SOME HUMOURS OF THE GREATEST INDOOR GAME
Fun in the Billiard Room
Billiards, as played by professionals, does not lend itself to humorous incidents. It is too serious, not to say too solemn, an affair, with too much hanging on the issue, for the principals to treat it after the jocular fashion of the irresponsible amateur.
Nevertheless, some of the leading pros have had quaint experiences, more especially outside big matches.
THE SHRIMP AND THE UMBRELLA.
Some years ago a couple of strangers were sitting in the billiard-room of an hotel at a Lancashire watering-place while a game was in progress. From time to time they commented on the play, but although their remarks were quietly and good-humouredly made, and only to each other, one of the players, who happened to be the local champion, appeared to get rather nettled by their criticism, and when the game was over he loudly challenged the room.
The smaller of the two strangers, who was quite a little man, smiled and shook his head, whereat the challenger grew very wroth and “dared” him to play 100 up.
“Oh, all right,” said the little man, as he trotted up to the table, “but, as you say, I am only a shrimp, and your cues are too long for me. However, this will do.”
“This” was a handsome, tightly folded umbrella. The local champion, thinking his opponent was joking, gave a miss in baulk.
The little man, however, did indeed use his umbrella as a cue, and to some effect. His first shot was a splendid screw “loser” off the red which, of course, was on the spot. So accurately was the stroke judged too that the red was left over a middle pocket in an easy position to be potted.
Down it duly went. The umbrella magician had “position” for the spot stroke, and in a very few minutes he had “run out” with thirty-one “spots. ” The news of the exploit spread through the hotel, and the landlord coming in recognised in the visitor none other than the redoubtable W. J. Peall, the spot stroke champion. Peall then explained the mystery; his innocent-looking “gamp” was fitted with a proper cue point, carried inside a detachable ferrule.
DOWSON’S STORY.
Charles Dawson sometimes tells this story about himself; he heard it from the district registrar of his native town of Huddersfield, while he was playing a match there.
On the Friday evening there came to the registrar’s office a grimy mill-hand, who inquired: “Wheer’s t’chap as registers deaths?”
“I am he,” said the registrar.
“Coom, then, I want thee to register t’death o’ ma wife, Mary Jane Jones.”
“When did she die?” was the official’s natural question.
“She’s not dead yet, but she’ll dee to-neet,” was the startling reply.
“What on earth do you mean?” demanded the registrar, thinking he was dealing with a madman, or that there was murder afoot.
“Nowt much,” answered the mill-hand; “only t’doctor say’s she can’t live till morning; she’s sure to dee to-neet.”
“But look here,” said the registrar, “I cannot register a death until it has taken place; if your wife dies to-night you must come again to-morrow.”
“Nay, owd chap,” said the mill-hand, “I can’t coom t ’morrow; it’s the last day o’ Charlie Dawson’s billiard match, an’ Aw’ve gotten eight bob on him.”
THE ENTHUSIAST.
When H. W. Stevenson was playing at Johannesburg, an old Boer, who had watched the game with interest, came up to him, and asked how he got his living.
“Why, by playing this game,” said Stevenson, indicating the table.
“Do you mean to tell me that people will pay to see you knocking these little balls about?” asked the old “Dopper” incredulously.
“Yes,” said Stevenson, “they will pay me quite a lot of money.”
“Allemachtig!” said the Boer, hands uplifted. “I always heard that the English were mad, and now I know it.”
THE PHILOSOPHER‘S VIEW.
In the amateur game I suppose the “classic” story is of Herbert Spencer, who was once induced to take part in a 100 up with an Army captain. The great philosopher gave a miss in baulk; his opponent scored, and going on ran out with a fine break of 99, and then, turning round, said rather bumptiously: “What do you think of that, Mr. Spencer?”
“Captain Snooker,” replied the nettled thinker, who had a very human side, and appreciated defeat no more than most of us, “a certain dexterity in games of skill argues a well-balanced mind, but such dexterity as you have shown is an evidence, I fear, of a misspent youth!”
* * *
Captain Robert Marshall, the distinguished author of “The Second-in-Command” and other successful plays, has a pretty wit.
One day he was in the billiard-room of his club, where a couple of “duffers” were making a snail-like progress with a game of 100 up. Nevertheless, poor though the play was, Captain Marshall stayed on, and even appeared to be greatly interested in the players’ efforts; so much so that one of them remarked: “I wonder at your caring to watch a rotten game like this. You seem quite interested.”
“Oh,” said Captain Marshall quietly, “it’s not so much your play that interests me, as your wonderful self-control.
“Our self-control! What do you mean?” demanded the duffer, walking into the trap.
“Why,” said the dramatist, preparing to make a hasty exit, “when you get what you played for, you never show any surprise.”
SOME FAMILIAR TYPES.
The humours of the average billiard-room are perhaps rather those of character than of incident. Billiard players will, I think, readily recognise the following types.
First of all, there is the ultra-sensitive player who is always being “put off.”
It is not a matter of his being “put off” by anyone speaking on his stroke, or obstructing his view of a pocket—these are legitimate sub jects for complaint. No, he displays remark able ingenuity in discovering excuses for bad play, and I am sure he must be a near relation of the golfer who declared he was “put off” a shot by the infernal row of a lark, singing away up in the heavens.
The rumble of a cab outside, the striking of a match, the presence of players at an adjacent table, the colour of an opponent’s hair or the cut of his clothes, an open window or a closed one, the presence or absence of a fire in the room, the time the waiter takes to bring the drinks, the drinks when they do arrive, a fly on the ceiling—any one of these “annoyances” is sufficient to make him declare passionately that he has been “put right off” and will never “play the beastly game again.”
There is also the lugubrious player, the man who makes up his mind beforehand that he is going to lose, and, as a natural consequence, usually does encounter defeat.
He does not exactly grumble; he expects misfortune, gets it, and accepts it with melancholy resignation. His game is punctuated with heavy sighs, and why he ever plays I’m sure I don’t know, for it is incredible that he should derive any pleasure from the sport.
A livelier type is the excitable player, and on the whole he is good fun to play with though sometimes he makes the game a trifle too exciting. When he is playing you are generally in imminent danger of having an eye knocked out with his cue, which he brandishes like a flail a flail all over the place.
When it is a “near thing” for a cannon coming off or a ball going into a pocket, he jumps up and down with excitement, shaking the whole place, and he is a terrible chap to have playing at the next table to you.
In many billiard-rooms there is not enough space betwen two tables to allow of a player from each table playing back to back, as they may sometimes have to do. But our excitable friend never looks to see whether you are in his way. Round he rushes, back comes his cue, and you receive a fearful jab in the hinder part of your anatomy. However, on the whole, he is a good chap, and a sportsman, and his would antics are more amusing than annoying.
A FREAK MATCH.
Of quaint incidents in billiard-rooms I think the most extraordinary in my experience was a “freak” match betwen a very good player and a very bad one.
The terms of the match, which was for a substantial stake, were that the bad player was to be allowed to say “Boo!” three times during the match just as his opponent was about to play.
The player played level; nevertheless, the bad cueist won easily, and that without saying “Boo” once!
Every time his opponent prepared to make a shot he would steal up behind him open mouthed. The striker, expecting the “Boo” either made the stroke hurriedly or waited expectant until his aim was spoiled, and in the end he became totally unnerved, and was sound whopped.
A CASUALTY.
An amusing thing I have often seen happen is for a player deliberately yet quite unintentionality to give his opponent the game. This often happens in the case of a close game when a player is more intent on the table than the score.
“Spot” is 99; “Plain,” say, 83. “Plain” get going, and makes 10, when he is badly “left”. He carefully surveys the position, and after must thought gives a safety miss. “Spot,” of course, wins amid the delighted shouts of the onlookers.
I have seen a ball, forced off the table, law plump in a teacup, to the great astonishment on the spectator who was on the point of conveying it to his lips.
I have seen a fat old gentleman, who had been standing too close behind a player, stretched writhing on the floor as the result of a vicious and I believe not wholly unintentional jab in his “little Mary.”
But on the whole, as I have said, the humour of the billiard-room lies more in the character of its occupants, than actual happenings.
The “hawk,” obviously playing badly, still further to entice his “pigeon”; the bad tempered player; the duffer, who always will be a duffer, but is quite content and is overjoyed to he makes ten; the excitable player; the cautious give-nothing-away man; the melancholy person—all these and their idiosyncrasies afford quite amusement to the observant onlooker, and an hour in a billiard-room is often entertaining spent, if only for the study of character alone.
Ernest Wootton.
Modern Man, Saturday 22 May 1909