Daily inter mountain. [volume] (Butte, Mont.) 1881-1901, 1901-03-06

tune. The Armada of luck has smiles
for every newcomer, but only scratches
for inveterate suitors"
| Two gallons of gold? Luck for be-
ginners? thinks the reader of the warn
ing-suppose l try and adjust my pro-
gramme to those data? Yes, win a pot
and don't give them a ghost of a chance
to snatch 1T back. Or, the puff diIates
on the scenic charms of the coast noun
! tains and quite incidentally mentions
the fairy palace where a witch as
| capricious as Circe of old lavishes her
favors on the most unworthy. Every
sinner for 100 miles around will make
a note of that, with results that may
| lead him to doubt his own prestige. And
whenever the rooms are crowded t::e
administration introduces sham wiz
ner. He may have been on the pay roll
| of the company for years or date his
| engagement from a recent interview
with one of their metropolitan agents,
but contrives to appear as a newcomer,
and if possible, to attract attention as a
devotee of fashionable sports before
entering the hazard den. When he does
come the ushers invite him to re-
served seat, and it is whispered that
| the Count Tomas do Sol of Gonzales is
going to try his luck.
| But suppose he should lose?
The custom of allowing players to
/ stake their bets in cash will cover that
! contretemps. Count Tomas slams down
a wad of bank notes, and, if luck fails
| to favor him, increases his stakes in
| bulk, till at last he hits a winning num-
| Der, and receives pile of coin that
appears to have almost exhausted the
reserve fund of the bank. He cannot
help winning again if he continues to
| bet on even chances and his second hit
| is followed by a whispered consultation
| of cashiers; they have to suspend OPP
erations till their emergency messenger
can return with additional funds.
Count Tomas, who has broken the
| bank and does not care to conceal the
fact, is a countryman of Martin Garcia,
who cleaned out the tiger at Baden
Baden, in the good old Rhineland rou-
lette times, and who had bought his
| secret of success from an AndaluSian
| fortune teller.
DISCRETION IN LUCK.
The sensation soon sets the whole
Riviera agog, and is sure to spread to
Paris and st. Petersburg. For a week
| or two the lucky count basks in the
| sunlight of popularity, but ceases his
| visits to the temple o.. fortune, and,
| indeed tries to impress his admirers
with the fact that discretion is the bet
| ter part Of luck, as we'll as of courage.
Nothing easier than to get a few
thousand ahead if you make the best
Of your Inspirations; but never try to
bully fortune when she happens to turn
coy. That's what ruined poor Garcia
| won 100000 francs and lost every CEN
| time because he couldn't make it ten
| millions even, and then tried tO1 fecoup
his reverses by main force. A sort of
clairvoyance tells man when his lucky
hour has come. and he could make a
bank as profitable as a gold mine if he
only knew when to STOP
A multitude of such bats attracts
nibblers enough to make the trap enor-
mously profitable, without the aid of
foul play in any criminal sense of the
word.
There is no direct cheating. and its
| wholesale transactions enable the bank
to content itself with a small percentage
of guarantee profit, viz. one thirty
seventh in roulette and one siXty-fOurth
in trente-et-quarante.
The latter is a card game, and the
mere possibility of hand
tricks induces the masses to patronize
the wheel of fortune, with it's visible
preclusions of crookery. A wheel with
81 partitions spins one way, a little ivory
ball turns rapidly in the opposite direc-
ton, and the skill of Bosco, combined
with the eyes of an Argus, would not
enable a would-be trickster to influence
the result one per mil. In the last mo-
ment, when the ball has exhausted it's
rotary impulse and is veering to topple
down the wheel pit, the wheel itself is
| still spinning with swiftness that blurs
the view of the partitions, so that even
| then a prediction of the event would be
mere gueSSWOrk.
The Monte Carlo rooms are watched
night and day, and cheating is both
ways impossible, but the bank can
afford to let players try the most in
genious Systems" and rely on it's per
cent advantage that must assert itself
in the long run.
Coming and going. it amounts to
per cent of all the stakes risked-a mere
tritle, at first sight, though the tend
ency of the mathematical import is just
this: That, after 33 bets, the law of
probability will clean out the average
player.
And what must be the present profits
| of a syndicate that could build palaces
! 25 years ago. and has since more than
| trebled the patronage of its man-trap?
The railroad that could get along with
two special coaches for Monaco in 1876
now runs two special trains; the group
of hotels at the depot has developed
into a long-stretched terrace of hotels
and lodging houses, yet Monte Carlo
is still growing. and the cemetery is
growing faster than the town itself.
Progressive nuisances, it is true, tend
! to become self-limiting; excessive pub
lie Affections may generally be expected
| to provoke revolt, but in the special
case of the Monaco man-trap that pros
pect is modified by the circumstance
that it's growing power for mischief
goes hand in hand with an increasing
power of bribery.
F. L. OSWALD.