I have seen some so dexterous at Knapping, that they have done it through the handle of a quart-pot, or, over a Candle and Candlestick: but that which I most admired, was throwing the same, less than Ames Ace, with two Dice, upon a Groat held in the left hand, on the one side of the handle, a foot distance, and the Dice thrown with the right hand on the other. “Lastly—by _Stabbing_—that is, having a Smooth Box, and small in the bottom, you drop in both your Dice in such manner as you would have them sticking therein, by reason of its narrowness, the Dice lying upon one another; so that, turning up the Box, the Dice never tumble; if a smooth Box, if true, but little; by which means you have bottoms according to the tops you put in; for example—if you put in your Dice so that two fives or two fours lie a top, you have, in the bottom, turned up two twos, or two treys; so, if Six and Ace a top, a Six and an Ace at bottom.” At this time were played several games requiring tables and dice, such as _Irish_; _Backgammon_; _Tick-tack_; _Doublets_; _Sice-Ace_ and _Catch-Dolt_; whilst the games requiring no special tables were _In and In_; _Passage_ and _Hazard_, which latter was the game most usually played, and of which Cotton remarks “Certainly, Hazard is the most bewitching game that is played on the Dice; for when a man begins to play, he knows not when to leave off; and, having once accustomed himself to play at Hazard, he hardly, ever after, minds anything else.” Ned Ward[8] (1663-1714), of course, mentions gamblers and gambling, but his experiences are of low Coffee Houses and Alsatia: and, presumably most of the Gambling Houses were of that type, for Thomas Brown[9] (1663-1704) speaks of them as follows. “In some places they call Gaming Houses _Academies_; but I know not why they should inherit that honourable name, since there is nothing to be learn’d there, unless it be _Sleight of Hand_, which is sometimes at the Expence of all our Money, to get that of other Men’s by Fraud and Cunning. The Persons that meet are generally Men of an _Infamous_ character, and are in various Shapes, Habits, and Employments. Sometimes they are Squires of the _Pad_, and now and then borrow a little Money upon the _King’s High Way_, to recruit their losses at the _Gaming House_; and, when a Hue and Cry is out to apprehend them, they are as safe in one of these Houses as a _Priest_ at the _Altar_, and practise the old trade of _Cross-biting Cullies_, assisting the frail _Square Die_ with high and low _Fullams_, and other napping tricks, in comparison of whom the common Bulkers and Pickpockets, are a very honest society. How unaccountable is this way to _Beggary_, that when a man has but a little money, or knows not where in the world to compass any more, unless by hazarding his neck for’t, will try an experiment to leave himself none at all: or, he that has money of his own should play the fool, and try whether it shall not be another man’s. Was ever anything