Pawn

“ The pawns move forward one square at a time, except when a pawn is situated in front of a hostile piece with an unoccupied space on the further side, in which case the hostile pawn must be jumped, as at draughts, but without removing the jumped pawn from the board. ”

“ It is not always right to take your adversary’s pawn with your king, for very often it happens to be a safeguard and protection to him. Place a black rook on 5, with a pawn on 45, and the white king on 53, and he will be sheltered by the black pawn from the attack of the rook. ”

“ But will the men of these times, who boast that they have got the world in pawn, contribute so much as one nether garment to posterity four thousand years hence? The world changes hands every thirty years, and a new set of pawn-keepers appears ”

“ The student will remember that a gambit means the sacrifice of a Piece or Pawn for the sake of an advantage that is to be gained later by the first player. Each player, in turn, moves his KP to K4 and then the first player moves his KBP to KB4, where it is in a position to be captured by the adverse Pawn.
The student will note that in each of these openings, the first move of each player is identical, i.e., the KP to K4. This opening move clears the way for the King, the Queen, and the King's Bishop, if the player cares to develop them. ”

“ Pawns have been taken and restored in all classes, from the Sovereign, who pawns or loses his crown, to the Lady whose reputation is in pawn, and becomes at last not worth half a crown. Shuffling, cutting, dealing out and [358] dealing in, double dealing and double faces, have long been the order of the day. ”

“ But, if a pawn is moved, or a piece is captured, the counting must begin again.
A “minor piece” means either a knight or a bishop. “Winning the exchange” signifies capturing a rook in exchange for a minor piece. A “passed pawn” is one that has no adverse pawn either in front or on either of the adjoining files. A “file” is simply a line of squares extending vertically from one end of the board to the other. An “open file” is one on which no piece or pawn of either colour is standing. A pawn or piece is en prise when one of the enemy’s men can capture it. ”

“ Out of every hundred people born in the world, ninety-nine are pawns and always will be. So you’ve plenty of company.
[187]
“A pawn,” he went on, “is very much handicapped in his movements. If he chooses, at the beginning of the game he may move forward two squares. After that he must cover only one square at a time, and that straight ahead.
“Knights, bishops, castles, queen, these have far greater freedom of movement. These, in life, are the highly successful ones, the great scientists and other scholars, successful lawyers, merchant princes. ”

“ From the standpoint of the war as a whole, we have, for the time being, but I agree quite unnecessarily, and as the result of some bad bungling somewhere, lost a pawn, and a pawn that, if employed in another direction, might and should have been extremely useful. ”

“ As we rode up on the prairie, the herd of ponies thundered by, and swept down the bluffs to the camp. The rolling expanse before us was dotted with Indians, each one urging forward his horse to its utmost speed. Many of them were already a long way in advance, and were passing over the furthest high bluff, which seemed to rise up and meet the sky. Hard as we might push our ponies, there was little hope that we would be in time to have any hand in the encounter—if one took place—between the Pawnees and their hereditary foes. ”

“ There are grades in pawning as in everything else, and distinctions must be observed even in poverty. The aristocratic Spanish cloak and the plebeian calico shirt, the silver fork and the flat iron, the muslin cravat and the Belcher neckerchief, would but ill assort together; so, the better sort of pawnbroker calls himself a silver-smith, and decorates his shop with handsome trinkets and expensive jewellery, while the more humble money-lender boldly advertises his calling, and invites observation. ”

“ Then, if he comes not forth when the charming serpent takes him by the hand, and bids him, the Pawnees shall smoke him out like a fox, and his blazing habitation shall make night pale, and there shall be no resting place for his foot, and children and squaws shall whip him into the forest, and set the dogs upon his trail, and he shall be hunted from hill to hill, from river to river, from prairie to prairie, from forest to forest, till, like the frightened deer, he rushes, panting, into the great lakes, and the waters rise over him, and cover him from the Pawnees’ scorn. ”

“ A young man named Crazy Wolf stood up and spoke; and when he had finished, the interpreter said, “That man has given you a black horse, the best that he has.”
[Pg 62] Another young man on the other side of the lodge spoke, and the interpreter said, “He has given you a roan horse, the best that he has.” Then all the Wichitas began to speak at once, and before they knew it, the Pawnees had ten head of horses, and robes and blankets, saddles, bridles, shields, spears and moccasins—many beautiful presents. So they were well provided. ”

“ The space between the mountains and the river, on each side of the village, was thickly planted with close ranks of prickly pear, impassable to man or beast, so that the only way in which the Pawnees could be attacked was in front, by forcing a passage across the river, which could not be effected without a great loss of life, as the Pawnees are a brave people and well supplied with rifles, although in their prairie hunts they prefer to use their lances and their arrows. ”

“ In ancient times the Pawnees had no horses and went hunting on foot. Arrow heads were made of flint or deer horns. Until a recent date, the old stone arrow heads were believed to have supernatural power. White traders introduced those made of iron. The warriors were skillful marksmen and the bow and arrow remained the favorite weapon as long as there were buffaloes to kill. The endurance of the Pawnees, when hunting, was remarkable. In the first place, scouts were sent out to look up a herd. Having discovered one, they returned with information regarding its location. ”

“ It was a monument raised by superstition, for the Pawnees never undertake an expedition against the savages who may be hostile to their tribe, or against the wild beasts of the forest, without commencing the chase, or war, by some religious ceremony, performed amidst these heaps of bones. At the sight of them our huntsmen raised a cry of joy; they well knew that the plain of the buffaloes was not far off, and they expressed by these shouts the anticipated pleasure of spreading havoc among the peaceful herds. ”

“ QUEEN AGAINST ROOK
This is one of the most difficult endings without Pawns. The resources of the defence are many, and when used skilfully only a very good player will prevail within the limit of fifty moves allowed by the rules. (The rule is that at any moment you may demand that your opponent mate you within fifty moves. However, every time a piece is exchanged or a Pawn advanced the counting must begin afresh.)
Example 40.—This is one of the standard positions which Black can often bring about. ”

“ So this man was the greatest of all warriors, and was brave. He was like a bear. He originated the bear dance which still exists among the tribe of Pawnees. He came to be an old man, and at last died of old age. I suspect the old bear died at the same time. ”

“ The Pawnees, when they went on the warpath, were always prepared to simulate wolves. This was one of their regular practices, and this no doubt was one reason for their remarkable success in taking horses, for it enabled them to escape observation and to reconnoitre at close quarters without danger of discovery. ”

“ When the pawns begin to cry out in the plaintive way of pawns, they are hushed before they become disturbing. It is in this power to play the game on its own artificial lines, and yet to play with pieces made scrupulously after the pattern of nature, that Mrs. ”

“ Bird recognized it at once. It had come from a bone breast-plate, worn by warriors to protect them from the arrows of their foes. For some moments he stared at it in silence. Then he gave it to Little Raven.
"Now we know that those ponies carried riders," said White Otter. "They are not our friends, the Cheyennes. They are warriors."
"I believe they are Pawnees," declared Sun Bird. ”

“ The Blackfeet Indians have often told me the same thing about the stone arrow heads which they used in early times.
Game, which inhabited the underbrush or the forest, was captured by a method similar to that employed to secure the buffalo. If the Pawnees discovered that deer or elk were in a piece of timber, they would surround it, and then alarm the game, and keep them from breaking through the line of men. The animals, frightened and confused, would run round and round in a circle until exhausted, when the Pawnees would close in, and kill them with their arrows. ”

“ Each player, it will be observed, has eight superior Pieces or officers, and eight minor ones which are called Pawns; and, for the purpose of distinction, the Pieces and Pawns of one party are of a different color from those of the other. ”

“ The beautiful pony bounds out of the picture with great spirit and grace, guided by his happy, round-faced rider, whose right hand lifts a bâton, and whose left holds the bridle. The brilliant colors of his riding-costume make the picture exceedingly effective in rich, warm tints,—the green velvet jacket and the red-and-gold scarf,—while the young cavalier’s fluttering streamers and the horse’s sweeping mane and tail give a swift breezy motion to the whole scene. ”

“ When the knight, who was a very handsome young man, rode up, he wondered to see the marvellous tree of gold and silver, and said to the two sisters, ‘Whose is this beautiful tree? Whoever will give me a twig of it shall have whatever she wants.’ Then Little One-eye and Little Three-eyes answered that the tree belonged to them, and that they would certainly break him off a twig. They gave themselves a great deal of trouble, but in vain; the twigs and fruit bent back every time from their hands. ”

“ Poor beasts, there was every description of horse, pony, or mule forced into the service, but an all-prevailing similarity of lean sides and projecting bones, of staring unkempt coats, gradually approaching similar colour as the red mud dried upon their hides. ”

“ This was Pan, who became the god of the shepherds, and the companion of the mountain nymphs, penetrating through the densest thickets, and inhabiting the most wild, rough, and lofty summits of the sylvan Arcadia. There it is his business to destroy the wild beasts; and when, having returned from hunting, he drives his sheep into a cave, he plays upon his reeds a tune sweet as the song of any bird in spring. ”

“ Then the Duck assumed the Queen’s shape, went up to the child’s room, tucked him up comfortably in his cradle, and then swam back down the gutter again, in the likeness of a Duck. This was repeated for two nights, and on the third the Duck said to the Scullion:
‘Go and tell the King to swing his sword three times over me on the threshold.’
The Scullion did as the creature bade him, and the King came with his sword and swung it three times over the bird, and lo and behold! his wife stood before him once more, alive, and as blooming as ever. ”

“ But the young Lion liked the taste of horse-meat, and he caught and killed pony after pony.
Soon the king heard that a Lion was killing the ponies when they went to bathe in the river. "Build a tank inside the town," said the king. "The lion will not get the ponies there." But the Lion killed the ponies as they bathed in the tank. ”

“ He could just see the very pony he wanted: an iron-gray little fellow with a black mane and tail—just such a pony as he had seen, and priced, at the county fair that fall, And he could just imagine how it would feel to have that sturdy little fellow under him and to go galloping off over the country roads with the breeze in his face and the gravel flying behind, and the jolly good fun of covering long distances, of running races, and of learning the hundred possible tricks of riding. ”

“ The wanderer, if not a first-rate walker, will do well to mount a pony—a forest pony, be it said; for they know a bog when they see it, and will not set foot upon its promising but treacherous surface. ”

“ Gazing ahead, the piercing eyes of the young pony rider saw every tree, bush, and rock, for he knew but too well that a deadly foe, lurking in ambush, might send an arrow or a bullet to his heart at any moment. ”

“ Under his hands the wild traits disappeared, the short-sighted pony grew into a long-sighted hunter, sound hoofs and limbs were softened to unsoundness, the language of signs gave place to understanding of human speech, while discipline of the harem and the herd became obedience in the fields of sport, of labour, or soldier service. ”

“ If the ponies were not marvels, it could not be done; and if one were not a safe rider, one certainly could not stick on. The pony gives a strong hoist of his fore-legs, and you are up one rock and hanging on by his withers; then a strong hoist of the hind legs and you are nearly over his neck; and this goes on for hours; and when it is beyond the pony you climb on your feet, and ford the torrents as best you may.
Up and up the steep banks of the river we climbed, among the pines and mighty tumbled boulders. ”

“ The lion sprang at the Red Knight, and would have torn him in pieces had not the princess held him back, and bidden him to change himself into a man again. And in a second a man took the place of the lion.
‘Now become a bear,’ said she; and a bear advanced panting and stretching out his arms to the Red Knight, who shrank behind the princess. ”

“ Is that active little fellow, who, with race-horse coat and full flanks, moves under his rider with the light step and the action of a pony—is he the same animal as that starved and head-bowed object of the North, subject for all pity and cruelty, and clothed with rags and insult? ”