Extract from the book: Jean Boussac. Card game encyclopedia. Paris, 1896, p. 142–147.
Simpler than whist and stake, the Manila game has various combinations, and is not, so much, easiest to play. It is played with a game of 32 cards whose value here is.
The ten we mans are worth 5 points.
AS A Manillon 4 -
King 3 -
Lady 2 -
LE VALET 1 -
In total, for each color, 15 points. So there is for the four 60 -point colors. In addition, each lifting is worth a point and as there are eight lifted in the game, it is a total of 68 points that one and the other camp share, in a more or less equal way .
The players, four in number, form two camps. The partners are appointed amicable or drawn. In the latter case, a player takes the cards and distributes them one by one to the four players, until he comes out a king the distribution continues between the three other players until he comes out another king and Then the owners of these two kings are associated against the other two players. Other times we distribute the cards until the four kings have come out, and then the two players who have red kings are together
The displayed text can include one against those who have black kings. All this is a matter of prior agreement.
The partners place each other in front of the other, we diagonal, each having an opponent on the right and on the left.
The situation being advantageous, it is still a very questionable point we draw it by lot, and it is the strongest card which designates the donor without it being able to order, that is to say-to do done by the 'One of his opponents.
The donor beats the cards, cuts off by his left opponent and begins the distribution with his right -wing opponent. After each blow, the hand changes, and the situation passes to the player placed to the right of the previous donor.
Each player receives 8 cards: they are given four per four. This is the rule in the absence of a contrary agreement. So there is no heel. The asset is designated by the 32 and last card, which the donor, to whom it belongs, returns to the carpet and must leave it spread out until his right neighbor has played his first card he then raises it for the Put in his game. If the return is a Manila (one ten) the donor scores 5 points for him and his partner; If it is a manillon (an ace), he scores 4 points if he is a king, he scores 3 if he is a lady 2, a valet 1.
What must be observed in the Manila is that the lifes are worth by their quality and 'not by their quantity also must strive to make points rather than levees.
Game walk. - If the party to whom the situation comes back to mark the return, which can be worth from 1 to 3 points, or nothing at all if it returns a new, an eight or a seven, the party opponent has a great advantage which is the attack.
The partners question themselves, or, which is very preferable, the one who is the first to play, questions his partner in order to well combine the two games. He must inquire in a skillful way, so as to know as exactly as possible what this partner can have, avoiding talking too much, that is to say to inform the enemy too much. But this is a matter of experience.
If the questions asked must be skillful, they should never be ambiguous, nor designed in terms intelligible to only partners, who could agree with certain phrases whose meaning would escape adversaries.
The first player, placed to the right of the donor, throws a card on the carpet, the second plays in turn, then the third and the fourth.
We cannot give up color or sub-dorder, that is to say that you have to provide the requested card and overcome if you can, otherwise you have to cut. When one of the partners is master, the other partner is not obliged to cut or force, but he must provide color and if he does not; He will discard. And it is a science to know how to discard, that is to say getting rid of a map that is embarrassed or a good card which is exposed to be taken by the enemy, to spare a cup, etc. ... but all this is a matter of practice and cannot be taught in a book.
Whoever lifted, then plays the first; And so we continue until the 8 cards that make up the game of each player.
The part is usually played in 34 points and partly linked but it is often appropriate that the manilia will be 44 or 64 points, in one part and without revenge.
You can do any other conventions; otherwise the uses or the previous ones are law.
When all the cards are played we count the points.
The levies of each parts, which were made by both of the partners, are brought together together.
Either a lifting in which there is a manila, a king, an eight and a seven: it will count thus: 5 for the manila, 3 for the king, that is 8, and the new lifting, because the lifting always counts for a point. A lifting in which there is no significant card and the case is frequent - therefore counts only for a point.
As has been said, the outstanding cards and the levees produce a total of 68 points, half of which is 34. Consequently, the party whose levees produce more than 34 points, wins the excess, and one of the players From this party the mark as well as he marked the turning, if it was a significant card, so that we can make 34 points at once, and, if we found a Manila, That's 39, the maximum.
If each parties is 34 points, which often happens, the blow is zero.
If two partners are stealing, that is to say all the lifting, they earn 34 points; This is called doing thirty-four and we say adversaries that they are thirty-four.
Of a few other rules. - 1. If there is a card returned to the game, we do it again, but the hand does not pass.
2. If the donor lets see one or more cards of his game or the game of his partner, the blow is good; But if the cards seen belong to the game of adversaries, they have the right to start the game again, or to hold on for good, they would have seen their cards.
3. The one who, by cutting down a card, announces a cut and plays another, is held, if the opponents require it, to take back their card and to play the announced color; But the opponent has the right to cover the card played, if he judges it, and we continue.
4. Except the case of previous error, any card on the carpet no more can be noted.
5. If one of the players fell two cards at a time, it is the one below that is well played. The use of certain localities is that in this case the adversaries have the right to choose as a card played, the card they want. This must be considered the real rule, unless there is a convention or precedents.
6. Who blunders, loses his gives; And, moreover, if he only realizes his error after having returned, he loses 34 points.
7. Whoever plays with cards in addition or less loses 34 points.
8. But when the poorly served player realizes the error before playing, it is the donor who loses 34 points.
9. Who renounces, cuts to false, or sub-torce loses 34 points.
10. Who plays before his turn, loses 34 points.
11. Who takes a lifting made up of only 3 cards loses 34 points, if he then plays before having recognized his error.
12. Who plays by leaving two lifting on the carpet without collecting them, loses 34 points.
13. Who looks at a folded lifting, either that it belongs to it, or that it belongs to the opponents, loses 34 points.
14. We are not punished for picking up a lifting belonging to the opponents.
15. If one of the players asks to see the game of his partner, this game will have to stay spread out on the table until the end of the blow.
16. He who makes a false ad loses 34 points.
17. The donor can look at the return, that is to say the last card that is under the game after the cup, but if he comes to be mistaken in the distribution of the cards, he loses 34 points.