The whole pack of fifty-two cards is taken, shuffled and cut in two packets. They are now laid out face uppermost, in three rows of four cards each, in all twelve cards. If in the first twelve cards any court cards appear, they are taken out, filling up the spaces with fresh cards; should these again be court cards, they are abstracted as before, filling in the spaces as described; if not, they are thus counted: Eleven must be made up of any _two_ cards, such as an ace and ten (ace counting as one), and covered, or two and nine, each card being covered as counted, three and eight, four and seven, five and six, etc. If a court card appears, it is a stop and counts as nothing. If, as the cards are covered, eleven can be made out of any of the two cards, and continued to the end, exhausting all the cards, it is taken that the wish will be gained; in that case all the court cards ought to be on the top, as those cast aside at first are used at the last, to cover each two cards as they count eleven. If the court cards cannot be got to come out at the end, the wish is supposed to be delayed, and if eleven cannot be made from nearly the beginning, it is said, the wish will not be realized at all. To explain the meaning more clearly, the following diagram is given. We will suppose they are as follows:-- +------------+ +------------+ +------------+ +------------+ | _Jack_ | | _Four_ | | _Seven_ | | _Four_ | | _Clubs_ | | _Spades_ | | _Spades_ | | _Clubs_ | +------------+ +------------+ +------------+ +------------+ +------------+ +------------+ +------------+ +------------+ | _Three_ | | _Six_ | | _Four_ | | _Jack_ | | _Diam._ | | _Spades_ | | _Hearts_ | | _Diam._ | +------------+ +------------+ +------------+ +------------+ +------------+ +------------+ +------------+ +------------+ | _Five_ | | _Ace_ | | _Eight_ | | _King_ | | _Diam._ | | _Clubs_ | | _Hearts_ | | _Diam._ | +------------+ +------------+ +------------+ +------------+