Los Angeles herald., 1907-07-04
BUGS OF BIG GAMBLERS
ARE PECULIAR AND MANY
Special to The Herald.

Special to The Herald.
NEW YORK, June 30.-A man who
bets heavily on horses that look right
to him was standing on the Gravesend
lawn the other afternoon talking the
next race over with his betting com.
missioner. He was just dismissing the
commissioner to the ring to get dowr
a heavy wager on his pick for the race
when a racing man of his acquaintance
strolled up behind him and placed ar
arm about the heavy bettor's should
ers.
Hello, Ed" said the acquaintance
"Give me one of those Gig rettes OF
yours
The man who makes the plunge bets
looked distinctly annoyed. and let out
an ejaculation. He produced a gold
cigarette case, touched the spring and
held it out to his acquaintance, but at
the same time he called back his bet
ting commissioner, who was making
for the ring.
Never mind that bet, joe" said the
plunger to the commissioner, when the
latter turned in his tracks and came
back at the summons. "I'll stay off.
A racing man standing near the
group explained the little incident.
'The sky-limit player who tagged
the race because his acquaintance
boned him for cigarette he said, lis
one of these superstitious mustang
PLAYERS His main bug is that when
anybody maces him for one OF the
paper smokes before race he is bound
to lose. no matter what he goes to in
the race.
Cigarette Touch Knocks Bet
"When the touch for a cigarette
comes in time, as it did ju-t now, he
stays off the race altogether, no mat
ter how much alive the one he has
picked may uok to him. He's been
nursing that bug for two or three years
now.
Nearly all of the high-notch play
ers Of the cayuses give ear to the buz-
zing of their own particular kind of
superstition bugs and some of these are
queer insects. 1 can remember when
the only generally prevalent race track
superstition was the hunchback thing.
''Most of the bookie whangers be-
lieved that they could get the money
If they could touch the hump of a
hunchback on their way to the track
or within the track grounds. But this
one petered out five or six years ago,
when it developed into regular
hunchback industry or trust.
track trains, and they hung around the
entrance gates to the tracks and pa
raded up and down the lawns. waiting
to have their humps touched. They
looked for the piece of change from
those who touched their humps, and
for a number of years they did we'll at
the game.
Too Many Hunchbacks Made Trouble
But too many of them got into it
and finally the deformed ones got jeal-
GUS of each other and started in to
scrap with each other for patrons. Then
they had to be shooed away.
"Thus the one big and universal track
superstition was broken up into hum
dreds of individual ones. Some of the
most level-headed of the big players
are the fellows with the oldest super
stitions.
lone of them, a man who rarely or
never bets less than $4,000 to race ana
who not uncommonly unloads to the
tune of ten times $4,000 when his con-
victions are strong, has the queer
weevil that if he catches sight of a
woman with the string of one of her
low-cut shoes united he's in mad. He
tried for two years to beat that one
down by disregarding 1t, but 1t finally
tied him in bowknots.
"This bug of his goes back to a
day three or four summers ago, when
he brought a woman friend to the
track. On the way to the track he had
to stoop down and tie one or other of
the strings of her low-cut shoes sew
eral times and finally, in moment of
hot weather petulance, he said to her
that it was a wonder she couldn't rig
herself out in a pair of kicks that
uoI1ldn't keen a man kneeling on the
ground in front of her like an idiot half
the time.
He Dropped His Whole Roll
"That made her sore. and when the
train reached the track she promptly
got into a carriage and returned to
New York, telling him before she went
that she hoped he'd drop the whole
bank roll and then some. He dropped
it right enough. He played four rank
Edams that day, all for chunks, and
got left at the post twice, disqualified
once and outrun the other time
"Then for four straight days he
never got near enough to a pay off line
to chunk a ball of popcorn at the
cashier. 1t was the most disastrous
streak he'd had for years, and it put
some lines of thought at the corners
of his eyes.
kid Weller, than whom nobody will
send the spinach along faster when he
thinks he's correct, gives aid and COM
fort to a curious kind of bug. He likes
the horse that comes to a halt and
stands still for a minute or two on the
parade past the stand before going to
the post.
"Kid" Weller Likes Sensible Horse:
s,yUal1ar has got If that the horse that