The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1896-09-06

said my newspaper friend, as he opened the
door with night key and let me into a large
parlor, on the tables Of which were papers
from all parts of the world. l saw copy
of the Cosmopolitan Magazine. a Harper's
Weekly and the Chautauqua Magazine and
next to them lay copy of the Police Gazette.
Before | could realize how such an ungodly
paper as the latter came to be taken by
Chautauqua circle. tall, thin, gentlemanly
young man, with brown mustache and cold
blue eyes, came in. | was introduced to him
as the manager of the Chautauqua. He gave
me words of welcome in voice like oil, and
asked me TO step into the next room. l did so,
and there saw the biggest and most popular
social circle In Cripple Creek. 1T was lit
erary circle to some extent and its members
were hard at work. They sat about little
tables, each with several leaflets in his hand.
AS | looked I saw that the leaflets were
illustrated. They were covered with red and
black spots and with pictures of kings,
queens and knaves. 1t was a poker Chau-
tauQua, and the chips on the tables repre-
scented many dollars. In another part Of the
room was what ! thought at my first en-
trance an object lesson class standing around
what seemed to me to be a model OF Jerusalem
same ancient city. The professor sat down
he leetured. l drew nearer. The profess
sor was croupier and the wheel he was turn
ing was not model of Jerusalem, but that
which has lost so many greenhorns so much
money in the game of roulette. The scholars
were the players and the money on the table
showed me that the game was high one.
A young fellow from Philadelphia came into
this Chautauqua night. He had but
few dollars, but he began to bet on the red
and black. Luck was in his favor and he
doubled his stakes. He left the money on
the table, changing it from one color to the
other and then 1t was doubled again
and again until he had at last won $4,000.
This was all the cash the bank had on hand.
The croupier stopped the game and went out
and got $4,000 He brought this in and
dared the young man to put up his $4,000
on a single turn of the wheel and to double
it or lose. The Philadelphia, however, re-
piled that he had got enough and that he did
not care to play any longer. He took all
his money off with him to lose it, in all prob
ability, in some future game. The majority
of the gamblers lose in the end The per-
centage Of every game played here Is In favor
Of the bank and the most of the games are
swndles out and out.
IN CRIPPLE CREEK JAIL.
And still Cripple Creek is, in some re-
spects an orderly town. You can keep out
of all this vice if you will, or if you Guilt
vate it too much it may possibly land you
in jail. There are better jaiis than that OF
Cripple Creek. The visit 1 paid to the prison
was just before the fire. The marshal took
me to the police station, a building which
looked for all the world like the tower of
a windmill boarded up. We passed through
this, and at its back, in little shed, found
the jaiI There were at least a dozen prison
ers who were Gagged up like so many wild
animals The whole twelve were kept inside
of an iron framework made OF two-inch Dars
crossed like a lattice work and bound to-
gether so as to form two tiers OF cages. ana
so that you could look through all of the
cages at once Each cage was just about
high enough for a man to stand upright
within it, and each contained from two TO
three men. There was no chance Tor seciu-
sion or privacy for any one. All were housed
in together, and a burglar and murderer
slept side by side with two fooilsn drunken
br-rs who had raised row at dance nan
'iio Frank G. Carpenter.