The daily morning journal and courier., 1897-07-21

erence to the contact of races and mi grations must be made with extreme caution, as we find pretty much the same Samee everywhere. The games of amusement played at the present day by civilized people are clearly sur vivals of divinitary rites, this fact be- Ing shown by the position which all games occupy among the people whom we call savages, The more complicated games, such as playing cards, appear to have direct relations with the divin- itary calendar. And the counting boards or cables, upon which pieces of wood are moved, as in backgammon or chess, have similar relations.
 "The collection shown at Atlanta, While occupying a great deal of space and apparently diversified in character, merely represented an attempt to illus trate the development of two types of games which are represented to-day by playing cards and chess. In the course of these investigations it Is shown that in a sense playing cards in one form or another are practically universal, and were known to many of the tribes of | the American continent antedating the discovery Their most highly artistic 1 form occurs in the gambling sticks of the Indians of our northwest coast l These gambling, sticks, 1t is demonstra- ted, were derived from arrow shaft | ments marked with the enblems of | place and personality.
 "The cards of northeast Asia such as are used in Korea, reveal precisely the
 same origin as these arrow shaftments. Chinese cards connect with them, and
 our own cards may be regarded as the
 legitimate issues of the same series." l Incidentally in the collection a num- Der of highly artistic packs of playing l cards are exhibited, intended to illus
 trate the ancient and existing cards of the principal nations. A Persian set
 among the Oriental cards is of striking ly artistic beauty. The card pieces are
 painted with delicate miniatures execu-
 ted upon a ground of gold foil. Curi-
 ous enough, the game played with them
 is our familiar game of poker
 | General A. Houtum- -Schindler of Te- heran in reply to a letter of inquiry, has
 furnished the following account of the
 Persian game: The game is called
 ''As," and is exactly like poker, but without any flushes or sequences.
 There are four players and each player
 gets five cards, dealt to the right. The
 dealer puts down a stake. The first
 player then looks at his cards: if he "goes" he says "di dam" q have seen),
 and covers the stake or raises it. If he
 does not wish to play he says "Nadi l dam" q have not seen), and throws 1 down his cards.
 He may also "go' without looking at | his cards that is, in poker parlance, | 'straddle," and he says ''nadid di dam'' | (not seeing, I have seen). The second
 player, if he wishes to play, must cover | the stakes, and can also raise The
 third player and the dealer then act in the same way, just as in poker, and when the stakes of all players are equal and no one raises any more, the cards
 are turned up and the player holding the best hand wins the stakes. The hands in the order of their value are three of a kind and a pair, full, three, ace, king, etc; two pair, aces highest. When two players have the same pail, or pairs, the other cards de- eide. For instance, a pair of kings, ace soldier and some card of little value
 Bluffing is feature of the game, and is
 called zaram, literally, Fire off gun Backgammon is one of the few classi- cal games to which the present day at
 tains. It is extremely interesting from the fact that 1t is identical with the Ro.
 man gaming, dice being cast from 6 dice box into little tower, the Turie-
 eula of the classical writers In the museum backgammon board is showr from the Malay Peninsula, which is
 used in a game identical with our own
 A Syrian specimen is beautifully inlaic Iiwith mother-of-pearl
 Modern ingenuity" said Mir. Culin cannot be said to have risen to tht
 point of inventings a game. All games
 were invented ages ago, and 1t is to b,
 questioned whether single applicat tior
 for patent upon the idea of game lwould be granted in our patent office
 were the history of primitive game. fully known and accessible. ."-Washing ton Post.
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