Auction Quadrille

An interesting work called A New Treatise Upon Real Quadrille From The French of Mons. Martin’ was published in 1764 by G. Burnet of London. It is printed as a dual language work with verso pages in the original French, and the matching English translation in recto.

It is a very rare book with institutional copies to be found only in the British Library and the University of Missouri, but a scan is available in Google books.

The most interesting section is one chapter (VIII) on the rarely described version known as Auction Quadrille, or Quadrille à L’Enchaîre in French.

According to Mons. Martin, Auction Quadrille is played without any form of ‘Ask Leave’, no Mediateur, no Sans Prendre, and no Favourite trump suit.

Eldest hand has precedence, and the lowest allowable bid is in effect to take four tricks. If eldest hand says “I will play”, then that is taken as a bid of four tricks, and a younger hand must overcall  by explicitly naming a higher number e.g “I also for five tricks”. The next player may overcall by saying “And I for six tricks”, and rarely a fourth might say “and I for seven tricks”. Precedence goes to the elder hand if two players are prepared to play for the same number of tricks. N.B. no trump suit is stated at this point in the bidding.

The hombre only names their trump suit once the other three players have passed

Eldest hand leads to the first trick, and the normal rules of trick play at Quadrille apply.

Martin says “as most of these games are passed, they consist of 12 single rounds and 4 double ones, and six fishes are always put down..” (two for the game and four for the matadores - one apiece for Manille and Basto, and two for Spadille). A Tour or round was  a cycle of four deals, one by each player, so he was referring to  64 deals (16 x 4).

The basic settlement for winning your game by taking at least as many tricks as were bid for is along the lines of (n + 1)  fishes where ’n’  is  the number of tricks bid for, and (n + 3) where matadores are held e.g  4 tricks gain 5 fishes for a simple game, and 7 fishes with matadores.

These payments are exactly doubled in ‘Double Rounds’

A Vole wins a bonus of 20 fishes for bids of 4 to 6 tricks, and 40 fishes for bids of 7+ tricks.

The Vole premium is exactly doubled in ‘Double Rounds’.

An Announced Vole wins a premium of 200 fish.

The general scheme of payment for failing to make your bid is along the general lines of being beasted exactly the same amount you would have won along with these side payments

Reward/Consolation    -  One fish to each opponent.

Matadores -   One fish to each opponent if three are held.

Footnote
The game is played with the same 40 card deck used for Ombre and other forms of Quadrille and Quintille (remove 8.9.10 of each suit).

Red suits       - K.Q.J.A.2.3.4.5.6.7

Black suits     - K.Q.J.7.6.5.4.3.2

Red Trumps     -  Spadille. Manille. Basto. Punto.K.Q.J.2.3.4.5.6

Black Trumps  -   Spadille. Manille. Basto. K.Q.J.7.6.5.4.3

Where the Matador trumps are:

Spadille    -  A♠︎

Manille     -  Red 7/Black 2

Basto       -  A♣︎

Punto      -  A♥︎/♦︎