Smyrna times., 1888-12-05
THE RAIN GAMBLERS.
A GAME IN WHICH NATURE TAKES
A THIRD HAND"

Betting on the Amount of Rainfall in
Bombay-LivelY Times During the Rainy
Season - Cheating Impossible - Simple
Tools of the Game.
The Bombay police are at present ex-
ercised over a point of public morals
which suggests grave reflections to those
who imagine that human nature can be
regenerated by act of parliament. In
England we have done our best to check
| gambling by the suppression of lotteries,
and betting houses, and ''list shops" and
by Withholding all legal protection from
the goose who has backed his fancy and
finds it hard to collect the proceeds. But
still the evil is not eXterminated, and so
far as risking money on the performances
of horses on race course or of men ON
the ash path is concerned, the mischief is
perhaps more rampant than cNer it was.
In truth, the ennui of existence, among
men with no internal resources OF ex-
ternal business, must be relieved in some
way. And this, the Bombay authorities
discovered, is supplied among the native
population by means of the rain gambling.
BETTING ON THE RAINFALL.
Whether this form of betting is new or
old we are not informed, though, as
everything in the east is very antiquated,
the chances are that it has been going on
from time immemorial, though it is only
recently that it has come prominently
under the notice of the police. All kinds
OF gambling are, of course, plentiful in an
Indian city-frOm the purchase of lottery
tickets to the vulgar excitement of chuck
farthing. But the rain gamblers, though
not drafted solely from the upper circle of
native society, are in Bombay confined,
for the most part, to men with some
means. In vulgar parlance, it is known
as "sutta, and consists in betting ON the
amount of rain which will be discharged
from a passing cloud.
Naturally ina country where the sky is
as brass for more than half the year, this
form of speculation can be indulged in
only during the monsoon season when
business is partly suspended and the world
generally in western India is "peg low"
With the southwest monsoon the rainy
season in Bombay sets in and lasts with
amazing regularity, from the second week
in June till near the close of September.
AT this period the air is moist and clammv
and the citizens move, as it were, in
a kind of vapOr bath, though old residents
are fond of declaring that the monsoon is
pleasant enough "when one gets accus-
toned to the rain" In any case it gen
orally leaves off for an hour or two in the
evening, when a ride or walk is possible.
But that is just the period when the rain
gambler hies him to the sutta saloon. The
principal of these haunts-the only one
indeed with which the police seem ac-
quainted-is situated in close proximity
to one of the principal police stations.
CHEATING IS IMPOSSIBLE
According to a description in a local
journal the place is perfectly easy of ac-
cess, and there is no attempt to hide any
thing from the authorities, or from any
one else. Nor, in truth, except for the
temptation which it affords to people with
no money to lose to risk their earnings,
or, what is worse, the earnings of their
employers, rain gambling is about the
most innOcuous of all forms of betting.
Cheating is impossible, and though expe-
rience counts for something, there can
not be any chance of the greenhorn being
hoodwinked, since the game is the sim
plest imaginable, and the fact of Nature
taking the third hand" in the sport pre-
cludes the suspicion of the willy "shrof"
manipulating the implements of the
game
Implements, indeed, in the gambling
senSo VI Iue term, Jnere are nOne and,
SO long as gamester has learned tG read
the signs Of the heavens, the meresC tyro
has as much chance of winning as the
most regular frequenter of the sutta
saloon. The room is occupied bv the
stalls of the shroffs, or bankers. who nav
to the owner of the establishment a GER
tain percentage of their gains; and othis
magnate all disputes are referred, his de-
clsion, like that of the umpire in a cricket
match, being final
IMPLEMENTS OF THE GAME.
The only tools Of any kind in the place
are two rough rain gauges. One of them
consists of long gutter running along |
the caves of a shed. At one end there is
an aperture, to which is affixed a spout. |
through which the water trickles when |
the rain comes down in a drizzle. But |
when 1t pOurs the water shoots over tho |