Arizona republican., 1904-03-18
CONCERNING THE CARD FlEND.
Some of the Various Disguises in Which he Appears at Times.

One of the most agreeable things in the world, when one is engaged in supposedly friendly game of cards Is to have ones partner say at the end of the hand:
 "Too bad! Too bad! If you hadn't led that ace we would have taken two more tricks"
 Your partner may be mild-man- nered looking man with a deprecatory aspect; he may be man who is brow beaten by his wife and business asso- ciates seven days in the week. But at cards he is supreme. Through the years that he has sat on the train, or on Wednesday evenings at his club. the importance of the game has grown upon him-his perspective has been warped, and from an innocent, inof- fensiye individual he has, in this re- spect, developed into bully.
 There are of course. card fiends of other kinds. There Is the fierce old gentleman with the iron-gray whiskers and the glittering eye, who bristles criticism at every point. He sits down to a game as if he were going into a battle. Then again there is the excess siyely polite individual whose soft, well-modulated and insinuating voice cuts into one like a razor. Lurking behind it's polite restraint is the deadly gleam of satire. Possibly you did not notice, he says, that such and such a card was played in the third round. He was quite surprised, he informs you, to find that you held the king Of clubs-your play indicated that you could not possibly have held it.
 Then there is the man who is silent, who expresses his feelings by what he does not say. When, after hesitating for some time in inward despair, you finally push forth the card of all cards that you should not have played, he assumes an air of intense weariness. His shoulders drop; he expresses in pantomime the fact-patent to all-that the blow has fallen, that the limit of endurance has been reached.
 At times, again, he smiles significant ly at your opponents. as If by your idiocy he was perfectly justified in ex- pressing a certain sympathy with the enemy He lifts his eyebrows and drops them again-he looks at you anx- iously, he pounds his card on the ta- ble to emphasize the fact that he hopes you will notice what he is playing.
 Of all types of a card fiend this is perhaps the worst, because the extent of your asininity, your stupidity, he leaves entirely to the imagination. There is a certain amount of definite ness in being told to your face, ''you should not have done that, sir" It limits your error to a specific instance. The best of players make mistakes. You are not necessarily a fool for do- ing so in this particular case. But when the silent one shrugs his shoul- ders, when he shuts his teeth together when his offensive smile at your adver- sary indicates all too plainly that he rather hopes they will win as a vindi- cation of his own martyrdom-then indeed. you are in a bad case. Under these painful circumstances you may be any or all kinds of an ass.
 There have been, of course. inno-. cent victims thus placed, who, when the card fiehd began to show his colors, have not been content to admit his superiority. They have contended, with some spirit and undoubted moral courage, that cards, no matter what the game may be, are a species of rec reation. and when allowed to become more than this should not be indulged in. They have asserted that the best whist player in the world may be an intolerable bore when he carried his fad too far; and that he may not be. and probably isn't, fit for good many other things more important than whist. And by various observations calculated to show that cards are one of the most meaningless and unprofit- able forms of intellectual amusement they may succeed in disconcerting him.
 This method. however, of dealing with the card fiend is not always sat isfactory. It rarely cures him. What is needed Is a union of well-bred card players. no player who has not the elements of common decency and po- liteness to be admitted.
 This will keep the card fiends out. And if any of them, by some inad- vertence should get in and begin his