Some say they cannot play chess before dinner, others
not after dinner. Too much dinner is considered a fair excuse
for losing at chess, but no dinner at all is not a valid plea.
According to the Rev. A. B. Skipworth, who should be an
authority on the subject, professional chess players are not
supposed to dine at all, but our great friend, the genial Mars,
dissents from this view. Staunton, Boden, Steinitz, Mars and
Skipworth himself are essentially diners, and Bird has been
accused of a tendency that way.
The professionals so called are very few, compared with former
years, yet they find the beef for many a Chess Editor, who barely
supplies the salt.
It is not a desirable thing in England like it was in India,
Arabia and Sweden to have the reputation of being great in
chess, nor is it supposed now, as it was in the Arabian manuscript,
the Treasure of the Sciences, and Olaus Magnus' work to imply
any particular proof of wisdom and discretion or evidence of fitness
for other things and one is not likely to secure a patron, or a
post, much less a wife by it. An example of how professional chess
players are regarded and can be treated now-a-days is afforded
by the gradual extinction of the class, and absence of the only
two young masters from their native country.
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