In throwing
three dice, if 2, 3, and 4 are thrown, making 9, their
corresponding bottom faces will be 5, 4, and 3, making 12, which
together are 21--equal to the three dice multiplied by 7.
CARDS.
The origin of cards is as doubtful as that of dice. All that we
know for certain is that they were first used in the East. Some
think that the figures at first used on them were of moral
import: the Hindoo and Chinese cards are certainly emblematic in
a very high degree; the former illustrate the ten avatars, or
incarnations of the deity Vishnu; and the so-called 'paper-
tickets' of the Chinese typify the stars, the human virtues, and,
indeed, every variety of subject. Sir William Jones was
convinced that the Hindoo game of Chaturaji--that is, 'the Four
Rajahs or Kings'--a species of highly-complicated chess--was the
first germ of that parti-coloured pasteboard, which has been the
ruin of so many modern fortunes. A pack of Hindoostani cards, in
the possession of the Royal Asiatic Society, and presented to
Captain Cromline Smith in 1815, by a high caste Brahman, was
declared by the donor to be actually 1000 years old: 'Nor,' said
the Brahman, 'can any of us now play at them, for they are not
like our modern cards at all.
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