PIQUET, BASSET, FARO, HAZARD, PASSE-DIX, PUT, CROSS AND
PILE, THIMBLE-RIG. The gaming table : its votaries and victims, in all times and countries,
especially in England and in France. Vol. 2 | ||
PIQUET
is said to have derived its name from that of its inventor, who contrived it to amuse Charles VI. of France. The game was played with thirty two cards, that is, discarding out of the pack all the deuces, treys, fours, fives, and sixes. Regular piquet-packs were sold. In reckoning up the points, every card counted for its value, as ten for ten, nine for nine, and so on down to seven, which was, of course, the lowest; but the ace reckoned for eleven. All court cards reckoned for ten. As in other games, the ace won the king, the king the queen, and so on, to the knave, which won the ten. The cards were dealt at option by fours, threes, or twos, to the number of twelve, which
The game was also played as pool precisely ac-cording to the rules briefly sketched as above, the penalty for losing being a guinea to the pool.
Piquet required much practice to play it well. It became so great a favourite that, by the middle of the 18th century, the meanest people were well acquainted with it, and `let into all the tricks and secrets of it, in order to render them complete sharpers.' Such are the words of an old author, who adds that the game was liable to great imposition,
Evidently they did not `assume a virtue' in those days, `if they had it not.'
PIQUET, BASSET, FARO, HAZARD, PASSE-DIX, PUT, CROSS AND
PILE, THIMBLE-RIG. The gaming table : its votaries and victims, in all times and countries,
especially in England and in France. Vol. 2 | ||