OTTR CORRESPONDENTS ON CHESS. 6*43 



To obviate this defect, tacticians have long felt the desideratum of some 

 game that should present a more faithful image of war, and afford an 

 opportunity for combining the actions of the three arms, and of making the 

 application of their evolutions to every variety of locality. With this view, 

 a game (Jeu de la Guerre) was invented in 1800, by a Swiss, to which the 

 celebrated Massena devoted at one time much of his attention. But a still 

 more complete game (Kreiggs Spiele) was invented some seven or eight 

 years ago, by a Prussian artillery officer, which caused a great sensation at 

 the time in the military circles on the continent. The game may be seen in 

 the arsenal at Berlin. It illustrates the operations of the three arms as they 

 occur in the field, and in the presence of the enemy, and is furnished with 

 plans of ground, exhibiting every local feature that can effect tactical move- 

 ments, and also with marks according to the scale of the plan, showing 

 the actual space which the bodies of troops they represent, would occupy on 

 the ground, whether formed en masse or in line. The " materiel" of the 

 game consists in small rectangular figures, various in size, according to the 

 strength of the force they represent ; from sections of men, to even single 

 files ; and single pieces of cannon to masses of six battalions, with their 

 batteries. There are scales, showing the ranges of musketry, and also of 

 artillery either with grape or round shot. Plans of the battles of Ligny and 

 Quatre Bras, of Austerlitz and of Leipsig, and also of the Katsbach, have been 

 lithographed expressly for this game, exhibiting every gradation of slope, at 

 intervals of five to four hundred and fifty. The game is played by two 

 persons, and presided by an umpire. 



The Emperor of Russia was so struck with this game, on visiting Berlin, 

 that he invited the inventor to St. Petersburgh, to teach it in his army, and 

 he himself devoted much time to it, under the tuition of Prince Paskewitch, 

 the conqueror of Warsaw. I am, &c. &c. 



G. H. 



LETTER TL 



Sir, In naming the chief players of the London Chess Club, your corre- 

 spondent assigns the third place to Mr. Keen. Now he ought to have known 

 that Mr. Keen has scarcely been in the room six times in as many years, and 

 that Mr. Frazer is indisputably the third best player in the club, and far 

 stronger than Mr. Keen ever was even in the zenith of his play. In his ac- 

 count of the Edinburgh players, your contributor places Messrs. Crawford 

 and Murray after Mr. Donaldson, the fact being that Mr. Bennett is the 

 second player in the club, and Mr. Mackarsey the third. As mention is 

 made of Dr. Berry's medal, your readers may be interested in knowing that 

 it was won by Mr. Donaldson, who still bears it unchallenged long may he 

 wear it ! 



The following passage in the paper calls for some comments : " In 

 England there are many Chess societies, particularly in Liverpool, where 

 the devotion to the game is highly meritorious ; so general is this feeling 

 among the citizens, that Chess problems have long occupied a corner in a 

 lively well-written periodical." The truth is that there has been no Chess 

 Club in Liverpool for the last five or six years, although before that time 

 there was one, of which Mr. Knowles and Dr. Brandreth were the prime 

 movers. So little is Chess encouraged by the money-getting Liverpuddlians, 

 that a Mr. Copeman, who attempted to establish a Chess-room there last 

 winter, could not get half a dozen subscribers. The " well written periodi- 

 cal " (Egerton Smith's Kaleidoscope) has been long dropped for lack of 

 support. 



The writer ought to have known that the Westminster Chess-club, in 

 Bedford-street, although recently established, numbers nearly forty mem- 



