The L'Anse sentinel. (L'Anse, L.S., Mich.) 18??-current, 1898-04-16

through sheer gambling. Says trav-
eler through the west: ~ have trav-
eled 1000 miles at time upon the
western waters, and seen gambling at
every waking moment from the COM
mencement to the termination of the
Journey" The southwest of this coun-
try reeks with this sin. In some of those
cities every third or fourth house in
many of the streets is a gaming place,
and it may be truthfully averred that
each of our cities is cursed with this
evil.
Men wishing to gamble will find
places just suited to their capacity. not
only in the underground oyster-cellar,
or at the table back of the curtain COW
cred with greasy cards, or in the steam
boat smoking cabin, where the bloated
wretch with rings in his ears deals out
his pack, and winks on the unsuspect-
ing traveler-providing free drinks all
around-butin gilded parlors and amid
gorgeous surroundings. This sin
works ruin, first, by providing an
unhealthful stimulant. Excitement is
pleasurable. Under every sky and in
every age men have bought it. We
must Mt times have excitement. A
thousand voices in our nature demand
it. 1t is right. 1t is healthful. 1t is
inspiriting. 1t is desires 5iod-given.
But anything that first gratifies this
appetite and hurls it back in terrific
reaction is deplorable and wicked.
Look out for the agitation that, like n
rough musician, in bringing out the
tune plays SO hard he breaks down the
instrument! God never made man
strong enough to endure the wear and
tear of gambling excitements.
A young man having suddenly in
herited large property, sits at the
hazard tables, and takes up-in a dice
box the estate won by a fathers life-
time sweat, and shakes it and losses it
away. Intemperance soon stigmatizes
it's victim, kicking him out, a slavering
fool, into the ditch, or sending him,
with the drunkard's hiccough. stagger-
ing up the street where his family
lives. But gambling does not in that
way expose its victims. The gambler
may be eaten up by the gamblers pas
sion, yet you only discover it by the
greed in his eyes, the hardness of his
features, the threadbare coat, and his
embarrassed business. Yet he is on
the road to ruin, and no preachers
voice, or startling warning, or wife $
entreaty, can make him stay for mo-
ment his headlong career.
The internal spell is on him; giant
is aroused within; and though you bind
him with cables, they would part like
thread, and though you fasten him
seven times around with chains, they
would snap like rusted wire; and
though you piled up in his path
Heaven-high Bibles, tracts and SER
mons, and on the top should set the
cross of the Son of God, over them all
the gambler would leap like roe over
the rocks, on his way to perdition.
"Aceldama, the field of blood!'
Again, this sin works ruin by killing
industry. A man used to reaping scores
or hundreds of dollars from the gam
ing table will not be content with slow
work. He will say: "What is the use
of trying to make these $50 in my store
when l can make five times that in
half an hour by the dice?n You never
knew a confirmed gambler who was in
dustrious. The men given to this vice
spend their time not actively employed
in the game in idleness or intoxication,
or in sleep, or in corrupting new vic
Tins. This sin has dulled the car
perter's saw and cut the band of the
factory wheel, sunk the cargo, broken
the teeth of the farmers harrow, and
sent strange lightning to shatter the
battery of the philosopher. The very
first idea of gaming is at war with all
the industries of society.
Any trade or occupation that is of
use is enrolling. The street sweeper
advances the interests of society by the
cleanliness effected. The cat pays for
the fragments it eats by clearing the
house of vermin The fly that takes
the sweetness from the dregs of the
cup compensates by purifying the air
and keeping back the pestilence. But
the gambler gives not anything for
that which he takes. recall that sem
tence. He does make a return, but it
is disgrace to the man he fleeces, de-
spair to his heart, ruin to his business,
anguish to his wife, shame to his chill
dren and eternal wasting away to his
soul. He pays in tears and blood and
agony and darkness and woe.
What dull work is blowing to the
farmer when in the village saloon in
one night he makes and loses the value
of summer harvest! Who will want
to sell tapes and measure nankeen and
cut garments and weigh .sugar, when
in a nights game makes and loses and
loses and makes again and loses again
the profits of a season?
John Borack was sent as mercan-
tile agent from Bremen to England and
this country. After two years his en-
ployers mistrusted that all was not
right. He was a defaulter for $S7, 900.
1t was found that he had lost in LON
bard street, London, $50, 900; in Fulton
street, New York, $40, 900, and in New
Orleans, $1,000. He was imprisoned,
but afterwards escaped and went into
the gambling profession. He died in a
lunatic asylum. This crime is getting
it's lever under many a mercantile
house in our cities, and before long
down will come the great establish
ment, crushing reputation, home com
fort and immortal souls. How il di-
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