The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1898-06-14
THE KING OF HEARTS.
ON THE BOTTOM OF THE DECK,
BUT 1T SHOWED IN A HAND.

Dodge of Desperate Man-SteaIs the
Card to Give Himself IA Winning
King FulI-AnOthcr Player Holds
Four Trays and the Cheater Loses
SI1,OOO of Trust Funds.
From the Chicago Inter-Ocean.
"One of the queer analyses Of gambling,
such as you hear from time to time" said
the gray haired, young-looking man, was
that of an old man with whom 1 used TO
talk frequently in Jim Harris gambling
house in La Crosse. He had lost an eye
early in his career, but had managed to re-
tain the other one by strictly observing the
ethics Of whatever game he played after
the loss of the first, though ne had not es-
capped the inevitable nickname of one
eyed Hopkins He was a mild hammered
man with some ideas of his own, and pc
cullarities of expression. Listening to him
was great joy even if you did not agree
with him, for his ideas were suggestive and
his expressions were amusing. He was
trying to dissuade me from playing poker.
" Poker is exciting enough he said.
TN admit that right off You can fry your
brain over three Of a kind when you can't
guess if the other man has four or five
spades in his flush. And when you do split
a pair of aces and fiji a royal flush on the
draw you're liable to get palpitaton. Oh,
yes; poker is exciting. You're likely to lose
your self-respect, though, after you've
been bluffed out of a big jackpot and seen
two fellows eat each other all up in the
winning hand after all What's that? A
good player wouldn't get bluffed out under
those circumstances? OH wouldn't he?
tell you, sonny, I've seen ALTERED good
players lay, down monstrous good cards.
-" Now, faro is a gentleman's game If
you are going to gamble, play faro. You
don't have to get excited, and you don't
have to play the other fellows game to
win your own. You're up against clean
straight proposition all the time, and you
know what il is, and you can play 1t eX-
actly according to your own ideas of
what's proper and fit But poker is a
gladiator struggle. Outside of the abso-
lutte impossibnty of being able to tell the
value Of any hand you may hold, between
a seven high and royal flush, you are
more or less at the mercy of every other
player in the game. He can make you
bet more than you want to, or he can
refuse to see you at any stage. It's not
gentleman's game
81 didn't agree with him then" contin-
ued the gray haired. young-looking man,
land l don't agree with him now And,
as / felt sure he was only talking to get
me up against the bank, l only laughed at
him. I have often thought, though, of
what he said and / don't know but he
is right in one particular. 1t is a game
in which a gentleman is sometimes at a
disadvantage, because It is one in which
he is at the mercy of the sleight-of-hand
performer You don't think, ] suppose,
that a gentleman has any business to play
with a trickster and perhaps he hasn't,
| but it happens often enough.
Gambling is like politics. You run
against queer associates. And this holds
good even in what Is called a friendly game
of poker. 1t Is true that many men play
poker honorably One who permits himself
to do a dshonorable thing ceases of
course, to be a gentleman, whether he Is
playing poker or doing anything else. But
the excitement of the game tells, and If
there is a streak of yellow in man 1t will
show in his play, somehow or other, at
some time. l like whisky and believe that
1t is an excellent thing when 1t is used
properly but IL has ruined many a man.
And l think of poker in much the same
way that 1 do Of whisky l admire and en-
joy the game, and look upon it as pas
time for full grown men, pleasant, excit-
ing and mentally invigorating-imp
If you please, though it is unquestonably
injurious when the Indulgence is carried TO
]
man to be ruined by it,
did you ever see man cry? By crying
l don't mean the mere shedding of a few
tears, such as may be wrung from the
strongest man by the excess of emotion
such as sympathy or great grief, or even
by agonizing pain, or a tempest of anger.
Such tears are no more evidence of inher-
ent weakness than the salt drops that ooze
from the eyes in a gale of wind. But /
mean breaking down and sobbing and
crying like a spanked child, or hysterical
woman. 1t is not a pleasant sight, and l
never saw it but once. Neither do care to
see 1t ever again; but the one occasion was
the direct result of the crash Of utter and
irremed.able ruin that came to a weak
ling from oVerindulgence I'm poker
I'VE hadn't suspected him of weakness
If we had he wouldn't have been in the
game, for We played for sport and not for
one another's money in any sense of wish
ing to enrich ourselves by the game 1t is
a subtle distinction. but every poker PLAYER
knows it, You can't play poker without
playing for money-at least / cant-but
It's one thing TO play for the pleasure of
winning and it's quite another to play for
the possession of the money that YOU NAV
win. Don't tell the Pharisees that, though.
| They wouldn't understand you if they
could.
IT was accident that brought us to-
gether that first time We played, but the
game proved 20 be so pleasant that we re-
uewod it again and again, till it came to
be regular thing every Saturday night
IL grew to be a pretty stiff game, too, for.
though we started in with a 50 limit, we
got to playing table stakes after a few
months, ana it was not an uncommon
thing to see 5000 or $1,000 on the table
OF an evening Ii was moi so very des-
perate as it may sound though for we
were all fairly prosperous men and the
occasional loss of u few hundred was not
a serious thing TO any. Of us. At least,
thought so al the time and I am pretty
sure that nearly all Of us thought the
same thing.
"And then we played so steadily, for so
long a time-it was nearly three years be-
fore the game broke up--that We came to