Marshall County Republican. (Plymouth, Ind.) 1856-1878, 1869-07-29
BETTING IN LONDON.

BETTING IN LONDON.
A Raid Upon the Betting Houses of
Loncon-iioxv the Betting Busines ss
Is Conducted.
Correspondence OF the New York Tribune.
LONDON, juno pa matter of far great
er interest to half the people of England
than the tinkering of the Lords on the
Irish Bill, is the Government raid ON the
betting-houses. don'tknow whether this
particular flower of English civilization has
been transplanted to New York, or whether
you have any notion of the extent and
profit of its cultivation here. Take Wright's
establishment for an example. Wright is.
l suppose, what is calleda n respectable man.
He is member-of the Ring, member of
Tattersalls. and, for aught know, n men,
Der of the church. He advertises i'm the
newspapers that ho will transact
q commission business for per-
sons desirous of investing their
money on specified horses. Send him ten
shillings, or ten or thousand pounds, and
he will 'invest" it for you at the current
odds on any horse you like for any rnce.
There are said TO be greenhorns green
enough to send money to be laid out at the
discretion of the respectable Mr.. Wright
In that case, as the counsel for the govern
ment remarked, he of course put ther money
on some horse sure not to win, and when
he has not won, the respectable Mr.. Wright,
equally of course, puts the money into his
pocket But where money is sent to back a
particular horse, the fiction is kept up that
some third person-name not necessary to
be known to the public, but might be called,
We. viii say, Mrs. Harris against the
horse and wins or loses. But thepossiblli.
! " IN carrying on great business like Mr..
Wr1ghts, consists IN acquiring public con-
fidence, and that confidence would speedi-
ly be lost If in any case the money won by
customer We're not forthcoming. Mr.
Wright does in fact pay if he loses, and
whether he gets the money from anybody
else or not is matter of indifference to
the lucky fellow who gets it from him.
So far as the public knows, and the law
knows, Mr.. Wright is simply a sbookmnkcr"
on gigantic scale. To the ordinary ad-
yantages Of that lucrative business he
adds the advantage of paying himself a
commission ON the money he loses. There
are many such houses in England. Wrieht's
Is perhaps the largest. Morris, who is also
under prosecution, is another great one.
You may Judge of the extent of their busi-
ness from two facts. On last years Derby,
when Blue Gown won, the amount paid
on that single horse, through Wright
alone, was more than three hundred thou
sand pounds sterling somewhere near
two millions of what now pass for dollars
III America. The other fact shows
the system as we'll as the ex-
tent of the business. The sums received
are entered in book like check-book.-
receipt for each sum is torn out of the
book, and the counterfoil, containing n
corresponding entry, remains in the vol
ume. When Wright was arrested the DO
lice found this bcok-indeed, there was no
concealment about it, for the business was
carried on in daylight in public Office,
with great number of clerks. The book
contained $4,000 vouchers, of which S2, :
900 had been taken out Each one repre-
sented somebody's investment, and this
enormous number covered period Of only
two months. They varied In amount from
ten shillings to fifty pounds, and tho whole
sum must have exceeded f1OO 600 and
probably was f2O0, 600 or f3OO, 900.
Considering that there are some hun
dreds of such houses all over England, and
that their operations are carried on with
every sort of publicity, that they can only
be carried on at all by the completely of
the public, and that they have gone on
thus openly tor years, it produces sensa.
ton of surprise TO find that it is all done in
Migrant violation of law. There is a stat
ute some fifteen years old against betting
houses, known to lawyers as the 1G and IL
Wet. l19, which was carried through Par
lament by the present Chief Justice. then
Att'y-(ien. Cockburn. 1t would be very
modernte to say half the members of the
House OF Commons and more than half the
Lords are habitual gamblers on the turf.
Nevertheless, they passed this law without
objection, for it was understood that it was
meant to put down betting by persons of
an inferior class, and it is ell known that
betting on the part of poor men who cam
not risk more than ten shilinps at n time.
Is an immoral transaction, while betting on
large scale is truly gentlemanly
sport If you happen to be clerk and ere
tempted to rob your masters till for the
sake OF backing a Derby favorite the mas
ter class has plain interest in discourag-
ing these ventures. If you are Duke of
Newcastle, and only squander revenue of
f1o,oOO year, it is supposed to be no.
body's business but your own does not
degrade the patrician order OF which you
are distinguished member, nor lower the
tone OF public morals nor encourage the
clerk to follow your example, and 'plnnge"
|
portunities for petty larceny.
The source and center of all the turf-
gambling in England is Tattersall's. What
Tattersall's is, need hardly be exp]ained
any more than what Westminster Abbey
Is. Most people know that it is betting
club, to which great numbers of the best
known men in England belong-men
known in politics, in society, everywhere.
perhaps, except in the church. If any
bishops are members their names are not
given to the public. It's just as much the
headquarters OF betting, as the Exchange
IL the headquarters of stock-gambling, and
the sprice of horse-that is, the odds
given or taken about him for any mce-
Is determined absolutely by the
quotations Of Tattersall's, Just as the
price OF consols arc determined by theouo
tations of the Stock Exchange. 1t is the
place where bets are made, and where thew
are paid on ''settling days" One of the
commission agents before the court last
week, stated that no could not transact his
business at oil without hearing regularly
from Tattersalls. Business men in Wall
street are familiar with those little yellow
slips which are sent round by venders of
Geographic news, telling from hour to hour
the prices OF stocks the world over. Just
such little slips 60 from Tattarsall's g oil over
England. with the latest betting quotations,
and the betting houses fill their commits.
sions in accordance with tho prices thus
made for them.
anybody can see, then, that to proceed
against the betting houses and leaving Tat
tersalls untouched is only pruning of the
branches of tree that ought to be torn up
by the roots. The counsel for Morris iust-
ly complained that his client should be at.
tached while the greatest offenders in the
land went unmolested The newspapers
published the betting quotation as regular
~ as ever, and although the Bow street
magistrate warned the commission. agents
not 70 continue operations pending
the present trials, he said in res.
pect to Tattersall's, that the case was NOT
before him. There may be a distinction
In law between tho two, but there is mono
in morals, and whether or not the case be
within the jurisdictioH of How street, il is