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This is his entrance fee and may be either a "dub," an "alley," a "crystal," or sometimes a "real," although this is very rare as well as extravagant. About ten feet from this ring a line is made called a "taw line." The first player, usually determined as soon as school is out by his having shouted, "First shot, fat!" stands behind the taw line and shoots to knock out a marble.
Under the raw smell of burnt powder Major Tremayne took leave of Grimbal and the rest; each man went his way; and John, pursuing a bridle-path through the marshes of the Taw, proceeded slowly to his appointment. An unexpected spring retarded Grimbal's progress and made a considerable detour necessary.
He said, "There were amusements fitted for persons of all ages and degrees, from the rattle to the discussing a point of philosophy; and that men discovered themselves in nothing more than in the choice of their amusements; for," says he, "as it must greatly raise our expectation of the future conduct in life of boys whom in their tender years we perceive, instead of taw or balls, or other childish playthings, to chuse, at their leisure hours, to exercise their genius in contentions of wit, learning, and such like; so must it inspire one with equal contempt of a man, if we should discover him playing at taw or other childish play."
To Arthur, an "ally taw," that is, a real alabaster marble, such as he now fumbled in his pocket, was an object of more importance than all the defunct bishops, archbishops, kings, queens, and benefactors of every sort, whose grim portraits stared at him by day and night.
When a player pitches the potsherd into the wrong division or on a line, he is out. When a player kicks into the wrong division or on a line, he is out. In the next turn he must play from taw. When the turns of the others come they must begin at the division in which they failed.
This erection, with its battlements and embrasures, outlying scarps and counterscarps, remarkably suggests the deliberate and calculated creation of man. It stands upon a little solitary hill at the head of Taw Marsh, and wins its name from the East Okement River which runs through the valley on its western flank.
This is Barnstaple Bay, into which flows a wide estuary forming the outlet of two rivers: the northernmost is the Taw, and at the head of its estuary is Barnstaple. The other is the Torridge, and upon it, at about nine miles distance from Barnstaple, is the small but prettier town of Bideford.
Where there are only two players, the first is sure to "sneak," that is, to roll his taw so that it will rest near one of the marbles in the ring. If number two hits number one, and so kills him, he wins the game, but if there are more than two in the game, number one is put out.
When midnight arrived Dick an' Piker was each about two thousand ahead, I was slidin' back to taw, an' the old man was payin' the fiddler. We had doubled the edge again at eleven, an' were usin' both the strange decks, changin' every few deals. Then the luck began to settle to Dick.
These, being the cheapest, are the most numerous, and are usually the objects of attack, and so change owners the oftenest. While the names of marbles and the terms of the game may vary slightly in different parts of the United States, they are in the main so much alike that the following will be understood by all boys throughout the land: The Taw or Shooter is the marble used for shooting.
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