The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1897-07-01
BETTING IN FRANCE.
Gay Parisians Dearly Love TO Play
the Races
From the Washlnrton Evening star

'le races IN the gay French capital. The
courses being themselves tolerated
with a view to the amelioration of the
equine Species" the betting finds its easily
comprehended liberation in the ameliora-
tion of the courses" Yet it is not with
out debate. The gay French capital is
not so gay but that it has grave cliques
TO protest that no evil shall be done that
good may come. And so. of course, the
government is placed in difficulty, out of
which 1t finds its way by compromise. 1t
Is not against the law to play races; but
TO play the races you must go out to the
races
But yes, for sure, it's very easy for the
rich-for the digesters'-to lol, out to
Longchamps in their carriage; but how 10
the. brave Workingman, the noble, clear
eyed natures nobleman, to take a day off
from his toll when he desires to pick a
winner?"
These types, the wine merchant" the
garcon de cafe, the newspaper and tobac-
co functionaries being very much in touch
with the down-trodden workingman, in
thier continuous performance act of touch
ing him, have conceived and daily execute
a veritable touchdown on the government
and workngman alike by means of this
appeal to liberty, equality and fraternity.
Give us your money" the philanthro-
pists say, kindly, land we will go out to
your instructions, we will execute them to
the letter. bringing home to you.
less a commission, all the winnings your
provision foresaw and our devoted assd-
uity accomplished"
Now for two reasons, first contrari-
ness and an invincible determination to
evade an arbitrary law and secondly
no less fixed determination to play the
sure tip dreamed of, worked out with
pencil from statistical sporting an
nual. the tip overheard, bought, found in
coffee grounds obtained in any of a hun
bred WAYS. as may he this clandestine
betting iourshes enormously among the
lower and the lower middle classes. The
cafe waiter, who is known to take risks,
has to keep note book. He only works
at night and & few hours before lunch.
Every afternoon he changes from IAN
honest workingman" to one of the con-
temmed luxurious idlers. and he likes it.
He would fam be a "digester' too
he Will take one of those four horse
or six-horse omnibuses, loag, high on it's
springs, its seats fixed crosswise like
those of a summer trolley car. The dri-
yer, in a blue coat. a red vest, with gilt
buttons, gorgeous topboots and an oil
cloth high hat of the old postilion type,
cracks a long whip while the conductor,
in plain clothes, hoarsely solicits passen-
gers from out the passing throng.
The merry omnibus with its three-card
men, its ogling damsels with lips pre-
ternaturally cherry ripe, its seedy, mid
die aged men, downcast, furtive, bright
ening into hopefdlness over some South
African gold mine prospectus, its vigor-
Gus loafers, the merry omnibus with its
clerks out of work, its clerks evading a
days work, through falsehood, it's wrong
going fathers family risking the rent
money, its misdirected youths fresh from
the pawn shops, jinges merrily to sound
through the great park they call the Bois
and then into the lovely hill-and wood
surrounded basin, where they race upon
the Longchamps turf. The track itself
is all green turf and as the bunch of
splendid racing animals comes laundering
by and passes in the twinkling of an
eye, their heels kick up soft clods of
grassy dirt that splatter back on those
in the first rank around the fence.
There must be thirty betting booths in
the great popular two-franc Enclosure.
Pay 81, like Lhe self-iudulgent swells, to
enter the pesage, to see the weighing to
observe the horses as they are walked
round and round, to watch the actions of
this noted plunger and that celebrated
hacker, to have information of the last
odds of the bookmakers, to mix with the
flower of Paris, to observe the ladies and
their toilets, to be charged a quarter for
a lemonade and 20 cents for thin sand
the betting booth run by the government.
The government of France is operating
here among the lowly and the humble
taking their 81 and 50 shots, exactly as 1t
is among the plutocrats across the way.
He will get better odds!
There is something remarkable in this,
and, as the case lies deep in the unfath-
enable darkness of no single human i'm
pulse, but the infinitely blacker mystery
of the movement of souls In conglomera-
ton, that Is, in the incoherent Topping of
the idiotic crowd, no formula for its use
in the elusive problem of accumulation is
to be hoped for by the philosopher or
Spectator. Only the fact remains. 1t is
that, while the mutual pools in the aris-
tocratic pesage may be paying thirty
francs for ten on such and such a horse
those Of the pleban pelouse-the great
ring where you pay only 40 cents admis-
sion--may yield easily full twenty francs
for five! And this explains why in all
photographs of the Grand Prix and other
great events you will see blurred across
the track the indistinct images of a hun
bred men caught by the camera in the act
of running back and forth before the race
or after II, to lay their bets in the booths
of the populace or ascertain how much
the populistic pools are paying.
Should you follow the garcon de cafe as
he lays the cash intrusted to him. YOU
would not that, while all the little govern
mental Shantles operate on the same race
in the same way-and, note II, paw the
same when all Is figured up-he will still
walk from this to that, perplexed, and
seem to calculate, resolving a hard prob
lem. When he does this. II denotes that he
is exercising his own individual right to
pick out winners on his own account. He
seeks 10 penetrate the motive Of the
crowd. the fancy Of the moment. on which
must depend the final price-and present
value--of each horse, and. correlatlvely.
the excruciatlng risking Of his own dear
dollar.
Each booth is the same, but the chance
movement OF the mob will cause them TO
be very differently patronized Each
booths establishment consist Of two inhu-
manly lmpollte and snappy civil service
clerks, one to receive the dollars-5-franc
pleces--glvlng out a single numbered ticket
for each dollar, while another al a big
blackboard records each ticket sold by
marking a stroke opposite the name OF
that horse represented on the ticket by
his number. Thus cit will arrive that.
when. say. so have been paid into this
booth, there will be nifty strokes upon the
blackboard and distributed among the.
/ say four horses TO be run.
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