Produced by Mike Lough
THE GAMING TABLE:
ITS VOTARIES AND VICTIMS,
In all Times and Countries, especially in England and in France.
IN TWO VOLUMES.--VOL. I.
By Andrew Steinmetz, Esq.,
Of The Middle Temple, Barrister-At-Law; First-Class Extra Certificate
School Of Musketry, Hythe; Late Officer Instructor Musketry, The Queens
Own Light Infantry Militia.
Author Of 'The History Of The Jesuits,' 'Japan And Her People,' 'The
Romance Of Duelling,' &C., &C.
'The sharp, the blackleg, and the knowing one, Livery or lace,
the self-same circle, run; The same the passion, end and means the
same--Dick and his Lordship differ but in name.'
TO HIS GRACE
The Duke of Wellington, K.G. THIS WORK IS DEDICATED, WITH PERMISSION, BY
HIS GRACE'S MOST DEVOTED SERVANT
THE AUTHOR.
PREFACE.
To the readers of the present generation much of this book will,
doubtless, seem incredible. Still it is a book of facts--a section of
our social history, which is, I think, worth writing, and deserving of
meditation.
Forty or fifty years ago--that is, within the memory of many a living
man--gambling was 'the rage' in England, especially in the metropolis.
Streets now meaningless and dull--such as Osendon Street, and streets
and squares now inhabited by the most respectable in the land--for
instance, St James's Square, THEN opened doors to countless votaries of
the fickle and capricious goddess of Fortune; in the rooms of which
many a nobleman, many a gentleman, many an officer of the Army and
Navy, clergymen, tradesmen, clerks, and apprentices, were 'cleaned
out'--ruined, and driven to self-murder, or to crimes that led to the
gallows. 'I have myself,' says a writer of the time, 'seen hanging in
chains a man whom a short time before I saw at a Hazard table!'
History, as it is commonly written, does not sufficiently take
cognizance of the social pursuits and practices that sap the vitality
of a nation; and yet these are the leading influences in its
destiny--making it what it is and will be, at least through many
generations, by example and the inexorable laws that preside over what
is called 'hereditary transmission.'
Have not the gambling propensities of our forefathers influenced the
present generation?....
No doubt gambling, in the sense treated of in this book, has ceased in
England. If there be here and there a Roulette or Rouge et Noir table in
operation, its existence is now known only to a few 'sworn-brethren;'
if gambling at cards 'prevails' in certain quarters, it is 'kept quiet.'
The vice is not barefaced. It slinks and skulks away into corners and
holes, like a poisoned rat. Therefore, public morality has triumphed,
or, to use the card-phrase, 'trumped' over this dreadful abuse; and the
law has done its duty, or has reason to expect congratulation for its
success, in 'putting down' gaming houses.
But we gamble still. The gambling on the Turf (now the most uncertain
of all 'games of chance') was, lately, something that rang through and
startled the entire nation. We gamble in the funds. We gamble in endless
companies (limited)--all resulting from the same passion of our nature,
which led to the gambling of former times with cards, with dice, at
Piquet, Basset, Faro, Hazard, E O, _Roulette_, and _Rouge et Noir_. At
a recent memorable trial, the Lord Chief Justice of England
exclaimed--'There can be no doubt--any one who looks around him cannot
fail to perceive--that a spirit of speculation and gambling has taken
hold of the minds of large classes of the population. Men who were wont
to be satisfied with moderate gain and safe investments seem now to
be animated by a spirit of greed after gain, which makes them ready
to embark their fortunes, however hardly gained, in the vain hope of
realizing immense returns by premiums upon shares, and of making more
than safe and reasonable gains. We see that continually.' In fact, we
may not be a jot better morally than our forefathers. But that is no
reason why we should not frown over the story of their horrid sins,
and, 'having a good conscience,' think what sad dogs they were in their
generation--knowing, as we do, that none of us at the present day lose
_FIFTY OR A HUNDRED THOUSAND POUNDS_ at play, at a sitting, in one
single night--as was certainly no very uncommon 'event' in those palmy
days of gaming; and that we could not--as was done in 1820--produce a
list of _FIVE HUNDRED_ names (in London alone) of noblemen, gentlemen,
officers of the Army and Navy, and clergymen, who were veteran or
indefatigable gamesters, besides 'clerks, grocers, horse-dealers,
linen-drapers, silk-mercers, masons, builders, timber-merchants,
booksellers, &c., &c., and men of the very lowest walks of life,' who
frequented the numerous gaming houses throughout the metropolis--to
their ruin and that of their families more or less (as deploringly
lamented by Captain Gronow), and not a few of them, no doubt, finding
themselves in that position in which they could exclaim, at _OUR_
remonstrance, as feelingly as did King Richard--
'Slave! I have set my life upon a _CAST_, And I will stand the _HAZARD
OF THE DIE!_'
Nor is gaming as yet extinct among us. Every now and then a batch
of youngsters is brought before the magistrates charged with vulgar
'tossing' in the streets; and every now and then we hear of some victim
of genteel gambling, as recently--in the month of February, 1868--when
'a young member of the aristocracy lost L10,000 at Whist.'
Nay, at the commencement of the present year there appeared in a daily
paper the following startling announcement to the editor:--
'Sir,--Allow me, through the columns of your paper, to call the
attention of the parents and friends of the young officers in the
Channel-fleet to the great extent gambling is carried on at Lisbon.
Since the fleet has been there another gambling house has been opened,
and is filled every evening with young officers, many of whom are under
18 years of age. On the 1st of January it is computed that upwards of
L800 was lost by officers of the fleet in the gambling houses, and
if the fleet is to stay there three months there will soon be a great
number of the officers involved in debt. I will relate one incident that
came under my personal notice. A young midshipman, who had lately joined
the Channel fleet from the Bristol, drew a half-year's pay in December,
besides his quarterly allowance, and I met him on shore the next evening
without money enough to pay a boat to go off to his ship, having lost
all at a gambling house.
Hoping that this may be of some use in stopping the gambling among the
younger officers, I remain, yours respectfully, AN OFFICER.'(1)
(1) Standard, Jan. 12, 1870.
In conclusion, I have contemplated the passion of gaming in all its
bearings, as will be evident from the range of subjects indicated by the
table of contents and index. I have ransacked (and sacked) hundreds of
volumes for entertaining, amusing, curious, or instructive matter.
Without deprecating criticism on my labours, perhaps I may state that
these researches have probably terminated my career as an author.
Immediately after the completion of this work I was afflicted with a
degree of blindness rendering it impossible for me to read any print
whatever, and compelling me to write only by dictation.
ANDREW STEINMETZ.
CONTENTS OF VOL. I.
CHAP.
I THE UNIVERSAL PASSION OF GAMING; OR, GAMING ALL THE WORLD OVER
II GAMBLING AMONG THE ANCIENT HINDOOS--A HINDOO LEGEND AND ITS MODERN
PARALLEL
III GAMBLING AMONG THE ANCIENT EGYPTIANS, PERSIANS AND GREEKS
IV GAMING AMONG THE ANCIENT ROMAN EMPERORS
V GAMBLING IN FRANCE IN ALL TIMES
VI THE RISE AND PROGRESS OF MODERN GAMING IN ENGLAND
VII GAMBLING IN BRIGHTON IN 1817
VIII GAMBLING AT THE GERMAN BATHING-PLACES
IX GAMBLING IN THE UNITED STATES
X LADY GAMESTRESSES
XI GAMBLING POETS, SAVANTS, PHILOSOPHERS, WITS, AND STATESMEN
XII REMARKABLE GAMESTERS
XIII THE LOTTERIES AND THEIR BEWILDERMENTS
XIV THE LAWS AGAINST GAMING IN VARIOUS COUNTRIES
THE GAMING TABLE.
CHAPTER I. THE UNIVERSAL PASSION OF GAMING; OR, GAMING ALL THE WORLD OVER.
A very apt allegory has been imagined as the origin of Gaming. It is
said that the Goddess of Fortune, once sporting near the shady pool of
Olympus, was met by the gay and captivating God of War, who soon allured
her to his arms. They were united; but the matrimony was not holy, and
the result of the union was a misfeatured child named Gaming. From the
moment of her birth this wayward thing could only be pleased by cards,
dice, or counters.
She was not without fascinations, and many were her admirers. As she
grew up she was courted by all the gay and extravagant of both sexes,
for she was of neither sex, and yet combining the attractions of each.
At length, however, being mostly beset by men of the sword, she formed
an unnatural union with one of them, and gave birth to twins--one called
DUELLING, and the other a grim and hideous monster named SUICIDE. These
became their mother's darlings, nursed by her with constant care and
tenderness, and her perpetual companions.
The Goddess Fortune ever had an eye on her promising daughter--Gaming;
and endowed her with splendid residences, in the most conspicuous
streets, near the palaces of kings. They were magnificently designed and
elegantly furnished. Lamps, always burning at the portals, were a sign
and a perpetual invitation unto all to enter; and, like the gates of the
Inferno, they were ever open to daily and nightly visitants; but, unlike
the latter, they permitted _EXIT_ to all who entered--some exulting with
golden spoil,--others with their hands in empty pockets,--some led by
her half-witted son Duelling,--others escorted by her malignant monster
Suicide, and his mate, the demon Despair.
'Religion, morals, virtue, all give way, And conscience dies, the
prostitute of play. Eternity ne'er steals one thought between, Till
suicide completes the fatal scene.'
Such is the _ALLEGORY_;(2) and it may serve well enough to represent
the thing in accordance with the usages of civilized or modern life; but
Gaming is a _UNIVERSAL_ thing--the characteristic of the human biped all
the world over.
(2) It appeared originally, I think, in the Harleian Miscellany. I
have taken the liberty to re-touch it here and there, with the view to
improvement.
The determination of events by 'lot' was a practice frequently resorted
to by the Israelites; as, by lot it was determined which of the goats
should be offered by Aaron; by lot the land of Canaan was divided;
by lot Saul was marked out for the Hebrew kingdom; by lot Jonah was
discovered to be the cause of the storm. It was considered an appeal to
Heaven to determine the points, and was thought not to depend on blind
chance, or that imaginary being called Fortune, who,
'----With malicious joy,
Promotes, degrades, delights in strife,
And makes a _LOTTERY_ of life.'
The Hindoo Code--a promulgation of very high antiquity--denounces
gambling, which proves that there were desperate gamesters among the
Hindoos in the earliest times. Men gamed, too, it would appear, after
the example set them by the gods, who had gamesters among them. The
priests of Egypt assured Herodotus that one of their kings visited alive
the lower regions called infernal, and that he there joined a gaming
party, at which he both lost and won.(3) Plutarch tells a pretty
Egyptian story to the effect, that Mercury having fallen in love with
Rhea, or the Earth, and wishing to do her a favour, gambled with the
Moon, and won from her every seventieth part of the time she illumined
the horizon--all which parts he united together, making up _FIVE DAYS_,
and added them to the Earth's year, which had previously consisted of
only 360 days.(4)
(3) Herod. 1. ii.
(4) Plutarch, _De Isid. et Osirid._
But not only did the gods play among themselves on Olympus, but they
gambled with mortals. According to Plutarch, the priest of the temple of
Hercules amused himself with playing at dice with the god, the stake or
conditions being that if he won he should obtain some signal favour, but
if he lost he would procure a beautiful courtesan for Hercules.(5)
(5) _In Vita Romuli_.
By the numerous nations of the East dice, and that pugnacious little
bird the cock, have been and are the chief instruments employed to
produce a sensation--to agitate their minds and to ruin their fortunes.
The Chinese have in all times, we suppose, had cards--hence the
absurdity of the notion that they were 'invented' for the amusement
of Charles VI. of France, in his 'lucid intervals,' as is constantly
asserted in every collection of historic facts. The Chinese invented
cards, as they invented almost everything else that administers to our
social and domestic comfort.(6)
(6) Observations on Cards, by Mr Gough, in Archaeologia, vol. viii.
1787.
The Asiatic gambler is desperate. When all other property is played
away, he scruples not to stake his wife, his child, on the cast of a
die or on the courage of the martial bird before mentioned. Nay more, if
still unsuccessful, the last venture he makes is that of his limbs--his
personal liberty--his life--which he hazards on the caprice of chance,
and agrees to be at the mercy, or to become the slave, of his fortunate
antagonist.
The Malayan, however, does not always tamely submit to this last stroke
of fortune. When reduced to a state of desperation by repeated ill-luck,
he loosens a certain lock of hair on his head, which, when flowing down,
is a sign of war and destruction. He swallows opium or some intoxicating
liquor, till he works himself up into a fit of frenzy, and begins
to bite and kill everything that comes in his way; whereupon, as the
aforesaid lock of hair is seen flowing, it is lawful to fire at and
destroy him as quickly as possible--he being considered no better than a
mad dog. A very rational conclusion.
Of course the Chinese are most eager gamesters, or they would not have
been capable of inventing those dear, precious killers of time--cards,
the EVENING solace of so many a household in the most respectable and
'proper' walks of life. Indeed, they play night and day--until they have
lost all they are worth, and then they usually go--and hang themselves.
If we turn our course northward, and penetrate the regions of ice
perpetual, we find that the driven snow cannot effectually quench the
flames of gambling. They glow amid the regions of the frozen pole. The
Greenlanders gamble with a board, which has a finger-piece upon it,
turning round on an axle; and the person to whom the finger points on
the stopping of the board, which is whirled round, 'sweeps' all the
'stakes' that have been deposited.
If we descend thence into the Western hemisphere, we find that the
passion for gambling forms a distinguishing feature in the character
of all the rude natives of the American continent. Just as in the East,
these savages will lose their aims (on which subsistence depends), their
apparel, and at length their personal liberty, on games of chance. There
is one thing, however, which must be recorded to their credit--and
to our shame. When they have lost their 'all,' they do not follow the
example of our refined gamesters. They neither murmur nor repine. Not
a fretful word escapes them. They bear the frowns of fortune with a
philosophic composure.(7)
(7) Carver, _Travels_.
If we cross the Atlantic and land on the African shore, we find that the
'everlasting Negro' is a gambler--using shells as dice--and following
the practice of his 'betters' in every way. He stakes not only his
'fortune,' but also his children and liberty, which he cares very little
about, everywhere, until we incite him to do so--as, of course, we ought
to do, for every motive 'human and divine.'
There is no doubt, then, that this propensity is part and parcel of 'the
unsophisticated savage.' Let us turn to the eminently civilized races of
antiquity--the men whose example we have more or less followed in every
possible matter, sociality, politics, religion--they were all gamblers,
more or less. Take the grand prototypes of Britons, the Romans of old.
That gamesters they were! And how gambling recruited the ranks of the
desperadoes who gave them insurrectionary trouble! Catiline's 'army of
scoundrels,' for instance. 'Every man dishonoured by dissipation,' says
Sallust, 'who by his follies or losses at the gaming table had consumed
the inheritance of his fathers, and all those who were sufferers by
such misery, were the friends of this perverse man.' Horace, Juvenal,
Persius, Cicero, and other writers, attest the fact of Roman gambling
most eloquently, most indignantly.
The Romans had 'lotteries,' or games of chance, and some of their prizes
were of great value, as a good estate and slaves, or rich vases; others
of little value, as vases of common earth, but of this more in the
sequel.
Among the Gothic kings who, in the fulness of time and accomplishments,
'succeeded' to that empire, we read of a Theodoric, 'a wise and valiant
prince,' who was 'great lover of dice;' his solicitude in play was only
for victory; and his companions knew how to seize the moment of his
success, as consummate courtiers, to put forward their petitions and
to make their requests. 'When I have a petition to prefer,' says one of
them, 'I am easily beaten in the game that I may win my cause.'(8) What
a clever contrivance! But scarcely equal to that of the _GREAT_ (in
politeness) Lord Chesterfield, who, to gain a vote for a parliamentary
friend, actually submitted to be _BLED!_ It appears that the voter was
deemed very difficult, but Chesterfield found out that the man was a
doctor, who was a perfect Sangrado, recommending bleeding for every
ailment. He went to him, as in consultation, agreed with the man's
arguments, and at once bared his arm for the operation. On the point of
departure his lordship 'edged' in the question about the vote for his
friend, which was, of course, gushingly promised and given.
(8) Sed ego aliquid obsecraturus facile vincor; et mihi tabula perit ut
causa salvetur.--Sidonius Apollinaris, _Epist_.
Although there may not be much Gothic blood among us, it is quite
certain that there is plenty of German mixture in our nation--taking
the term in its very wide and comprehensive ethnology. Now, Tacitus
describes the ancient stout and valiant Germans as 'making gaming with
a die a very serious occupation of their sober hours.' Like the
'everlasting Negro,' they, too, made their last throw for personal
liberty, the loser going into voluntary slavery, and the winner selling
such slaves as soon as possible to strangers, in order not to have
to blush for such a victory! If the 'nigger' could blush, he might
certainly do so for the white man in such a conjuncture.
At Naples and other places in Italy, at least in former times, the
boatmen used thus to stake their liberty for a certain number of years.
According to Hyde,(9) the Indians stake their fingers and cut them off
themselves to pay the debt of honour. Englishmen have cut off their
ears, both as a 'security' for a gambling loan, and as a stake; others
have staked their lives by hanging, in like manner! Instances will be
given in the sequel.
(9) De Ludis Orient.
But leaving these savages and the semi-savages of the very olden time,
let us turn to those nearer to our times, with just as much religious
truth and principle among them as among ourselves.
The warmth with which 'dice-playing' is condemned in the writings of
the _Fathers_, the venerable expounders of Christianity, as well as
by 'edicts' and 'canons' of the Church, is unquestionably a sufficient
proof of its general and excessive prevalence throughout the nations of
Europe. When cards were introduced, in the fourteenth century, they
only added fuel to the infernal flame of gambling; and it soon became
as necessary to restrain their use as it had been that of dice. The two
held a joint empire of ruin and desolation over their devoted victims.
A king of France set the ruinous example--Henry IV., the roue, the
libertine, the duellist, the gambler,--and yet (historically) the
_Bon Henri_, the 'good king,' who wished to order things so that every
Frenchman might have a _pot-au-feu_, or dish of flesh savoury, every
Sunday for dinner. The money that Henry IV. lost at play would have
covered great public expenses.
There can be no doubt that the spirit of gaming went on acquiring new
strength and development throughout every subsequent reign in France;
and we shall see that under the Empire the thing was a great national
institution, and made to put a great deal of money as 'revenue' into the
hands of Fouche.
But the Spaniards have always been, of all nations, the most addicted
to gambling. A traveller says:--'I have wandered through all parts of
Spain, and though in many places I have scarcely been able to procure
a glass of wine, or a bit of bread, or any of the first conveniences of
life, yet I never went through a village so mean and out of the way,
in which I could not have purchased a pack of cards.' This was in the
middle of the seventeenth century, but I have no doubt it is true at the
present moment.
If we can believe Voltaire, the Spaniards were formerly very generous
in their gaming. 'The grandees of Spain,' he says, 'had a generous
ostentation; this was to divide the money won at play among all the
bystanders, of whatever condition.
Montrefor relates that when the Duke of Lerma, the Spanish minister,
entertained Gaston, brother of Louis XIII., with all his retinue in the
Netherlands, he displayed a magnificence of an extraordinary kind. The
prime minister, with whom Gaston spent several days, used to put two
thousand louis d'ors on a large gaming-table after dinner. With this
money Gaston's attendants and even the prince himself sat down to play.
It is probable, however, that Voltaire extended a single instance or
two into a general habit or custom. That writer always preferred to deal
with the splendid and the marvellous rather than with plain matter of
fact.
There can be little doubt that the Spaniards pursued gaming in the
vulgar fashion, just as other people. At any rate the following anecdote
gives us no very favourable idea of Spanish generosity to strangers
in the matter of gambling in modern times; and the worst of it is the
suitableness of its application to more capitals than one among the
kingdoms of Europe. 'After the bull-feast I was invited to pass the
evening at the hotel of a lady, who had a public card-assembly.... This
vile method of subsisting on the folly of mankind is confined in Spain
to the nobility. None but women of quality are permitted to hold banks,
and there are many whose faro-banks bring them in a clear income of a
thousand guineas a year. The lady to whom I was introduced is an old
countess, who has lived nearly thirty years on the profits of the
card-tables in her house. They are frequented every day, and though
both natives and foreigners are duped of large sums by her, and her
cabinet-junto, yet it is the greatest house of resort in all Madrid. She
goes to court, visits people of the first fashion, and is received
with as much respect and veneration as if she exercised the most
sacred functions of a divine profession. Many widows of great men keep
gaming-houses and live splendidly on the vices of mankind. If you be not
disposed to play, be either a sharper or a dupe, you cannot be admitted
a second time to their assemblies. I was no sooner presented to the lady
than she offered me cards; and on my excusing myself, because I really
could not play, she made a very wry face, turned from me, and said to
another lady in my hearing, that she wondered how any foreigner could
have the impertinence to come to her house for no other purpose than to
make an apology for not playing. My Spanish conductor, unfortunately
for himself, had not the same apology. He played and lost his money--two
circumstances which constantly follow in these houses. While my friend
was thus playing _THE FOOL_, I attentively watched the countenance and
motions of the lady of the house. Her anxiety, address, and assiduity
were equal to that of some skilful shopkeeper, who has a certain
attraction to engage all to buy, and diligence to take care that none
shall escape the net. I found out all her privy-counsellors, by her
arrangement of her parties at the different tables; and whenever she
showed an extraordinary eagerness to fix one particular person with a
stranger, the game was always decided the same way, and her good friend
was sure to win the money.
'In short, it is hardly possible to see good company at Madrid unless
you resolve to leave a purse of gold at the card-assemblies of their
nobility.'(10)
(10) 'Observations in a Tour through Spain.'
We are assured that this state of things is by no means 'obsolete' in
Spain, even at the present time. At the time in question, however, the
beginning of the present century, there was no European nation among
which gaming did not constitute one of its polite and fashionable
amusements--with the exception of the _Turks_, who, to the shame of
Christians, strictly obeyed the precepts of Mahomet, and scrupulously
avoided the 'gambling itch' of our nature.
In England gambling prevailed during the reign of Henry VIII.; indeed,
it seems that the king was himself a gamester of the most unscrupulous
sort; and there is ample evidence that the practice flourished during
the reign of Elizabeth, James I., and subsequently, especially in the
times of Charles II. Writing on the day when James II. was proclaimed
king, Evelyn says, 'I can never forget the inexpressible luxury
and profaneness, gaming and all dissoluteness, and as it were total
forgetfulness of God (it being Sunday evening) which this day se'nnight
I was witness of, the king sitting and toying with his concubines,
Portsmouth, Cleaveland, and Mazarine, &c., a French boy singing
love-songs, in that glorious gallery, whilst about twenty of the great
courtiers and other dissolute persons were at Basset round a large
table; a bank of at least L2000 in gold before them, upon which two
gentlemen who were with me made reflections with astonishment. Six days
after all was in the dust!'
The following curious observations on the gaming in vogue during the
year 1668 are from the Harleian Miscellany:
'One propounded this question, "Whether men in ships at sea were to be
accounted amongst the living or the dead--because there were but
few inches betwixt them and drowning?" The same query may be made of
gamesters, though their estates be never so considerable--whether they
are to be esteemed rich or poor, since there are but a few casts at dice
betwixt a person of fortune (in that circumstance) and a beggar.
'Betwixt twelve and one of the clock a good dinner is prepared by way
of ordinary, and some gentlemen of civility and condition oftentimes eat
there, and play a while for recreation after dinner, both moderately and
most commonly without deserving reproof. Towards night, when ravenous
beasts usually seek their prey, there come in shoals of hectors,
trepanners, gilts, pads, biters, prigs, divers, lifters, kidnappers,
vouchers, mill kens, piemen, decoys, shop-lifters, foilers, bulkers,
droppers, gamblers, donnakers, crossbiters, &c., under the general
appellation of "rooks;" and in this particular it serves as a nursery
for Tyburn, for every year some of this gang march thither.
'Would you imagine it to be true--that a grave gentleman, well stricken
in years, insomuch as he cannot see the pips of the dice, is so
infatuated with this witchery as to play here with others' eyes,--of
whom this quibble was raised, "Mr Such a one plays at dice by the ear."
Another gentleman, stark blind, I have seen play at Hazard, and surely
that must be by the ear too.
'Late at night, when the company grows thin, and your eyes dim with
watching, false dice are often put upon the ignorant, or they are
otherwise cozened, with topping or slurring, &;c.; and, if you be not
vigilant, the box-keeper shall score you up double or treble boxes, and,
though you have lost your money, dun you as severely for it as if it
were the justest debt in the world.
'There are yet some genteeler and more subtle rooks, whom you shall not
distinguish by their outward demeanour from persons of condition; and
who will sit by a whole evening, and observe who wins; and then, if
the winner be "bubbleable," they will insinuate themselves into his
acquaintance, and civilly invite him to drink a glass of wine,--wheedle
him into play, and win all his money, either by false dice, as high
fulhams,(11) low fulhams, or by palming, topping, &c. Note by the way,
that when they have you at the tavern and think you a sure "bubble,"
they will many times purposely lose some small sum to you the first
time, to engage you more freely to _BLEED_ (as they call it) at the
second meeting, to which they will be sure to invite you.
(11) It appears that false dice were originally made at _Fulham;_ hence
so called, high and low fulhams; the high ones were the numbers 4, 5, 6.
'A gentleman whom ill-fortune had hurried into passion, took a box and
dice to a side-table, and then fell to throwing by himself; at length
he swears with an emphasis, "D--e, now I throw for nothin;, I can win a
thousand pounds; but when I lay for money I lose my all."
'If the house find you free to box, and a constant caster, you shall be
treated below with suppers at night, and caudle in the morning, and
have the honour to be styled, "a lover of the house," whilst your money
lasts, which certainly will not be long.
'Most gamesters begin at small games, and by degrees, if their money or
estates hold out, they rise to great sums; some have played first all
their money, then their rings, coach and horses, even their wearing
clothes and _perukes;_ and then, such a farm; and at last, perhaps a
lordship.
'You may read in our histories, how Sir Miles Partridge played at dice
with King Henry the Eighth, for Jesus Bells (so called), which were the
greatest in England, and hung in a tower of St Paul's church, and won
them; whereby he brought them to ring in his pocket; but the ropes
afterwards catched about his neck; for, in Edward the Sixth's days, he
was hanged for some criminal offences.(12)
(12) The clochier in Paul's Churchyard--a bell-house, four square,
builded of stone, with four bells; these were called _Jesus_ Bells. The
same had a great spire of timber, covered with lead, with the image of
St Paul on the top, but was pulled down by Sir Miles Partridge, Kt, in
the reign of Henry VIII. The common speech then was that he did set L100
upon a cast at dice against it, and so won the said clochier and bells
of the king. And then causing the bells to be broken as they hung, the
rest was pulled down, and broken also. This man was afterwards executed
on Tower Hill, for matters concerning the Duke of Somerset, in the year
1551, the 5th of Edward VI.--Stowe, B. iii. 148.
'Sir Arthur Smithhouse is yet fresh in memory. He had a fair estate,
which in a few years he so lost at play, that he died in great want and
penury. Since that Mr Ba--, who was a clerk in the Six-Clerks Office,
and well cliented, fell to play, and won by extraordinary fortune two
thousand pieces in ready gold; was not content with that, played on,
lost all he had won, and almost all his own estate; sold his place in
the office, and at last marched off to a foreign plantation, to begin a
new world with the sweat of his brow; for that is commonly the destiny
of a decayed gamester--either to go to some foreign plantation, or to be
preferred to the dignity of a _box-keeper_.
'It is not denied but most gamesters have, at one time or other, a
considerable run of winning, but such is the infatuation of play, I
could never hear of a man that gave over a winner--I mean, to give over
so as never to play again. I am sure it is _rara avis_, for if you once
"break bulk," as they phrase it, you are in again for all. Sir Humphry
Foster had lost the greatest part of his estate, and then playing, as
it is said, _FOR A DEAD HORSE_, did, by happy fortune, recover it again;
then gave over, and wisely too.'(13)
(13) Harleian Misc. ii. 108.
The sequel will show the increase of gambling in our country during the
subsequent reigns, up to a recent period.
Thus, then, the passion of gaming is, and has ever been, universal.
It is said that two Frenchmen could not exist even in a desert without
_QUARRELLING;_ and it is quite certain that no two human beings can be
anywhere without ere long offering to 'bet' upon something. Indolence
and want of employment--'vacuity,' as Dr Johnson would call it--is the
cause of the passion. It arises from a want of habitual employment
in some material and regular line of conduct. Your very innocent
card-parties at home--merely to kill _TIME_ (what a murder!) explains
all the apparent mystery! Something must be substituted to call forth
the natural activity of the mind; and this is in no way more effectually
accomplished, in all indolent pursuits, than by those _EMOTIONS AND
AGITATIONS_ which gambling produces.
Such is the source of the thing in our _NATURE;_ but then comes the
furious hankering after wealth--the desire to have it without _WORKING_
for it--which is the wish of so many of us; and _THIS_ is the source of
that hideous gambling which has produced the contemptible characters and
criminal acts which are the burthen of this volume.
We love play because it satisfies our avarice,--that is to say, our
desire of having more; it flatters our vanity by the idea of preference
that fortune gives us, and of the attention that others pay to our
success; it satisfies our curiosity, giving us a spectacle; in short, it
gives us the different pleasures of surprise.
Certain it is that the passion for gambling easily gets deeply rooted,
and that it cannot be easily eradicated. The most exquisite melody, if
compared with the music of dice, is then but discord; and the finest
prospect in nature only a miserable blank when put in competition with
the attractions of the 'honours' at a rubber of Whist.
Wealth is the general centre of inclination. Whatever is the ultimate
design, the immediate care is to be rich. No desire can be formed
which riches do not assist to gratify. They may be considered as the
elementary principles of pleasure, which may be combined with endless
diversity. There are nearer ways to profit than up the steeps of labour.
The prospect of gaining speedily what is ardently desired, has so
far prevailed upon the passions of mankind, that the peace of life is
destroyed by a general and incessant struggle for riches. It is observed
of gold by an old epigrammatist, that to have is to be in fear; and
to want it is to be in sorrow. There is no condition which is not
disquieted either with the care of gaining or keeping money.
No nation has exceeded ours in the pursuit of gaming. In former
times--and yet not more than 30 or 40 years ago--the passion for play
was predominant among the highest classes.
Genius and abilities of the highest order became its votaries; and the
very framers of the laws against gambling were the first to fall under
the temptation of their breach! The spirit of gambling pervaded every
inferior order of society. The gentleman was a slave to its indulgence;
the merchant and the mechanic were the dupes of its imaginary prospects;
it engrossed the citizen and occupied the rustic. Town and country
became a prey to its despotism. There was scarcely an obscure village to
be found wherein this bewitching basilisk did not exercise its powers of
fascination and destruction.
Gaming in England became rather a science than an amusement of social
intercourse. The 'doctrine of chances' was studied with an assiduity
that would have done honour to better subjects; and calculations were
made on arithmetical and geometrical principles, to determine the
degrees of probability attendant on games of mixed skill and chance,
or even on the fortuitous throws of dice. Of course, in spite of all
calculations, there were miserable failures--frightful losses. The
polite gamester, like the savage, did not scruple to hazard the dearest
interests of his family, or to bring his wife and children to poverty,
misery, and ruin. He could not give these over in liquidation of a
gambling debt; indeed, nobody would, probably, have them at a gift; and
yet there were instances in which the honour of a wife was the stake of
the infernal game!.... Well might the Emperor Justinian exclaim,--'Can
we call _PLAY_ that which causes crime?'(14)
(14) Quis enim ludos appellet eos, ex quibus crimina oriuntur?--_De
Concept. Digest_. II. lib. iv. Sec. 9.