I don't suppose there is any use in trying to find out when the game of "Jack Stones" was first played.

No one can tell.

It certainly is a good many hundred years old.
All boys and girls know how to play it.

There is the little rubber ball, which you toss in the air, catch up one of the odd iron prongs, without touching another, and while the ball is aloft; then you do the same with another, and again with another, until none is left.

After that you seize a couple at a time, until all have been used; then three, and four, and so on, with other variations, to the end of the game.
Doubtless your fathers and mothers, if they watch you during the progress of the play, will think it easy and simple.