81.—"I read The Billiard Monthly with interest and am sure that you are doing wisely to keep it elementary. Professionals and expert amateurs have little, if anything, to learn from published hints on the game, but there are many like myself to whom such hints are valuable. My immediate object in writing is to ask for a definition of certain terms that are constantly used in reports of billiard matches. Will you please say exactly what is meant by (1) a drop cannon; (2) a 'stab' shot; (3) a 'stun' shot, and (4) a 'ricochet' shot?"
Thanks for your remarks with regard to the paper. Yes, we want to be of service to the ordinary player of 100 up, and are glad if we are succeeding in that direction. A drop cannon is made when the cue ball just drops on to the cannon (or second object ball) disturbing it but slightly. A stab shot is a full contact with low and sharp cueing, which leaves the cue ball on the spot from which the object ball is driven. In a stun shot the cueing is not so low and may, at close range, be central and the contact is not quite full.
Its chief use is to prevent follow on of the cue ball and make it diverge slightly. A ricochet shot is one in which top and check side cause the cue ball, after contact with an object ball close to a cushion, to return to the cushion in a series of loops, as a result of the top and side with which it is laden.
82.—"My great difficulty in billiards is that I do not know exactly where to aim in making a shot. I see that the angle is less or more than half-ball, and I play finer or to run through, or to screw, or to force, but I always have the feeling that what I am doing is very much in the nature of a lottery. But when I have seen professionals play I have felt that they even know exactly where to aim in order to get on one side of the cannon ball or the other and with just the necessary amount of contact to guide it where they want it. How is this certainty to be obtained?"
Largely by practice and observation, but more quickly by an appreciation of certain mechanical effects. The diameter of a billiard ball may be taken as two inches. Thus every possible contact falls within one inch and every possible aim within two inches. By a progression of nine aims, progressing by quarter inches from the object ball centre to an inch beyond its circumference, every stroke and position that is possible on the billiard table is to be obtained if accompanied by proper compensation, strength, and touch. So far as the mere aim is concerned, it must be definitely graded by quarter inches, although such is the margin for error in many pocket strokes that an eighth of an inch of error in the aim either on the fine or full side may not sometimes greatly matter.
83.—"I have a private billiard table and always play with ivory balls, but I go occasionally to the house of a friend who uses bonzoline balls, and I find that I can do nothing with them. I feel so uncertain each time I take up the cue that I am almost paralyzed in my strokes and it would be worth a lot to me if I knew the secret of changing, without inconvenience, as so many players seem to do, from one class of ball to the other. Can you give me any hint?"
There are four ways of getting the stroke with bonzoline balls, and the choice mainly depends upon the intended run of the object ball. Where this need not be microscopically considered the best plan is to play a little fuller than with ivories. The other three ways are (1) playing a little finer; (2) spotting (if in hand) a little more widely, and (3) using check side. Sometimes a combination of two of these methods may be desirable to secure a normal run of the object ball, the extra contact being a shade less thick and the extra putting a shade less wide. But to secure and maintain confidence we should say;"Simply aim a little thicker with bonzolines than with ivories, and midway between the two with crystalates.
84.—"I see that George Gray in his book describes the quarter-ball run-through as being made by aiming from the centre of the cue ball on to a quarter of the object ball, and a three-quarter run-through as being made by aiming from the centre of the cue ball on to a part of the red ball about a quarter of an inch from the centre of the red. Can you kindly say why these terms are employed for such aims?"
A half-ball means that half of the object ball is covered in the line of aim by half of the cue ball; a quarter-ball that one quarter is so covered; and a three-quarter ball that three quarters is so covered. The aim for the half-ball is consequently at the edge, for the quarter ball half an inch outside the edge, and for a three-quarter ball half an inch inside the edge. Whenever aim is thicker than at the edge of the object ball the contact is in the nature of a run-through, and we should say that a half run-through should be aimed halfway between edge and centre of object ball, a quarter run-through one quarter of the way between edge and centre, and a three-quarter ball run-through three-quarters of the way between edge and centre. If George Gray describes a quarter run-through as aimed on to a quarter of the object ball we think he must mean one quarter of the distance between edge and centre.
Otherwise no appreciable point of aim would be left for the half run-through, which is, of course, intermediate between the quarter and the three-quarter.
85.—"You are constantly saying: 'Play for position,' and that it is no use potting or going in-off without leaving the other ball where it ought to be. But how is this to be done? It is all a perfect maze to me."
As it is to everyone at first, but if you apply yourself seriously to practice your marvel will presently be why anyone should play without safeguarding position when it can be just as easily maintained as not. The one great touchstone in billiards, to the test of which all questions of position, kissing, losing balls, etc., can be brought, is the half-ball angle both for pots and for in-offs. Whenever you play a half-ball in-off potting contact is made with the object ball half an inch inside its edge and it takes a course along that line.
Obviously, therefore, you should never take a half-ball aim without glancing along this line. Perhaps the result will be that you will then shift your aim or modify or increase your strength to avoid some pitfall that is awaiting the object ball. Similarly, when you are potting, if the line from the pocket comes out half an inch inside the edge of the object ball you know that you have got the half-ball potting angle, and you know that your own ball will take the usual half-ball throw-off.