The Portland daily press., 1894-06-21
THE BANK AT MONTE CARLO.
No "System Ever Devised Can Break
It."

The Crouper's take OFF,, Enriches the
Banks Stockholders and the Prince of
Monaco-Their Investment Returns MILL
ions Annually.
A profit of 81, 400. 900 on capital of
$4,000, 600 represents fairly successful
Investment. 1t is at any rate more
lucrative employment of money than
boarding it in an old stocking. What
provident father of a family, anxious to
leave decent competence to his child
rem, would not be glad to find such an
opportunity of "placing"his savings as
this business affords? The only thing
which could possibly deter him from
taking advantage of it, if it came in his
way, would be his remembrance Of
certain old saw, said to have been much
favored by the Duke of Wellington, in
which "high interest" is associated with
1bad security Prudential considera-
tions of that sort might make him hest
tate, and would probably put him on in
curing whether the undertaking which
yielded such magnificent returns was
not one of an exceptionally hazardous,
agitating and anxious character. Yet
if this were the sole cause of his hesita-
ton, it would not take long for the case
in mind to remove it.
1t would be easy to convince the eau
tious investor that the enterprise, so far
from being hazardous, was absolutely
safe; that, though it was profoundly
agitating to many people whom it con-
cerned, it's directors themselves were not
included among the number; and that,
ifsany anxiety broke their sleep of nights
it would at all events have no pecuniary
origin. The business, he might be as
sured. is absolutely without risk; it
makes no severe demands upon human
labor, and none whatever upon human
ingenuity or forethought. Little is need
ed for its successful prosecution but the
services of a considerable number of
employees, none of whom, however, need
possess any higher or rarer qualifications
than those which fit the cashier of
bank for his daily duties, while the re-
mainder will be quite sufficiently
equipped for their position if they possess
good club waiter. Add to these outgo-
ings the payments required, perhaps the
only considerable item of expenditure,
for wages of supervision" we have
enumerated all the industrial burdens
which this profitable undertaking has to
bear.
If this account of it still seems to the
prudent investor to be too good to be
true, If he is inclined to suspect that the
business, though both splendid and safe
SO long as it exists at all, must assuredly
be short-lived one, the creation of some
passing taste or fancy of society-well,
evenShere it would be possible to remove
his fear. He might be confidently as
sured that this so far from being a new
and probably transient fashion, is al
most as old as civilization itself; that
those who conduct it have built upon no
loose and shifting soil of popular caprice,
but have laid their foundation on the
bed rock of an interchangeable instinct;
and that, unless man himself proposes
to prohibit it their business will last as
long as the cuidity, the rashness and the
folly of mankind. For the name of that
business is !" hel1-keeping," and the I'M
dertaking whose directors have issued
this comfortable balance sheet, declaring
profit of sixty-six per cent. on their
capital, is that of the Casino at Monte
Carlo.
the application of human intelligence to
money-making, has money been SO easily
made. OF course the cost of plant and
material and the interest of capital sunk
therein. has not been reckoned in the
rough estimate above. The invested
wealth represented blythe saloons and gar
dens themselves is considerable, and the
daily charge for maintaining their at
fractions is, doubtless, also very great.
Among the annual expenses, too, is to
be reckoned the gift" of $4,000 lbs.
year to his Serene Highness, the Prince of
Monaco. for permitting public gaming
house to flourish in his dominions, and
dark illusions are made to further mys-
FERROUS sum of 10000 lbs. expended in
"subventions" to European newspapers.
But these, after all, are mere fleabites.
The management may well be indiffer-
emit to outgoings of his kind, which are
summed up in tens Of thousands, while
it is in hundreds Of thousands that their
profits come rolling in. What is of real
though melancholy significance in the
matter is the large, the almost epic, sim
plicity of the industry itself.
The amount of the capital employed in
prosecuting it is mere accidental cir
cumstance; the method of it's prosecu-