The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1906-11-04
SKAT THE GAME THIS WINTER.
GERMAN RIVAL THREATENS PRE-
EMINENCE OF BRIDGE.
bridge Teachers Now Giving Lessons I'm
Skat-The Game Approved by Mimi
Edward-Features In which H Is
Superior TO Brldse-HOw II 10 Played.


Unless all signs fail, there will be a new
candidate for public favor in the line OF card
games this winter, and that il skat. The
word is a German abbreviation Of an italian
term in taroc, and is pronounced with the
long "a as il it were spelled "skaht.'
Any one who has watched the history OF
cards must have remarked the curious
regularity with which the favorites come
and go. In 1893, when whist was at the
height Of it's fame, and the annualc congress
OF the American Whist League brought
together $50 delegates at the Oriental Hotel
from all parts of the United States, and even
from England, a writer in II U declared
( that the day was not far distant when bridge
would supersede all other forms Of whist.
About seven years ago THE U announced
that bridge was the coming game, although
it was still unknown outside a few Of the
leading clubs, and not a single text book on
the game had been published.
There was a time when euohre was the
national game in America, and whist was
very little played. When poker was at the
height of its popularity among fashionable
people and there were fifty-six women's
poker clubs meeting in a single uptown
hotel in New York the idea that any game
could ever take its place. especially such a
simple game as whist, waslaughedat. What
game was there, people asked. that could
touch poker2
Blu the game came. and 1t was straight
whist, without honors. Years before dupli-
cate was heard of whist was the fashionable
craze in society. When duplicate came, in
1891, it knocked out whist, a game which is
now obsolete. .
Ten years ago forty-two papers In the
United States were devoting from two TO
four columns a week to duplicate whist
news and notes. Every one said that no
game could ever take the place Of duplicate,
and the few who had ever heard Of bridge
condemned it as simply a gambling propo-
sition. which would do for an occasional
variation from the real game. like piquet
or klondike.
Euchre is still a popular game, IL Ia true,
but not with the people who demand greater
opportunities for intellectual rivalry than
such a simple game affords. Euchre has
dropped into the second class. and Is now n
round game. like pinochle.
Poker is still popular. but only as a gam
bling proposition and behind closed doors.
1t was never a game which could be used
for social or charitable purposes in large
gatherings,
OF the forty-two papers that published
whist columns ten years ago but two re-
main. and although the game still iourishes
among the Stub that belong TO the whist
league it is seen only on regular club nights.
Before and after the compass game and at
all other times the play is bridge. There
are still trophy matches and tournaments.
but whist has practically disappeared from
the social world. and one is never asked to
dinner with whist afterward; the game is
always bridge.
Bridge is unquestionably the present
f~avorite, and in spite of all that has been
written and preached against it card play
ers seem 10 be bridge mad. The same ex-
~travagant assertions Of undying~ popularity
are to-day put forward in favor Of bridge
that were heard years ago about euchre
and poker and whist and duplicate.
One continually hears the assertion that
there canr.Jt be a better game and that
nothing can ever take its place. They said
precisely the same things about duplicate
ten years ago. May it not be possible hat
they are equally in error about bridge?
People love change, and card players are
always ready 10 take up something new,
but the standards which have been set by
suoh games as whist and bridge nave edu-
Gated people up to demanding games which
offer the fullest opportunities for the exer-
else Of the intellect. and it may safely be
I said that no game will ever be widely popu-
lar in this country in which the mental
| enjoyment derived from the play of the
cards is not more of an object than the
| mere winning or losing Of the game itself.
Games of this high class are not invented
In a day, and no absolutely new game has
ever become the fashion. IL may be COM
paratively unknown, but it must be matured.
IL is only the finished product that can ever
be a ~favOrite in the first set.
All the great favorites of the past have
been old. The origin of euchre is lost in
the mists Of antiquity. II looks like a
variation Of the oldest known game of cards,
spoil five.
Poker came to America at the time of
the French Revolution. The civil war
and the introduction of the draw made it
popular.
Whist was two hundred years old when
America took il up, and had had its rage
in England a century before. Bridge had
been played in Europe for fifty years at
least before New York ever heard of il,
and il was known in England as far back
as 1870.
The fact that a game is already known
or has been played for years, is no reason
why it should not step into the front rank
and become the fashion. II is not the in
trinsic merit of a game that makes it a popu-
lar favorite. but some fortuitolls combina-
ton Of circumstances that brings it to the
notice of people that have influence and
following in such matters.
The ~ravorite at court is never a newborn
baby. but some one that Is picked ont from
the throng that always surrounds the
throne. Every game has its day, and
there may be games now but little known
which will be all the ragein the years to
come.
Some Of these games with possibilities
could he named, but the visible cloud upon
the card playing horizon now is skat. No
bigger than n mans hand perhaps, but full
of portent for the future.
It is not a new game, and it is not by any
means unknown. There are 10000 skat
players in this country to-day, with a
well organized league, which has held an
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