Los Angeles daily herald., 1875-02-02
An American statesman's Treatise on Poker

Eastern exchanges are publishing
copious extracts from a recently pub
lished manual of the game of "poker,"
the authorship of which is ascribed to
General Schenck, our Minister to Eng
land. Here is a specimens:
The author of this little manual
does not expect all who read it to be-
come Immediately proficient in poker,
for the game is difficult, and to excel
in playing it demands almost genius.
Still, as my venerable friend General
Dix would say, "Est guiacdne prodiea'
te9,us, sd non ddtatr uttrd,n and / do
not conceal from myself nor my read
ers the hope that | shall reap the re-
ward of public benefactor in giving
to the youth of England a new game.
| do not hope to convert the aged.
They are welded to whist, and old
people cannot learn new games. But
whist itself is in its dotage.A Already
good partners cannot be found, and
bad partners at whist are triais to the
temper, which even Job could not
have endured for any length of time.
A saint in heaven would grieve to see his
hand
Cut up by one that will not understand
In poker every man paddles his own
canoe, and is responsible to himself
alone for his mistakes and losses.
"Troy owes to Homer what whist
owes to Hoyle," but Hoyle could not
play poker, and the poker playing at
Washington and in the Southwest is
as far superior to the poker playing as
my countryman Morphy's chess play
ing is to the play of country parson
in Buckinghamshire.
CLASSIFICATION.
There are several sorts of poker, as,
for instance, plain POKER, draw poker,
twenty deck poker, and the variations
of these are innumerable. will say,
however, that men should not play
twenty deck unless he has four eyes
in his head, or purse as deep as the
shaft of Nevada silver mine. The
real game, the game par excellence, is
draw poker, whose delightful uncer-
tainty, after the antes and blinds are
already on the board, is the charm of
the game and the leading encourage
ment to bluff.
Something to play for is the essence
of this game. The ante should not
vary; it should comprise one fish of
established value, and each player
should ante up each time, the dealer
putting up another fish for the privil-
ege of dealing and the last call. In
the same way the blind always gives
additional life and force to the game.
| bave always noticed that when par
ties subscribed largely in "a stock ven-
ture, they always heve faith i'll it,
whether it is worth anything or not,
and that is the principle of the ante
and the blind.
ON BLUFFING.
If Hercules and Llychus play at dice,
(which is The greater man! The throw
May turn by fortune from the weaker hand.
SO rs Alcdes beaten by his page"
Without the blind the beginning of
poker is dull without the bluff the
ending of it is vapid. If these bits of
finesse were absent, the strongest card
would in all cases determine the for
tune of the players; all science and
skill would disappear from the game,
and the empire of brute force be es-
tablished. But in draw-poker moth
ing is left to chance, if the game is
played well. The art of the game is
to conceal from your own face every
that would lead to the value
of your own hand, and to read in your
adversary's face every sign that will
betray to you the value of his hand.
AS general thing, a pair of "trays,"
with courage and a long purse, is
worth more than three kings.
OF THE FLUSH.
More money has been lost in draw 4
ing to flush than i'm the Franco Ger
man war. 1t is estimated in my
country, where men are apt to reduce
the most recondite matters to their
results, that more. than
10000 negroes and 10000 bales of cot
ton have been bet and lost by holders
of sequences of four, with chance of
drawing a "quintn and filling the
flush. Whether the player gets his
flush filled or not, he is sure to bet;
hence comes much bluf1ing. But
those who bluff on ilushes nearly al
ways lose, for the consciousness of
having been SO near good thing and
it,unnerves and betrays them.
A Senator who has just failed to get
the nomination for President is never