The Sedalia weekly bazoo. [volume] (Sedalia, Mo.) 187?-1904, 1885-05-05
LONDON CLUBS.
How Gambling Is Made q Business of n
These Places.

How Gambling Is Made q Business Of al
These Places.
One who has evidently acquired con.
siderable knowledge of club gambling
and card sharping from rueful expert
ence writes: To listen to the converse.
ton of a gambler you would
think he never won. This
is the kind of thing: eyes,
just my luck, here 1 am losing again;
but it serves me right, for swore after
my loss on Tuesday night I'd never
touch a card again. It's simply too
awful 1 never win! Other fellows
have a turn of bad luck, and then the
tickle goddess shines on them; but
with me never. Upon my honor, last
year / lost more than six thousand
pounds; dare say you won't believe it,
but / did"
Then, to any one replying, "Ohi
come now, / heard of your winning
last night two or three hundred" he
will rejoin, by jovel it's too bad. Of
course that's got all over the place.
Yes, certainly 1 did win that; but of
course you never heard of nv losing
eleven hundred only three nights be-
fore. L do win sometimes, | admit;
but it is invariably when I'm playing
for comparatively nothing; when l
have piled up the agony and am play
nc fairly high, l lose.
That is pretty faithful report of the
usual conversation of a professional
gambler. There is one man of this
sort whose income, TO nv certain
knowledge, is exactly two thousand
pounds year; and he has fine house,
carriages, horseS-everything simply
perfect. He entertains magnifi7
Gently, lives at the rate of four,
teen thousand pounds a year and has
no debts. How does he do il? The
reply is, this man-who wishes you to
believe he is so desperately unlucky-
is a card player. He will begin play
ing ecarte pony a game, and a pony
on the rub-not Il bad stake for an in
come of two thousand pounds year,
Later on he will get into big figures; il
will be hundred pounds game and a
hundred pounds the rub; and then the
best out of three games for thou. and
we stop" Lastly it is double on
quits" and he rises winner on the
night of some thousands. This man
has, too, a splendid zero. 1t is this.
Early in the evening he announces that
he must 60 home early; his wife is i'll,
and he has promised TO be home soon.
If he is winner at two o'clock he
rises, looks at his watch. is aStounded
to see the hour-he must 90 at once.
If the loser wishes him to remain on
and give him a chance. he replies!
mo. L really can't tonight; I'll give
you your revenge any other night. old
fellow; but tonight | must 90 home.
/ warned you before we began that
win or lose must stop, as my wife is
ILL.,"
All this looks straight enough; but is
it so? No. For if at two o'clock this
man is loser he not only sticks on till
he has got back his losings, but waits
till he has put on few hundreds to
the good. 1t may be thought this game
could only be played few times.
myself have seen it successfully per-
formed fifty times.
Quite the prince of sharpers is man |
who has been at the work for about
fifteen years, and is a past master in
the art. He is a member of lots OF
clubs, and | have heard it computed
that he must have landed over fifty |
thousand pounds sterling at the least. |
He is assisted by more or less attrac-
tive wife, and it was chiefly through |
falling in love with her that one poor |
fellow, some five years ago, lost more
than five thousand pounds at ecarte at
one sitting at his rooms at Brighton.
The lucky winner of this sum began |
with no income at all; and yet up to |
the time he married he lived at the rate
of quite three thousand pounds year. |
His wife has an income of few hum |
dreds, and he now manages to live |
quite en- millionaire. At Paris he is
well known; his wife's arrival and her
dresses are described in lie Boulevard,
Gu Bias and similar papers. He has
made various paying trips to gambling
places abroad, where when he has |
picked up men who won at the tables, !
bis wife would invite them in ito sup
per and smoke" and then he and his
Il.