BIG HANDS.

This is a hand that is stocked, and is put up very often in playing for fun, in order to get bets on it, as it is much more easy to stock in playing for fun than otherwise, as there seems to be no occasion for watching, and the dealer will so stock them as to give his opponent a hand that he would be easily enticed to bet on; for, to all appearance, it would be as easy for him to make four as two, and he very readily bets on it. Now, we will suppose him to be three. He gets, at the next deal, an ace, king, queen, jack, ten, and deuce of diamonds, and clubs are turned up trumps. He gives himself six low cards without any game. You then beg : he runs them, and gives you the remaining three kings, and himself the remaining three aces, turning a club for trumps. If you are silent, he will say, "My hand is poor, and I will give you all you can make," and, you having a very superior hand, viz., ace, king, queen, jack, ten, and deuce of trumps, with the kings of spades, clubs, and hearts, will claim four times, and so would any player, from the poorest to the best; your hand bids more than fair to make it. But he will readily offer to bet you cannot; the greater the amount, the better for him, as he is sure of winning. He takes your bet, and plays; and after you have played out your trumps, his three aces catch your three kings, which altogether count him twenty-one, while your ace, king, queen, jack, and ten of trumps count you but twenty, and he wins the game. This hand is very deceptive, and unusually enticing; it will deceive the very best players, and I have seen men bet on it the second and third time, thinking they had surely made a misplay; but it is impossible for them to win unless the dealer chooses to let them, in order to entice them still further on, or to get a larger bet on the same game again; for which purpose they sometimes choose to play in a manner that is called "throwing the game away," in order to make you think that when you lost you might have won if you had played rightly. I have seen bets run as high as five to one in favour of this hand ; so certain was the holder of winning, that he readily risked this odds ; but he invariably lost. Variation.—You may be playing for amusement only; the dealer will lay out two hands, with their faces upward ; one will be a very good hand, and the other a very poor one. He will then tell you that you can make any suit trumps which you please, and take choice of hands. Of course you will make the trump to suit the best hand. He will then offer to bet you a sum that you cannot take the good hand and make four, or the poor hand and make one. The good hand promises so fairly to make four, that you would be very likely to bet and take the good hand. But you would lose; for you could only make high, low, jack, and ten for game, while he would make eleven and beat you. This is a very enticing trick, and I would advise all persons not to bet on it, if it should ever be proposed to them. The player says, you may have choice ; but he, by all means, prefers that you would take the large hand, and try to make four; for the little hand can always make one if played right; but very few men who play cards will make one from it. None but veterans, or such as have, through particular favour, been initiated into the secret by them, will do it: for there are so many ways to play it wrong that it is seldom played right. There are, also, other games where the cards are turned up similarly to the one just described; but never suffer yourself to be enticed into betting on any of them; for the man that will propose them will always beat you.

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