Evening Star Newspaper, June 7, 1931, Page 87

THE SUNDAY STAR, WASHINGTON, D. C, JUNE 7, 193L & 7ur Bripge Forum * 1t’s Up to the Good Bridge Player to Protect His Partner From Making Revokes—National 1ournaments This Summer. The Goat. Here's to the man who gapes and yawns While some one else is dealing, Who during the time the others bid Keeps gazing at the ceiling. Who, when it has come his turn, employs A voice that's full of feeling. Here's to the way he slaps his cards Or plays with stately measure; Here’s to the way he takes a trick As if a priceless treasure; In making himself appear absurd He give the others pleasure. O hearts, partner?” asked a / l player recently when his asso- ciate had failed to follow suit. “Why, the very idea!"” she ex- claimed. “Do you mean to in- sinuate that I would revoke? I bhave never revoked in my life.” It was explained to her that a good player is supposed to protect his partner from making a careless revoke, on the theory that nobody is infallible and any one may happen to pull out the wrong card by mistake. She had never heard of that before, and it required consider- able explainimg on the part of the others prescnt to make her feel that she had not been insulted. It is really up to every player to protect his partner from revokes. The very laws of the game specifically accord the right to ask whether the partner has any or none of the suit led. “Failing, partner?” is one perfectly proper way of asking the question. So is “Failing in spades?” or “Lacking spades?” or any other way of suggesting that the partner take another look at his hand and make sure whether he can follow suit or not. Revokes are almost impossible when partners thus protect each other. When one has been made and the partner has nct asked such a question, the blame for the revoke attaches more to the pariner for not asking the question than to the player who revoked. Bridge etiquette requires proper treatment of a partner as well as of opponents. Failure to use the protective question really constitutes a breach of etiquette, and it therefore behooves every meticulous player to get the habit of observing this point. The Summer Schedule Among the bapner events of a promising bridge Summer are two national tournaments. The forty-first annual congress of the Ameri- can Whist League, in conjunction with the thirty-second annual congress of the Woman's Whist League, will be held in Hanover, N. H, in the famous Hanover Inn of Dartmouth Col- Jege. Bridge championships, both auction and eontract, with whist games “on the side,” will be on June 25, 26 and 27. Whist championships, with auction and contract “on the side,” will be from June 29 to July 4, inclusive. The Summer tournament of the American Bridge League, with several official national champion- ships in both contract and auction at stake, will be at Asbury Park, N. J., during the entire week beginning July 20. Right now is said to be a very good time for calendar-marking by any ene planning a bridge vacation. An Extra Problem J. P. Marsh has an idea which will interest some real bridge students. It can be used whenever they encounter an end-play problem involving half a dozen tricks or so, such as some of the problems of play on this page at times. “I suggest for a further problem,” he writes, “the reconstruction of the entire hand and play of the preceding tricks. Although sometimes such a hand is impossible both to arrange and to play logically up to the position given, it is splendid mental exercise.” Contract Systems How would you bid and play the following hand, neither side being vulnerable and South the dealer? &0 ¥Qs3 ®AQE54 »1084 NORTH oK @ AJ986432 $KEJ £ E YAl08 493 g SlexKki02 $3 Sorin Q9763 415 ¥97643 @J16 &HAKS This hand came up in the tournament for the championship of Westchester County, suburban to New York, where more bridge is played to the square foot probably than anywhere else, outside, possibly, of Cleveland. It is a fine example of the value of pre- emptive bids. At all but two tables, after South’s pass, West bid four spades and every one else passed. In the two cases where West passed, the hand was passed out and a chance a score was wasted. -an ideal situation for a pre-emptor, qualifications being about seven probable when not vulnerable or eight when and such defensive weakness that BY SHEPARD BARCLAY. the hand is not of much value against an adverse suit bid. This particular hand may be reckoned as good for about seven and a half tricks if played at spades and perhaps not over a trick or so on the defense, for the spades are in danger of even first round ruffs. The best l2ad against the hand is the ten of clubs, “top of nothing,” to avoid underleading guarded honors. South, winning this, should not repeat clubs and immediately set up the suit in dummy, but should keep the suit blocked while trying to pick off dummy’'s side entries. Ieading up to the semi-tenace in hearts would be bad, so the diamond should be chosen first to try to drive out the king. After North wins this, he should repeat the diamond in the hope of a ruff, but the hope is vain and declarer gets the rest of the tricks. In several instances North made the lead Jason George and Continued from Sizth Page without that responsibility I could travel ahead fah fah furthah, my deahs. “But, as I journeyed along through life, cheeldren, I began to realize that he who hasn’t a burden is out of luck. It is the burdens that make the game worth while. A wife is a bur- den, a mother is a burden, any human being you're wholly or partially responsible for is a burden. 1'QUT what's the use of traveling and what does it matter whether you get where you're going or not if you haven't somebody who's vitally concerned in your getting there? “I say it's burdens that make men travel. I say that having to boil the pot is what keeps men's work human and sympathetic and worth- while. I say that free souls never write any- thing but free verse they have to give away. and free souls never paint a picture you can understand or make a song you'd want to sing. They're free—they don’t have to; and it's hav- ing to that makes a bird fly and & man climb. “He travels the furthest who carries a pack. If you ain't got a burden, go get one. And if she’s a pretty, charming and fairly extravagant burden, who'll make you step fast to keep up with her needs—so much the better. Mull over that, my children, mull over that.” Well, I wish I could tell you that Jason George hopped up and grabbed Sybil and told the world he's seen the light. But I can't. Because Jason George don’t move that way. It takes Jason 25 minutes to shave—5 in shav- ing and 20 in making up his mind which side of his face to start on. Sybil Vail comes over to me afterward and thanks me, but I tells her that I don’t know whether I've helped or spilled the beans. It's another two weeks before I see Jason. He's looking like the lost tribes or something. I ask him how come, and he says, fugubrious, “Sybil’s gone away.” “Hooray!” I says, “that's what you wanted, wasn’t it?” “I miss her,” he says. “But you're still a free soul,” I says. “Whaddyumean, free?” he says. “When I can’'t think of anything but her. And who wants to be a free soul, anyhow? Free souls are tramps,” he says. “You've been mulling,” I observes. He nods. Then: “I wish I knew where she is.” “What would you do if you knew?” I says. “Travel there—fast,” he answers. “And after that?” “Travel back—or on. But not alone. Which- ever way she wanis to travel.” of a heart, which enabled declarer to discard a club on his heart ace, so that six-odd were made. A Law a Week In duplicate contests, is a re-deal allowed at the first table if all four plcyers pass the hanrd, or must the deal stand, to be played then at the other tables? Under the official laws of the American Bridge League, the deal stands and is re- corded as a pass-out, with no score for either side. To allow the cards to be dealt over again would mean to discriminate zga‘nst those who have a system which permits them to make opening bids on hands containing only two defensive tricks, and in favor of those who the Widow Vail “Jason,” I says, “you're a lot further than you were awhile ago. I guess I'll help you on. I know where she is.” And I gave him the address—which was right in town. “But before you go,” I says, “I want to point out to you that you won't find marriage all a bed of roses. It has its troubles and its trials and at times your burden seems heavy, but——" I don’t talk to myself much, and with George gone there didn't seem much reason to con- tinue. I never will know how much my speech had to do with it. You see, Helen (my wife) and Sybil got together after I had spieled my spiel —and it was Helen who fixed up the absent “treatment for Jason George, Anybody who calls that wife of mine a bur- den has got me to fight. Asparagin Now MadeinU.S. RARE, highly expensive and highly value able product of great promise in the fight States through the experimental work of the biochemic division of the Bureau of Animal The new product, Asparagin, makes excel- and for the manufacture of tuberculin for testing cattle. It is very likely to replace beef brich and peptone for this use. The im- very may be seen in the tment of Agriculture alone doses of tuberculin per constituent of certain lupines and vetches. agin is similar to the production. Twelve-day old Jupinus albus are particularly fruitful as a source of asparagin, ylelding as much as 27 per cent of the substance which is a complex compound of nitrogen, hydrogen, carnon and oxygen. The process of production perfected in the department’s laboratories is simple. The plants from which asparagin is to be extracted are dried and the stalks are ground, always, of course, in the seedling stage. The asparagin require stronger opening hands. That very thing is done in the rules adopfed by some clubs of standing for the government of play in their own games. In all known cases «i such clubs, the members are practically 21l in the habit of requiring stronger than two trick hands to open the bidding, so that in their case the re-deal is perfectly fair. Are artificial bids ethical if explained to opponents when made, or showld they be ex- plained in advance? How would you bid #nd play the following Land, North being the dealer with both sides vulnerable? as val9 ¢ Q108652 H974 A 10975 AAQ643 ¥Q87642 V13 o4 * KT &Q6 HAIBS AKJ3 YKS5 eAJ93 % K1053 _ZV cw Sjyslvms And yet they come, the new rystems. Ona by T. N. Winslcw is dcscribed in two beo - lets called “Logic of Contract” and “Precisi Contract.” He introduces a new element whi 1 he names “naturals,” whereby an ace counis 1%, king 1, queen !, and at no trump jackg 1. The system is a new form of the straight- away method—*“th> stronger the hand the highce the bid” up to bids of three. One found - tional part of it is what is nominated as “the rule of 12,” as follows: “To the combined naturals of the two hands of a partnershp, add the total number of trumps of the two hands and deduct 12; the remainder shows the number of odd tricks or the size of the contract that may be made.” Joshua Crane, American residing in Lendon, who has distinguished himself in golf with a short pulter manipulated with one hand, a&lso has a new system which he has published. 1t might be called the ‘“nodal point system” be- cause if the total values in your hand exceed certain “nodal points,” you have enough strength to make a certain bid. Problems of Play West having bid Lis diamonds and having led the king and then the ace of bis suit, how would you play to make 2 four-spade con- l;;ct on the North and South cards of this ? 410963 WAKS9 Q6 HEK:093 & None ¥vJ63 ¢J10743 HQIE53 SHAIB542 YQl10s 9 dATE - South trumps small, enters the dummy with a heart to lead trumps, and when East ~8%- cards on the 10 he knows the situation. Two trumps and a diamond must be lost. There is one chance to prevent a club loser—to find West with only one or two clubs and eliminate the two red suits from the hand. Setting out on this plan, the declarer, Mrs. Edith G. Darley, let West win the fourth trick with the spade queen. When a club was re- turned, she took it with the ace, cashed the king and queen of hearts, led the ace of spades and then a small club. If West had ruffled, she would have played low from dummy. West instead discarded a diamond, so she played the king. Now came a spade from dummy, which West had to win, and ha@ nothing left to return but a heart or diamond. In either event, she could ruff with the North hand and discard the last elub from South, leaving trumps for the last two tricks, This is what experts call a “strip” or “elim- ination” play, obliging opponent to lead a suit which can be ruffied in one hand while the other discards a loser, The New Problem Hearts are trumps. South leads and mus$ teke all the tricks. How? & 82 VAKS 4 None L 11} WNome | eqs |8 g &Q10 SOUTH & A6 S AS