Three-up

subs. phr. (streets’).—A gambling game. Three halfpennies are ‘skied’ to a call: if they do not ‘fall’ alike, the cry is void, and the operation is repeated. When the three coins ‘come off’ (i.e., fall alike), bets are decided. If two play, it is ‘up for up,’ i.e., they toss and cry alternately: if three or more join in, it is a school, and one, a ‘pieman,’ cries to the halfpence of the others until he loses, when the winner of the toss becomes ‘pieman’ in turn: see SCHOOL and SCHOOLING.