"Who will believe that man could e'er exist Who spent near half an age in studying Whist; Grew grey with Calculation,--Labour hard!-- As if Life's business centred in a card? That such there is, let me to those appeal, Who with such liberal hands reward his zeal. Lo! Whist he makes a science; and our Peers Deign to turn school-boys in their riper years; Kings too, and Viceroys, proud to play the game, Devour his learned page in quest of Fame: While lordly sharpers dupe away at WHITE's, And scarce leave one poor cull for common bites."
Though Mr. Barrington has not assigned any grounds for supposing that Whist was the same game as that which was formerly called Trumps, or Trump, it is not unlikely that he was induced to suggest the possibility of their being the same from his having read, in 'The Compleat Gamester,' that Whist differed but little from the game called English Ruff and Honours, and in consequence of his having learnt, from Cotgrave's Dictionary, that Ruff and Trump were the same.[194] He says, in a note, that "In 1664, a book was published, entitled 'The Compleat Gamester,' which takes no notice of Whisk." Though it be true that "Whisk" is not named in the first edition of the book--printed in 1674, not 1664--yet the following passage, distinctly asserting that Whist was then a common game in all parts of England, appears in the second edition published in 1680.
"Ruff and Honours (by some called Slam), and Whist, are games so common in England, in all parts thereof, that every child almost, of eight years, hath a competent knowledge in that recreation; and therefore I am more unwilling to speak anything more of them than this, that there may be a great deal of art used in dealing and playing at these games, which differ very little one from the other." In the 'Memoirs of the most Famous Gamesters, from the reign of Charles II, to that of Queen Anne,' 1714, a sharper named Johnson, who was hanged in 1690, is mentioned as having excelled in the art of securing honours for himself and partner when dealing at Whist; and in the works of Taylor the Water-poet, printed in 1630, Whisk is mentioned among the games at which the prodigal squanders his money:
"The prodigalls estate like to a flux, The Mercer, Draper, and the Silkman sucks: The Taylor, Millainer, Dogs, Drabs, and Dice, Trey-trip, or Passage, or the Most-at-thrice. At Irish, Tick-tacke, Doublets, Draughts, or Chesse, He flings his money free with carelessnesse: At Novum, Mumchance, Mischance (chuse ye which), At One-and-thirty, or at Poor-and-rich, Ruffe, Slam, Trump, Noddy, Whisk, Hole, Sant, New-cut. Unto the keeping of four Knaves he'll put His whole estate; at Loadum or at Gleeke, At Tickle-me quickly, he's a merry Greek; At Primifisto, Post-and payre, Primero, Maw, Whip-her-ginny, he's a lib'ral hero; At My-sow pigg'd: but (reader, never doubt ye) He's skill'd in all games, except Looke about ye. Bowles, Shove-groat, Tennis, no game comes amiss, His purse a nurse for anybody is; Caroches, Coaches, and Tobacconists, All sorts of people freely from his fists His vaine expenses daily sucke and soake, And he himself suckes only drinke and smoake. And thus the Prodigall, himselfe alone, Gives sucke to thousands, and himself sucks none."[195]