boy asks who strikes. If the boy guessed wrongly, he made a forfeit, but if rightly, he was released.] This sport is mentioned as follows by Gay: "As at hot-cockles once I laid me down, I felt the weighty hand of many a clown; Quick rose and read soft mischief in her eye." A humorous writer in the Gent. Mag. for Feb. 1738, says: "Hot cockles and more sacks to the mill were certainly invented in the highest times of ignorance and superstition, when the laity were hoodwinked, and a parcel of monks were saddling their backs and bastinadoeing them." Cornelius Scriblerus says: "The chytrindra described by Julius Pollux is certainly not our hot-cockle; for that was by pinching, and not by striking: though there are good authors who affirm the rathapygismus to be yet nearer the modern hot-cockles. My son Martin may use either of them indifferently, they being equally antique." Pope's Works, vi. 116. HUNT THE SLIPPER. THIS game is noticed by Mr. Rogers in the Pleasures of Memory, 1. 35: ""Twas here we chas'd the slipper by its sound.” IRISH. An old game, similar to backgammon, but more complicated. It is thus alluded to in Hall's Horæ Vacivæ, 1646: "The inconstancy of Irish fitly represents the changeablenesse of humane occurrences, since it ever stands so fickle that one malignant throw can quite ruine a never so well-built game. Art hath here a great sway, by reason if one cannot well stand the first assault, hee may safely retire back to an after game." KISSING THE POST. BAGFORD, in his Letter relating to the Antiquities of London, printed in the first vol. of Leland's Collectanea, 1770, and dated Feb. 1, 1714-15, p. lxxvi. says: "This brings to my mind another ancient custom, that hath been omitted of late years. It seems that, in former times, the porters that ply'd at Billingsgate used civilly to intreat and desire every man that passed that way to salute a post that stood there in a vacant place. If he refused to do this, they forthwith laid hold of him, and by main force bouped his **** against the post; but, if he quietly submitted to kiss the same, and paid down sixpence, then they gave him a name, and chose some one of the gang for his godfather. I believe this was done in memory of some old image that formerly stood there, perhaps of Belius, or Belin." He adds: "Somewhat of the like post, or rather stump, was near St. Paul's, and is at this day call'd St. Paul's stump." It is the duty of the Rector of St. Mary-at-Hill, in which parish Billingsgate is situated, to preach a sermon every year on the first Sunday after Midsummer day, before the Society of Fellowship Porters, exhorting them to be charitable towards their old decayed brethren, and "to bear one another's burthens." The stump spoken of by Bagford is probably alluded to in Good Newes and Bad Newes, by S. R., 1622, where the author, speaking of a countryman who had been to see the sights of London, mentions "The water-workes, huge Paul's, old Charing Crosse, KIT-CAT. ["A GAME played by boys; easier to play than to describe. Three small holes are made in the ground, triangularly, about twenty feet apart, to mark the position of as many boys, who each holds a small stick, about two feet long. Three other boys of the adverse side pitch successively a piece of stick, a little bigger than one's thumb called cat, to be struck by those holding the sticks. On its being struck, the boys run from hole to hole, dipping the ends of their sticks in as they pass, and counting one, two, three, &c. as they do so, up to thirty-one, which is game. Or the greater number of holes gained in the innings may indicate the winners, as at cricket. If the cat be struck and caught, the striking party is out, and another of his sidesmen takes his place, if the set be strong enough to admit of it. If there be only six players, it may be previously agreed that three put outs shall end the innings. Another mode of putting out is to throw the cat home, after being struck, and placing or pitching it into an unoccupied hole, while the in-party are running. A certain number of misses (not striking the cat) may be agreed on to be equivalent to a put out. The game may be played by two, placed as at cricket, or by four, or I believe more. Moor.] وو KIT-CAT-CANNIO. ["A SEDENTARY game, played by two, with slate and pencil, or pencil and paper, like kit-cat, easier learned than described. It is won by the party who can first get three marks (0's or x's) in a line; the marks being made alternately by the players 0 or x in one of the nine spots equidistant in three rows, when complete. He who begins has the advantage, as he can contrive to get his mark in the middle." Moor.] LEAP-CANDLE. ["THE young girls in and about Oxford have a sport called leap-candle, for which they set a candle in the middle of the room in a candlestick, and then draw up their coats in the form of breeches, and dance over the candle back and forth, with these words: The taylor of Bisiter, He has but one eye; He cannot cut a pair of green galagaskins, This sport in other parts is called dancing the candle rush." Aubrey's MS. ap. Thoms, p. 96. The verses here quoted are still common in the nursery.] LEVEL-COIL. NARES, in his Glossary, says this is " a game of which we seem to know no more than that the loser in it was to give up his place to be occupied by another. Minshew gives it thus: To play at levell coil, G. jouer à cul léve: i. e. to play and lift up your taile when you have lost the game, and let another sit down in your place.' Coles, in his English Dictionary, seems to derive it from the Italian leva il culo, and calls it also pitch-buttock. In his Latin Dictionary he has level-coil, alternation, cession;' and 'to play at level coil, vices ludendi præbere.' Skinner is a little more particular, and says, ‘Vox tesseris globulosis ludentium propria:' an expression belonging to a game played with little round tesseræ. He also derives it from French and Italian. It is mentioned by Jonson, Tale of a Tub, iii. 2: 'Young Justice Bramble has kept level-coyl Here in our quarters, stole away our daughter.' "Gifford says that, in our old dramatists, it implies riot and disturbance; but I have seen it in no other passage. Coil, indeed, alone signifies riot or disturbance; but level coil is not referred by any to the English words, but to French or Italian. The same sport is mentioned by Sylvester, Dubartas, IV. iv. 2, under the name of level-sice: 'By tragick death's device Ambitious hearts do play at level-sice.' "In the margin we have this explanation: A kinde of Christmas play, wherein each hunteth the other from his seat. The name seems derived from the French levez sus, in English, arise up.'" See further in Halliwell's Dictionary, p. 516. LOADUM. [A GAME at cards, thus mentioned in Poor Robin's Almanack for the year 1755: "Now some at cards and dice do play LOGGATS. STEEVENS, says: "This is a game played in several parts of England even at this time. A stake is fixed into the ground; those who play, throw loggats at it, and he that is nearest the stake wins. I have seen it played in different counties at their sheep-shearing feasts, where the winner was entitled to a black fleece, which he afterwards presented to the farmer's maid to spin for the purpose of making a petticoat, and on condition that she knelt down on the fleece to be kissed by all the rustics present." Malone says: "Loggeting in the fields is mentioned for the first time, among other new and crafty games and plays, in the statute of 33 Hen. VIII. c. 9. Not being mentioned in former acts against unlawful games, it was probably not practised long before the statute of Henry VIII. was made.' وو "A loggat-ground," says Blount, another of the commentators on Shakespeare, "like a skittle-ground, is strewed with ashes, but is more extensive. A bowl, much larger than the jack of the game of bowls is thrown first. The pins, which I believe are called loggats, are much thinner and lighter at one extremity than the other. The bowl being first thrown, the players take the pins up by the thinner and lighter end, and fling them towards the bowl, and in such a manner that the pins may once turn round in the air, and slide with the thinner extremity foremost, towards the bowl. The pins are about one or two and twenty inches long." |