The herald., 1897-02-07

have been tampered with. There Is no
means of finding out except by taking
the box apart, and such a course would
strenuously be objected to by the own
er; or by buching against the box until
the player has found out the exact po-
sition of each card on each roller. and
that would be 70 costly as to be I'M
practicable.
However the idea that boxes quit
losers from week in to week out Is a
fallacy which is harbored only by the
weak brains of those whom Arthur Or
ton referred to in his philosophical al
though ungrammatfcal axioms.
A saloon keeper recently took four dol
lars in nickels and worked his machine
before a number of people with the
result that when his last five-cent piece
had disappeared in the slot he was ex-
actly even. By all the combinations
that had occurred he had made thirty
two cigars. Now. II a customer had
done that he would have blown in 81,
which the saloonkeeper would have
received In advance. and 1t is probab bic
that he would have smoked ten cigars
on that day, drank six cocktails, and
given away the other sixteen tickets to
his friends. Result, a swelled head and
81 gone.
The sanguine man who goes up
against the machine with the idea that
he Is going to make a royal flush al
ways gets five cards that won't match.
1t Is the fellow with only one nickel
about his clothes and all his other money
at home or in the bank that makes a
winning. He goes in on the proposition
that a five-cent cigar or a five-cent beer
is too poor for his blood. If he loses
his nickel he doesn't care, but II he
makes two kings he gets Key West
or tipples Lemps' or Blatz's. Should he
get full hand or better he is immeas-
urably ahead Of the house, even if he
invites his friends or even strangers to
join him, and while he elately pledges
them and smiles, the barkeeper scowls,
if he knows that the player is gutter.
When the fever Of winning tickets or
cigars is upon the nickel-in-the-slo
fiend he loses all sense of keeping count
He can only remember the tickets he
has won and forgets all about the money
he has blown in. A few DAYS ago a
young fellow was pressing the button
as fast as he could and asking everybody
to have one on him. while he joyfully
displayed nine tickets as an evidence of
extraordinary luck. When a friend
catechised him. however, about what he
had spent, he found upon investiga ton,
and much to his dismay, that he was out
nearly SIS.
Some fellows come to be regular ma
chine fiends and spend every spare mo-
ment and every spare quarter in the ac-
QUESTION of tickets. One young man
worked the business so actively that not
long since in one saloon he had for safe
keeping $50 tickets and in another nearly
as many. He fondly Believed that he
was ahead of the game, but he was
slightly mistaken; the game was ahead
of him. of course, any way it can be fig
ured out
This article has been written only for
the purpose of illustra ting to the unini-
tiated what the poker machine is, and
the writer does not presume in any way
to deduce from the facts shown any
moral object lesson which might be of
benefit to the man who has not yet
played but could easily be induced to do
So The wise man will draw his own
conclusions and the fellow who has mon
ey and no brains viii on the contrary
keep on bucking until the latter COM
modify gives out or the machines are
consigned to the "demnition bow vows"
Other chance machines there have
been in the field, but none has remained
so popular as the poker hand device.
This may join the silent majority of ma
chimes some fine day, and another take
it's place, but poker and anything savor-
ing of poker Is such a favorite inStitu-
ton in the United States that hardly
anything but a supreme court decision
will consign this little joker which con-
tains no joker to the boneyard of nickel
grabbing devices.
FRANK OAKLEY.