Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1904-07-09
NEW YORK: GOSSIP
The Lambs That Will Part
With Their Fleece.
2'lt
ABETTER c0 % ISLAND
ROAD HOUSES FIND NO BUSINESS
NOW.
Automobiles Have Been Their Death
Warrant-Other
Topics.
Special Correspondence of The Evening Star.

NEW YORK. July 8, 1904
Every time transatlantic liner arrives at
the port of New York with a story of GER
tain OF the steamers passengers having
been feeced by voyagng card swindlers. a
wall goes up from the unthinking and the
unreasonable about the lack of protec-
ton from sharpers which the steamship
companies give their Patrons"
This. as matter of simple course is the
veriest nonsense. The steamship COM
panies do the best they know how to pro-
tect their patrons from gamblers. But
they can't forbid foolish passengers from
playing cards with strangers. Neither can
they refuse to sell transportation on their
vessels even to men who are known and
tabled as professional card sharks. That
matter has been determined by the highest
court in the state of New York. A noted
ocean-voyaging card sharper brought suit
against one of the great steamship COM
panies for refusing to sell him a passage to
the other Side. He won the suit, although the
steamship company took it to the states
court of final resort. The company couldn't
prove that he was a common gambler, be-
cause men who had been swindled by him
refused to come forward and proclaim
their foolshnesS. Moreover the court held
that, even had the man been shown to be
common gambler, the steamship company
could not, on that account alone, refuse to
carry him on its steamers. In the final
courts decision 1t was as much as stated
that 1t was up to every man a-traveing to
look after himself. and that it would be
establishing an absurd prec edent to consti-
tute any common carrier the guardian or
censor of its patrons morals or methods or
recrea ton.
Warning of Companies.
The steamship companies. a matter of
plain business policy, do everything within
their power to rid their vessels of the voy-
aging sharpers al least to thwart them.
Every liner that leaves or enters the port
OF New York has its smoking room placard-
ed with warnings against the gamblers.
Passengers are advised rot to play cards
with strangers most of these placards
read. When professional gamblers
XII own to be on beard steamer, the plaC-
ard is often changed to: Professional
gamblers On board. Passengers are adj
svised to engage in gaines of cards only
with persons known to them" This is all
that the steamship people can do and re-
main within the law. The steamship man
ayers are fully aware of the fact that the
sersa tional stories of gambling and fleeing
on their vessels work serious injury to their
passenger traffic but they are powerlesS to
adopt any further measures for the ex-
tincton or foiling of the ocean going swim
dlers than those which they do adopt. Not
irfrequently, when The pursers of the big
known to them, the pGrsers move about
quietly among the male passengers in the
smoking and card rooms and notify them
OF the presence of the heecers on board the
ship. and point them out. But, even when
this has been done. passengers have been
known to enter info card games with the
fellows whom they knew to be professional
SwinderS. There are Il good many Foy-
aging men who are copceited over
their imag inary skill at cards that they are
quite unable to perceive the possibility or
10
and vain men of this sort wantonly take
chances for the purpose of showing Off TO
their friends and endeavoring to prove their
craftiness. 1t is needless to say that puff
ed-up chaps of this character invariably
come out at the little end of the horn
They however, are the very last of the
feeced ones to "squeal." knowing. as they
do, that the laugh IS more than suHcientiy
on them without their making their 1mbec-
ility a matter of newspaper knowledge.
One of the two card swindlers who were
EXPOSED on board the steamer which ar
rived in New York on Tuesday last claimed
to be a general in the regular army or the
United States, but several seasoned voy-
ayers on the steamer recognized MIN as an
oId-timer at the trade OF gouglng the I'M
wise ones on transatlantic liners. From the
statement made by one of the passengers.
there seems to have been no necessity
whatever for any of the voyasers on mat
steamer to be chiseled out or money py the
sharks The passenger states that a rev
hOurs after the departure or the steamer
from the other side the purser entered the
smoking room and thus addressed the large
crowd of men sitting about:
.Gentlemen, a pair OF professional GAIN
blers known to me- are on board TINS snip.
They dangerous swlnoiers i ealiey
advise that none of you enter into any
game of chance on TINS cruise Will any
body unknown to you.
The passenger states that the two sharp
ers were in the smoking room at the time.
the purser delivered himself OF this warn
80 no n nj
thew had a game going at full blast with
pair of lambs whom they had easily ropeu.
1t is the old story of the buzz saw ana the
minus fingers. And there are Esyp'iah
heroelyphics and picture writings OF the
era of the Hyksos kings exhibiting the
plucking of fools at games of chance
Change in Coney Island.
The evaporation of the thick vapor of
toughness which in former years enveloped
Couey Island is a pleasant thing to con-
Template since that resort is really the
only outing place within the financial or
geographical reach of hundreds of thou
sands of swelterng New Yorkers-and any
uitlander who imagines that New York. be-
cause it Is situate close to the sea- is not
literally one OF the hottest cities in Amer
lea during the summer months Is due for
startling establishment the first time he
makes the Isle Of Manhattan during a
soegy humid SPELL The recrudescence of
Coney Island has been rapid and thorough.
Respectable people no longer go there Sole
ly for the purpose OF experiencing the more
less rollickng sensation of being tempo.
rarily tough themselves. There remains at
Coney a tough district but 1t is sequestered
and firmly kept within bounds, SO that it Is
quite possible to spend an afternoon at the
once hopelessly vicious and squalidly licen-
tious resort without coming away with a
bad taste in the mouth.
About thousand persons OF the tens OF
thousands who went down to Coney Island
last Sunday however, returned to thetr
homes with wrath in their souls. They
were the stubborn ones with the hatred OF
the bloated corporations In their hearts.
The new rule of the transportation COM
pany making the rail trip to Coney Island
a matter of a dime each way. instead of a
nickel, went into effect on Sunday last. and
1t was so f1ercely resented by the thousand
and odd stubborn ones that they allowed
themselves to be thrown off the cars be-
fore they consented to dig up the addi-
consent. -
A good many of them didn't allow
themselves to be thrust off the cars for
their refusal to pay the other nickel. Sew