The game may be made more difficult by each player writing on a third slip of paper a verb or an adjective, these to be collected and redistributed with the nouns and questions.
All but one of the players sit in two rows facing each other, those directly opposite each other being partners. The odd player walks around the rows behind the others, asking questions of any player facing him from the farther row. The question must be answered, not by the player addressed, but by his partner or _vis-a-vis_, who sits with his back to the questioner.
Any player answering a question addressed directly to him, or failing to answer one addressed to his partner, or giving an incorrect answer to a question, changes places with the questioner, or pays a forfeit, as may have been decided on beforehand.
FOR THE SCHOOLROOM.--When played in the schoolroom, the adjacent rows should form a group and face each other so as to leave free aisles between the groups in which the questioners may walk, as shown in the diagram of "Old Man Tag."
The game may be made to correlate with almost any subject in the school curriculum, the questioner asking, for instance, for capital cities, boundaries, mountains, etc., for geography; for dates or the names of heroes in great events, for history; or even for brief problems in mental arithmetic.
The players are divided into two parties. One party goes outside of the room, and those remaining choose some verb, which is to be guessed and acted by the other party. The outside party is then told some word which rhymes with the chosen verb. They consult among themselves, decide on a verb which they think may be the right one, enter the room, and without speaking act out the word they have guessed. The inside party must decide from this pantomime if the correct verb has been guessed. If not, they shake their heads. If right, they clap their hands. No speaking is allowed on either side. If the outside party be wrong in their guess, they retire and try another word, repeating this play until they hit upon the right word, when the two sides change places.
The players sit in a circle, holding in their hands a long piece of string tied at the ends so as to form a circle large enough to go around, a small ring having been put upon this string. One player is chosen to stand in the center. The players who are seated then pass the ring from one to another, the object being for the player in the center to detect who has the ring. The other players will try to deceive him by making passes to indicate the passage of the ring when it really is not in their vicinity. When the player in the center thinks he knows who has the ring, he calls out the name of that player. If right, he sits down, and that player must take his place in the center. This game may be played by the players repeating the following lines as the ring is passed around the circle:--