of the players will forget to move on the twenty
marker when he takes the other back to zero; more advanced arithmetic is
involved and another objection is that a separate board is required for
pool.
[Illustration:
Fig. 34
]
[Illustration:
Fig. 35
]
[Illustration:
Fig. 37
]
Another kind of marker is a nickel-plated one let into the woodwork of
the cushions, and worked by pressing a button (fig. 37). Two are placed
side by side, one for each player. A further variety of the same kind is
a hand marker, which is useful in a country house.
POOL BASKET
If you should happen to possess a good set of pool balls, you should get
a set of dummy balls, made in box-wood or inferior ivory, to shake up in
the basket, for the violent shocks that real balls receive in the basket
at the hands of an energetic marker are a fruitful source of cracking
and faulty running.
THE HALF-BALL ANGLE
[Illustration:
Fig. 38
]
A piece of wood of about the thickness of half a ball (say 1¹⁄₃₂ in.),
as shown in fig. 38, is to be bought, and will be found exceedingly
useful to beginners. The idea of this invention is that by its means the
angle by which a ball (fairly struck in the middle without side, No. 1
strength) is deflected from its course by colliding a half-ball with
another is accurately shown (fig. 39).
Let A be the striker’s ball, and let it be required to hit the ball B
exactly half-ball. Clearly the line of progression of ball A will be
along the line A D. At D it is deflected in the direction of the arrow
F; and the angle between F D and E D, the original course of the ball,
is the amount of deflection due to collision. This will be found to
amount to 33°.
Suppose, then, it is required to find the proper place to spot a ball,
so as to go into a pocket half-ball off another (fig. 40).
Let O be the object ball, P a pocket. It is required to spot a player’s
ball somewhere near the line A B to go into the pocket off O. Place the
angle A of the instrument against the ball O in such fashion that the
side A D points for the centre of the pocket. Then a ball with its
centre upon the line A E produced will, if it strikes the ball O
half-ball, proceed towards the centre of the pocket.
[Illustration:
Fig. 39
]
The course of the player’s ball will not be _along_ A D, but converging
upon it from a point half a diameter distant from the ball O. Hence the
angle of deviation as shown by the instrument is made slightly greater
than that described by the ball; that of the instrument being about 35°,
the real angle being about 33°.
Of course it cannot be mathematically correct at all distances, but it
is near enough for practical purposes, and will help to train the eye to
estimate half-ball angles.
[Illustration:
Fig. 40
]
The two lines marked upon the upper surface of the instrument, if
produced through the angle A, will give the direction taken by the
object ball after collision, according as the shot is played from B or
C.
[Illustration:
An Outside Billiard-room
]
CHAPTER III
ELEMENTARY: ONE-BALL PRACTICE
Before commencing the manual of instruction in billiards, it is
desirable to address a few words of advice to the beginner, and to
explain some of the technical terms used. Others will be described in
future chapters.
It is clear that before playing, the room must be entered; and hence we
commence with the mode of doing so. The operation seems so simple as to
be too trivial for notice; but, far from that, there is nothing short of
actual play which shows more clearly the difference between a
well-trained, well-mannered player and a novice or a careless and
discourteous visitor. The door of a room should always be approached
quietly, for the table may be occupied; if it be so, _wait for the
stroke_. When the stroke is played, open the door quietly, and walk
straight to a seat. Avoid everything likely to distract the attention of
the players from their game, and recollect that for the time being the
room, its light, fire, and so forth, belong to them. Persons who smoke
should wait for the stroke before scratching a match, and when
extinguishing it should not do so by waving it before the eyes of the
player. In short, ordinary courtesy is nowhere more important than in
the billiard-room, for if men can play, their nerve and attention are
strained; interruption may prove fatal to the chance of one of them, and
is sure to be resented, even though it may pass without remark.
In the previous chapter the terms employed respecting the table and
implements have been detailed; these are now supplemented by others in
common use during play.
_Angled._—A ball is angled in respect to that part of the table to which
it cannot be directly played.
_Ball._—In billiards three balls are used, white, spot-white, and red.
The player’s or cue-ball will usually, in this volume, be called ball 1;
the object ball, or ball played on, ball 2; and the third ball, ball 3.
A line-ball is one resting on the baulk-line.
_Baulk._—The space between the baulk-line and the bottom cushion. A ball
within that space is in _baulk_; when a white and red ball are in baulk
and the other is off the table, the situation is termed a _double
baulk_.
_Break._—The term is applied to a continuous score, or one made in
unbroken succession.
To _break the balls_ is to play as at the opening of a game.
_Bridge._—The player’s hand which rests on the table, and which serves
as a guide to the cue, is so-called.
_Coup._—If a player fails to hit another ball, and by the same stroke
causes his own ball to enter a pocket, he is said to have _run a coup_.
_Cover._—A ball is said to be _covered_ when it cannot be directly hit
by player’s ball because of the interposition of another ball; in other
words, when ball 1 cannot directly strike ball 2 because of ball 3, ball
2 is said to be _covered_ by ball 3.
_Foul._—A stroke made in contravention of the rules.
_In hand._—When a player’s ball is off the table it is termed _in hand_.
_Hazard._—When a player with his ball pockets another ball he is said to
make a _winning hazard_; when he pockets his own ball after contact with
another ball he makes a _losing hazard_.
_Kiss._—Ball 2 is said to kiss when it comes a second time in contact
with ball 1. The kiss is generally made off a cushion.
This term is used with much laxity in the language of billiards, and
includes what the French call _coups durs_, when ball 2 is touching a
cushion, and _rencontres_, when balls 1 and 3 meet, the former having
been set in motion by the cue and the latter by the impact of ball 2.
When ball 2 has an unforeseen collision with ball 3, and thereby
prevents a cannon, the failure is attributed to robbery by a _kiss_.
_Miss-cue._—Failure in the delivery of the cue on player’s ball; usually
a slip from want of chalk or from defective striking.
_Plant._—When two balls touch and an imaginary line through their
centres if prolonged terminates in the centre of a pocket, a _dead
plant_ is said to be on. If the ball further from the pocket be played
on and struck almost anywhere, the ball nearer the pocket will
inevitably be _planted_ or go into the pocket. The _plant_ is still
possible when the line through the centres falls slightly to the right
or left of the pocket.
_Strength_ is the measure of force used to make a stroke, which is said
to be soft or hard according to the _strength_.
[Illustration:
Stringing
]
To _string_ is to play from baulk to the top cushion so as to leave
player’s ball near the baulk-line or bottom cushion as may be selected.
Before a match the players _string_ simultaneously for choice of balls,
and for the option of commencing the game.
After these preliminaries, the first matter of importance is that
players should try to acquire an easy attitude. For its attainment
precise rules like those for military drill cannot be given, because
what are suitable for a tall spare man are wholly impossible to one who
is short and stout. Therefore, advice must be general. The learner
should go to a proficient of about his own make, whose style is admitted
to be good, and be shown the best attitudes to reach a ball placed in
various parts of the table, first from baulk, and afterwards from other
and more cramped positions. If this be neglected, he is apt to contract
faulty habits, which become more difficult to abandon the longer they
have been entertained.
[Illustration:
An Easy Attitude
]
In playing an ordinary stroke from baulk, a right-handed player should
stand so that his body shall be on the left of the line of stroke, which
is, in fact, the axis of the cue; the left foot should be advanced so
that the toe shall be just below the cushion, and pointing in the
direction of the stroke; the right foot retired more or less according
to the stature of the player, and pointing at a right angle to the left
foot. The right leg should be straight, the left more or less bent; the
right hand should hold the cue near the butt, the elbow being nearly
vertically above the hand, whilst the left hand should be extended in
the line of stroke, so that the cue resting between the thumb and
forefinger shall lie as nearly as possible horizontal. For a left-handed
player the same advice holds good, save that throughout the word ‘left’
should be substituted for ‘right.’ For all players that attitude is best
which is least stiff or constrained, and which combines the greatest
measure of steadiness with freedom of action.
The formation of a good bridge is essential to accurate play. Its object
is to supply a rest for the cue at the height of the stroke to be
delivered, and this ordinarily is the centre of the ball. Just as for
the right hand, which puts the cue in motion, freedom is the chief
necessity, so for the left, which acts as the guide and support,
stability is of the first importance. That is best attained by bringing
some weight to bear on the base of the thumb, and consequently by
somewhat raising the knuckle-joint of the little finger. As hands vary
in shape and size, no precise rule or measurements for the formation of
a bridge can be laid down. A competent instructor will show how a bridge
is made, and an intelligent learner will soon acquire the habit of
making one which suits himself. The general mode is to place the hand
flat on the table, elevate the knuckles about two inches or rather more,
keeping the fingers rigid or unbent, so as to form nearly a right angle
with the palm, raise the thumb, and press it moderately just above the
joint against the forefinger, forming with it the rest or point of
support of the cue, spread the fingers slightly so as to widen the
foundation, so to speak, of the bridge and increase its stability, and
by means of raising or lowering the little finger, bring the point of
support so that the cue shall lie level with the point of the ball to be
struck. These directions, perhaps, seem complicated; but if the
prescribed movements are gone through once or twice before the learner
by a competent person, all difficulty will disappear. The final movement
whereby the height of delivery of the cue is regulated, is one of much
importance, which we do not recollect to have seen mentioned in previous
manuals.
[Illustration:
PRELIMINARIES.
]
[Illustration:
The Bridge
]
Exceptional rests or bridges have to be made to meet exceptional cases.
Thus, when a ball is under a cushion, the tips of the fingers form the
sole support; in other instances the thumb is lowered and the forefinger
bent so as to form a ring or hook through which the cue is passed. The
French call this _bouclée_.[12] There are, in fact, many variations
which it would be a waste of time and space to describe; some, indeed,
have to be invented as the necessity for their use may arise.
The attitude and method of making a bridge having been acquired, the
next point is to deliver the cue freely and horizontally. It should be
lightly held near the butt and repose on the bridge, so that ordinarily
from 9 to 12 inches project towards the ball. Considerable differences
in the distances between the bridge and the ball occur during the
variations in a game, but it is generally true that the nearer they are
the greater the accuracy with which the ball can be struck, and the
further (within reasonable limits) they are apart the greater the power.
What is gained in power is, to some extent, lost in accuracy.
A little practice with the cue without a ball is useful to familiarise a
beginner with the necessary action, that is the horizontal backward and
forward motion; a slow withdrawal followed by a faster forward stroke.
When this is attained practice with one ball should be commenced. It is
of the highest importance; for by means of it alone can the rare
qualification of a true delivery of cue be acquired. And this applies
not merely to beginners, but to persons who are out of practice, for the
commonest of all faults, and the secret of most failures to score, is
that the player’s ball is not truly struck. It may seem strange, but it
is nevertheless true, that many persons who play what is held to be a
fair game cannot truly strike a ball.
Let us then suppose a ball placed on the spot on the centre of the baulk
circle, and that the player has assumed a suitable attitude in order to
play up the table over the billiard spot. The tip of his cue should be
about half an inch from the centre of the ball, and the axis of the cue
should be as nearly as possible parallel with the surface of the table,
and in the same vertical plane as its central line, because the path
travelled by a ball truly struck in the centre is, till after impact
with a cushion or with another ball, invariably a prolongation of the
axis of the cue. Having aimed carefully over the spot, he should draw
the cue slowly back three or four inches and then bring it forward,
giving the ball a smart tap, in contradistinction to a push, in the
centre; the strength of the stroke to be such that the ball shall return
into baulk. If ball, table, and stroke are true, the path travelled will
lie precisely over all the spots in the central line; and after impact
with the top cushion the ball will return to baulk by the same route.
Herein is manifest the excellence of this stroke for practice; because
if the ball be struck either right or left of the centre, it will return
to the right or left of the central longitudinal line of the table. The
nearer the return path is to that line the better the stroke, and the
further it is from it the worse; so that an infallible measure of the
truth or accuracy of hitting the ball is supplied by the result. It is
impossible to overstate the value of this test, and by the time that a
person can play this stroke up and down the table with varying strength
and fair accuracy he has gone far towards mastering the first step at
billiards. To secure striking the ball in the centre, as soon as aim is
taken the player should fix his eyes on the ball and try to the best of
his ability to deliver the cue truly and as horizontally as possible so
that the tip does not see-saw up and down. The tap on the centre of the
ball should be sharp and clean, the cue being permitted to follow it for
a few inches; less when the stroke is soft, and more when it is hard.
It may probably appear in course of practice that the striker has a
tendency to hit the ball either right or left of the centre; he should
correct this by striking on what seems to him slightly the other side.
Thus, if he, whilst aiming truly, brings the ball back to baulk
invariably to the right of the central line, he should strike at what
seems to him slightly to the _left_ of its centre; if by doing so he
brings the ball back over the spots, he may be assured that he has found
the true centre of the ball, and by continuing the practice his eye will
become educated, and the tendency to strike on the side will diminish or
disappear. The stroke should be repeated till it is mastered at every
possible strength, or, say, hard enough to cause the ball to travel four
lengths of the table. When confidence in the power to strike a ball in
the centre has been acquired, further practice should be made. Place the
ball on one corner spot of the =Ｄ=, play to the centre of the top
cushion immediately behind the spot, and the ball should return over the
spot on the other corner. This, too, is very useful practice; it
familiarises the eye with the general truth of the axiom that the angle
of reflexion is equal to the angle of incidence; and variations from
this stroke (which need not be defined here, as any person of ordinary
intelligence can multiply them indefinitely) will prove of constant use
when it is necessary to play at a ball protected by baulk.
For the sake of clearness, one other example may be cited.
Place the ball on the right corner of the =Ｄ=, measure a point on the
top cushion an equal distance from the right side cushion, that point
will be precisely opposite the right corner of the =Ｄ=; halve the
distance between that point and the left top pocket, and at the half set
up a mark—a piece of chalk laid on the cushion will do. If the ball be
played correctly on to the place thus indicated, it will return to the
left bottom pocket. Easier strokes of the same kind can be made across
the table into any pocket, and confidence, which is an important factor
in the game, is thus acquired. Before leaving the subject of these
exercise strokes, it is desirable to emphasise the value to a beginner
of acquiring a good style and of cultivating it incessantly till it
becomes natural, and then he may, without harm, indulge occasionally in
a game; if he begins with games he is certain to contract bad habits,
which, becoming more confirmed the longer he plays, must result in
increasing his difficulties and may never be wholly cured.
As regards indicating the strength to be used in playing various
strokes, the best plan is to refer to the positions of the balls when
they are at rest after a stroke; but as some rough guide may save
beginners many trials, it has been usual to indicate by means of numbers
the approximate strength to be used. Thus Strength No. 1 is a slow, or
soft stroke; No. 2 harder, and so on till No. 5 or No. 6 may be taken as
the greatest possible strength. Various measures have been adopted by
different authorities; for our purposes in this book it is proposed to
classify them thus:
Strength 1. From softest possible to that required for one length of the
table.
Strength 2. From one length to two lengths of the table.
Strength 3. From two lengths to three lengths of the table.
[Illustration:
Using the Rest.
]
Strength 4. From three lengths to four lengths of the table, beyond
which it is probably unnecessary to go. These definitions may be further
subdivided as desired: thus a very gentle stroke would be called a very
slow or soft No. 1; a less slow one, medium No. 1; a stroke which
required the strength to take a ball the length of the table, a full or
free No. 1, which it is obvious reaches No. 2 strength; where No. 1 ends
No. 2 begins, and so on.
It is clear that the practice prescribed will familiarise the beginner
with the various strengths, a matter which he will find greatly to his
advantage.
When the ball cannot be comfortably reached by hand an artificial
bridge, known as the rest, is employed. A short man requires it
frequently, a tall man less often, but both should practise with it
assiduously. A competent person will show a beginner the proper way of
using it in a very short time. The handle of the rest should be nearly
in the same line as the cue, only so far out of it as to permit of free
delivery; the cue should be lightly held between forefinger and thumb,
knuckles up, the elbow being raised level with the butt. The hand which
holds the rest should lie on the table.
These are general rules, but they must on occasion be modified. The
practice already defined will serve for strokes with the rest if the
ball be placed sufficiently far from the cushion. The half-butt and
long-butt should also be used. Before leaving this subject it is well to
say that to be obliged to use the rest, and, worse still, the half-butt
and long-butt, is at any time a drawback. This can be reduced to a
minimum by learning to play with either hand; a most useful
accomplishment, by no means very difficult of attainment.
The following memorandum by Mr. Dudley D. Pontifex, who besides being a
billiard-player of very high class is an expert at many other games, on
the great importance of cultivating an almost mechanical accuracy in
delivering the cue, and on the methods which he has followed in order to
attain this end, will be read by proficients as well as beginners with
both interest and profit. In essentials it agrees with the
recommendations already given, and where it may seem to differ the
variations are so small as not to require examination and explanation.
Some interesting remarks on the styles of leading professional players
will be found, and attention is justly directed to Roberts’s admirable
delivery of the cue, which is said to appear to be harder or stronger
than it really is; but one of the excellences of that great master’s
strokes is that they are habitually struck harder than is usual with
other professionals; the necessary compensations are, however, applied,
and though the ball starts with considerably greater initial velocity
than is usual, yet it does not necessarily travel farther or effect
more. A heavy drag stroke played the length of the table by Roberts will
travel nearly twice as fast as one struck by any other man, yet the
object ball will often be found not to be harder hit.
The feat of screwing back to baulk from the red ball on the billiard
spot, direct and without trick, is so remarkable that readers cannot
fail to be much interested in a well-authenticated instance of the
stroke. Besides Mr. Pontifex, William Seymour, (marker in 1895 at the
Queen’s Club) was present at the time, and has seen the gentleman do the
stroke on many other occasions.
MEMORANDUM
BY DUDLEY D. PONTIFEX
There is one characteristic which distinguishes games such as billiards
and golf, and sharply divides them from others like cricket and tennis.
While in the latter the stroke has to be made on a moving ball, in the
former the ball is stationary. Instructions as to the method of making a
stroke consequently vary in value in the two classes of games. The tiro
at cricket or tennis is told to play a particular ball in a particular
way, but is met with difficulties when he attempts to carry out the
advice. The cricketer knows that he ought to play back or forward
according to the length of the ball, but alas! too frequently is unable
to decide until too late what the length of some particular ball is. At
tennis it is much the same. The player knows well enough how the stroke
should be made, but at the critical moment finds himself in such a
position that it is utterly impossible to make a correct stroke. In
these games the value of instructions is proportionable to the capacity
of the player to adapt himself to the exigencies of the moment. It is
quite different as regards billiards. Having once made up his mind as to
the method to be adopted, there is absolutely nothing to prevent the
player from carrying it into practical effect. He is not hurried for
time. He is not called upon to make a sudden and, as it were, intuitive
decision instantaneously. On the contrary, the table and balls are
before him, and his opponent has to wait quietly until the turn is
completed. Consequently the value of instructions, if there be any value
in instructions, is relatively greatly enhanced in this class of game.
When one of our best professionals is playing, it is no uncommon thing
to hear the remark made, ‘What beautiful strength!’ To my mind the
excellence of a fine player’s game lies not so much in his strength as
in his accuracy. Given accuracy, strength will follow; at all events
there is no reason why it should not. But strength without accuracy is
useless, and even worse than useless. If a good player and a bad one
meet, the latter usually has the better of the leaves. The reason is not
difficult to discover, for the good player fails far more frequently
from want of accuracy than from bad strength, and the balls are left
fairly placed for his opponent. The bad player has little accuracy and
less strength. He goes for his stroke, and chances position. After a
score he leaves himself little, but if he fail he leaves little for his
opponent. His play is characterised by a series of disjointed efforts.
But, although the good player fails more often from want of accuracy
than from bad strength, he does not, unless the balls are very close
together, try for exact strength. To use a well-understood phrase, he
tries to get them there or thereabouts. Take a very fine player, and let
him play from baulk with the other two balls nicely placed in the middle
of the table, and let him play two breaks with the balls so placed. It
is almost certain that after the third stroke, probably the second, the
breaks will branch out differently. The good player only tries to place
the balls about where he means. If he be at all successful, he will have
the choice of playing one of perhaps half a dozen different strokes. Not
one of these half-dozen strokes is, it may be, difficult; and then he
has to consider which will leave him the best break, and if there be
three or more leaving an equally good game he takes the easiest. What is
deserving of observation is that, whichever he selects, he usually makes
the stroke and approximately carries out his idea.
It is this deadly accuracy which is so noticeable in the play of the
best professionals. How have they obtained it? First and chiefly by
years of constant and assiduous practice, secondly by a correct
mechanical style. Nothing can take the place of the former. No amount of
teaching will be the equivalent of strong individual effort extended
over a length of time. The player who really excels at billiards must
have given a large amount of time to it. He who plays a wonderful game,
and yet hardly ever touches a cue, exists only in the imagination of the
incompetent novelist. But, although nothing can compensate for hard
practice, something may be done for the beginner by teaching him how to
obtain a correct style. To avoid errors is the surest and quickest way
to real progress, and to thoroughly grasp the idea of a true mechanical
style is the most important lesson in billiards. There is no one style
that can be said to be the only correct and proper one. If the best
half-dozen players be watched, it will be seen that they all differ in
various ways from one another. The position of their heads, and the way
in which they hold the cue, are often entirely different. One thing,
however, may be noted, that however much they differ from one another,
they are true to themselves. Each man keeps rigidly to his own style.
His position and his manner of delivering the stroke are constant so far
as circumstances permit, and this is the lesson which the amateur may
properly take to heart. Billiards is more of a mechanical game than
anything else, and, because the mechanical part of it is so important,
nothing can take the place of continual practice on right lines. And
even that which may have been a defective style originally may, by
becoming habitual, lose half its injuriousness. The beginner, however,
wants to avoid defects so that he may have nothing subsequently to
unlearn, and he wants to know the nearest road to the best game of which
he is capable. When he has once got a clear idea of what a correct style
is, he is next door to getting the thing itself. And it is worth some
little trouble to get. For not only will his general progress at the
game be more rapid, but he will find the utility of it at a critical
moment. Some pernicious trick or mannerism may not be particularly
injurious on ordinary occasions, but when the stress of a match comes it
is apt to be fatal. It is then that the man with an easy and correct
style finds half his work done for him, as it were.
It is by no means an uncommon thing to see what may be called the
pump-handle style, where the cue, instead of moving horizontally or
nearly so, is at the commencement of the stroke lifted high at the butt,
and then brought forward with a circular sweep. This makes it a matter
of no little skill in itself to hit the ball at all correctly, and yet
we see players who apparently are not satisfied with the ordinary
difficulties of billiards, but must add a quite superfluous one to every
stroke.
Most of these eccentric players must be to some extent aware of their
eccentricities, and a very little reflection would show that they are
quite unnecessary and may be harmful.
Apart from any theoretical consideration of the matter, a casual
observation of really good players proves that they do not indulge in
these atrocities. In fact, our best players are, almost without
exception, easy, graceful players, and distinctly the best break I ever
saw North play was at the same time the quickest and least demonstrative
of any I have seen made by that player. The play of John Roberts is
almost above criticism, and his style is at once the delight and despair
of all. Diggle, Dawson, and Richards, more especially the last, are
charming players to watch. They who can remember Cook at his best will
recall with delight a style that was in the opinion of many unrivalled.
An imperturbable temper that nothing appeared to ruffle, a nerve that
never seemed to fail, a touch always firm and crisp, yet often using a
strength so delicate that he seemed to require instruments more accurate
than the best manufacturers could supply—these were some of the features
of a game that ever had a great fascination for the spectator.
A few words may not be out of place on the benefit of private practice,
_i.e._ practice by oneself. I believe from a tolerably wide experience
that they are exceptional, very exceptional, who can keep on improving
without having had, at some time or other, a good deal of private
practice. How many men there are who play their two or three hours every
day, and yet at the end of fifteen years are little, if any, better! It
is because their energies are being entirely absorbed by the immediate
contest. If they have a fault in style, they have no time to correct it.
They cannot make up their minds to court present defeat for a future
gain. They play the same old game with the same bad result year in and
year out. The least innovation on their stereotyped game will probably
result in failure, and perhaps defeat, and is therefore rejected. After
a time they come to accept their game as the best of which they are
capable, and when they see really good play they admire it, but never
appear to dream of taking a hint from it for their own improvement.
A short time given to private practice would do much for such a one.
Here there is no opponent to distract, no dread of consequences. The
greatest novelty, even to the playing of a losing hazard at dead slow
strength the length of the table, may be attempted fearlessly. But this
is not all. Not only may every kind of stroke be attempted without any
attaching penalty, but if there be a fault of which the player is
conscious he may now correct it. His attention is now concentrated upon
the one point, and it is wonderful how soon that which has become
habitual may be changed by steady determined suppression. Billiards
again, at least to play one’s best game, is very much a question of
confidence, and confidence is born of familiarity. He who has played a
particular stroke in a particular way a hundred times successfully in
private practice, not only feels that he can do that stroke in that way
in a match, but that it is his best chance of doing the stroke at all.
He is in a way compelled into the better class of game.
Probably no amateur is in the least likely to go through the years of
continuous labour that the best professionals have given to the game.
But in many instances he may, by giving some consideration to the matter
and taking a little trouble, acquire a greater degree of accuracy than
has hitherto been associated with his game. Accuracy in play means
accuracy in striking, and the player has to aim at hitting ball after
ball with the precision of a machine. Of course one seldom or never gets
two strokes running exactly alike, but the various movements of the body
which precede and accompany the delivery of the stroke may be and should
be alike. This uniformity of style is the groundwork of accuracy, and it
is by a recognition of the various movements and a careful observance of
them that the player may obtain a correct mechanical style. He should
once for all definitely decide what is the best style for him to adopt,
and, having decided, should strictly observe it with unfailing
regularity. It is absolutely fatal to keep chopping and changing in the
endeavour to copy a better player. In all probability that which is
copied has nothing to do with the excellence of the play. It is perhaps
some little trick which is peculiar to the man, the result of his build
or of his early billiard education. Most of us have known some friend
who, after seeing John Roberts give one of his wonderful exhibitions of
skill, has attempted to imitate his rapidity of play. The last state of
that person is worse than his first. We cannot all play our best in the
same way. Some men are naturally quick players, others lose whatever
merit they may have in the attempt to hurry through their stroke.
Usually, the better practice a man is in the quicker he plays, but,
whether he play fast or slow, he should always play naturally and at the
same pace. If he be playing badly, conscious hurrying over or dwelling
on the stroke will not mend matters. The reason for the bad play must be
sought elsewhere. Usually the internal machinery has in some way gone
wrong. But the last thing a man cares to admit is any failing in
himself. It is far more pleasant to attribute his ill success to
something else. Still, if his style be not radically wrong, and if
during one of these seasons of depression he attempts to vary it, his
game will surely suffer when the causes which led to his temporary
deterioration have passed away.
If I venture to give some advice, it is with a double motive; first, to
illustrate my meaning how, by a careful attention to details, uniformity
of style may be obtained, and, second, in the hope that it may in some
respects be found useful by beginners. But before doing so I should like
to say a few words as to what I conceive to be the real utility of
advice. What is too often the case is this. The beginner tries to
recollect before every stroke all he has learnt, and laboriously
endeavours to reduce each and every rule into practice at the same time.
Some of these rules may be the exact opposite of his previous method.
The consequence is that this attempt at wholesale assimilation causes
the player to look like a trussed-up fowl, uncomfortable to himself and
unnatural to others. He should remember that that which is ungainly in
style is usually wrong, always superfluous.
Rules may be good enough in themselves, but if there be a grave
difference between them and our former method there will always be a
difficulty about their immediate application. There is no authority for
the opinion that the world was made in a day, and even at games time
must be allowed to bring about the desired result. Too great insistence
upon the observance of several rules at the same time distresses and
discourages the player. But if he will get, more especially in the
intervals of play, a clear mental recognition of the rules which he
believes to be specially applicable to himself, he will find that they
will presently begin to work out in practice. This is not only a more
pleasant but a better way. Without any conscious effort, the player
finds that the mind is beginning to direct and control the bodily
movements. The result thus arrives in an apparently natural way, and
when it so comes it comes to stay. That this is the best use to which
advice can be put is an opinion derived from an experience more or less
intimate with a variety of games.
No exact formula can be laid down with regard to position. This is
precisely one of those cases in which some latitude must be allowed for
a man’s make and shape. Two points, however, should be borne in mind. To
state them in their natural order they are, first, that the player
should always, so far as circumstances permit, assume the same relative
position as between himself, his own ball, and the line of direction. A
useful general rule is the following. When the player takes his position
opposite his own ball with his left leg advanced as is the usual manner,
the line of direction if prolonged backwards through the centre of his
ball would pass through the centre of his body. As he settles to his
stroke, the body naturally sways a little to the left, leaving the right
arm free to swing in the proper direction. Secondly, the position should
be a firm one. The advantage of this will be more particularly felt in
any game in which nerves play a part. If there be any tendency to
unsteadiness in the player’s position, it will then be emphasised. The
body should be kept as motionless as possible, the feet being firmly
placed and the right leg straight.
It is not easy to recognise the true natural angle[13] under all its
different phases, and the frequent failure of even the best players at
long losing hazards shows this. Constant practice is the only teacher,
and the plan of having for private play two strips of wood joined
together at the proper angle—and which was, I believe, first introduced
by Joseph Bennett—is very useful. The angle is more sharply defined, and
therefore easier of recognition, if taken through some fixed point, and
this point should be the centre of the player’s ball. The angle should
be taken to the centre of the pocket.
It is almost a rarity to find a really good baulk-line player, and in
some cases it is quite the weakest point in a man’s game. That this
should be so seems strange, seeing that the player has such a wide range
within which to place his own ball. It is, I think, often this very
option of choice of position that causes the stroke to be missed. The
player places his ball, perhaps, quite correctly for the first long
loser he has, but misses it through hitting his own ball falsely. He
does not attribute his failure to its proper cause, but thinks he has
placed his own ball wrongly. Next time he puts it a little wider or
narrower as the case may be, and if he happen to put on by accident the
proper amount of side and does the stroke, he is almost worse off than
ever, for the first time he does hit his own ball truly he comes to
grief. By this time he has got an entirely wrong estimate of what the
true natural angle is, and it may be a matter of several days before he
can do the stroke with any certainty. Another point may be remarked. If
the player use only his left eye in play, he should judge the angle only
with his left eye; if he use both eyes, then judge with both eyes; but
if he uses the right eye to take the angle and the left eye to play,
when he settles to his stroke the angle will often appear wrong, and he
will become confused as to what the correct natural angle really is.
This probably arises from the fact that with most people the focus of
the two eyes is not identical.
Whether the cue should be held only by the fingers, or in the hollow of
the hand, may be matter of opinion, but there is no doubt it should be
held lightly, not gripped. Any rigidity of the muscles tends to impair
the easy pendulum swing so essential to accurate play. Some people seem
to think it necessary to grip the cue when making a screw. The point is
easily susceptible of practical demonstration if they will only
condescend to hit the ball in the proper place.
With many players, again, the position of the left hand appears to be a
matter of supreme indifference. They place it on the table anyhow, and
almost without taking a glance at the stroke. Now it is all very well to
say ‘Look at John Roberts. He doesn’t worry about these things,’ but we
are not, most of us at least, of the calibre of John Roberts. His easy
and graceful style is deceptive. If anyone will take the trouble to
contrast the face of the man with his manner of play, it will be
apparent how thoroughly concentrated is his mind on the game. He is the
consummate artist who conceals the difficulty of the stroke under the
ease of its execution. For most players, and all beginners, it is
advisable to pay some little attention to the position of the left hand.
Obviously it is of importance. If it has to be moved, however slightly,
after the player has settled to his stroke, the result will be a loss of
accuracy. It should be advanced with care, by which I do not mean with
wearisome laboriousness, to the player’s ball, the eye being steadily
kept on the line of direction, or, better still, on the exact spot on
the object ball it is desired to hit.
The cue from tip to butt should be in one straight line with the line of
direction. It may be thought that this is always the case, but a close
observation will show that very frequently the cue along its length is
by no means in a straight line with the point aimed at. I have found it
most useful to bear this rule in mind, especially when beginning
practice after a long absence from the billiard-table.
The player should not hurry up from the table after delivering his
stroke. The fault indicated may easily become a habit, and a very bad
one. It may be often observed among the more impatient class of players.
It may cause the body to move at the very moment when it is most
essential it should be quite steady, viz. at the moment of the cue’s
contact with the ball.
A few more hints may be useful to some. Much of billiards is played
before settling to the stroke. This may at first sight appear an absurd
statement, but it contains an important truth. If the player have a
clearly defined idea not only of what stroke he is going for, but how it
is to be made, much of the difficulty is already overcome; but if he go
down to his stroke, and then have an elaborate consultation with himself
as to what is to be done, the process is not only harassing to his
opponent but detrimental to himself. Once having decided on the stroke,
he should go for it unhesitatingly, and as though no other stroke were
possible. To play one game, at the same time having a lingering
partiality for another, is not usually attended with success.
The height of the player and the length of his arms will to a
considerable extent determine where he should hold the cue so that he
may combine sufficient power with the greatest attainable accuracy. It
must not, therefore, be held too far back. This may cause a slight loss
of power, but that is of very small importance. The bad play so often
seen in amateur billiards is not usually to be attributed to any want of
power of execution.
I have never known a professional do a stroke which most amateurs could
not copy, though I have known one instance of an amateur being able to
do that which probably no professional living could do. The feat
deserves to be recorded. The gentleman was an undergraduate at
Cambridge, and it was said that he could from baulk screw back off the
red on the spot into baulk again. One day I asked him to do it for my
edification, and at the third attempt he succeeded. The balls used were
two of the usual set with which we ordinarily played. He used his own
cue, which was one of the usual pattern of English cues. The white came
straight back without touching a cushion. There are many persons besides
myself who have seen him do it, but I have never heard an authenticated
case of any other person who could perform the feat.
On the face of it, it seems wrong that a man of six feet and one of five
feet six inches should hold cues of the same length in the same place,
and a slight consideration of the nature of a proper stroke will show
very good reasons for not holding the cue too long. The stroke itself
should be made by, as nearly as may be, a horizontal motion of the cue.
Any depression of the cue-tip has a tendency to make the ball take a
slight curve. There are strokes when it is desirable to sharply raise
the butt for the very purpose of making one’s own ball describe a curve
before contact with the object ball, and such strokes are sometimes very
useful when the pocket is a narrow one. But as a general rule the
movement of the cue should be as nearly horizontal as circumstances
allow. Now, if the cue be held too long for thorough control over it, as
the player’s hand goes back before delivering the stroke it will take an
upward direction, and one of two things must take place when the stroke
is made. If, during the forward movement, the cue work in a plane, it
will be depressed at the moment of contact with the ball; but if at the
moment of contact it be horizontal, or nearly so, it will have described
a slightly circular movement. This is one of the things to be avoided,
for the cue should work like a piston-rod.
The bridge should be a short bridge rather than a long one. What is
meant by a short bridge is a short distance between the bridge itself
and the player’s ball. Too long a bridge must necessarily diminish
accuracy of hitting. The stroke itself should come from the arm alone,
and as much as possible from the elbow, the movement of the shoulder
being kept within the narrowest limits. However delicate, it should be a
clean, crisp blow, avoiding the least suspicion of a push. In this
respect it is exceedingly instructive to watch John Roberts play. He
appears to strike the ball so hard, even in his close game, that one is
at a loss to understand how it stops so quickly—the fact being that the
ball is struck so firmly, and so clean, as to give the appearance of a
harder stroke than in reality it is. It is a very unusual thing to see
an amateur strike his ball crisply when using delicate strengths. Not
only should the angle be judged, but aim should be taken through the
centre of the player’s ball. This applies to every stroke not less than
a half-ball. For all ordinary strokes—excepting, of course, screws,
&c.—the ball should be struck, whether with side or without, exactly
half-way up. The ball when so struck runs truer.
One last word of advice. It is—simplify your game. If you can take your
choice of two games, one which looks promising but with possible
complications, the other simple and obvious, choose the latter. Some two
or three years ago Dawson was for this reason a most instructive player
for the amateur. His game was so simple that he never appeared to be in
a difficulty. He has somewhat changed its character since, but I
question if he has ever played better than he did then. In this respect
John Roberts is the last player the amateur should attempt to copy. His
game is full of complications, but he gets rid of them with an ease and
a celerity that fairly astonish the onlookers. He is out of a difficulty
almost before one has recognised that there is one. Sometimes he seems
to fairly revel in them, and deliberately to make them for the pleasure
of getting out of them. It is certainly wonderfully attractive, but the
percentage of men who could play such a game with success would be
infinitesimal.
If this memorandum appear too didactic, I can only apologise to my
readers. It must necessarily assume that character to some extent. But,
in truth, the advice is not meant for good players. It may be that there
are some fine players who have never consciously observed any rules, but
have naturally adopted a correct style. They are facile players, but
they know not the pleasure which comes from attacking and overcoming
difficulties. There are others, quite as fond of the game, who find the
road to even partial success a somewhat stony one. These hints, or some
of them, may perhaps be of use to such. One thing is certain. Not even
the most perfect rules or the most undeniable instructions can of
themselves make a good player. They cannot take the place of hard work.
All they can do is to help the beginner over some of the difficulties
others have met with, and so save him time.
[Illustration:
The Bridge (_bouclée_)
]
CHAPTER IV
MOTION, IMPACT, AND DIVISION OF BALLS: TWO-BALL PRACTICE
The practice prescribed in the preceding chapter had for its chief
object the attainment of certainty in striking ball 1 truly in the
centre; we now proceed to study some of the elementary facts concerning
the impact of one ball with another.
In the first place, the conditions of impact should be recognised, and
what is termed the division of balls must be explained.
[Illustration:
Fig. 1
]
Now, for practical purposes the cloth and bed of the table are level,
and the balls are of the same size; hence when they touch one another
the point of contact is invariably on the line of their greatest
horizontal circumference, which, as all know, is precisely at half their
height. It will hereafter be shown that ball 1 may be caused to leap,
and so strike ball 2 above this; but for present purposes, when a plain
stroke alone is being considered, it may be accepted as a fact that the
point of impact is always at half the ball’s height. That fixes the
location of impact vertically; but horizontally it is evident that there
is considerable latitude. Ball 1 may hit ball 2 either precisely full,
when the centre of one is played on the centre of the other, or it may
strike either to the right or left of the centre of ball 2; the limit on
either side being the finest possible touch. The accompanying figure
will show what is meant. When ball 1 hits ball 2 full, at the moment of
impact it occupies the position 1″; and the part of 2 which can be
struck by a ball situated at 1 is from P″ to P; if ball 1 occupies the
position 1′, then the part of 2 which may be touched is restricted to
that marked P″ P′; but should ball 1 be placed at 1″, then the only
point on 2 it can touch is P″. Therefore the nearer 1 is to 2 the less
of the latter can be struck, and the further away the more.
As regards the division of balls, for the English game at any rate, the
simpler it is the better. The larger balls on a smaller table, as used
in the French game, admit of more minute subdivision than do our smaller
balls, which may be, and often are, further from the player’s eye. To
attempt a division which the eye cannot easily appreciate is a mistake.
For purposes of play both balls 1 and 2 must be divided; and although at
this early stage of the manual we are not concerned with the division of
ball 1 (for all practice at present is confined to centre strokes), yet
it is convenient now to record the divisions of both balls.
Ball 1 is divided by its vertical and horizontal diameters into four
parts. The centre stroke is delivered at C, and is of all strokes by far
the commonest and most important.
A ball struck high and right is struck in the sector C A E; low and left
in C D B; high and left in C A D; low and right in C E B.
The vertical and horizontal lines are divided from the centre where they
intersect, into four equal parts each way. Thus a ball ¼ high is struck
on the line C A at the point marked ¼; ½ low is struck on C B at the
point marked ½; ¾ right is struck on C E at the point marked ¾; ¼ left
is struck on C D at the point marked ¼. Combinations of these divisions
are of course possible: thus ½ high and right would indicate a point P;
¾ left and ½ low is represented by P′. That division is quite as minute
as the eye can follow; indeed, for general purposes it will probably
suffice to indicate the sector only; to say, for example, ball 1 should
be struck high and right.
[Illustration:
Fig. 2
]
[Illustration:
OPENING THE GAME.
]
In respect to ball 2 the matter is different; it cannot, as has already
been shown, be struck save on the line C C′ A, the height moment of
reaching 2, then its position will be that of the dotted circle 1″,
whose centre is C″, and P′ is the point of impact. For any stroke
between full and half-ball the point of impact will lie between P and
P′; between half-ball and the extreme of fineness the point of impact
will lie beyond P′ in the direction of E.
Ball 2 being struck by ball 1 at P′ must travel in the direction P′ B F,
the line from the point of impact passing through B the centre. There is
practically no departure from this rule. Hence it follows that if it be
desired that ball 2 should travel in the direction B F, say to a pocket,
imagine a line from the pocket passing through the ball’s centre; this
cuts the circumference at P′, which is manifestly the point which must
be struck by ball 1. Where is the centre of ball 1 to be aimed at in
order that P′ may be struck? Produce the imaginary line F B P′ to C″,
making P′ C″ equal to B P′ or in other words equal to the radius of the
ball. If the centre of ball 1, C, be aimed on C″, ball 2 must be struck
at P′ and must travel in the direction required.
Pray realise that it is impossible to hit ball 2 at the point aimed at
save when the stroke is full; in every other case the aim must be beyond
the point of impact, and the rule above given will enable anyone to
determine precisely where aim should be taken.
When a ball is struck by the cue its first impulse is to slide forward,
and if there were no friction between the ball and the cloth it would do
so till arrested by other causes; but as there always is this friction,
the lower part of the ball is thereby retarded, and the result is the
rolling or revolving motion with which all are familiar. This will be
further considered when the subject of rotation is discussed, but it is
mentioned here as the cause of certain effects which will be observed in
some of the strokes recommended for practice. When one ball impinges on
another the immediate result is a greater or lesser flattening of both
surfaces at the point of impact; this is instantaneously followed by
recoil,[14] the result of each ball reassuming its spherical form. The
greater the strength of stroke the greater the flattening and the
greater the recoil; the converse likewise holds good.
Further, the force or strength with which ball 1 strikes ball 2 is
immediately divided on impact; if ball 2 be struck full it appears to
acquire from ball 1 the whole of its energy save that due to naturally
developed rotation, the result being that ball 2 travels fast whilst
ball 1 remains comparatively stationary. If the distance between the two
balls be very small, little rotation is acquired and ball 1 transmits
its motion to ball 2 and stops on or near the spot which that ball
occupied; if the distance be considerable, ball 1 acquires rotation
which, overcoming the recoil on impact, causes it to travel slowly in
its original direction. When impact is other than full, ball 1 parts
with more or less of its force, which is transmitted to ball 2. What the
one loses the other gains.
These general remarks will seem to many self-evident and superfluous; to
others they may prove difficult to realise and distasteful; but
students, whether beginners or those who have already acquaintance with
the game, may rest assured that a careful consideration of them can do
no harm and may be of much advantage; for practice is assisted by an
intelligent appreciation of the behaviour of balls under certain
conditions; in short, by a consideration of cause and effect.
For practice: place ball 1 on the centre of the =Ｄ= on the baulk-line,
put ball 2 a foot up the table in the central line, play 1 full on 2
with varying strength, at first with strength to carry 2 to the top
cushion; the truth of the stroke will be shown by 2 passing over all the
spots in the central line and 1 following slowly in the same line for a
short distance. When tolerable certainty is acquired play the same
stroke harder, and if correctly struck ball 2 will return from the top
cushion and meet ball 1, kiss as it is called, in the central line. The
stroke can be made more difficult by placing ball 2 further up the
table, say on the centre spot, and playing as before, and again by
placing it on the pyramid spot. This practice, though it may seem
uninteresting, is most useful; it combines and continues that
recommended for one ball with that required for truth of stroke on
another. It also, as will hereafter be shown, is directly useful in the
matter of cannons, hence it should be assiduously practised.
[Illustration:
Fig. 5
]
Next set ball 2 upon the central line at such a distance from the
baulk-line as the player can imagine its division described on page 133,
and play ball 1 so as to make three-quarter, half, and quarter-ball
strokes with some confidence. This distance will no doubt vary with the
stature and sight of the player, but 2 feet may be tried as about
average. If P, P′, P″ be the points of impact for the various divisions,
ball 2 will, after the strokes, travel in the directions R, R′, R″, each
being the prolongation of a line from the point of impact through the
centre. Ball 1 will behave differently according to the strength with
which it is struck; what is always true is that it will travel in a
contrary direction to ball 2. If the one ball goes to the left after
impact the other will go to the right. Played with strength 1 or 2,
impact being at P, ball 1 will follow through the space which ball 2
covered, and will stop slightly to the right of the line A B. With
impact at P′ or a half-ball stroke, ball 1 will deviate further from the
line A B, and travel in the direction D, A C D being the half-ball
angle; when played quarter-ball, impact being at P″, ball 1 will deviate
less from A B and travel towards E. The object of this practice is to
accustom the eye to recognise approximately the directions taken by both
balls after impact.
A small matter which is a little obscure connected with the language of
billiards should here be noticed. In placing ball 1 for a stroke, it is
usual, and generally desirable, to select a spot from which the angle 1
C D shall be what is known as the half-ball angle, and certainty in play
is greatly based on the power of recognising this position. Consequently
in time players, perhaps unconsciously, refer almost every stroke to
that angle as a standard. If a hazard or cannon is on the table, they
consider for a moment whether the angle contained between the two paths
of ball 1 is greater or less than the half-ball angle, and to the best
of their ability they apply compensations to meet the difference,
playing fuller and harder when the angle is less, finer and slower when
the angle is greater, until a following stroke becomes necessary.
Nevertheless, the universal custom is to define the situation when the
angle is smaller as _wider_, and when the angle is greater as
_narrower_. Thus the position 1 C D is called wider than 1 C E. Clearly
it is so only as regards the deviation of ball 1 from the prolongation
of its original path—that is, from the path which would have been
followed if there had been no impact—consequently the angle of deviation
must be defined as that between the new actual path of ball 1 and the
path that would have been described if the deviation had not taken
place. This being accepted, the ordinary use of the terms _wider_ and
_narrower_ is appropriate.
In this and in all diagrams as far as possible the lines followed by the
centres of balls are shown; hence, as the centres cannot touch each
other or the cushions, the lines do not reach to the surface of either,
but are necessarily short of the point of impact by the length of the
ball’s radius. Ball 1, after impact other than full, describes a curve
due to the forces to which it is subject; this is greater in proportion
to the strength of stroke, and though in practice its effect must not be
neglected, it is not ordinarily shown in the diagrams, which do not
pretend to absolute accuracy, but merely to such measure of correctness
as is required for practical purposes. An illustration of the curve, and
a warning when its existence must not be overlooked, will be found in
Chapter V.
[Illustration:
Fig. 6
]
From the strokes recommended in Chapter III. for practice it will have
been learnt that in a general way a ball played against a cushion will
return therefrom, so that the angle of reflexion shall be nearly equal
to the angle of incidence. A useful two-ball practice based on this is
to place balls 1 and 2 on the table and endeavour to play on 2, having
first struck a cushion. The difficulty is to determine the point on the
cushion on which 1 must impinge so as to rebound on 2.
The solution is approximately:—From ball 1 let fall 1 A perpendicular to
the cushion A C D; produce 1 A to B, making A B = 1 A. Join B with the
centre of 2; where that line cuts the cushion at C is the point
required. Play 1 so that it shall strike C and it will rebound on 2.
Similarly, if the second ball occupy the position 2′ the line from B to
its centre intersects the cushion at D; ball 1 played to touch the
cushion at D will travel to 2′. In a game of course the cushion must not
be marked, but in practice it will at first be found advantageous to
mark the spot sufficiently to guide the stroke and educate the eye. This
is easily done by placing a piece of chalk on the wooden frame of the
cushion just behind the spot to be hit, thus doing away with the need of
marking the cushion with chalk, which it is well to avoid. When it is
necessary to mark the cloth of bed or cushion, pipeclay such as tailors
use is preferable to chalk. Special attention is necessary to two facts:
first, the angle of reflexion varies with the strength; that is, a soft
stroke will come off very nearly at the same angle as that of incidence,
whilst with a hard stroke there is a perceptible difference; second, the
point on the cushion which should be hit must not be aimed at. This is
merely a modification of what has already been explained with reference
to the points of aim and of impact. Fig. 7 shows how very far a ball on
the line 1 P played, _i.e._ aimed at P, is from hitting that point;
instead of doing so it strikes the cushion at T; hence allowance must be
made in aiming, the length allowed on the cushion diminishing as the
angle approaches a right angle. When the stroke is at a right angle to
the cushion the points P and T coincide and no allowance is required.
One reason why the angle of reflexion varies with the strength is that,
on impact with the cushion, the ball, being harder than the rubber,
indents it—makes a sort of cup, in fact, deeper as the stroke is
stronger. Friction with the cloth of the cushion has also some effect on
the angle, and there may be other causes at work; fortunately, it is
probable that one to some extent counteracts another. This practice from
a cushion is interesting as well as useful; at first the beginner will
be satisfied if he hits ball 2 anywhere and anyhow; but soon he will be
able to hit it on one side or the other, as he may wish, when the
distance ball 1 has to travel is not very great. Hereafter both cannons
and hazards will be mentioned, which must be played _bricole_, or off a
cushion before ball 2 is struck, and the practice proposed will make
their execution fairly easy and certain. We conclude this chapter, which
has covered important ground, with four illustrations of the division of
ball 2 at the moment of impact. A shows ball 1 applied to 2 for a
quarter-ball stroke, B for a half-ball, C for a three-quarter-ball, and
D for a full ball stroke; the phases varying between partial and total
eclipse.
[Illustration:
Fig. 7
]
[Illustration:
Fig. 8
]
CHAPTER V
PLAIN STROKES, WINNING AND LOSING HAZARDS, CANNONS: THREE-BALL PRACTICE
By the practice already recommended, the beginner should have become
fairly able to strike ball 1 in the centre, and familiar with the
divisions of ball 2; he may therefore with advantage proceed to play
natural or plain strokes. We prefer the term plain, partly because, ball
1 being struck in the centre, no rotation beyond that which is
self-acquired or spontaneous is communicated by the cue, and partly
because one stroke deserves the name natural as much as another. It is
as natural for a ball struck on its side to rotate round its vertical
axis as it is for a ball struck in the centre to have no such rotation.
In billiards plain strokes cover a vast field; most of the certainties,
or strokes which should seldom be missed, come under that definition.
Their number is infinite, and it is impossible to give diagrams of more
than a few typical examples. The student can, without great effort,
multiply and vary them at will, and it is desirable that he should do
so, altering the strength and noting the behaviour of each ball after
the stroke. He will thus learn more than he can possibly acquire from
any book, however excellent, and will profit much if his practice is
occasionally supervised by a competent instructor.
Let us begin with winning hazards. Place ball 2 on the centre spot; it
is then opposite the middle pockets. Choose one of them into which the
ball is to be played. From what has already been explained, it is known
that the ball should travel on a line drawn from its centre to the
centre of the pocket—that is, from C to A (fig. 1); also that the point
of impact must be where that line prolonged meets the circumference at
B, and that the centre of ball 1 must therefore, at the moment of
striking, be at P, B P being equal to B C, or the radius of the balls.
No matter where ball 1 may be situated, its centre has to be played on P
in order that the winning hazard may be perfectly made.
Set ball 1 on the prolongation of A C, which is the line of the cue’s
axis. The player must place himself accordingly, and aim full at ball 2.
The stroke is precisely similar to that recommended for practice over
the spots, but easier, as the distances are shorter. It should be played
with various strengths. With a soft No. 1, ball 2 will roll into the
pocket, ball 1 following a few inches on the same path. If it diverge
there is error in the stroke, and endeavour should be made to correct
it. That is, the player should not be satisfied with the mere winning
hazard, which is very simple, but should by watching the path of the
balls, satisfy himself that the stroke was true. With No. 2 strength, or
a free No. 2, ball 1 will follow on, and eventually drop into the same
pocket.
When tolerable certainty has been acquired, ball 1 may be moved to 1′,
1″, &c., either to the right or left of the original position. No good
can result from giving precise measurements for the various situations
of ball 1; it does not, indeed, greatly matter where it is set, so long
as the player can reach it with comfort; what is obligatory is that its
centre must pass over the point P. The limit of the stroke is when the
position 1^n is reached; thence, if correctly played, point B will just
be touched, and no motion to ball 2 be communicated. Hence, when the
path of ball 1 before impact is at right angles to that which 2 must
travel, the winning hazard is impossible. In other words, a right-angled
cut is impossible; such strokes sometimes seem to be made, but the
explanation will, on examination, be found in the size and shape of the
pockets. These winning hazards should be practised into both middle
pockets till a tolerable certainty or confidence is acquired. Some
persons will make the full, whilst others will play the fine strokes
best; and again, it will often be found that, when playing into the
right-hand pocket, there is a tendency to error on one or other side,
but when playing to the left-hand pocket the mistake is just reversed.
If the strokes are taken too full to the right, they will be made too
fine to the left. The proper procedure is obvious: by making a very
small allowance each way the mistake will be corrected, the eyes will
become educated, and the tendency to error will diminish. It need
scarcely be added that the kind of stroke in which one has least
confidence should receive the most attention; failure indicates where
practice is required.
[Illustration:
Fig. 1
]
Also, let the path of ball 1, after impact, receive close attention, and
as soon as some certainty in making the hazard is felt, let the exercise
consist quite as much in playing to leave ball 1 in or near a desired
place as in the success of the hazard. The value of this is all but
self-evident, and it is as important in pool or pyramids as in
billiards.
Similar practice may, with advantage, be made to the top corner pockets,
ball 2 being placed on the billiard, and afterwards on the pyramid spot.
The rules for finding what point of 2 should be struck and the points of
aim are, of course, unaltered, but attention may usefully be given to
the following hint, based on the construction of the cushions at the
neck of the pocket. Whether a pocket is easy or not depends, perhaps,
more on this than on the actual width at the fall. If the channel is
gradually rounded off, with but little rubber in the sides, a ball once
in the neck is nearly sure to fall into the pocket; but if there is much
rubber in the sides, the same ball would expend its energy in rebounding
from side to side, and have no disposition to travel forward into the
pocket. Cushions cut square, as it is called, make the pockets more
difficult than those sloped gently away; the channel is narrower.
Let ball 2 be placed between the spot and the top cushion, or anywhere
on a line connecting a point so chosen and the corner pocket into which
it is proposed to play. In this case the point of aim is no longer the
true centre of the pocket, nor even the centre of the portion of the
pocket which is open from position 2, but a point so chosen that ball 2
may impinge on the neck or side of the pocket entrance, and thence drop
in. The accompanying sketch will show what is meant. If ball 2 were
played on C, the centre of the pocket, it would strike the cushion A,
and very probably rebound to the opposite side, and the hazard would
fail: but if, on the contrary, it strike the cushion B at a point T,
inside the neck of the pocket, then, unless played very hard, the hazard
will to a certainty be made.
[Illustration:
Fig. 2
]
With reference to the position of ball 2, C is termed a blind pocket,
because the full width at the fall is not open. Hazards into blind
pockets are therefore more difficult than those into open ones;
nevertheless, if the player is careful to observe the required point of
impact, and to allow accordingly in aim, such strokes can be played with
considerable confidence.
When measurements are given whereby the positions of balls on the
billiard-table may be found, they must not be supposed to be absolutely
accurate. They no doubt are nearly so for the table and balls with which
the stroke was played for the purposes of this volume; but tables,
balls, cloth, and climate are subject to variation which may make
modification necessary, and, moreover, each man has a mode of using his
cue as peculiar to himself as is his handwriting. Therefore, once for
all, let it be understood that the diagrams and descriptions must be
treated as but approximate. All measurements from a cushion are from the
edge on which balls impinge to the centre of the ball whose position is
to be fixed; those from a pocket are from the middle of the fall. The
dotted lines with figures marked in Diagram I., example A, show the
measurements whereby the position of ball 2 is determined. Many mistakes
are made by inaccurate reading of instructions, and by failure to use
the measure correctly, but the eye will prove a useful check; for if the
position of the balls, when placed on the table, does not nearly
coincide with that shown in the diagram, there is an error somewhere
which a little patience and consideration will cause to be discovered.
A few typical strokes are shown on Diagram I.:—
A. Ball 1, on or near the right corner of the =Ｄ=; ball 2 7½ in. below
the right middle pocket, and 8 in. from cushion 3. The measurements are
in this instance shown on the diagram as a guide in other cases.
Play a free No. 1 strength. Ball 1, after pocketing 2, should travel to
the top cushion, and so far back as to leave an easy winning hazard on a
ball on the billiard spot. With slight variation of the position, the
stroke may be played slower or faster, as may be desired. If the
strength is misjudged, and ball 1 should stop somewhere between the top
cushion and the desired position, a losing hazard in the left top pocket
may not improbably be possible. The positions of both balls may be
considerably varied, whilst the stroke remains virtually unchanged. The
further ball 1 is brought to the left along the baulk-line, the fuller
is the hazard, and the position of ball 1 after the stroke will be more
to the right of the spot than that shown in the diagram.
B. Ball 1, 25½ in. from cushion 2, and 10 in. from the top cushion.
Ball 2, touching the top cushion and 12 in. from the right top pocket.
Play a gentle No. 1, which will leave ball 1 about 7 in. from cushion 2
and 14 in. from the top cushion.
In this stroke ball 2 and the cushion are simultaneously struck, as will
be apparent if ball 1 be placed against ball 2 at the proper point of
impact; hence a very common rule is to direct the player to aim between
ball and cushion. The general rule however for finding the point of
impact holds good, and the fact that under the circumstances the cushion
is struck at the same time as the ball is merely a coincidence.
[Illustration:
Instead of Long Rest
]
C. Ball 1, 3 in. from the left side cushion, and 9 in. from the left top
pocket.
[Illustration:
A DISPUTED SCORE.
]
[Illustration:
Diagram I.
]
Ball 2, touching the left side cushion and 4½ in. from left top pocket.
Play a very soft stroke so that ball 1 may be left at 1′; a losing
hazard from the spot is then open. This stroke is best made if the
player stand close to the balls and lean over the table, making his
bridge for the cue _bouclée_—_i.e._ the forefinger bent round the cue.
If played in the usual way the stroke could not be reached without the
long rest, and the eye is then so far from the ball that error and
failure are probable. Any ordinary player can show the stroke, which is
quite easy and very useful.
D. Ball 1, 5 in. from cushion 5 and 17 in. below the left middle pocket.
Ball 2, 6 in. from cushion 5 and 7 in. below the left middle pocket.
This is an example of a hazard to a blind pocket. Ball 1 should be
struck gently, and its position after the stroke will be in the
direction of the right top pocket. It is, in fact, a fine cut, and if
played with sufficient strength ball 1 may probably go into the right
top pocket. If ball 1 be placed 6 in. from cushion 5, the stroke is
slightly fuller and may be played slower; after impact the ball will
travel in the direction D E.
Diagram II. shows positions for doubles, with which it is well to
accustom the eye. Though such strokes are not very much used in
billiards, they are occasionally of great value, and their principle is
based on the equality of the angles of incidence and reflexion. It is
clear that a double may be set up at almost any part of the table, and
it is well that several positions should be selected and played from
till some certainty is obtained; those shown in the diagram are merely
types. In these cases ball 1 is played full or nearly so on 2, and
position for a further score may with attention to strength be attained.
Doubles are used more in pool and pyramids than in billiards, and will
be treated in detail when the two former games are described.
[Illustration:
Diagram II.
]
It may be as well to make a few remarks explanatory of the diagram. A is
an example of a double in baulk where the balls are easily reached. The
point A on the cushion where impact with ball 2 should take place is
half-way between the baulk-line and the bottom cushion. A ball played
from B to A should, if truly struck in the centre, fall into the left
bottom pocket. Place balls 1 and 2 as shown in the diagram on the line B
A, keeping 2 sufficiently far from the cushion to avoid a kiss; play
full, and 2 should be doubled. Again, let C be the middle point of
cushion 6, and imagine lines joining it with the right middle and right
top pockets. On these lines place the balls. A full stroke from ball 1
to 2 should double the latter in the one case into the right top pocket,
in the other into the right middle pocket.
Next, D is an instance of a simple double, from which in more ways than
one a losing hazard from spot may be left. Ball 1 is 24 in. from cushion
6 and 26½ in. above the middle pocket; ball 2 is 5 in. from the same
cushion and 20½ in. above the pocket. A full stroke will double ball 2
into the right middle pocket, and ball 1 may be left near the line from
the left middle pocket to the spot.
In the case marked E, ball 2 is just beyond the shoulder of the right
middle pocket, ball 1 being so placed nearly in a line from 2 to the
left bottom pocket that a full stroke about No. 1 strength will carry 2
to the left top pocket. Ball 1 may be so played as to leave a losing
hazard into the left top pocket from a ball on spot.
All these strokes should be played medium strength, say No. 1 or 2; in
practice it will be found that the angle of reflexion varies somewhat
with the strength, and in a less degree with the table.
As great accuracy is of the highest importance in playing winning
hazards, it is evident that, when either ball has a considerable
distance to travel, the stroke should not be played too slowly; for in a
very slow stroke imperfections of ball or table tell more than when
greater strength is used. Also, before leaving the subject, it is
desirable to impress the reader strongly with the importance of the
remarks on pages 145–6 respecting play into a more or less blind pocket.
Attention to them is essential to good spot play and also to what is
called play at the top of the table. Clearing the dangerous shoulder of
the pocket is the secret of success.
We now proceed to losing hazards, which with most amateurs form the
mainstay of the game; partly because being easier than winning hazards,
they are usually taught first, but mainly because they are possible with
a slovenly style and inaccurate striking which effectually prevent
success with winners. In reality, however, they will repay care and
accuracy as much as any other stroke, because, unless ball 2 be struck
in the proper place, it will not travel in the desired path, and the
result of a poor stroke may be success as regards the hazard, coupled
with leaving ball 2 hopelessly safe. When played with intelligence and
with due regard to the position of ball 2 after the stroke, they form
most excellent practice. Following the usual custom, these strokes may
be divided into short and long losers, and each will be separately
treated; at present, of course, plain strokes only being considered. It
is convenient to take the half-ball hazard as the standard or typical
stroke; it is the easiest for the reason given at p. 133, because aim is
taken at the edge of ball 2, a well-defined mark, instead of at an
indefinite point on the ball’s surface. Moreover, on billiard-tables
certain positions are recognised as affording half-ball losers, and
these are most valuable to a player as supplying the means, during play,
of testing and correcting his strokes or his judgment of angles. It
often happens from many causes that a man’s eye or nerve partially
fails, which failure destroys confidence and begets still worse play; he
probably before long gets a stroke from one of the many positions which
should be played half-ball. The mere effort to recognise the situation
tends to arrest demoralisation, whilst the success which follows correct
recognition goes far to restore equanimity and confidence. That is one
reason against wantonly altering the positions of the spots on the
table, the size of the =Ｄ= and such matters; though, no doubt, if the
game can thereby be certainly improved, the alteration is justified, and
in time players will learn similar positions under the altered
circumstances. Hitherto such changes have been made rather with the view
of cramping the play of one or two men, and so placing others less able
or less diligent on a par with them, than with the object of making an
undeniable improvement in the game. Such modifications under the pretext
of reform are much to be deprecated.
Taking the billiard, pyramid, and centre spots as fixed points on the
table, Diagram III. shows with sufficient accuracy the lines of
half-ball strokes to the top pockets. Let the billiard spot be
considered first. From either top pocket there is a half-ball stroke to
the opposite one; also from either middle pocket there is similarly a
half-ball hazard into the opposite top pocket. Next, from a ball placed
on the pyramid spot there are half-ball hazards from either corner of
the =Ｄ= into the top pockets; and, lastly, from a ball on the centre
spot, half-ball strokes to either top pocket may be made from positions
about 7½ in. to the right and left of the centre spot of baulk. Precise
accuracy in definition of these strokes is not attempted; tables and
balls vary, whilst no two men strike exactly alike; hence each must work
out for himself the exact position for a half-ball stroke; it will in
every case be reasonably near the lines indicated.
Diagram IV. illustrates several losing hazards, all good for practice.
For the group marked A, place ball 1 on an imaginary line from the
centre of the red spot to the upper edge of the shoulder of the left
middle pocket about half-way between them, where it can be conveniently
reached by the player; it is then in position for a gentle half-ball
stroke to the right top pocket. When correctly played, impact with ball
2 takes place on the central longitudinal line of the table, and
consequently 2 travels to the top cushion on that line, and returns on
the same path a shorter or greater distance according to the strength of
stroke. A very gentle one will bring ball 2 back to the spot; a medium
stroke will result in leaving it near the pyramid spot, and it can be
brought further down the table if desired; but for practice at this
stage endeavour should be made to leave ball 2 between the red and
pyramid spots on the centre line. If this is effected, ball 2 has been
truly struck; should it return to the right of the line it has been
struck too full, and if it rests to the left of the line too fine. So
that here again we have an index which points out error and shows what
is required for its correction. The hazard is so easy that after a
little practice it will seldom be missed, and for that reason it should
be worked at till it becomes what is called a certainty.
[Illustration:
Diagram III.
]
Then from A lay off, in the direction of the right middle pocket, a
series of positions marked A′ A″ A‴ A⁗, each about 1¾ in. from the
other, and from each of these play the hazard. The point of impact
should be the same in every case, therefore the point of aim will vary
slightly with the change of position; but the chief variation in the
stroke lies in the strength employed.
For the position A′ the strength is about No. 2, and ball 2 should be
left on the central line L L between the centre spot and the bottom
cushion. For A″ the same stroke a little stronger, ball 2 returning from
the bottom cushion towards the centre spot: and so on. It is seldom
necessary to practise beyond A‴ in dealing with plain strokes. The
strength required for this stroke is considerable approaching No. 4, and
ball 2 should travel beyond twice the length of the table. In all these
strokes endeavour should be made to keep ball 2 travelling on the line L
L; this will be found not quite an easy matter, and sometimes divergence
may not be from any fault of striking, for an imperfection in the ball
which might account for an error of half an inch or less in 6 ft. would
produce a perceptible deviation during a journey of 24 to 30 ft.
Nevertheless, the prime source of failure is to be looked for in a
faulty method on the part of the player, who, if he cannot easily remedy
what is wrong, should without hesitation revert to the practice
previously prescribed. After some work at this he will probably find
that ball 1 was not being truly struck, and will amend the fault. These
strokes should then be transferred to the other side of the table,
making the hazards into the left top pocket. They are very conveniently
played with the left hand, and the player who can use both hands almost
indifferently has a great advantage over a purely one-handed performer.
It is entirely, we think, a matter of resolution and of practice. At any
rate, these strokes should be played from both sides of the table till
they can be made without difficulty.
[Illustration:
Diagram IV.
]
Example B exhibits a valuable stroke of common occurrence. Ball 1 is on
the line from the left top pocket to the spot. That line should be taken
from a point nearer the top than the side cushion. Ball 2 should be
struck so as to drive it as indicated, half a foot or more above the
right middle pocket on to the cushion, whence it rebounds and comes to
rest conveniently over that pocket. A similar stroke should be played
from the right top pocket, and there is as usual a little license as to
the position of ball 1; it may be further from or nearer to the pocket
than is shown in the diagram, and also a little above or below the line
indicated, and still be a plain stroke; when the divergence is greater,
side is required, and the methods of play will be hereafter explained.
The strokes marked C on this diagram afford admirable practice for
middle pocket losing hazards; for their results record plainly the
errors committed. They have been selected because the point of impact on
ball 2 is in the central line of the table; therefore, as has been
already shown, its path should lie on that line. Another advantage these
strokes possess is that from each position of ball 2 precisely similar
hazards may be made into the right and left middle pocket.
Place ball 2 in the central line of the table, 24 in. from the
baulk-line. A half-ball hazard is open from either the right or left
corner of the =Ｄ=. Ball 2 should pass up and down the central line, the
distance varying with the strength; for simple hazard practice it should
be brought back to its place before the stroke was made. Next bring ball
2 1½ in. down the central line; place ball 1 10 in. from the centre of
baulk; play as before.
This stroke may be repeated by bringing ball 2 down the central line 1½
in. each time, till a position 18 in. from the baulk-line is reached.
When nearer than this the stroke is so far changed that the strength
must be reduced, so that ball 2 shall not return from the top cushion,
but shall be cut towards one of the top pockets, and as the position of
ball 2 approaches the baulk-line it will be found desirable to place
ball 1 further and further back in the baulk within the limits of the
=Ｄ=. Ball 1 is placed 1½ in. towards the centre for each stroke up to
the fifth when ball 2 is 18 in. from baulk. Whilst accuracy should be
aimed at, its perfect attainment is impossible; in playing these strokes
occasionally a very good one may be made, and ball 2 may keep very close
to the central line. Oftener, however, there will be divergence, and
hence it is well to recognise limits within which the stroke, though not
very good, may yet suffice to leave ball 2 in play. In the diagram the
lines P M and Q N, drawn from the corners of the =Ｄ= parallel to the
sides of the table, form such boundaries. If ball 2 be left anywhere in
the space so enclosed, and as far down the table as the spot, there is
almost certainly a plain hazard to be made off it from baulk into either
top or middle pockets.
Other and easier middle pocket hazards may be indefinitely multiplied,
and should be practised till the person playing acquires confidence, not
merely that he can make the stroke, but that he can vary the strength at
will from such delicacy as scarcely to move ball 2 to one which will
bring it in and out of baulk. A few examples are given in Diagram V.
A. Ball 2, 16½ in. from cushion 3, 12½ in. below right middle pocket;
ball 1 on right corner of the =Ｄ=. Play half-ball about No. 2 strength,
leaving ball 2 placed for a hazard in the left middle pocket. Ball 2 can
be brought back nearly over the centre spot, and the danger of the
stroke is that, if played too fine, ball 2 will lie near cushion 6 and
be practically out of play.
B. Ball 2, 15½ in. from cushion 3, 6 in. below right middle pocket; ball
1 on baulk centre spot. Play half-ball No. 2 strength, leaving ball 2
with hazard into right middle pocket.
C. Ball 2, 21 in. from cushion 5, 10 in. below left middle pocket; ball
1 on baulk centre spot. Play half-ball No. 2 strength, bringing ball 2
back over or near the centre spot of the table. With slight variation of
strength and aim ball 2 can be brought back into almost any desired
position on the table.
D. Ball 2, 9 in. from cushion 5, 23½ in. below left middle pocket; ball
1, 5½ in. to the right of the centre of baulk, or on position 5 of
Example C, Diagram IV. Play a half-ball slow No. 1. Ball 2 will travel
to the side cushion on a line at right angles to its face, or, in other
words, parallel to the baulk-line, and will return on the same line to a
distance varying with the strength. A medium No. 1 strength will bring
the ball back from 24 to 30 in. from the side cushion. There is great
latitude in placing ball 1 for this stroke, which can be made as far as
8½ in. to the right of baulk centre, the difference in play being merely
in strength. The further ball 1 is placed from 2 the greater is the
strength required, and as a consequence the further does ball 2 return
from the side cushion. This stroke is of the class called ‘jennies.’
Each stroke here recommended for practice can be played from either side
of the table; and this should always be done in order that the eye may
become equally familiar with the angles into either side pocket.
The next two examples (Diagram VI.) are of an importance which the
beginner may not at once realise, but which is abundantly clear to a
professional or to an advanced amateur. The hazards are in themselves so
easy that a very poor player can have no difficulty in making them; but
mark the difference between the right and wrong method of play. In the
first example the paths of ball 2 after impact are drawn, both when
rightly and when wrongly struck; and an examination of them will show
that if the proper method is followed, error in strength has much less
effect in leaving the ball out of play, and if the stroke is wrongly
played the margin for such error is comparatively small. The principle
here illustrated applies to many positions, and consequently the strokes
deserve close study.
[Illustration:
Diagram V.
]
Example A.—Place ball 1, 40 in. from the top cushion, 7 in. from cushion
6; ball 2, 16 in. from the top cushion, 11 in. from cushion 6; play a
free stroke rather finer than half-ball; it is a bad stroke indeed which
leaves ball 2 out of play. Another good example is shown at B; ball 1,
24 in. from cushion 4, 4½ in. from cushion 3; ball 2, 13 in. from
cushion 4, 9 in. from cushion 3. Play a free stroke finer than half-ball
on 2, which will follow a course somewhat resembling that indicated.
Diagram VII. may be thus set up:—Ball 2, 5 in. from left middle pocket,
½ in. above a line joining the centres of the two middle pockets; place
ball 1 7 in. to the right of the centre spot in baulk; play half-ball on
ball 2 a free stroke. Ball 2 must be very badly struck if it is left out
of play; it should strike the left side and top cushions and return to
position. If played improperly, it returns from the top cushion only,
and unless the strength is very exact is probably lost to play. Many
accidents may happen; it may be holed in the left top pocket, or, still
worse, catch in it and run safe under the top cushion; it may return
close to cushion 6 and come to rest either above or below the middle
pocket; in each case it is left in a more or less undesirable position.
If played too full, ball 2 will probably be left safe near cushion 2;
hence there are at least two types of wrong paths which might be shown,
but they have been omitted to avoid complicating the diagram.
Having fairly mastered short losing hazards, the next step is to study
similar strokes into the top pockets from baulk. They are called long
losing hazards, and form an excellent test of a performer’s capacity at
the game of billiards, in which they fill an important part. They
require greater accuracy than the short hazards, because the balls have
to travel over a greater distance, so that correctness in placing ball 1
for a plain half-ball stroke on ball 2 is of the greatest consequence.
Smoothness and truth in the delivery of the cue must not be lost sight
of, and a short reversion to the practice recommended in Chapters III.
and IV. for the attainment of these objects will prove to be of much
benefit.
[Illustration:
Diagram VI.
]
The typical long losing hazard is made from ball 2 on the centre spot,
ball 1 being about 7½ in. from the centre of the baulk. Differences in
the elasticity of the balls will make a slight alteration in the best
position for ball 1; where it is considerable, 8 in. may not be too far
from baulk-spot, and where it is less 7 in. will suffice; the position
also varies with the strength of stroke. This hazard is rightly
considered a difficult one, and it cannot be mastered without much
application; it is indeed now of more value than of old, because in a
break when ball 1 is left touching another ball, the game is continued
by placing the adversary’s ball on the centre spot, the red on spot, and
playing from baulk.
The stroke can be made with considerable difference of strength, which
varies of course with the position desired for ball 2. Ball 1 should be
struck in the centre (not below) about No. 2 strength; this will bring
ball 2 back over the middle pocket, the stroke being played half-ball.
If it be made ten or twelve times in succession on a clean table, the
path travelled by 1 after impact will be fairly visible, and it is an
instructive subject of study. First there is a straight line to within
the length of a radius of the point of impact, next there is a somewhat
violent curve, the result of the forward course suddenly modified by
impact, the rebound due to elasticity and the frictional action between
ball and cloth, and this in turn is merged into a second straight line.
The action described is not peculiar to this stroke, but is visible in
many others, and exists more or less in all, but this one forms a
favourable opportunity for observation. The path travelled by ball 1 is
roughly indicated in fig. 3, and the practical lesson to be learned
therefrom is that in playing cannons the curve must never be overlooked
or forgotten when the third ball lies within the sphere of its
influence. Reference has just been made to the impact of two balls and
the rebound which follows, a subject which was referred to in the last
chapter; it is of interest, and at this moment appropriate, to consider
the matter a little further.
[Illustration:
Diagram VII.
]
[Illustration:
Fig. 3
]
In fig. 3 ball 1 played on 2 impinges at T; 2 travels from T as shown by
the arrow. B C shows the line travelled by 1 after impact as it is
exhibited in the diagrams; but the true path is more nearly B D. Hence
it is clear that a cannon on ball 3 would just be missed, the position
of 1 being indicated in the act of passing 3. The tendency of the lines
B D and B C to approach each other and ultimately to coincide is
apparent. It is also clear that the magnitude of the curve B D depends
on the strength of stroke as well as on the elasticity of the balls. If
played very hard, it will be greater; if very soft, it will almost
disappear, the line of travel approximating to B C, in which case it is
evident the cannon would be made.
The balls may for our purpose be assumed to be of equal density and
perfectly elastic; that is, they are equally hard, equally heavy, and
when they receive the shock of impact they recover their figure or shape
with a force equal to that which caused the momentary compression. What
happens more or less in every stroke in which one ball is made to strike
another is that at the moment of collision the round surfaces are
flattened by the shock, and impact is not confined to what is accurately
called a point, but is extended to this flattened surface, which varies
in size according to the strength of the stroke, the hardness of the
balls, and the part of ball 2 struck. In using a very perfect set of
ivory balls 2³⁄₃₂ in. diameter, in a stroke rather fuller than half-ball
with strength from No. 3 to 4, this temporary flattening was found to
extend to about the size of the head of a small tin-tack, say ⅒ in. in
diameter; nearly but not quite as large as the billiard balls shown in
the diagrams. The rebound is due to the reaction whereby the balls
recover their normal shape; in the case of ball 2, which was at rest
before impact, the effect is to make it travel on a line from the point
of impact through its centre; the effect on ball 1, which was not only
moving forward but also revolving, being to check its velocity, some of
which is imparted to ball 2, to rebound, and to assume a new path, the
first part of which is curved as a result of the blending of the various
forces to which it is subjected. In this explanation no pretence to a
mathematical solution is made; it is simply the result of watching the
behaviour of the balls and endeavouring to account for it by an exercise
of common-sense. Most persons who have played much must have noticed
occasional stains of red on the white ball; these were the results of
impact, and if carefully examined would be found to be small circular
spots; similarly all persons are familiar with the fact that the red
ball gradually loses its colour, which it parts with in the way here
noticed.
Now to return to the long losing hazards; the usual mistake is to place
ball 1 for a stroke finer than half-ball, the result being that it
strikes the side cushion on the dangerous shoulder; therefore, when in
doubt, allow for this and place the ball for a full rather than for a
fine stroke. The hazard from ball 2 on the central point of the table
should be constantly practised, first into one top pocket and next into
the other, till it can be made with considerable facility and with
varied strength. Then let ball 2 be placed on the pyramid spot and ball
1 on or near the corner of the =Ｄ=; a half-ball stroke will make the
losing hazard into either top pocket. Care should be taken not to hit
ball 1 above the centre, and the strength should be about a soft No. 2.
Ball 2, after striking the top and side cushions, should come to rest so
that a middle pocket hazard may be left.
Between these two hazards a number of others may be interpolated, the
most satisfactory plan being to set ball 2 at intervals of 6 in. from
the centre spot up the central line towards the pyramid spot as shown in
Diagram VIII. By this means six separate hazards are provided for
practice, or four are inserted between the two already described. Taking
these four 6 in. in succession above the centre spot; for the first,
ball 1 should be placed about 7 in. from baulk centre; for the second
about 5 in.; for the third about 2½ in.; and for the fourth on the
centre spot of the baulk. As before explained, these positions for ball
1 are but approximate; they require modification proportioned to the
elasticity of the balls, the personality of the player, and the strength
used. For example, from the position when ball 2 is on the centre spot
and for the next two positions, in playing with bonzoline balls it would
be prudent to place ball 1 from ½ to ¼ in. further from centre of the
=Ｄ= than the positions indicated.
[Illustration:
Diagram VIII.
]
When the eye has become acquainted with the half-ball angle, ball 2
should be set up anywhere within the lines P M, Q N (Diagram IX.),
between the centre and billiard spots, and practice continued. Unless
for some special purpose, endeavour should be made to leave ball 2
within the space enclosed by these lines.
On Diagram X. two hazards, when ball 2 is further up the table than the
pyramid spot, are shown. They are types of two classes, either soft or
strong strokes—forcing hazards, as they are called. A is of the latter
class; that is, though the hazard can be played quite gently by the use
of side, yet as a plain stroke from the left corner of the =Ｄ= the
strength required would be such as to make it probable that ball 2 would
be left in baulk after the stroke. To avoid this, place ball 1 so that
the hazard may be played with strength sufficient to bring ball 2 in and
out of baulk. Place ball 2 about 16 in. from the top cushion, and 26 in.
from cushion 2; ball 1 should be played from baulk 8 in. to the left of
the centre, a free No. 2 or No. 3 strength. Ball 2 will travel somewhat
as shown by the dotted line; if struck fuller it will go further and
keep better within the lines P M, Q N.
[Illustration:
Diagram IX.
]
B is an example of a gentle stroke, and of a type which frequently
occurs in the course of a game. Ball 2, 4 in. from the left side cushion
and 4 in. from the top cushion. Place ball 1 on the baulk-line on the
left corner of the =Ｄ=. Play on to the left top cushion so as to rebound
on 2 about half-ball. As in most other strokes, there is considerable
latitude both as regards strength and the fulness or fineness with which
ball 2 may be struck. A few trials will show where it is desirable to
place ball 1 if a very gentle stroke is required, and where it should be
put if a stronger one is wanted. That the latitude both as to the
position of ball 2 and to the point of aim is great is clear from the
results of a number of trials, ball 1 being played at a point on the
left side cushion about 18 in. below the top cushion; the path taken by
ball 2 varied generally between the two shown on the diagram; when it
was struck full or nearly so, it impinged on the top cushion at R, and
travelled towards the pyramid spot, and sometimes beyond it; when struck
fine it was cut towards M, and of course did not travel so far. It is
useful to be able to play this stroke when ball 2 is at some distance
from the pocket until, in fact, the direct losing hazard becomes
possible, and therefore it should be practised till the eye can select
with tolerable accuracy the point of the cushion at which ball 1 should
be aimed. This method of playing by first striking a cushion or
_bricole_ is too much neglected in the English game, which suffers
thereby; when played it is often considered a fancy stroke, whereas
numerous plain strokes, specially cannons, are advantageously made by
its judicious use. Seeing that play from a cushion is sometimes
imperative, as, for example, when player’s ball is in hand and a
certainty left in baulk, _bricole_ practice from a variety of positions
will well repay the labour bestowed.
What has been mentioned about the elasticity of balls and the consequent
rebound after impact has a special importance in treating of cannons.
This class of strokes has a tendency in the recent development of the
game of billiards to supersede in a measure losing hazards which
formerly, without doubt, were the mainstay of our players. The
inferiority of losing to winning hazards in respect to influencing the
game was conclusively shown when the spot stroke was played, but that
stroke was rarely formidable save in professional hands; the amateur, as
might be expected, clinging to the easier losing hazard. When the spot
stroke was barred, a substitute had to be found, and in a great measure
this has been supplied by the cannon, chiefly, no doubt, in runs or
series of strokes called nurseries (of which more will be said
hereafter), but also by strokes which have the result of leaving the
three balls close together, _gathering_ them, as the Americans say. To
deal fully with these involves the use of side and of other refinements
of play with which as yet the student is not supposed to be familiar; at
present attention is confined to plain strokes, which include those made
direct from ball to ball and those made after impact with one or more
cushions, but all played without side.
[Illustration:
Diagram X.
]
[Illustration:
Fig. 4
]
The general rule to be observed as to strength is to make it
proportional to the distance to be traversed and to the angle between
the paths of ball 1. That is to say, the smaller the angle between balls
1, 2, and 3, the greater the strength required. Figure 4 shows at a
glance what is meant. Ball 1, played half-ball on 2, cannons on 3, as
indicated by the lines. The nearer 3 approaches the position 3′, which
is nearly at right angles to a line joining the centres of 1 and 2, the
harder must the stroke be played. When it passes the right angle and
approaches to 3″, screw is required in addition to strength; that is,
ball 1, though still truly struck in its vertical central line, must be
struck below its true centre. Hence it may be said that, the greater the
angle or the finer the stroke, the more gently should it be played; the
smaller the angle, or the fuller the stroke, the greater is the required
strength.
The other point of importance is common to all plain strokes, but may
here be usefully repeated; the player should stand for the stroke so
that the line from 1 to 2 prolonged through 1 backwards shall form the
axis of his cue.
Another matter never to be forgotten is that the finer the stroke the
less velocity ball 1 loses, and consequently the less is imparted to
ball 2; the fuller the stroke the more 1 loses and 2 gains.
[Illustration:
Fig. 5
]
It is evident that, in every instance given of losing hazards, if ball 3
be substituted for the pocket the stroke will be converted from a hazard
to a cannon; indeed, if that ball lie on any part of the path of ball 1
after impact or within the distance of a radius (1¹⁄₃₂ in.) on either
side of the path, a cannon must result. Hence the examples for losing
hazards are equally available for practice cannons, the eye-training for
the requisite angle being the same. The cannon is in fact easier than
the hazard, the target being nearly equal to the width of two balls, as
fig. 5 shows; 1 played on 2 may just touch 3 to the left, when it would
occupy the position 1′, or it may just touch the other side as shown,
1″. The width of this target varies with the distance between balls 2
and 3; at greatest it may be taken as double the size of a ball, or 4⅛
in. The pocket on the other hand is usually 3⅝ in. at the fall, the
target it presents being under the most advantageous circumstances
somewhat larger; on the other hand, when it is blind the target is
reduced.
A few cannons useful for practice, which if properly played result in
gathering the balls, that is in leaving the three balls together, or so
placing them that another stroke is left, are shown in the accompanying
diagrams. In every case when indication is desirable the path of ball 1
is marked by a thin line; that of ball 2 by a dotted line; and that of
ball 3 by a line consisting of a dash and dot alternately. In some cases
the positions of the balls after the stroke are indicated thus:—1′, 2′,
3′; 1′ being the position which 1 has taken, and so on; in other cases
this is not done because the situations are somewhat indeterminate, and
also when the balls are but slightly moved the diagram would be confused
and needlessly complicated.
The cannon shown in Diagram XI. is not merely an excellent plain stroke
for practice, but the position is not infrequently met with or played
for in a game, and is of a type which will repay close attention. As in
all other cases, the measurements are merely approximate, and it is
evident that a great variety of similar cannons can be set up simply by
varying the position of ball 2. For ball 3 is supposed to be on the
spot, and ball 1 in hand, so that a slight change in the position of
ball 2, either up or down the table or in its distance from the side
cushion, merely entails a corresponding move of ball 1, so that the
cannon on ball 3 may always be played a soft half-ball. In the present
instance, ball 2 is 18 in. from cushion 6, and 6½ in. above the central
transverse line of the table. If ball 1 be placed a little to the left
of the baulk centre, say from 1 to 2 in., and played half-ball, so as to
do little more than reach ball 3, and cannon on its right side, ball 2
will be brought towards the spot from which ball 3 has not been far
removed. The balls may not improbably be left in the positions 1′, 2′,
3′, in which case there is an excellent opening; but it must not be
expected that in every instance fortune will be equally favourable.
Still, unless the stroke is very badly played, the three balls will be
left not far from each other, and at the top of the table, and that is a
sufficient recommendation. The stroke, when correctly set up, simply
requires a true half-ball plain stroke, with attention to strength. If
ball 3 is sometimes hit on one side, sometimes on the other, and
occasionally missed altogether, the inference is that accuracy in the
half-ball stroke is wanting, and it is well to try and recover that by
the methods previously recommended; when confidence is restored, then
pay particular attention to the strength. Do not be satisfied till ball
3 is displaced from the spot not more than a few inches, say under six.
Hence, in this class of cannons, which, like all other strokes, should,
whenever possible, be practised under professional supervision, the
first thing to do is to place ball 1 correctly for the half-ball angle;
the next is to strike 2 precisely half-ball; and the last is to regulate
the strength so that ball 1 shall strike ball 2 very gently. These
remarks are to some extent general, and may be usefully applied, at the
reader’s discretion, to many strokes.
[Illustration:
Diagram XI.
]
Diagram XII. shows a variation of the stroke just described; ball 2 is
still 18 in. from the left side cushion, but is 3 in. below the central
transverse line. There is, it is clear, a losing hazard into the left
middle pocket from about the right corner of the =Ｄ=; but it is a better
game in this position to place ball 1 2½ to 2¾ in. left of the baulk
centre, and play the half-ball cannon. If ball 2 were further from the
side cushion, the losing hazard would become the better stroke, and this
example may be considered as almost the limit at which the cannon is to
be preferred. The balls will approximately follow the paths indicated,
and their positions after the stroke may be about 1′, 2′, 3′, a fair
chance remaining for continuing the break; and if, as will often happen,
ball 1, placed a little wider or played a little finer, should strike
ball 3 on the other side, _i.e._ on the side next the left top pocket,
then ball 3 is driven towards the right top pocket, leaving a hazard (a
winner for preference) into it, ball 2 is left, as before, near the
spot, and the situation is still eminently favourable. If played a great
number of times, some unfortunate results will occasionally happen; the
three balls may be left in a line, all nearly touching the top cushion,
and ball 1 between 2 and 3; even then a way may be found out of the
difficulty, but at present the plain cannon is being considered, and it
is difficult to set up on the table a better practice stroke.
[Illustration:
Diagram XII.
]
The cannon shown in Diagram XIII., though apparently a little different,
is, in reality, played precisely like the others; the results, too, are
in a way the same, for the three balls are gathered at the top of the
table. The main difference is that, the cannon being made off the top
cushion, ball 1 is generally left above ball 3—a situation not so
favourable as when ball 1 is below the other two balls. It often
happens, however, that ball 2 is so left that a losing hazard from it
into the left top pocket can be made, and the break may be thus
continued. The further it is desired to bring ball 2 towards the left
top pocket, the more towards baulk centre should ball 1 be placed; and
the nearer to the spot it may be wished to leave it, the finer should
the stroke be set. One advantage of practising this stroke is that
confidence is acquired in making the cannon from the cushion, which is
in this instance greatly preferable to playing a forcing stroke direct,
though many persons, thinking of the cannon alone, would erroneously
select the latter mode of play. A substantial gain is made when the
player has recognised that the stroke is almost exactly like the two
just described, and that the top cushion may, save in a small extra
allowance of strength, be completely ignored.
On Diagram XIV. two cannons are shown; to that marked A special
attention is invited. The position, or a similar one, often occurs, and
is as often incorrectly played by amateurs, when balls 2 and 3 are on
the table, and 1 in hand. Thinking solely of making the cannon, the
player usually spots 1 towards the right of the baulk for a half-ball
stroke. Result, a cannon and separation of the balls, 2 being doubled
towards baulk, 3 carried up the table and not improbably lodged in
safety under cushion 6.
Place ball 2, 14 in. from cushion 5, 30 in. below the left middle
pocket.
Ball 3, 11 in. from cushion 5, 17 in. below the left middle pocket.
Ball 1, 9 in. to the left of baulk centre. Play a gentle stroke on 2 so
as to double it from the cushion to 3 and with strength sufficient for
ball 1 to reach 3. The three balls will be left close together and not
far from the left middle pocket. Care must be taken to prevent the balls
being left in one straight line, and also to avoid a kiss between balls
1 and 2 before the cannon.
[Illustration:
Diagram XIII.
]
Example B, though not of so common occurrence as A, is also an excellent
practice stroke.
Ball 1, 5½ in. from cushion 3, 21½ in. from the bottom cushion.
Ball 2, 4 in. from cushion 3, 33 in. from the bottom cushion.
Ball 3, in front of the left top pocket, 3 or 4 in. from it. Play a
centre ball stroke, about half-ball on 2, with strength to carry 1 to
3—say a free No. 1. Ball 2 will double from cushion 3 and join 1 and 3
near the left top pocket.
In this stroke accidents may happen, and if it be missed by a hair’s
breadth the adversary will rejoice. Ball 3 may be cannoned into the
pocket and ball 2 may also go in; but, if played often, the result will
generally be satisfactory and the stroke is therefore a fairly sound
one. If ball 3 were the red, it would be prudent to play so as to leave
ball 2 somewhat behind and thus reduce the danger of losing it in the
pocket. A little consideration will show that the varieties of this
stroke are numerous, and that by means of some of them the three balls
may be brought to the top of the table.
The strokes shown in Diagram XV. exemplify that most useful class of
cannons in which the velocity of ball 1, struck often with considerable
force, is almost wholly transmitted to ball 2, and 1 retains little more
than is required to reach 3. This is achieved in the first place by
playing as full as the cannon will admit of on 2, and next by a peculiar
use of the cue, which the French term _arrêté_ because it is grasped and
not permitted to follow the ball more than an inch or two after
delivery. The stroke is a stab, and its intensity can be varied by
raising the butt of the cue. The point of ball 1 to be struck is, as
before, the centre, but delivery instead of being horizontal is at a
smaller or greater angle with the surface of the table. The stroke is
made as though the striker desired to stab the ball through its centre
to the table. It springs away with more life than can be communicated by
a horizontal stroke, and parts with that life on impact with 2 more
readily, and therefore expires or comes to rest on reaching 3 with
greater certainty. The stab is not required in every case, but where
ball 2 has a long path to travel and ball 3 is at a right angle from 2
or less, it cannot be dispensed with. Classified as a stroke, it may be
placed between the horizontal centre and the screw, which will be
described in the next chapter, whereby ball 1 is made to return towards
the point of the cue after impact with 2.
[Illustration:
Diagram XIV.
]
A simple form of these cannons is shown at A on this diagram. No
measurements are required, as the position is perfectly simple and
equally good for practice when varied according to pleasure. It can be
conveniently played when ball 3 is on the pyramid spot, ball 2 about 6
in. from it and rather nearer the player, ball 1 being between the
player and 2 near the latter as shown. Play ball 1 nearly full on 2 with
strength sufficient to cause its return from the cushion to 3, which 1
should reach but scarcely move. When played as shown across the table
the stroke is always a gentle one, and when the balls are close to the
cushion from which 2 has to return it must be played very softly indeed.
The usual faults made in playing are that 2 is struck too hard and too
fine, the result being that the three balls separate instead of coming
together.
For B, a pretty little stroke useful in turning the corner at the left
top pocket, the following measurements will help in placing the balls,
which can however be set up from the diagram with sufficient accuracy.
Ball 1, 5½ in. from cushion 6, 22½ in. from the top cushion.
Ball 2, 3½ in. (full) from cushion 6, 16½ in. from the top cushion.
Ball 3, 8½ in. from cushion 6, 13 in. from the top cushion.
Play a gentle stroke on 2 from ¾ to ½ to the right so as just to reach
3; 2 will return from side and top cushions, and the three balls will be
left together. It is evident that this stroke may be adapted to any
corner of the table, an exercise which may be left to the student.
[Illustration:
Diagram XV.
]
Example C.
Ball 2, 19 in. from cushion 6, 16½ in. from the top cushion; ball 3 on
the spot; ball 1, 18 in. from cushion 6 and 12 in. from the top cushion.
Play a little less than full on 2 with strength to bring it back from
the bottom cushion to the neighbourhood of the spot; ball 1 to travel to
3, which it moves slowly towards the right top corner pocket.
This stroke as exhibited at C is not very difficult, though some
moderate execution is required, and an intelligent application of the
stab will give more perfect control of the balls. As ball 3 is placed
further from 2 and nearer the top cushion, so does the stroke require
greater skill and judgment, the stab then becoming more necessary, as
the energy or life of ball 1 must expire about the moment it reaches 3,
otherwise the success of the stroke is much endangered.
Diagram XVI. shows a position of the balls which at first sight is apt
to be regarded with dissatisfaction by the player.
Ball 2 is too near cushion 2 and too far from the right top pocket for a
certain losing hazard; say 28 or 29 in. from top cushion and 5½ in. from
the side.
Ball 3 is 3 in. from cushion 6 and 12 in. above the middle pocket.
Ball 1 is in the central line of the table, from 9 to 13 in. below the
pyramid spot.
Play No. 1 strength finer than half-ball on 2, which strikes cushion 2
and travels towards ball 3; ball 1 makes the cannon off cushions 2 and
1, and sometimes off cushion 6 as well.
[Illustration:
Diagram XVI.
]
The danger of this stroke is that balls 1 and 2 may kiss just before
ball 3 is reached, the result being disappointment for the player and a
good opening for the adversary. In the modern game, however, a man
should look for success to skill and enterprise which, though not
without risk, lead to rapid scoring, rather than to tactics of
obstruction, so dear to the heart of respectable mediocrity. The results
of this stroke will be found to vary considerably. Sometimes ball 3 will
be placed over the left middle pocket with a winning or losing hazard
for next stroke. Again, if the cannon is made on the right side of ball
3, ball 1 will travel below the pocket, and the next stroke will
probably be another cannon. It is clear that this type of stroke can be
modified at will; ball 1 may remain fixed whilst ball 3 is moved up the
left side and 2 down the right side of the table, or ball 1 may be
shifted a little up or down the central line; the limits being when
losing hazards become preferable to the cannon.
[Illustration:
High Bridge for a Cramped Stroke
]