Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1889-02-19
is IT A GAME OF CHANCE?
The English Courts Decide that Playing Bill
lizards for the Rent Of the Table is Gam
bling-Following In the Lead of Allegheny

bl1ng-F0li0wlngi In the Lead OF Allegheny
County Courts.
A decision rendered by the English courts in
relation to playing billiards in taverns is inter-
esting, from the fact that Judges Ewing and
White took the same ground whelf granting
licenses last year. The London Standard, in
referring to the subject says:
THE decision pronounced by the Queens
Bench Division, in the case of Dyson, appel
liant, will come as an unpleasant surprise to
that by no means inconsiderable class of En-
glishmen who are fond of billiards, and de-
pend for table on the inn or public house.
So long as the law remains what Mr.. Baron
Huddleston has defined it to be, they will have
to choose between playing for love or not play
ing at all. 1t is true that the judgment was
confined to the specific case of skittle pool, but
the arguments on which it rested would appear
to cover nearly every variety Of the game.
wherever there is anything in the nature OF a
stake, the prohibition must be held to apply.
Even the lightest penalty that usage imposes on
loser-the obligation to pay for the table
would, it may be presumed come under the ban.
But for chance scuffie in o Norwich hostelry
people might have gone on indefinitely in the
ld-fashloned way, without the smallest suspic-
ion that they were doing anything contrary to
the statutes. Two young men hired table one
afternoon, and played skittle pool on it for
threepenny sixpenny and shilling stakes.
They did not bet; but there was some dispute
among the lookers-On, and out of that dispute
grew the assault. The offenders were duly
convicted; but, as a sequel to the prosecution,
proceedings were taken against the proprietor
OF the house for permitting gaming on licensed
premises.
inn IN rA1a Ia
for money? If it was, then, undeniably,
there had been breech of the licensing act
of 1872; for. under the seventeenth section,
any licensed victualer who suffers gaming of
any kind to be carried on in his house is sub
jected to prescribed penalties. Games of
chance that would not be ''unlawfIl' else
where are as strictly forbidden within the walls
of the tavern as the most barefaced indulgence
in pitch and toss on the curbstone. The issue
was, therefore, narrowed down to the question
What constitutes 'gaming?' 1t was urged |
before the Divisional Court, as it was before
the local justices, that the element of skill
creates the essential distinction. 1t was |
not, indeed pretended that If the stakes |
were excessive the penalty of permitting |
gaming would not be incurred; but |
hcient to give zest to the play, and when the |
result depended in the main on the compare |
tive dexterity of the players the amusement |
was not gaming" in the sense contemplated |
by the law. The judges declined to take this |
view. Gaming" Baron Huddleston uncom-
prom1singly declared, is playing for money. |
The more or less of skill, the lightness or the |
heav1ness of the stakes, matter nothing. The |
one test is-Was there money to be lost or won2 |
Chief Justice Cockburn's indulgent dictum, |
that Gaming must contain some of the ele |
ments of chance" was set aside as not at all |
consistent with the authorities. Unquestlona- |
bly,, the tendency of judicial Interpretation has
been toward harshness Dominoes it was held |
ing; fortiOrI, then, the match at skittle pool, |
which the Norwich publican was so unlucky as |
to allow on his premises, must be construed as |
preach OF the licensing law.
'Itis, of course, conceivable that pool may
be played without any recourse to the stimulus |
OF betting in any shape or form. But it would |
at once cease to be the pool which the majority |
OF billiard players love. Mr.. Justice Wills re-
marked incidentally, during the arguments on |
the case, that he never played for money or |
anything else. but found the game quite as in
teresting as if money were played for The |
confession throws most pleasing light on the |
learned Judges capacity for deriving enjoy |
menr from mild pursuits. But one is tempted |
to suspect that he is somewhat less accom-
plished, or at any rate less keen as a billiard |
player than as lawyer. There are many con.
scientious persons for whom the mere exercise
of walking around the table suffices, and whose |
highest flight or innocent ambition is to hit. or
rather not to miss, the object ball. But these
blameless amateurs do not see the standard of |
taste. The adopts, strange as it may appear
do not find the full measure of possible delight
In displaying their consummate mastery of the
balls. In billiards, as in whist, there must be
the prospect of winning something by luck or
by good management, or forfeiting something
in the event of mischance or clumslness. Why
this seasoning of sixpence or half-crowns
should be indispensable to whet the palate, it
would be a nice, and by no means easy, prob
lem to debate. The general feeling is strongly
against making stakes at cards so high
that loss cannot be borne without per-
feet equanimity Yet, quite as universal
is the admission that, without stake,
rubber. There is something paradoxlcal in the
two-fold truth; but truth it is. A gentleman
does not mind in the least paying up the points
he has lost: but he would not have been in
duced to cut in at whist unless there was a
chance of winning something from his antag-
onists The consideration which harmonizes
the two frames of mind is perhaps to be found
in the circumstance, that whereas, on the
average of years, the average player has no
balance to show on either side OF his account,
yet this happy equilibrium is due to his having
been forced (by the immediate conditions of
each game) to do his best to win. 1t is not the
prospect of profit, but the legitimate anxiety to
avoid loss that gives the FLIP and the zest. If
this be true OF ordinary games it is pre-emin-
emily true of pool. 1t is possible, as we have
allowed, to play it without stakes: but it is
difficult to imagine that it could be seriously
attempted on that basis. To pay for forfeit Of
successive "livesn in sixpences. and to pur-
chase an extension of vitality by the same sordid
means, appears to be of the essence of the
tn an hgt MT
stamps) for coins in a scheme worthy of those
hostesses who, to save the trouble and expense
of giving a ball, cheat honest pleasure
seekers by the transparent imposture of an
dance.
Pool, and the many varieties of billiard play
ing, will, in spite of the judgment of the
Queens Bench Division go on as heretofore in
licensed billiard rooms (provided they form no
part of premises licensed for the sale of intox-
lcating liquors), and In clubs. Ginger will be
hot in the mouth in spite of the Puritanical
to which the licensing act has lent
itself. But for the unfortunate publicans who
depend for large part of their profits on the
of the billiard table, the declaration
of the law on the subject is very serious
matter. Year after year, pool and pyramids
and billiards have been played for money on
the premises without the smallest shadow of a
suspicion that any licensing regulation was
being infringed. Nor Is it so much as sug-
gested that any grave abuse has resulted. The
influence of the public house
stops, for the most part, in the taproom. The
clink of the balls is often preacher of better
things to the confirmed topper. Whatever the
lawyers may twist the act of Parliament into,
the instructive judgment of sensible men
is that playing pool, as it is usually
played, is not gaming. That there is no element
Of chance in billiards. no conscientious player
would dare aver. The memory of fortunate
f1ukes would close the mouth of boasting at |
once. But it is not the element of accident
that gives the fascination: it is the opening for
skill; the infinite POSSIBILITIES of acquiring more
delicate manipulation and more accurate eye.
The mere wager is justly condemned; indeed, |
we should be sorry to say word that could be
Interpreted to imply any encouragement to