Melville actually dedicated Moby Dick to Hawthorne, so they were in fact quite good pals. It's true, however, that Hawthorne just kept getting more successful (The Scarlet Letter sold a veritable butt-load of copies, pushing Hawthorne eventually to an official post as consul) while Melville sank deeper and deeper into obscurity.

In a side note, I've been putting far more thought than I should into just exactly how one would play a game of Dukes and Wenches. Pox Around seems pretty straightforward, once you find somebody with a pox, which wasn't too hard in the 18th century, really. But just how would the Duke-Wench dynamic play itself out within a structured set of rules?

I don't know, but maybe you do! Have an idea for what the objective and rules for Dukes and Wenches might be? Send it in and if it's awesome we'll put it up and maybe even play a round or two come the next big Frederickfest!

- Count Dolby von Luckner

I'm not sure what sort of a game "Grubbers" is, but I am glad there is a "Super Grubbers."

--Geoff