Page:Brinkley - Japan - Volume 6.djvu/80

 (poem cards) occupy in the repertoire of feminine and youthful pastimes the same place that the difficult game of hana-awase holds among the amusements of men. In Japanese estimation, however, no game supports comparison for a moment with that of go, to which foreign translators give the misleading name "checkers," though it bears about the same relation to checkers as vingt-et-un does to whist. There is probably no other game in the world that demands such analytical insight and genius for combination. Every educated man plays go, but very few develop sufficient skill to be classed in one of the nine grades of experts, and not once in a century does a player succeed in obtaining the diploma of the ninth, or highest, grade. The board and men—small round counters of shell, ivory, or stone—used for playing go serve also for a pastime called gomoku-narabe, or "five in a row;" a simple amusement, affected by girls and children, and mistaken by many foreigners for go itself, with which it has no manner of connection. Chess (shogi), too, is very popular. It is cognate with the "royal game" of the Occident, but there are thirty-six pieces instead of thirty-two, and the board has eighty-one squares instead of sixty-four. On the other hand, though the movements and names of the pieces resemble those of their Western representatives, their powers are not so large, and it has consequently been inferred that the Japanese game is simpler than the Occi-