Barton County democrat. [volume] (Great Bend, Kan.) 1885-1915, 1889-08-15
BETTING on HORSES.
A Species of Gambling Very Popular ID
England and America

A Species of Gambling Very Popular ID
England and America
Engiishmen are accustomed to say
that Italians are greatly attracted by
their lotteries, and to attribute tie
fascination to the vein of superstition
in the Italian character. but the Wen
nese are Germans, and they all buy
tickets; the French Government knows
well that by lacking on a lottery to
loan it can enable great companies to
raise money in large sums after their
credit has wholly disappeared: and II
successor to Bish could open a Lon
don lottery tomorrow. half the work
ers in London would buy chances.
The passion for unearned gain is. in
fact, innate, and influences the half
educated European almost as trongly
as the half-civilized Chinese. whose
popularity is not that he CANDLES,
but that. rather than not pay when he
has lost. he will sell himself for a
slave. Betting on horses is at pres
emit in this country, which prohibits
lotteries, gambling made easy to the
smallest purse and the most deficient
intelligence A gaming table is not
always accessible. but anybody who
wishes can ''place" bet on a horse to
almost any amount he p!eases. either
with a boOkmaker or with a friend.
Tickets for what is really a horse lottery
are sold just as openly as they were
twenty years ago. As a rule, too. the
winner is paid. There is plenty of
''welshing" on the actual race-course.
and every now and then some great
betting man levants. taking so many
precautions to avoid pursuit in En-
gland as if he were 4 forger; but the
great mass of lost bets are fairly paid.
The bookmakers do not often lose. on
the whole, and individual bettors
make extraordinary eXertions to pay
up. The social feeling on the subject
Is still, in fact. exceedingly strong. so
strong that it is difficult for a de-
faulter who has been kicked into
hospital to obtain any redre at all.
and that we read every month in the
Northern papers of clerks and others
in positions of trust who have risked
penal servitude rather than not pay
their bets. Betting on horses is
therefore. in England, the aliuring
form of gambling. and its attraction is
deepened by a curious and not quite
applicable fact. Nobody is ashamed
of winning 4 bet on a race. As a rule.
man excuses himself for buying a
lottery ticket, even if he happens to
wilma rare occurrence-and if he
pockets a large sum at cards de-
t.,
fortune. except from the card
players present on the occasion, and
can grow irritable if even they allow
themselves too much latitude of COM
ment. The winner on horse race is,
on the contrary, little proud of his
success. and quotes it as evidence of
his sagacity. He knows a horse when
he sees one, witness those ESQ. He
Fan rely on his Information. so ne can:
whereas the man who lOst-why, he
actually believed that his tipster could
be trusted on his oath. Except in
very respectable circles the winner on
a horse race gains credit among his
acouaintances by his success. and, be-
sides. gratifes that strange pride
which induces three English citizens
in five to talk as if they understood all
about horses. dogs and the mathe-
matics of betting. the last subject
upon which half the chatterers know
as much as they do of Euclid. This
pride. which is very curious if you re-
member that majority of English
men live in cities. is the result. We
fancy. partly of tradition and partly OF
the sort OF caste superiority which still
belongs to those who ride instead OF
walking, but it is ingrained in entire
classes. some of them sedentary
classes, of the British community.
Vanity. therefore. is excited by sue
cessful betting rs well as greed. and
the result is state of society in
which great political newspapers are
compelled for weeks on end to devote
entire pages to the evidence given at a
trial the object of which is to decide
whether some jockeys and their en-
ployers did or did not habitually
cheat