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So moves of majesty, the bulky weight,
Now regal only in his port and gate:

His guards, his army, and his pride, subdued,
By pawns insulted, little pawns pursued;

Till penn'd and pounded by the puny bands,

Where late he reigned, he there close prisoner stands."

When a messenger informed Alamin Ben Haroun that the city of Bagdad was besieged, the caliph silenced him, saying, "Don't you see that I am on the point of giving checkmate?" The same potentate sought out the best players of his empire, brought them to court and pensioned them. His father, Abdallah III, used to bewail his sad fate in having more capacity for governing nations than for moving chess

men.

Ben Ziad, a caliph of Mecca, was also very fond of the game. "Is it not extraordinary," said he to a favorite with whom he was playing, "that sixteen pieces of ivory, placed on so small a plane, should give me more trouble to manage than so many millions of men that cover the vast empire of my domains?"

Seneca relates of one Canius Julius, that he was playing at chess when the centurion, who was leading a troop of condemned men to death, commanded him also to join them. As the game was unfinished, he said to his opponent, "Beware, when I am dead, that thou beliest me not, and say thou hast won the game." Then addressing the centurion, he said, "Bear me witness that I have the advantage by one," and directed his steps to the place of execution.

Although we can find no definite traces of the game in England be fore its introduction by the French in the eleventh century, it was scat vered over Europe at the time of Charlemagne*, and received a new impulse upon the return of the crusaders. Alphonso X, king of Castile, and Pope Innocent III, are both said to have written works upon it, and from an unknown Italian author of the thirteenth century an illuminated missal is extant containing a treatise in Latin hexameter upon chess. The manuscript states, after describing the pieces and moves, that the board represents the heavens, the squares the constellations, and the pieces the sun, moon and planets. He then continues : "The king is the sun, the pawn is Saturn, the knight is Mars, the queen is Venus, Alphynus the bishop is Jupiter, and the rook is the traveling moon.†

*A set of chess-men said to have been those with which this emperor was wont to play, are in the royal treasury of St. Denis, near Paris. The king is seated on a throne, the whole figure being about a foot in height. The queen, crowned, occupies a smaller throne. Two archers, who take the place of bishops, hold each a drawn bow; next to these are two centaurs, and lastly two elephants. The sixteen pawns resemble soldiers, and are armed with swords.

"Rex est sol, pedes est Saturnus, Mars quodque miles, regia virgo Venus, Alphynus Episcopus ipse est Iuppiter, et roccus discurrens luna.'"

In the Syntagma Dissertagmionum of Thomas Hyde, Professor of Arabic in the University of Oxford, published in 1694, we read that the ancient Irish were exceedingly fond of chess, and that, amongst them, the possession of some valuable estates has been decided by the game. The heirs of two noble families, the doctor says, hold their lands upon this tenure, that one of them shall encounter the other at chess, and that whoever of them should conquer shall retain the estate of his opponent; therefore, they, managing the affair prudently among themselves, meet by appointment perhaps once a year to indulge in this pastime, one of them makes a move, and the other takes a year before eplying. A scribe commits to writing the situation of the game, which by this method may continue from one generation to another.

Prince Henry, the youngest son of the Conqueror, afterwards Henry I, was sent with his brother Robert to the French court, and on a certain day after dinner he encountered Louis, the king's eldest son, at chess, and won so much money from him that Louis, losing his temper, reproached Henry with the base birth of his father and threw the pieces in his face. Henry took up the board and struck his antagonist with such force that he drew blood, and would have killed him had not his brother Robert interfered. King John was also a chess player, aud was so engrossed in a game when the deputies from Rouen came to notify him that their city was besieged by Philip Augustus, that he turned a deaf ear to their words until he had finished.

Some of the early players were quite expert at this pursuit while blindfolded, and others could play three or four games at one time. A Saracen named Buzecca visited Florence in 1266, and played simultaniously with three of the most skillful masters in that city. He saw but one board of the three, and won two games, the third ending in a drawn battle. Salvio, who wrote a treatise on chess, Ze one, Mediano, and the "chess-bishop," Ruy Lopez of Spain, Mangrolino of Florence, and Paoli Boi of Syracuse, were all accomplished blindfold players. Keysler informs us that Sacchieri, a Jesuit of Turin, who possessed a most wonderful memory, could play with three different opponents, without seeing one of the boards, and moreover converse with the company during the time of play. If any dispute happened to arise bout the situation of any piece or pawn, he could repeat every move made by both contestants from the beginning of the game, in order to ascertain the location of the piece.

Tamerlane was extremely fond of chess, and invented several forms of chess boards for the improvement of the military art, in order to represent the various evolutions of an army on the battle field. He himself was engaged in a game during the very time of the decisive battle with Bajazet, the Turkish emperor, who was totally defeated and taken prisoner. In the "Chronicle of the Moorish Kings of Granada," there is related that, in 1396, Mehemed Balba seized upon the

crown which justly belonged to his elder brother, and spent his life in a succession of disasters. His wars with Castile always terminated so unsuccessfully, that finally, finding his position desperate, he despatched an alcayde to the fort of Salobrena to assassinate his brother Jussef, lest those who espoused the cause of the latter should form any obstaeles to his (Mehemed's) son's succession. The officer found Jussef engaged at a game of chess with a priest, and when the prince learned the motive of the messenger, he begged for two hours' respite, which was at first denied, but finally the officer relented so far, in that he allowed him to finish the game; before its termination, however, word was brought of the death of Mehemed, and the unanimous election of Jussef to the throne.

In 1475 appeared the second book ever printed in the English language, The Game and Playe of the Chesse.* "Fynysshid the last day of Marche the yer of our lord god. a. thousand foure honderd and lxxiiij." It contains little or nothing, however, upon the subject which its titlepage would lead us to surmise, being devoted to "thauctorites, dictees, and stories of auncient Doctours philosophes poetes and of other wyse men whiche been recounted & applied vnto the moralite of the publique wele as well as of the nobles as of the comyn peple after the game and playe of the chesse."

We may here recount a few of the famous Englishmen who took delight in the "Royal game." Among the monarchs besides those already mentioned, we find Elizabeth, James I and Charles I, the latter of whom was indulging in this pastime when news was brought of the final intention of the Scots to sell him to the English. He continued his game with the utmost composure, and no one could have surmised that the tidings he had received were the reverse of agreeable. William of Orange, Prince Albert and Queen Victoria deserve enumeration among the chess fraternity, and Prince Leopold distinguished himself at Oxford as a fine player.

Philosophy, Science and Art are represented by such names as Lord Bacon, Wollaston the physician, Dr. Roget the mathematician, Flaxman the sculptor, and Proctor the astronomer, who occasionally found time to compose a problem.

But it is among the literati that our search is mostly rewarded, and truly, did space permit, we could mention a host of celebrities who are devotees of the mystic board. Amongst others we discover the Benedictine monk, John Lydgate, the author of the Anatomy of Melancholy, and the almost forgotten poets, Abraham Cowley, Sir John Denham,

* Only twelve copies of this book are known to exist, and consequently it must ever remain a ara avis among collectors. In 1813, Alchorne,s copy, wanting six leaves, fetched £54 12sh. at a uction, while in 1869 Mr. Quaritch offered a copy for sale, wanting seven leaves, for four hundred pounds!!

and Nicholas Breton. The last named has given us a beautiful poetical description of chess, concluding with the following:

L'ENVOY.

"Then rule with care, and quicke conceit,
And fight with knowledge, as with force;
So beare a braine, to dash deceit,
And work with reason and remorse.

Forgive a fault when young men plaie,
So give a mate, and go your way.

"And when you plaie beware of checke,
Know how to save and give a knecke,
And with a checke beware of mate;
But chiefe, ware had I wist too late:

Lose not the Queene, for ten to one,
If she be lost the game is gone."

Sir John Harrington, Walter Raleigh, Earl Chatham, Warton and Edmund Burke must not be forgotten in our list, and Sir W. Jones, Sir Walter Scott, Sydney Smith, Warren the novelist and Buckle the historian were also attached to the game. It may not be generally known that the friendship between Samuel Johnson and Mr. Baretti, which had existed for over thirty years, was broken off on account of a game of chess. It seems that Oinai, a native of Otaheite, became considerably proficient in this game while in London, and at one time defeated Mr. Baretti. The latter was frequently and occasionally unmercifully rallied by the great lexicographer on the subject, and "at length," says Mr. Baretti, "he pushed his banter on at such a rate that he chafed me, and made me so angry that, not being able to put a stop to it, I snatched up my hat and stick and quitted him in a most choleric mood." After the doctor had learned how thoroughly he had offended his friend, he again invited him to his house; but Mr. Baretti was then in the country, and before he returned Johnson was dead.

There is a story told of the Earl of Sunderland, minister to George I., who was a good player, that he upon a certain day had for his opponents the Laird of Cluny and the learned Cunningham, the editor of Horace. Cunningham with too much skill and too much sincerity beat his lordship. "The Earl was so fretted at his superiority and surliness that he dismissed him without any reward. Cluny allowed himself sometimes to be beaten, and by that means got his pardon, with something handsome besides."

Benjamin Franklin compared the game of chess to human life, "in which we have points to gain, and competitors or adversaries to contend with, and in which there is a great variety of good and ill events that are, in some degree, the effects of prudence or the want of it." He contends that by studying it we learn several things, viz.:—forelight, circumspection, caution, and finally "the habit of not being discouraged by present bad appearances in the state of our affairs, the

habit of hoping for a favorable change, and that of persevering in the search of resources."

Catherine de Medici, Henri IV. and Louis XIII. were chess players. Louis XIV., who detested games of chance, and would not allow them to be played at court, was so passionately addicted to chess that he pursued it even when riding in his carriage. Each man had a pin at his foot, which, being stuck into a padded chess-board, resisted the joltings of the royal vehicle. Philidor says that a set of chessmen belonging to Prince Eugene were in the possession of a coffee-house keeper at Rotterdam. They were three inches in height, made of solid chased silver, not different in color, but sufficiently distinguished by one side representing Europeans and the other Mongolians. The famous Prince of Conde seems to have held a similar opinion with Tamerlane, for he contended that it was necessary for an officer, in order to become a good general, to understand chess thoroughly.

Among other French monarchs and statesmen we must not omit, as being partial to the game, the names of Richelieu, Marshal Saxe, Robespierre and Bonaparte, as well as the latter's marshals, Berthier, Murat, and Eugene de Beauharnais. Two of Napoleon's greatest antagonists have figured in chess history: one, Admiral Tchichakoff, who opposed his passage to the Beresina, and the other no less a personage than the Iron Duke himself.

French authors as well as scientists seem to have found spare time for this pursuit, the names of Helvetius the physician, Comenius the grammarian, Voltaire, Rousseau, Marmontel, Baron Holbach, Lacretelle the jurist, and Diderot and D'Alembert the encyclopædists, figuring among the brotherhood. D'Aguesseau, the chancellor of France, was very fond of this exercise, and was accustomed to play with M. de Legalle, the master of Philidor and the best player of his time, for half a crown a game. The latter once proposed deep play to the chancellor, explaining it to be a living at Vincennes, that he wished to procure for an Abbé of his acquaintance. D'Aguesseau had the move, and in advancing his pawn he said "va l'Abbé.' His opponent, though in the advantage, did not desire to win the game, and upon his resigning the chancellor told him that his own victory should not prejudice his friend, and accordingly he gave him the benefice.

There is a curious anecdote told of Ferrand, Count of Flanders, that he was in the habit of being constantly defeated by his wife, with whom he was accustomed to play at chess, so that a mutual hatred took place between them, which finally rose to such a height that when her husband was taken prisoner at the battle of Bovines, the countess suffered him to remain confined a long time, though she could easily have procured his release.

Ferdinand of Aragon, Sebastian king of Portugal, and Philip II. of

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