Cavendish

“ It may happen that you are occasionally forced to lead a weak suit yourself; and in this event the least disadvantage, on the whole, is to tell the truth at once, by first leading the highest of it. Your partner apprised of the state of your hand, by the fall of your smaller card in the subsequent round, will probably deem it prudent to strive by defensive tactics to avert total defeat in that suit, rather than to contend single-handed against the combined strength of the opponents. ”

“ DO NOT FORCE YOUR PARTNER IF YOU ARE WEAK IN TRUMPS.
For you thus weaken him, and leave it in the power of the antagonists to draw all the trumps, and bring in their suit. If, then, a good partner refrains from forcing you, you may be sure he is weak; on the other hand, if he evidently intends to force you (as by leading a losing card of a suit he knows you must trump) , you may assume that he is strong in trumps, and you should take the force willingly, even though you do not want to be forced, depending on his strength to exhaust the adversaries' trumps. ”

“ When you have won the first trick in your partner's lead cheaply, you must be cautious in returning it, as the strength must be between your partner and your right-hand adversary. For example, say A, Y, B, Z, are the four players, and that they sit in this order round the table, so that A leads and Z is last player. If A leads a small card of a plain suit, Y plays a small one, and B (third player) puts on his best card, the queen, which wins the trick, it is clear that Z can have neither ace nor king ”

“ The state of the game and of the score will often direct as to a finesse late in a hand. Thus, if you hold a winning card, and want one trick to save or win the game, of course you should not run any risk. A finesse against even one card is generally wrong, if, by playing otherwise, you prevent the adversary from scoring three or five. A finesse is almost always bad, if by not finessing you insure the odd trick, as that makes a difference of two to the score. ”

“ You will not often be driven to open a weak suit originally, as one of your suits must contain as many as four cards. But it may so turn out that your four-card suit is composed of very small cards indeed, in which case you might prefer to open a suit containing better cards, though numerically weaker. Every one can see that ace, king, queen, is a better suit to open than five, four, three, two; but, as you descend in one scale and ascend in the other, there comes a point where the two descriptions of strength nearly or quite balance. ”

“ The principal general exception to playing a small card second hand, is when the circumstances of the hand cause you to seize any chance of getting the lead, as when you want to stop a lead of trumps, or to lead trumps yourself. ”

“ When you do not head a trick, you throw away your lowest card to economise your strength. Thus, with queen and two small ones, you would not throw the queen to king led. It is an error to suppose that it is of no consequence which card you play when you hold only small cards or cards in sequence. It is not of much consequence as regards merely the chance of making tricks; but it is of great importance in affording information to partner. ”

“ The question naturally arises, How is it that a player gains any advantage by publishing information to the table? It is often argued, and with much show of reason, that as almost every revelation concerning your hand must be given to the whole table, and that as you have two adversaries and only one partner, you publish information at a disadvantage. ”

“ Again, if you have a wretched hand and you are love to three or four, you assume that the game is lost, unless your partner is very strong; and if he is very strong, the trump is the best lead for him. ”

“ At Trick 6, Y's play in continuing the trump is open to criticism. His better lead seems to be knave of diamonds. Z wins his partner's ten of trumps in order to draw all the trumps. It is very bad play, for if Z passes the ten, and Y leads the knave of diamonds, the game is certain. This is an example of the very common error of winning partner's trick. It should seldom be done, and only if a positive advantage can be well-nigh demonstrated from doing it. ”

“ It is clear that A can have at most two hearts; consequently, if Y leads his tierce major in hearts, he must lose the game, as the opponents have two by honours. But, if Y can give his partner the lead, and Z has four more clubs, or the winning club, and A makes the mistake of trumping it, YZ may make every trick, and win the game.
Y would be right to play as he does even if A had led from only four spades. ”

“ Some players can never be brought to understand this; they do not like to see their winning cards trumped, and therefore frequently change their suit or even lead trumps when an adversary refuses to be forced.
It now hardly requires to be stated that it is bad play intentionally to force a weak adversary, and still [Pg 132] worse to lead a suit to which both adversaries renounce, as the weak will trump and the strong get rid of a losing card.
If you have numerical strength in trumps, you are justified in forcing your partner, relying on your own strength to disarm the opponents. ”

“ The instructed player frequently selects one card in preference to another with the sole object of affording information. When the principle is carried thus far, the play becomes purely conventional. For example: you naturally win a trick as cheaply as possible; if, fourth hand, you could win with a ten, you would not waste an ace. But suppose you hold knave and ten, which card should then be played? The knave and ten in one hand are of equal value, and therefore to win with the knave would be no unnecessary sacrifice of strength. ”

“ In selecting a suit for the lead, numerical strength is the principal point to look to; for it must be borne in mind that aces and kings are not the only cards which make tricks; twos and threes may become quite as valuable when the suit is established—i.e., when the higher cards of the suit are exhausted. To obtain for your own small cards a value that does not intrinsically belong to them, and to prevent the adversary from obtaining it for his, is evidently an advantage. Both these ends are advanced by choosing for your original lead the suit in which you have the greatest numerical strength ”

“ Another reason in favour of leading the lowest is, that it increases your chance of making tricks in the first two rounds. For in the first round of a suit the second hand generally puts on his smallest card, as will be seen hereafter. If, therefore, you originally lead the smallest, holding ace and others, the first trick will, in all probability, lie between your partner and the last player; and since there is no reason why the fourth player should hold a better card than the third, it is nearly an even chance that your partner wins the trick. ”

“ If your partner opens a suit, late in a hand, with a high card, your play, third hand, will depend on your judgment of the character of the lead. If it is probable that your partner has led from a weak suit, you will often be right to finesse king, knave, &c., or to pass his card altogether, so as not to give up the entire command of the suit. ”

“ PLAY YOUR HIGHEST CARD THIRD HAND,
in order to strengthen your partner. You presume that he leads from his strong suit, and wants to get the winning cards of it out of his way; you, therefore, do not finesse, but play your highest, remembering that you play the lowest of a sequence.
With ace, queen (and, of course, ace, queen, knave, &c., in sequence) you do finesse, for, in this case, the finesse cannot be left to your partner. In trumps you may finesse ace, knave, if an honour is turned up to your right. Some players finesse knave with king, knave, &c. ”

“ The fall of the cards may, one time or another, modify nearly every rule of play. A player who simply follows rule, and fails to grasp the situations in which rule should be departed from, is a mere machine without intelligence. General principles only apply to the general case; to apply them to particular cases, observation, inference, and judgment are essential. Thus, in the Analysis of Leads, it appears that the card which should be led in trumps often differs from the card which should be led in plain suits. ”

“ If a player, or players, under the impression that the game is lost—or won—or for other reasons—throw his or their cards on the table face upwards, such cards are exposed, and liable to be called, each player's by the adversary; but should one player alone retain his hand, he cannot be forced to abandon it. ”

“ When a player obtains the lead, for the first time, after one or more tricks have been played, he may open his strong suit in the same way as though he were the original leader. On the other hand, he may deem it advisable to open a weak suit; or to lead through a strong one, or up to a weak one; or, if great strength in trumps has been declared against him, may wish to conceal the fact that his best suit is only a very long one of small cards (see Hand IX, Tricks 6 and 7) ”

“ When you ask for trumps, you command your partner to abandon his own game, and to lead a trump; and you promise him, in return, if he has reasonably good cards, either to win the game or to make a considerable score. It has been laid down, that the minimum strength in trumps which justifies you in issuing such an order to your partner is four trumps, two being honours, or five trumps, one being an honour, accompanied by such cards in your own or your partner's suits that you are reasonably secure of not having a suit brought in against you. ”

“ The position of the trumps (spades) is known. A leads a heart, B trumps it. If Z overtrumps he loses the other two tricks, but if he throws the ace of diamonds he wins the other two tricks.
This rule for not overtrumping cannot be laid down absolutely when there are more than three cards in hand; but when only four trumps remain in, second and third best against best and fourth, it is so frequently advisable not to overtrump, that the player should consider well the position of the remaining cards before overtrumping. ”

“ It is the duty of a player to make the game as easy to his partner as he can. The play often depends on the sort of partner. For example:—you lead the ten from king, queen, knave, ten, only, or from king, knave, ten, &c. Suppose the lead to be from the former combination, and that your ten forces the ace from the fourth hand. You obtain the lead again. The proper lead now is the queen. ”

“ In the suit of your own choosing, you are presumably stronger than your partner; it is therefore undesirable at once to part with your high cards. Hence it is best, in general, to lead the smallest. Your partner, actuated by a desire to assist in establishing your strong suit, will play his highest card to your lead (see Play of Third Hand, p. 92) , and, if he fails to win the trick, will, at all events, force a higher card from the fourth player, and so help to clear the suit for you. ”

“ Thus with queen, knave, and two small trumps, a four suit with an honour, say for example, knave, ten, nine, and a small one, king guarded in the third suit, and queen guarded in the fourth, a small trump if it finds partner with an honour is by no means unlikely to win the game. If partner turns out very weak in trumps the leader must alter his plan, and, instead of continuing the trump lead, play to make three, five or seven tricks according to the fall of the cards in plain suits. ”

“ Any one, having the lead and several winning cards to play, should not draw a second card out of his hand until his partner has played to the first trick, such act being a distinct intimation that the former has played a winning card. ”

“ The Management of Trumps is, perhaps, the most difficult of the problems presented to the Whist-player. Before discussing the special uses of trumps, it may be observed that in some few hands trumps are led like plain suits, because they are your strongest suit, and you prefer leading them to opening a weak suit. ”

“ If you are at the score of three, the adversaries being love, one, or two, you should not lead a trump merely because you have five trumps with two honours, if they are unaccompanied by a very strong suit, or by good cards in each suit. ”