The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1894-04-01
SOME NATIONAL CANES
PLAYED by Various COlOniStS in Cos
mOp0litaB New York.

StAAStbOs ana CAl1eSe 4 al Tan VI Il 2
and Universal Poker.
From the New York sun.
Conditions Of life are so crowded in
New York that the foreigners who cone
here to live are forced for lack Of oppor-
/ tunIty to reinquish to great extent their
, national sports and to seek amusement in
I more artificial and less distinctive
pastimes. -Out-of-door sports are Beyond
the reach Of the poorer classes, to which
most Of the foreign-torn clement belong.
10 be sure, the canny Scotchmen get to-
gethcr occasionally. and retire in winter
time, when the ice is GOOD. to N-onkcrs or
some other suburb, where they drive
| themselves daft with that peculiarly
scotch pastime, curing. which IS prop
erly played only when ali the contestants
are in a condition Of utter delirium. The
/ Irish, too, when crowd of them get a day
or, occasionally proceed 10 some large
! held III locality wherc police are scarce,
and, after choosing w sides, indulge In 4
/ free fight, under association rules, with a
small football for excuse.
These games are comparatively iufre-
quent. however, and are participated in
by only a few enthusiasts. Nearly all
the different foreigners. whose colonies
form distinctive parts Of the city, have
succumbed to the seductiors Of the Amer
l an national game, poker fOrsaking the
pasimes OF thtlr parent countries Tor its
superior attractions. The most nota BILE
exceptions TO this rule are the Germans,
on whom poker has taken but little hold.
Bowling IS their chief amusement in the
line of games of exercise Not only do all
the men bowl, but most OF their wives as
well, and there are many wOmen's bowl
ing clubs among the Teutous of the city.
When German has tired himself out
with bowling and refreshed himself with
beer, he is always ready for game Of
pinochle. Dinner time is the great PIN
ochle hour, particularly for those Ger
mans who dine at res jaurantS. There
was never but one German cafe on the
east SIDE that didn't keep decks of pin
o@hle cards for its customers, and that
one failed in two months Pinochle is
played with two packs Of cards. a few
hundred points. and a few thousand
rules, of which it may be said in general
that one half of them contradict the
other half Notwithstanding this the
Germans are pdssi0nately fond of the
game, and when 2 party has once begun a
deal nothing short OF an earthquake can
stop II. 4 few weeks ago, as was told at
the time in the Sun, four Germ ans were
playing in Williamsburgh. and between
ONAL5 Out u bIttu LUX ii ufluh OF GGfEOLlC
acid, instead of whisky, from one of two
bottles standing together on table near
by. They took HIM TO hospital unCon-
sciOus and put policeman on guard over
him. When he came to the first thing he
said was:
WHO won dot benuclle game?"
Ssh Keep quiet, 80 said the policeman.
You're very sick. You'u die il you don
keep still. -
"Ach, so,' returned the sufferer. If I
die | die goot anyhow. I blay YOU
benuckle until I'm det. Hey,
He insisted SO strenuously that the Off
GER, to quiet him, finally sent out and got
pack of cards. They played all night,
the German won sl5 from the officer, and
recovered.
Still more fascinating to the Teutonic
gamesler is skat, compared to which
pinochle is as easy as old maid No one
but German can learn TO play skat. and
When'a nan once becomes infa tuated with
it, business, pleasure. wife and family be-
come secondary considerations. He lives
only for the purpose of playing skat
Every now and then the abiect slaves to
the skat habit get up tournament for
prizes, and play for days at a time Il ter
rible example ana warning to their COM
patriots. Skat is worse than opium
More than fifty volumes have already
IL
ground hasn't been fully covered yet.
chief characteristic OF the Germans
is that they play for tho fun of the game
There is sometimes u stake, but that is
never so much au object as the game
itself. Not so with the Bohemians and
Hungarians, who, like the Germans, are
great pinochle players. These people
always play for money. The game lacks
interest unless there IS stake, and gen
orally pretty heavy one. Go into any of
the cafes on East Houston street or Ave
nue. A or that vicinity, where the Bohe-
milan and Hungarian colonies are and you
will mad in each ono little plates on the
tables to be used as receptacles for coius
and bills. A popularity Of the Hungarian
player IS that he almost invariably puts
on his best clothes to gamble in, and a
very large proportion of the players in
these cafes Wear evening dress when
playing.
This is true TO great extent of the
Franco-AnericaEs also. They play more
in their homes than the Hungarians
When one krenchman comes IN to call on
another the host produces cards and says:
shall it be piquet, belique or vingt-et-
un3"
The visitor names the stakes, and the
game begins and continues throughout the
evening. billiards is also a favorite game
- ~ ~iANAi NN'AoliS tlAltA JAASA Z arc many
skillful players there The four-ball
game is unknown to them, and they inva-
riably play for a stake, no matter how
small There is this to be said of the
F'renchman: That he is generally po-
lite and amiable loser or anonchalaut and
never extensively exultant winner,
Exactly the opposite is true of the
Italian. Winning to him is the smile of
heaven, and losing personal insult TO
himself from the others engaged in the
game. According 10 the police, 20 per
cent of the murders and stabbing ARRAYS
in Mulberry Bend aud that locality arise
from rows over card Camts. Only re-
Gently an Italian was stabbed down there
because in poker game he held a flush Of
hearts ana a pair. of aces in the same
hand. Both of the aces were hearts. two
packs OF cards having been accidently
| mixed. but the man who held three of
| kind against the flush didn't stop to ask
particulars. lie made an earnest en-
deavor to cut the other mans throat and
then ran away such things are very
common A policeman who has seen long
service in Mulberry Bend outlines a typi-
cal Italian game there after this fashion!
-Four dagos worried al The week up in
Westchester s0mGwhGres, and come back
saturday night to their hole in the Bend.
They get three drinks Of whisky apiece,
60 into the cellar and play casino. JocEo
IS lucky and wins money Antonio goes
broke. Antonio gets up. picks up CLUB,