The origin of solitaire games is obscure; the most probable conjecture is that such games are derivatives of a group of sequence-building card games, known as stop, which have a history of several hundreds of years.
Solitaires are divided into two principal types, one in which the chance order of cards as shuffled by a player determines the outcome and another in which a player is permitted to use skill or judgment in rearranging cards so as to influence the final result.
Most solitaires are based on the problem of forming sequences in ascending or descending order, i.e., from the ace up to the king or from the king down to the ace, often in endless rotation. Suits have no comparative rank in these games, hearts and diamonds being called "red" and spades and clubs "black". The rules may require that sequences be built up in one color, in alternating colors, or in one suit alone; occasionally one or more of these methods is permitted in different parts of the game.
In the majority of solitaires, cards are dealt to the table in some plan or pattern, usually according to an arbitrary arrangement known as a tableau. The pattern customarily is laid out before the start of play, but in some games it is formed during play. The game develops out of the undealt portion of the deck known as the hand, or stock, which is turned up a card or more at a time, cards being played into the tableau as available or suitable.
One of the most popular of the great many variants of solitaire is Canfield, which is so called because it is said to have been originated by the American gambler and art collector Richard Albert Canfield (1855-1914). It is regarded by many as being the most typical solitaire as well as the most challenging.
In Canfield thirteen cards are counted off the top of the deck and placed in a pile face down, the top card of this stock being turned up. The fourteenth card is turned as a foundation card. Every card of the same denomination as the fourteenth card turned up there-after in play also becomes a foundation card, so that eventually four separate foundation piles are formed. The next four cards after the fourteenth are dealt in a row face up to form the tableau. The remainder of the deck forras the hand. The object of the game is to get all fifty-two cards or as many as possible into the foundation piles.
The player continuously turns up packets of three cards from the hand exposing the third card. In each such turn the exposed card is available for play, on a tableau card in de-scending order or on a foundation card in ascending order and in the same suit only. The top card of the stock, which is exposed continuously, also is always available for such play. Playable cards may be shifted from one part of the tableau to another or from tableau to foundation piles, but must remain in the foundations once played there. Play stops when cards can no longer be played into the foundation. Richard Canfield turned this game into a form of gambling by collecting from the player one chip for each card of the pack at the start of the game and paying him five chips for each card he could work into the foundation piles. The odds against the player in this game are far greater than five to one.
Hundreds of variants of solitaire are played, and many of these have several different names. Thus, Canfield is called also Klondike, Demon, or Fascination. Another solitaire game is known variously as Napoleon at St. Helena, Big Forty, Forty Thieves, or Roosevelt at San Juan. Other variants are Idiot's Delight, Streets and Alleys, Spiders, and Tower of Babel.
