What is the reason of the decline of Whist? Why is it that every year we
find fewer players, and less proficiency in those who play? It is a far
graver question than it may seem at first blush, and demands an amount
of investigation much deeper than I am able to give it here.
Of course I am prepared to hear that people nowadays are too
accomplished and too intellectual to be obliged to descend for their
pastime to a mere game at cards; that higher topics engage and higher
interests occupy them; that they read and reflect more than their
fathers and grandfathers did; and that they would look down with disdain
upon an intellectual combat where the gladiators might be the last
surviving veterans of a bygone century.
Now, if the conversational tone of our time were pre-eminently
brilliant--if people were wiser, wittier, more amusing, and more
instructive than formerly--if we lived in an age of really good
talkers,--I might assent to the force of this explanation; but what is
the truth? Ours is, of all the times recorded by history, the dullest
and dreariest: rare as whist-players are, pleasant people are still
rarer. It is not merely that the power of entertaining is gone, but so
has the ambition. Nobody tries to please, and the success is admirable!
It is fashionable to be stupid, and we are the most modish people in the
universe. It is absurd, then, in a society whose interchange of thought
is expressed in monosyllables, and a certain haw-haw dreariness pervades
all intercourse, to say that people are above Whist. Why, they are below
Push-pin!
It would be sufficient to point to the age when Whist was most in vogue,
to show that it flavoured a society second to none in agreeability; and
who were the players? The most eminent divines, the greatest ministers,
the most profound jurists, the most subtle diplomatists. What an
influence a game so abounding in intellectual teaching must have
exercised on the society where it prevailed, can scarcely be computed.
Blackstone has a very remarkable passage on the great social effect
produced upon the Romans by their popular games; and he goes so far as
to say that society imbibes a vast amount of those conventionalities
which form its laws, from an Tin-conscious imitation of the rules which
govern its pastimes. Take our own time, and I ask with confidence,
should we find such want of purpose as our public men exhibit, such
uncertainty, such feebleness, and such defective allegiance to party,
in a whist-playing age? Would men be so ready as we see them to renounce
their principles, if they bore fresh in their mind all the obloquy that
follows “a revoke”? Would they misquote their statistics in face of the
shame that attends on “a false score”? Would they be so ready to assert
what they know they must retract, if they had a recent recollection of
being called on “to take down the honours”?
Think, then, of the varied lessons--moral as well as mental--that the
game instils; the caution, the reserve, the patient attention, the
memory, the deep calculation of probabilities, embracing all the rules
of evidence, the calm self-reliance, and the vigorous daring that shows
when what seems even rashness may be the safest of all expedients.
Imagine the daily practice of these gifts and faculties, and tell me,
if you can, that he who exercises them can cease to employ them in his
everyday life. You might as well assert that the practice of gymnastics
neither develops the muscle nor increases strength.
I cannot believe a great public man to have attained a fall development
of his power if he has not been a whist-player; and for a leader of the
House, it is an absolute necessity. Take a glance for a moment at what
goes on in Parliament in this non-whist age, and mark the consequences.
Look in at an ordinary sitting of the House, and see how damaging to his
party that unhappy man is, who _will_ ask a question to-day which this
day week would be unanswerable. What is that but “playing his card out
of time”? See that other who rises to know if something be true; the
unlucky “something” being the key-note to his party’s politics which
he has thus disclosed. What is this but “showing his hand”? Hear that
dreary blunderer, who has unwittingly contradicted what his chief has
just asserted--“trumping,” as it were, “his partner’s trick.” Or that
still more fatal wretch, who, rising at a wrong moment, has taken “the
lead out of the hand” that could have won the game. I boldly ask, would
there be one--even one--of these solecisms committed in an age when
Whist was cultivated, and men were brought up in the knowledge and
practice of the odd trick?
Look at the cleverness with which Lord Palmerston “forces the hand” of
the Opposition. Watch the rapidity with which Lord Derby pounces upon
the card Lord Russell has let drop, and “calls on him to play it.” And
in the face of all this you will see scores of these bland whiskered
creatures Leech gives us in ‘Punch,’ who, if asked, “Can they play?”
answer with a contemptuous ha-ha laugh, “I rather think not.”
To the real player, besides, Whist was never so engrossing as to exclude
occasional remark; and some of the smartest and wittiest of Talleyrand’s
sayings were uttered at the card-table. Imagine, then, the inestimable
advantage to the young man entering life, to be privileged to sit down
in that little chosen coterie, where sages dropped words of wisdom, and
brilliant men let fall those gems of wit that actually light up an era.
By what other agency--through what fortuitous combination of events
other than the game--could he hope to enjoy such companionship? How
could he be thrown not merely into their society, but their actual
intimacy?
It would be easy for me to illustrate the inestimable benefits of this
situation, if we possessed what, to the scandal of our age, we do
not possess--any statistics of Whist. Newspapers record the oldest
inhabitant or the biggest gooseberry, but tell us nothing biographical
of those who have illustrated the resources and extended the boundaries
of this glorious game. We even look in vain for any mention of Whist in
the lives of some of its first proficients. Take Cavour, for instance.
Not one of his biographers has recorded his passion for Whist, and yet
he was a good player: too venturous, perhaps--too dashing--but splendid
with “a strong hand!” During all the sittings of the Paris Congress he
played every night at the Jockey Club, and won very largely--some say
above twenty thousand pounds.
The late Prince Metternich played well, but not brilliantly. It was a
patient, cautious, back-game, and never fully developed till the last
card was played. He grew easily tired too, and very seldom could sit
out more than twelve or fourteen rubbers; unlike Talleyrand, who always
arose from table, after perhaps twelve hours’ play, fresher and brighter
than when he began. Lord Melbourne played well, but had moments of
distraction, when he suffered the smaller interests of politics to
interfere with his combinations. I single him out, however, as a
graceful compliment to a party who have numbered few good players in
their ranks; for certainly the Tories could quote folly ten to
one whisters against the Whigs. The Whigs are too superficial, too
crotchety, and too self-opinionated to be whist-players; and, worse than
all, too distrustful. A Whig could never trust his partner--he could not
for a moment disabuse himself of the notion that his colleague meant to
outwit him. A Whig, too, would invariably try to win by something
not perfectly legitimate; and, last of all, he would be incessantly
appealing to the bystanders, and asking if he had not, even if
egregiously beaten, played better than his opponents.
The late Cabinet of Lord Derby contained some good players. Two of the
Secretaries of State were actually fine players, and one of them adds
Whist to accomplishments which would have made their possessor an
Admirable Crichton, if genius had not elevated him into a far loftier
category than Crichtons belong to. Rechberg plays well, and likes
his game; but he is in Whist, as are all Germans, a thorough pedant. I
remember an incident of his whist-life sufficiently amusing in its way,
though, in relation, the reader loses what to myself is certainly the
whole pungency of the story: I mean the character and nature of the
person who imparted the anecdote to me, and who is about the most
perfect specimen of that self-possession, which we call coolness, the
age we live in can boast of.
I own that, in a very varied and somewhat extensive experience of men in
many countries, I never met with one who so completely fulfilled all the
requisites of temper, manner, face, courage, and self-reliance, which
make of a human being the most unabashable and unemotional creature that
walks the earth.
I tell the story as nearly as I can as he related it to me. “I used to
play a good deal with Rechberg,” said he, “and took pleasure in worrying
him, for he was a great purist in his play, and was outraged with
anything that could not be sustained by an authority. In fact, each
game was followed by a discussion of full half an hour, to the intense
mortification of the other players, though very amusing to me, and
offering me large opportunity to irritate and plague the Austrian.
“One evening, after a number of these discussions, in which Rechberg
had displayed an even unusual warmth and irritability, I found myself
opposed to him in a game, the interest of which had drawn around us a
large assembly of spectators--what the French designate as _la galerie_.
Towards the conclusion of the game it was my turn to lead, and I played
a card which so astounded the Austrian Minister, that he laid down his
cards upon the table and stared fixedly at me.
“‘In all my experience of Whist,’ said he, deliberately, ‘I never saw
the equal of that.’
“‘Of what?’ asked!
“‘Of the card you have just played,’ rejoined he. ‘It is not merely
that such play violates every principle of the game, but it actually
stultifies all your own combinations.’
“‘I think differently, Count,’ said I. ‘I maintain that it is good play,
and I abide by it.’
“‘Let us decide it by a wager,’ said he.
“‘In what way?’
“‘Thus: We shall leave the question to the _galerie_. You shall allege
what you deem to be the reasons for your play, and they shall decide if
they accept them as valid.’
“‘I agree. What will you bet?’
“‘Ten napoleons--twenty, fifty, five hundred if you like!’ cried he,
warmly.
“‘I shall say ten. You don’t like losing, and I don’t want to punish you
too heavily.’
“‘There is the jury, sir,’ said he, haughtily; ‘make your case.’
“‘The wager is this,’ said I, ‘that, to win, I shall satisfy these
gentlemen that for the card I played I had a sufficient and good
reason.’
“‘Yes.’
“‘My reason was this, then--I looked into your hand!’
“I pocketed his ten napoleons, but they were the last I won of him.
Indeed, it took a month before he got over the shock.”
It would be interesting if we had, which unhappily we have not, any
statistical returns to show what classes and professions have produced
the best whist-players. In my own experience I have found civilians the
superiors of the military.
Diplomatists I should rank first; their game was not alone finer and
more subtle, but they showed a recuperative power in their play
which others rarely possessed: they extricated themselves well out of
difficulties, and always made their losses as small as possible. Where
they broke down was when they were linked with a bad partner: they
invariably played on a level which he could never attain to, and in this
way cross purposes and misunderstandings were certain to ensue.
Lawyers, as a class, play well; but their great fault is, they play
too much for the _galerie_. The habit of appealing to the jury jags
and blurs the finer edge of their faculties, and they are more prone to
canvass the suffrages of the surrounders than to address themselves to
the actual issue. For this reason, Equity practitioners are superior to
the men in the courts below.
Physicians are seldom first-rate players--they are always behind their
age in Whist, and rarely, if ever, know any of the fine points which
Frenchmen have introduced into the game. Their play, too, is timid--they
regard trumps as powerful stimulants, and only administer them in
drop-doses. They seldom look at the game as a great whole, but play on,
card after card, deeming each trick they turn as a patient disposed of,
and not in any way connected with what has preceded or is to follow it.
Divines are in Whist pretty much where geology was in the time of the
first Georges; still I have met with a bishop and a stray archdeacon or
two who could hold their own. I am speaking here of the Establishment,
because in Catholic countries the higher clergy are very often good
players. Antonelli, for instance, might sit down at the Portland or the
Turf; and even my old friend G. P. would find that his Eminence was his
match.
Soldiers are sorry performers, for mess-play is invariably bad; but
sailors are infinitely worse. They have but one notion, which is to play
out all the best cards as fast as they can, and then appeal to their
partner to score as many tricks as they have--an inhuman performance,
which I have no doubt has cost many apoplexies.
On the whole, Frenchmen are better players than we are. Their game is
less easily divined, and all their intimations (_invites_) more subtle
and more refined. The Emperor plays well. In England he played a great
deal at the late Lord Eglinton’s, though he was never the equal of
that accomplished Earl, whose mastery of all games, especially those of
address, was perfection.
The Irish have a few brilliant players--one of them is on the bench; but
the Scotch are the most winning of all British whisters. The Americans
are rarely first-rate, but they have a large number of good second-class
players. Even with them, however, Whist is on the decline; and Euchre
and Poker, and a score more of other similar abominations, have usurped
the place of the king of games. What is to be done to arrest the
progress of this indifferentism?--how are we to awaken men out of the
stupor of this apathy? Have they never heard of the terrible warning
of Talleyrand to his friend who could not play, as he said, “Have you
reflected on the miserable old age that awaits you?” How much of human
nature that would otherwise be unprofitable can be made available by
Whist! What scores of tiresome old twaddlers are there who can still
serve their country as whisters! what feeble intelligences that can
flicker out into a passing brightness at the sight of the “turned
trump”!
Think of this, and think what is to become of us when the old, the
feeble, the tiresome, and the interminable will all be thrown broadcast
over society without an object or an occupation. Imagine what Bores will
be let loose upon the world, and fancy how feeble will be all efforts
of wit or pleasantry to season a mass of such incapables! Think, I say,
think of this. It is a peril that has been long threatening--even
from that time when old Lord Hertford, baffled and discouraged by
the invariable reply, “I regret, my Lord, that I cannot play Whist,”
exclaimed, “I really believe that the day is not distant when no
gentleman can have a vice that requires more than two people!”