CHE 



176 



CHE 



the affront, by striking Louis with the board, 10 

 that he was laid bleeding on the floor; and Henry would 

 have killed hi* inUgonitt, if his elder brother Robert 

 had r ri!. John of Salisbury relates of the 



ante Loui* le Grot, in hit book Dr nugi< ctirialium ; 

 that, in a battle between the French and Engli h in 

 1117, an English knight seizing the bridle of tin- French 

 monarch, and crying out to hit comrades, " the king is 

 taken !" Louis ".truck him to the ground with his sword, 

 tying, " Ne tcait in pat qu' out echea, on ne prcnd pas 

 le rou9" 



There have been various attempts, among modern 

 chrts- player*, to improve, or at least to vary the game, 

 which have, however, generally died with their inven- 

 tors. Pietro Carrera, who wrote upon chess in 1617, 

 invented two new pieces, one of which, called cam/none, 

 was placed between the king's knight and castle, and 

 had the move of both these pieces : the other, named 

 emtaitr, was placed between the queen's knight and cas- 

 tle, and had the move of the bishop and knight united. 

 Francisco Piacenza, who styles hiuiself a doctor of laws, 

 proposed another plan of two additional pieces, called a 

 centurion and deaerinn, in 1683. The former, situated 

 between the king and his bishop, unites the move of 

 the knight with that of the queen and castle, for any 

 two squares only : the latter, situated between the queen 

 and her bishop, has the move of the bishop ; but only 

 for one square at a time. A still more complicated game 

 of chess was invented by the late Duke of Rutland, of 

 which Sir Abraham Janssen, an excellent chess-player, 

 was extremely fond. The chess-board was 14 squares 

 in breadth, and 10 in height ; and the pawns, of which 

 there were 11 on a side, may move either one, two, or 

 three squares the first time. The other pieces were the 

 king, queen, two bishops, two knights, a crowned cas- 

 tk, uniting the move of the king and castle, and a com- 

 mon castle. Ou the other side of the king was a con- 

 cubine, whose move united that of the castle and knight, 

 two bishops, a single knight, a crowned castle, and a 

 oommon one. In this gahie, the pawns and knights lose 

 much of their value, on account of the extent of the 

 board. 



Several other varieties of the game are specified, in 

 which the advantage given by one player to the other, 

 consists in allowing him U Kc cavaUo, or la Doniio cat-al- 

 fo ; that is, that nis king or queen may likewise move 

 like the knight. But in the opinion of adepts, the simple 

 form of the game is the best ; and is sufficiently compli- 

 cated to call forth all the ingenuity of the players. One 

 amusing variety, however, still deserves to be mentioned, 

 in which the king, with eight pawns, engages the whole 

 set, on condition of being allowed two moves for every 

 one of his adversary. In this case he can make his first 

 move into check, and bis second out of it, by which he 

 has a great advantage ; and he cannot be check-mated 

 unless his adversary has preserved his queen and both 

 castles. 



The annals of chess record some extraordinary perform- 

 ances of certain adepts at this game, who were accus- 

 tomed formerly to make- a livelihood of their art. Such 

 as Paolo Boi, commonly called the Syracusan, who 

 played at chess with Sebastian, king of Portugal ; and 

 at the court of Philip II. of Spain ; and his cotemporary 

 Leonardo of Cutri, known by the appellation of H Put- 

 IMA, or the boy. The fame of all thvse, however, seems 

 to have been exceeded by that of Mr Philidor, whose ex- 

 hibitions have been made in the presence of many persons 

 till living. This extraordinary chess-player was bred a 

 musician, in the band of the French king ; a situation 



which hii father and grandfather hail enjoyed before him. ('l.i*tei. 



At six year* of age he was admitted among the children '"""" > "~~" 



of the chapel n>\ . ; \ . d I > 



attend daily, he had an < .;ng chess 



fr m the musicians in waiting. ; ii -.. ;; ic ,. 



eighty. Cards not being allo.'. >.r the chapel, 



tiny had a long '.able with six chess-boards inlaid. 



Young Philidor soon became greatly attached to the 



game ; and having obtained instructions fto:u Mr <k- Lc- 



galle, win waj c -teemed the best chcss-pL)ir in 1'V 



he thought of trying to play by mcmoi y, having t 



that he was able to calculate moves, and even whole 



games at night, while he was lying in I 



He soon after this offered to p'.ay two games at thf 

 same time, at a coffee-house in Paris, without seeing 

 cither board ; and succeeded so well, that he beat two 

 antagonists, to either of whom he, though a first rate 

 player, could only give the advantage of a knight whcr 

 the boaid. in the middle of one of the games, it 

 false move was purposely made to try his skill, which, 

 after a great number of moves he discovered, and placed 

 the piece where it ought to have been at first. 



Forty years after this he played two different time* in 

 London, three games at once. Of one nf then- exertions, 

 the following account appeared in the London news- 

 papers in May ITS.i : " Yesterday, at the chess club iu 

 St James's street, Mr Philidor performed one of those 

 wonderful exhibitions for which he is so much celebrated. 

 He played, at the same time, three different games, with- 

 out seeing either of the tables. His opponents were, 

 Count Bruhl, Mr Bowd'er, (the two best players in 

 London,) and Mr Maseres. He defeated Count Bruhl 

 in an hour and twenty minutes. Mr Bowdlcr reduced 

 his game to a drawn battle in an hour and three quarters. 

 To those who understand chess, this exertion of Mr 

 Philidor's abilities must appear one of the greatest of . 

 which the human memory is susceptible. He goes 

 through it with astonishing accuracy ; and often corrects 

 mistakes in those who have the board before them. Mr 

 Philidor sits with his back to the tables, and some gentle- 

 man present, who takes his part, informs him of the move 

 of his antagonist, and then, by his direction, plays his 

 pieces as he dictates." 



In 1747, Mr Philidor played a match of ten games 

 with Stamina, a celebrated chess-player from Aleppo, 

 giving him the move, allowing a drawn gaine to be a lost 

 one, and belling five to four on each game. With all 

 these advantages, Stamma won only two games, of which 

 one was a drawn game. Yet it has been asserted, that, 

 towards the close of his life, this wonderful adept at 

 chess, was so beaten by a Turk whom he met with in 

 the suite of an ambassador from the Sublime Porte, that 

 the mortification which he felt from his defeat had the 

 effect of hurrying on his end. (in) 



CHESTER, an ancient and populous city of Eng- 

 land, the capital of Cheshire. It is situated in the hun- 

 dred of Broxton, at the distance from London of 181 

 miles, by Coventry and Newport ; by Litchfield of 19O. 

 It is thus placed near to the southern boundary of the 

 county, where it stands on a rocky eminence above the 

 river Dec, by a sweep of which river it is half encircled. 

 It consists principally of four streets, running from a 

 centre towards the four cardinal points, and each termi- 

 nated by a gate in the walls, by which the city is sur- 

 rounded. In respect of the curious structure of these 

 streets, it is called by Mr Pennant a city without a pa- 

 rallel. They are excavated from the rocky soil to the 

 depth of one story beneath the level of the ground, a 

 circumstance which has been the cause of a singular con- 

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