The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1870-11-21


continuous scores, being made at 1t: more than
1400 is said to have been scored by one Ameri-
can player; but the tables are often smaller, the
balls larger, than ours, and pushing with
broad pointed cue is permitted. One of the
! longest breaks at the English game on record
was 346 made by the champion, John Roberts;
| but that has since been eclipsed by breaks of
$50 and 394, made by w Cook, junior, who will
probably one day be the champion.
Pyramids, a great game for gambling, Is
| play ed with fifteen red and one white ball, and
consists of winning hazards only: 1t is good
! game, but rather monotonous. Some men at
/ tain wonderful proficiency at it, and an amateur
! in London lately, playing from baulk at the
/ | als arranged in the triangle as at the begin
! ming OF the game, holed the entire number in
seventeen shots wonderful feat, certainly
and exceedingly difficult to accomplish, as any
| player who attempts it Will find. Pool, the
! pleasantest and most social OF all games on the
! billiard-tabe, is played with any number of
variously- -colored balls, each player using
special color and playing indie
pendently of the other. Winning hazards,
! as in pyramids, alone count, each person re-
ceiving a certain stake from the owner of the
| ball which he pockets; the person pOcketed alse
/ losing what is technically called "a life"
/ having three at the commencement OF the game,
and losing all Glance OF the pool, made up of
! contributions from all the players, when he
| loses every life. A "star," or additional life,
! is allowed to the unlucky man who first loses
| the original three, on payment of the same stake
| as that paid at the beginning Each life
! should be q third of the sum deposited in the
| pool; thus, a three-shilling pool with shilling
| lives is very common, but of course the
! game is played for far higher stakes. We have
| heard of some enterprising Australians who, by
| way of variation at the game, played
! "bulloch pool and sheep hazard" Pool without a
| pool-that is to say, continuous winning hazards
! with small stake for pocketing ball-is a
! very good game for party of friends in coun-
try house. So also is ''shell out" in which
lumber of people plUy at pyramids, using the
same ball alternately, and receiving q small
| from other DlaVpra WhpnpVpr n
! is pocketed. 1t is a popular game in small
public rooms in London. The French game
! consists entirely of cannons, and is played upon
tables without pockets, with very much larger
balls than ours, and very brosd-pointed cues.
Some foreigners acquire marvellous pro-
fciency in it. M. Charles Berger, the
French champion, is wonderful player,
| possessing perhaps more power of cue than any
man living. For the Russian game Carline, the
German and other varieties, we must refer the
reader to any of the manuals on the subject.
Old billiard-tables were made of various
shapes some being oval and others square.
When Evelyn visited the Portuguese Ambassa-
dor in 1879, he saw what he calls new sort of
! billiards, with more hazards than the game then
pins, and he tells us that the ball was struck
with 'the small end of the billiard.stick,
which is shod with brass silver"
This 'billard-stick" would probably be
Continent fer some time before it was known
here; players in this country using the mace,
and trailing" at the balls, as children do to
this day when playing bagatelle Cues were at
first cut in various ways, some oOllquely and
others straight and the former, for some reason
or other, called "Jeffery." The leather
tipped cue which we use now did not come into
use, according to Mr.. kent6eld's authority,
until 1907 The best cues made of we'll
seasoned ash or lockwood, and the weight of the
butt and breadth of the tip may be left TO the
taste and fancy Of the player. It is said that
good cue should be of such a length as just to
! upright
person using it, at any rate, care should
be taken that it is not too short, as
in such a case it cramps the player. The balls
are of ivory, and the regulation diameter is II
little over two inches; but they vary very much.
Care is taken by the best makers that they
should be not only Of the same size, but of the
same density and specific gravity or they will
not run true. An author called Reuben Roy,
who wrote little work called TIE Science of
Billiards" gives good method for finding out
whether ball is perfect. He says:-"If n sus-
pected ball be marked with spot on any part
of its circumference, and he carefully placed on
the surface of q vase of clear water, with the
mark exactly uppermost, it will descend through
the lesser density of the water in exactly the
same position-that is, with the mark still
uppermost." This is good test, but requires
TO be carefully applied, and the best
plan is to get your balls from maker in whom
made of wood, and our slate-tables only came
into fashion about forty years ago. Billiard
tables are also made of iron, but the sate-bed is
list, tightly strapped and hammered together;
they are now manufactured of india rubber and
are therefore much faster, although some old
players, we believe still hold that the list
cushions were preferable, and that the ball re-
bounded from them at a truer angle. The
cushions should be kept as much as possible in
an equable temperature, requiring the applica-
tion of heat sometimes in cold or damp weather.
Indeed, good billiard-table requires much
looking after baby! Every bilard-player
in these days is familiar with the side-stroke-
that is to say, the striking of the ball upon one
side or other of its centre, so as to give 1t a
bias and make it come back from the cushion
at an angle different from that it would have
taken had il been struck in the centre. The
maxim to be remembered by all billiard players
is, that the angle of rehexion is equal to the
angle of incidence, aud the obje ect of "side" is
TO alter this angle according to the bias given
to the ball. Side can be communicated, as IL
were or put on one ball by another; though it
is q popular error to deny this; but the com
upon has touched another ball or the cushion.
Side put directly upon ball by the cue
will take effect withoutits touching either cush-
ion ball in its progress aud ball can be
made to describe a semicrcle on table, or go
round any object placed upon it, and return To
the striker "Screw" may be defined as side put
upon the ball perpendicularly, instead of hori-
zontally, and will make ball run out on the
table and come back, the axis of rotation being
reversed by a low stroke, aud a certain back
ward jerk of the cue, more easy to explain prac-
tically than theoretically The side stroke is
said to have been discovered by billiard pro-
prietor in Bath some years ago but other people
have laid claim TO this curious way of using the
cue, which certainly wrought a complete modi-
flcation in the methods of playing modern bill
| lizards.
1t is a great pity that so good game, re-