Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 24.djvu/579

Rh W H I W H I 543 Distilled spirits in the United States are the principal, and an increasing, source of internal revenue. In the fiscal year ending 30th June 1887 there were in the United States 969 grain distil leries ; and the quantity of spirits distilled in that year (including whisky, alcohol, high-wines, and cologne or neutral spirits, and excluding fruit-brandy) was 77,831, 599 gallons. The stock of spirits remaining in bonded warehouse on 30th June 1887 was 65,145,269 gallons. The total revenue from the manufacture and sale of dis tilled spirits for the fiscal year ending 30th June 1887 was $65,829,322. This includes the tax upon whisky, fruit-brandy, alcohol, high-wines, cologne spirits, and ruin. The revenue from the manufacture of whisky alone was $2,263,718,070. WHIST, a game at cards. The etymology of the name is disputed ; probablyit is of imitative origin, from &quot;whist &quot; (hist, hush, silence), the game being so named because of the silence required to play it attentively. In the 16th century a card game called triumph or trump (corrupted from &quot; triumph &quot;) was commonly played in Eng land. A game called trionft is mentioned as early as 1526, and triumphus Hispanicus in 1541. La triomphe occurs in the list of games played by Gargantua (Rabelais, first half of 16th century). In Florio s Worlde of Wordes (1598) trionfo is defined as &quot; the play called trump or ruff.&quot; It is probable that the game referred to by the writers quoted is la triomphe of the early editions of the Academie des Jeux. It is important to note that this game, called by Cotton &quot;French ruff,&quot; is similar to e&quot;carte. &quot;English ruff-and-honours,&quot; also described by Cotton, is similar to whist. If we admit that ruff and trump are convertible terms, of which there is scarcely a doubt, the game of trump was the precursor of whist. A purely English origin may, therefore, be claimed for trump (not la triomphe}. No record is known to exist of the invention of this game, nor of the mode of its growth into ruff-and-honours, and finally into whist. The earliest reference to trump in Eng lish is believed to occur in a sermon by Latimer, &quot; On the Card,&quot; preached at Cambridge, in Advent, about the year 1529. He says, &quot;The game that we play at shall be the triumph. . . . Now turn up your trump, . . . and cast your trump, your heart, on this card.&quot; The game of trump is frequently mentioned in the second half of the 16th century. In Gammer Gurtoris Needle (1575) Dame Chat says, &quot;We be fast set at trumpe.&quot; Eliot (Fruits for the French, 1593) calls trump &quot;a verie common ale-house game.&quot; Rice (Invective against Vices, printed before 1600) observes that &quot; renouncing the trompe and comming in againe&quot; (i.e., revoking intentionally) is a common sharper s trick. Decker (Belman of London, 1608) speaks of the deceits practised at &quot; tromp and such like games.&quot; Trump also occurs in Antony and Cleopatra (written about 1607), with other punning allusions to card-playing &quot;She, Eros, lias Packed cards with Caesar, and false-played my glory Unto an enemy s triumph.&quot; Act iv. sc. 12. Ruff-and-honours, if not the same game as trump, was probably the same with the addition of a score for the four highest cards of the trump suit. A description of the game is first met with in The Compleat Gamester (1674) by Charles Cotton. He states that ruff-and-honours (alias slamm) and whist are games very commonly known in England. It was played by four players with partners, and it was compulsory to follow suit when able. The cards ranked as at whist, and honours were scored as now. Twelve cards were dealt to each player, four being left in the stock. The top card of the stock was turned up for trumps. The holder of the ace of trumps was allowed to ruf, i.e., to take in the stock and to put out four cards from his hand. The game was played nine up ; and at the point of eight honours could be called, as at long whist. Cotton adds that at whist there was no stock. The deuces were put out and the bottom card was turned up for trumps. It is believed that the earliest mention of whist is by Taylor, the Water Poet (Motto, 1621). He spells the word Whisk &quot; whisk.&quot; The earliest known use of the present spelling is or in Hudibras, the Second Part (spurious), 1663. The word is then spelt indifferently whisk or whist for about half a century. Cotton (1674) spells it both ways. Seymour (Court Gamester, 1734) has &quot; whist, vulgarly called whisk.&quot; While whist was undergoing this change of name, there was associated with it the additional title of swabbers (probably allied to sweep, or sweepstakes). Fielding (History of Mr Jonathan Wild) says that whisk-and-swab- bers was &quot;the game then [1682] in chief vogue.&quot; Grose (Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue, 1785) states that swabbers are &quot; the ace of hearts, knave of clubs, ace and duce of trumps at whist.&quot; The true function of the swabbers is not positively known ; it is probable that the holders of these cards were entitled to receive a certain stake from the other players. Swabbers dropped out of general use during the 18th century. The points of the game rose from nine to ten (&quot;nine in all,&quot; Cotton, 1725; &quot;ten in all,&quot; Seymour, 1734, &quot;rectified according to the present standard of play&quot;). Simultaneously with this altera tion, or closely following it, the entire pack of fifty-two cards was used, the deuces being no longer discarded. This improvement introduces the odd trick, an element of great interest in modern whist. Early in the 18th century whist was not a fashionable game. The Hon. Daines Bar- rington (Archseologia, vol. viii.) says it was the game of the servants hall. Contemporary writers refer to it in a disparaging way, as being only fit for hunting men and country squires, and not for fine ladies or people of quality. According to Barrington, whist was first played on scien tific principles by a party of gentlemen who frequented the Crown Coffee House in Bedford Row, London, about 1728. Crown They laid down the following rules : &quot; Lead from the Coffee strong suit ; study your partner s hand ; and attend to the ^f 6 score.&quot; Shortly after the celebrated Edmond HOYLE (q.v.) published his Short Treatise (1743). It has been surmised by some that Hoyle belonged to the Crown Coffee House party. This, however, is only a conjecture. There is abundant evidence to show that, in the middle of the 18th century, whist was regularly played at the coffee houses of London and in fashionable society. And it is notorious that, ever since the time of Hoyle, the game has continued to increase in public estimation. It will be of interest to mark the successive stages Cotton, through which whist has passed from the time of Cotton to the present day. The only suggestions as to play in Cotton are that, &quot; though you have but mean cards in your own hand, yet you may play them so suitable to those in your partner s hand that he may either trump them or play the best of that suit ; &quot; also that &quot; you ought to have a special eye to what cards are play d out, that you may know by that means either what to play if you lead or how to trump securely and advantagiously.&quot; It appears from this that the main ideas were to make trumps by ruffing, to make winning cards, and to watch the fall of the cards with these objects. In the rules laid down by the Crown Coffee House school a distinct advance is to be noticed. Their first rule, &quot; Lead from the strong suit,&quot; shows a know ledge of the game only to be acquired by careful study, together with a long train of reasoning. The arguments in favour of the original strong-suit lead would be out of place here ; they are to be found in any modern manual. Their second rule, &quot;Study your partner s hand,&quot; though sound, is rather vague, and savours somewhat of a repeti tion of Cotton. Their third rule, &quot; Attend to the score,&quot; if amended into &quot;Play to the score,&quot; is most valuable. From the Crown Coffee House school to Hoyle is rather Hoyle. a wide jump; but there is no intervening record. Whether or not Hoyle derived at least a part of his inspiration from