Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1899-12-30
HE LOST A FORTUNE
Played Poker Hand for More Than
1t Was Worth.
FOUR KINGS LOOKED PRETTY Big
Until His Opponent Laid Down the
Cards That Won.
THEY WERE FOUR ACES
FOUR KINGS LOOKED PRETTY Big
THEY WERE FOUR ACES

Written for The Evening Star
"A New York boniface was telling me the
other day of an enormous poker game that
he had witnessed at one of the exclusive
poker par,ors in his top-heavy town. in
which the fortunate man of the party of
four quit $500 to the good at the close of
eight or ten hours play" said a veteran
New Orleans hotel man who was in Wash
ington at the opening of Congress. After
telling me this he leaned back and waited
for my eyes to protrude. He was some
what miffed and sulky when he noted that
the eye protrusion on my part didn't occur.
To bring him around to good nature again
and to convince him that ] wasn't attitude
inizing, L was compelled to spend a half
hour or so in winding a bit of a reel of
the days when there We're poker giants in
this country. He wasn't quite willing, at
the finish, to acknowledge that the winner
at draw of $500 was 4 poker pigmy but
when | happened to mention the occasion.
on New Year eve. 1865 when Phil. Cuth-
bert of St James parish dropped in a two
handed game at the ST Charles Hotel in
New Orleans little bundle of sIooOn0 ne
gurgied some, and then asked me if II got
into the New Orleans papers. ! told him
that in 1868 and Whereabouts the New Or
leans papers were too busy roasting the
carpet baggers to devote any space to such
minor matters a $1,000 poker game at
the st. Charles Hotel. where draw games
approXfmating that in size were generally
going on at any old hour Of the day or
night. There vas some rhetoric, | admit,
in that 'approXimating' statement but 1
wanted to set this New York man right.
AS matter of stern fact. a $4,000 game of
draw not a all uncommon in the old
st. Charles private parlors. After Phi.
Cuthbert had dropped that mound of $780,
600 on one hand, the New Orleans papers
did announce that Mr.. Philip Cuthbert the
Well-knOWQ planter of ST lanes
was about to start on a gold-prospecting
tour in Honduras; but they were generous
enough not to mention. If they knew it.
that, with four kings in his hand, he had
lost 100000 to Mr.. Joseph Lescolette ship
per, of Havre, Pernambuco, and New Or
leans.
How He Saw 1t All.
I'm order to lead up to that extraordinary
game, I've got to plead guilty to having
been table arranger and sweep-out boy
at the old St. Charles a the time the thing
happened. 1t was one of the functions of
my job to sort O. stand by, as the sailors
say, when games were on in the private
parlors, and run errands for the gentlemen
playing. That's how 1 happened 10 see it
all.
Phil Cuthbert was a raiser of pertuue
tobacco up in st. James parish, and he had
besides several thousand acres in cotton
His father, who died before the war was
well Under way, was supposed TO be worth
$-r'F'-''p 10 s-D,Vh'p', ana IL all Went to his
only son Phil. AT the close of the war the
estate had dwindled to some SSO0.00o. and
the young man started in to fatten ii out
still more. It was the talk of Louisiana
that he had taken s25ooo0 crimp in the
estate within two years after he entered
upon it, and it had nearly all gone at
cards. He wasn't a dissiplta1 man at ALL
but he lust naturally coultln't h.ln but
play poker, and he belonged 20 a family of
losers a poker. He never knew when the
psychological moment had arrived for him
to quit winner
Very Little Man.
Joe Lescolette-called Joe Familiarity be-
cause he under forty, a rounder. of
French nativity, who loved Americans and
their nicknames and dimnutves of good
fellowship-was probably the richest of the
New Orleans fruit importers at that time
His father before him had had a lire of
West Indian and South American sailing
packets hauling fruit into New Orleans for
the American market. and ice came into
the whole business at the old gentlcman's
death. He was killed. by the way, to get
bit ahead Of the story, at the battle of
Gravelotte. during the Franco-Prussian
war.
"Lescolette wasn't what you could call
hectic flush gambler during the few years
that he kept his name pretty constantly in
the mouths of New Orleans folks on ac-
count of his extravagances, but he was a
scientific master of the game of American
draw, all the same and. by the same
token, as nervy little man in a game of
cards, or in any other affair of life for
that matter. as ever came out of GauL
The Prelude.
"Cuthbert came down to New Orleans
from his plantation to attend the New
Year eve performance of Aida at the
grand opera, intending to return to ST.
James and spend New Year day on the
plantation. He met Lescolette in the smok-
two MI
We're friends of years standing, members
of the same clubs and they had various
business dealings with each other besides.
As they sat smoking between the acts
Cuthbert got poker light in his eye. He
slipped his arm through Lescolette's.
Joe he said, 4 desire to accumulate,
accrue and win a very large portion of your
wealth, even unto the half of your king
dom, this night. Suppose, then, when the
dying strains of Rhadames are only echoes
and this last act is finished, We repair to
the St. Charles
Well when they came in 1 was the but
tons in charge of the parlor they selected
for play. Much as they desired solitude,
they couldn't achieve it. About half a
dozen of their friends traipsed along with
them and took one of the tables in the
same parlor and went at dinky game of
$50 limit.
The First Act.
81 piled up couple of dozen decks of
cards within easy reach of Cuthbert and
the Frenchman, and, after they had taken
a couple of brandies and sodas apiece, talk
ing the while of everything else on earth
besides poker, they began play. Both of
them had their check books beside them on
the table, and the bank was to keep itself
as the saying goes. There was to be no
limit. The white chips were worth $40, the
reds $50, the blues $50 and the yellows 500.
This was double the usual value of chips
even in big games at the st. Charles. and
1 could see that both men We're out for it
in perfectly friendly and cordial way, Of
course but out for it, nevertheless.
"Lescolette was a scientific, COOL all
around percentage player of poker. He
had made study of the game, tust he
had made study of the fruit trade. and
he had very little Of the mercurial DISPOSE
ton of his race. Withal, he was a gener-
Gus man in game. and never took advan-
tage of opponents overgrown conf
dence. Cuthbert was an uneven player;
not a cool-headed man at all. He had no
license to play cards for big stakes under
any circumstances In the first place, he
drank too much over the game, and, in the
second place, he tried to play poker by in
tuition instead of by mathematical calcu-
Iatior and the study of the other fellows