MONACO
Beauty of site—Phœnician shrine of Melkarth—Meanness of
modern buildings—The Cathedral and Palace—Extent of the
principality—The Grimaldi—Rainier II.—Charles II. at Crecy—Antonio
Grimaldi—Lucien’s murder—Murder of Hercules I.—Louis I.: his
gibbets—Roquebrune and Mentone revolt—The gambling establishment of
Charles III.—M. Blanc.—Les Spélunges—Marriage of Prince of Monaco
annulled—La Turbie—Trophy of Augustus—Monte Carlo—S. Devota—The
Casino: importance to the principality—Roulette—Systems—Charges
of Captain Weihe: improbable because unnecessary—Cave of La
Veille—Death of the Duke of York.
MONACO is assuredly the loveliest spot on the entire Ligurian
coast. More the pity that it should be delivered over to such evil
associations as cling to it.
Monaco itself is a limestone crag rising out of the sea, linked to
the mainland by a neck, the rocks on all sides precipitous, but cut
into, to form an approach to the town. Above it towers the ridge that
extends from the Mont Agel, with its fortress gleaming white against a
gentian-blue sky, by La Turbie, “hunc usque Italia, abhinc Gallia,” and
the Tête-de-Chien, formerly Testa-de-Camp.
The rock of Monaco takes its name from Monoikos. It was dedicated to
the Phœnician Melkarth, the One god in a house, who would suffer no
other idols in his temple, and that temple anciently crowned the rock.
The adoption by the Grimaldi of a monk as supporter to the arms is due
to a misapprehension that Monaco is derived from Monacus. Unhappily,
matchlessly beautiful as is the situation, the buildings of Monaco do
not conduce to picturesqueness. The palace is mean and ugly to the last
degree. It has four towers, erected in 1215 by the Genoese architect
Fulco del Castello, but the domestic buildings connecting these towers
are of various dates, and all bad. The palace has not a single bold and
characteristic feature to give it dignity.
A vast sum—from the gambling tables—has been spent upon a cathedral,
designed by Charles Lenormand. Internally, and indeed externally, from
near at hand it is fine and dignified. But from a distance it produces
an unpleasing effect. It has no tall towers, no stately dome; but at
the rear, a monstrous hump, designed to make a display of the West
front, otherwise meaningless. The distant effect of this church is that
of an infant peacock, spreading its tail before it has any feathers to
display.
There is not a single commanding feature in the bunch of buildings
huddled together on the summit of the rock, and old Mentone, with its
commonplace church tower, presents a nobler aspect than does Monaco.
No finer site in the world could be found, and none has been so wasted
through incapacity to utilise it.
Monaco is an independent principality, under an autocratic government.
It, its prince, its gambling hell, are under the protection of France.
The principality comprises 5,436 acres, which would be the estate of
a petty English squire. But the Sovereign has his Council of State,
his nobles, and his bishop at command. Also an army, consisting of
five officers and seventy men. Formerly there was a guard of honour in
addition, whose function it was to blow trumpets and present arms when
the Prince entered or left the main gate of the palace. But this guard
of honour was dissolved, February 1st, 1904, and the soldiers of the
standing army now perform the duties formerly devolving on the guard.
The dissolution of the corps must have resembled the famous dismissal
by Bombastes Furioso: “Begone, brave army, and don’t kick up a row!”
The six bronze cannon in front of the palace were given by Louis XV.
Each has its name, and they bear the inscription: “Ultima ratio regum.”
The Grimaldi were a Genoese family, and they first appear in history
as assisting William, Count of Provence, and the Emperor Otho I., in
expelling the Saracens. For their services, the Emperor conferred
Monaco on one of them, others were rewarded with fiefs, near Nice, and
in the Maures, as already told.
A claim is made to descent from Grimoald Mayor of the palace, who
died 656, but it is baseless, and rests on no better foundation than
identity of name; for patronymics were not then in use.
The descendants of Gibelin Grimaldi, possessors of the fief of Monaco,
were at first only seigneurs, but eventually became sovereigns, and
the family obtained large tracts of land, and acquired great power in
Provence and Liguria. Till the seventeenth century they had a flotilla
of galleys destined to stop all coasters and exact a toll. This fleet
also served in the wars in which the neighbouring states were involved.
Rainier II., Prince of Monaco, in 1302, entered the service of Philip
the Fair, and was the first to lead a Genoese fleet in 1304 through
the Straits of Gibraltar into the ocean. He conducted sixteen galleys
to the coast of Flanders, and encountered the Flemish fleet before
Ziricksee. He concerned himself little about the French vessels that
had joined him, and allowed all of them to be taken; but as the
Flemings were felicitating themselves on their victory, he returned
with the rising tide, pierced their line, destroyed a number of their
ships, and took prisoner Guy de Namur, son of the Count of Flanders.
Charles II. of Monaco was made governor of Provence and admiral of
the fleet of Genoa. In 1338 he directed twenty galleys against the
Flemings; in 1346, along with Antonio Doria, he led thirty against the
English. The troops were disembarked, and joined the French army which
encountered the English at Creçy. The Genoese were esteemed the best
archers in the world. Grimaldi and Doria disposed them to the best
advantage, and they would have done great execution in the English
ranks, but that the rain had relaxed the strings of their bows, and,
says Froissart:—
“They hooted, advancing with their crossbows presented, and began to
shoot. The English archers then advanced one step, and shot their
arrows with such force and speed that it was like a fall of snow.
When the Genoese felt the arrows that pierced their arms, heads, and
though their armour, some of them cut the strings of their crossbows,
others flung them on the ground, and all turned and retreated in
discomfiture. The French had a large body of men-at-arms on horseback,
richly dressed, to support the Genoese. The King of France, seeing
them fall back, cried out: ‘Kill me those scoundrels, for they block
our way unreasonably!’ Then you would have seen the French men-at-arms
lay about them, killing all they could of those runaways.”
Grimaldi fell there, mortally wounded.
Antonio Grimaldi, Genoese Admiral in 1332, was charged to revenge the
ravages of the Aragonese on the coasts of Liguria, at a time when
civil war prevented the Genoese from defending themselves and their
possessions. Grimaldi, with a fleet of fifty-five vessels, harried the
coasts of Catalonia, leaving behind him only ruins, and loading his
vessels with plunder and captives. He carried off the galleys of the
enemy from the harbour of Majorca. The Aragonese sent against him a
fleet of twenty-four vessels, but he defeated it. In 1353 he was again
placed at the head of the Genoese naval forces, and again sent against
the Aragonese, who were now in league with the Venetians. Grimaldi had
a fleet of fifty-two sail, and he hoped to fight and defeat the enemy
before they could effect a junction. In this he was disappointed. He
met the combined fleets near an islet off the north coast of Sardinia,
August 29th, 1353. Pisani, the admiral of the Venetians, concealed a
portion of his fleet, and Grimaldi, deceived, attacked the rest. Whilst
thus engaged, he saw the detached portion of the Venetian flotilla
approach, and he found that he had to deal with seventy-three sail.
To present a strong front to the enemy, he bound his galleys together
by the sides and masts, reserving only four on each wing to act as
reserve. The Venetians and Catalans seeing this arrangement, also
united their vessels to the number of fifty-four, but kept sixteen free
at their flanks. This singular disposition shows how little, if at all,
naval manœuvres had altered since the time of the civil war between
Cæsar and Pompey.
The Catalans brought up three round tubs of vessels called _coques_
against the right wing of Grimaldi, and sank as many of his galleys.
Alarmed at this, he unlinked eleven of his vessels and rallied them to
the eight of the reserve, and, without striking another blow, fled, and
left the rest of the fleet a prey to the enemy. All the thirty vessels
thus abandoned by the cowardly admiral were obliged to surrender.
In that day the Genoese lost 3,000 men killed, and 3,500 taken
prisoners. The Republic had never before suffered such a disaster.
Despair took possession of government and people, and they abdicated
their independence and proclaimed John Visconti, Duke of Milan, as Lord
of Genoa. Lucien (1506-14) murdered his brother John, so as to obtain
the principality for himself—at least, so it was surmised, and Lucien
was obliged to fly from Monaco on that account, and conceal himself,
till Duke Charles of Savoy gave him an indult, forbidding all inquiry
to be made into the matter of the crime, and search after the murderer.
Then Lucien stole back to Monaco and assumed the sovereignty. His
sister Francesca had married Lucas Doria, and when left a widow, by her
will constituted her brothers Lucien and Augustine, who was bishop of
Grasse, guardians of her children. After her death her son Bartholomew
Doria complained bitterly that his uncle Lucien Grimaldi kept hold of
the inheritance and would not surrender it. At last, resentment induced
him to resolve on revenging himself on Lucien, for the wrong done to
himself, and for the murder of his uncle John. He secured the promise
of co-operation, if required, of the famous admiral, Andrew Doria, and
he sent to Monaco some confederates, with a request to Lucien to let
them be lodged there in safety, as they had got into a broil at Genoa.
He also intimated his intention to follow shortly and halt at Monaco
on his way to Lyons, where he hoped to have an interview with the King
of France, and to obtain from him a charge in his army.
When Bartholomew arrived at Monaco, Lucien invited him to breakfast and
gave to his nephew the place of honour at the table. Bartholomew could
not eat, and when pressed to do so by his uncle complained that he had
lost his appetite. Lucien then placed one of his children on Doria’s
knee; but the young man trembled so that the child had to be taken from
him. On rising from table Bartholomew asked the prince to give him some
instructions as to his course.
At this time Andrew Doria’s fleet put into the harbour of Monaco, and
the admiral sent to Bartholomew a laconic epistle, “What thou hast to
do, do quickly.” Lucien bade his nephew accompany him into a cabinet at
the end of the gallery. As the prince entered, the major-domo came up
and informed him that Andrew Doria’s galleys had arrived in the port,
and handed to Bartholomew the sealed letter bidding him be speedy in
executing what he had undertaken.
When the major-domo withdrew, none were in the cabinet save the prince,
who seated himself, a black slave, and Bartholomew, who stood by the
window. All at once the tramp of feet sounded in the gallery, and an
assassin rushed in, followed by others holding daggers and shouting,
“Ammaza! kill! kill!” In a few minutes Lucien was despatched, and then
the murderers, surrounding Bartholomew, marched forth, descended to the
port, and were received on board the galley of Andrew Doria.
Hercules I. (1589-1604) met with a violent death from some of his own
subjects. He used his sovereign power to get possession of and outrage
the wives and daughters of his subjects. At last some, whose wives had
been dishonoured by him, conspired, took him and flung him over the
rocks into the sea.
Louis (1662-1701), Prince of Monaco, became enamoured of the celebrated
Hortense Mancini, Duchess of Mazarin, exiled from France for her
intrigues. He followed her to Rome, and thence to London, where he
and Charles II. were rivals for her favour. Saint Evremond did all in
his power to separate her from the prince and constitute her a prime
favourite of the King, in place of the Duchess of Portsmouth. A rivalry
in prodigality ensued between little Monaco and the King of Great
Britain. It was the fable of the frog and the ox enacted. In an access
of jealousy Charles withdrew a pension of £4,000 he had accorded to
the duchess, whereupon Louis sent her an order for that same amount,
payable for life out of his treasury, accompanying it with a copy of
verses. That the money was paid regularly is more than doubtful.
This Louis was married to Charlotte de Gramont, who was one of “_les
grandes amoureuses_” of the reign of Louis XIV. She intrigued with the
king. She entertained a passion for her ambitious cousin de Lauzun.
Her many love adventures furnished Saint Simon with a good deal of not
very edifying matter for his Mémoires. Whilst Charlotte revelled in
Paris, Louis sulked at Monaco. As news reached him of Charlotte having
made a fresh conquest, he had a gibbet erected on the confines of
his tiny principality, and the happy man in effigy hung from it; and
as Charlotte’s caprices and conquests were numerous, the frontier of
Monaco was soon marked out at intervals by a score of gallows, from
which dangled dummy men, all dressed in Court costume.
“Not merely,” says Mme. de Sévigné, “is this measure retrospective,
but folk amuse themselves by informing the prince of what is now
going on. The consequence is that the gibbets have to be put closer
together, and more than half of the courtiers are now dangling in
effigy along the frontiers of Monaco. I can assure you that I have had
many a laugh over this, and others as well. The king himself laughs at
it. This frenzy of hangings passes all belief.”
At the beginning of the seventeenth century, the Spaniards had profited
by the minority of Honoré II. to put a garrison into Monaco, under the
pretext of alliance. Speedily they took advantage of this to behave as
masters of the place. Prince Honoré, to escape from their domination,
signed a secret treaty with Louis XIII. in 1641, by virtue of which
his sovereign independence was guaranteed and a garrison of 500 French
soldiers was assured him after the expulsion of the Spaniards. But
it was precisely this last thing that was most difficult to achieve.
Honoré succeeded by subtlety. He ordered the arrest of thirty of the
inhabitants of Monaco, lusty men, and cast them into prison; then
invited the Spanish garrison to a grand banquet at the palace, and
made them as drunk as fiddlers. When they were almost incapable of
defence, he opened the prison, told the men he had locked up that they
were to massacre the Spanish garrison, and put daggers into their
hands. The Spaniards, however, were not so drunk that they could not
defend their lives; they were, however, nearly all slaughtered; and the
gates were thrown open to some French soldiers who had been waiting
at Antibes to replace the Spaniards. This took place in November,
1641. In consequence of this, all the estates of Honoré in Italy were
confiscated, but Louis XIII. indemnified Honoré for this by granting to
him the Seigneurie of Les Baux in Provence and the Duchy of Valentinois.
Antoine, who died in 1731, was the last direct male of the house. He
left a daughter, Louise Hippolyte, who married Jacques François de
Matignon, Comte de Torrigny. She survived her father but eleven months.
Her son Honoré III. (1731-1795) lived at the time of the outbreak of
the French Revolution. The new ideas excited effervescence in little
Monaco, Roquebrune, and Mentone, which belonged at the time to the
principality, and they demanded elective councils. Honoré was compelled
to yield, whereupon the Councils suppressed all feudal rights. Then,
when he was frightened and ran away, the three towns declared the
House of Grimaldi deposed. Nice had been united to France, and Monaco
demanded the same favour, which was granted February 14th, 1793. Honoré
was arrested on September 28th, in the same year, and detained till
Thermidor 9th. He died in 1795. By the treaty of Paris, 1814, Monaco
was restored to Honoré IV., his son, but on the return of Napoleon from
Elba, the principality was occupied by an English force. By the treaty
of November 20th, 1815, it was transferred to Sardinia; but this lasted
only till 1816, when Honoré V. regained his principality. His son
Florestan I. (1841-56) abolished monopoly in bread, allowed free trade,
and founded a college at Mentone. The revolution of 1848 was disastrous
to the Prince. Mentone and Roquebrune severed their connexion with
Monaco and were annexed to Sardinia. Charles III. (1856-89) succeeded
his father, Florestan. He it was who conceived the idea of repairing
his losses by the establishment of gaming tables at Monaco.
[Illustration: THE THEATRE AND GAMING-HALL, MONTE CARLO]
The princes had coined gold, silver, and copper money from 1505, with
the legend, “Christus regnat, Christus imperat, Christus vincit.” This
legend became inappropriate thenceforth, in Monaco.
In 1856 Charles III. started the gambling tables in a building
adjoining the palace, afterwards occupied by the guard of honour.
But the venture was not a success. Monaco was out of the way, hardly
accessible from the land, where the Corniche Road ran high above, on
the summit of the cliffs by La Turbie, so that it could be reached
conveniently only by sea.
The gambling concession passed through various hands, till, owing to
the closing of the Casino at Homburg, M. Blanc thought of Monaco. In
1863 he went there, on March 31st, entered the bureau of the then
concessioners, Lefebre and Co., and said, “You want to sell this
affair; I am disposed to take it. Reflect. I shall return here at 3.30
p.m. I leave at 4 p.m. by the steamboat, and I want to have this matter
settled before I go back to Nice.” The company sold it to Blanc for
1,700,000 francs.
On April 1st, All Fools’ Day, 1863, Blanc formed La Société anonyme
des Bains de Mer et Cercle des Étrangers à Monaco, for fifty years,
with a capital of fifteen millions, represented by 30,000 shares of 500
francs each. One of the first to take shares in this gambling society
was Pope Leo XIII., at the time only cardinal. Blanc was a little man,
with moustache already white, aged fifty-seven, when he came to feather
his nest, and that of the Prince of Monaco, at Monte Carlo. He married
his daughter to Prince Roland Bonaparte, grandson of Lucien, Prince of
Caninio, the brother of the Emperor Napoleon I.
Blanc died in 1881. In 1882 it was resolved to double the capital of
this “bathing establishment.” The fifteen million was raised to thirty
million, divided up into 60,000 shares of 500 francs each, Blanc’s
heirs retaining about 52,000 shares in their own hands. As the original
concession was for fifty years, and would expire in 1913, it was deemed
advisable to approach the Prince of Monaco for an extension, and this
was granted, as the shareholders complained, “on very hard terms.” It
was signed on January 16th, 1898, and by this agreement the company
received a fresh concession for fifty years.
So profitable an affair is this Circle des Étrangers and Société des
Bains de Mer, that the ordinary 500-franc shares rose at once to 4,770
francs.
An old Italian proverb was to this effect:
Monaco io sono
Un scoglio.
Del mio non ho
Quello d’altrui non taglio
Pur viver voglio.
That may be rendered, “I am Monaco, a mere rock; I have naught of my
own, I take no goods of others; yet I must live.”
This proverb is now as inappropriate as the legend on the coins; for
Monaco lives and thrives on the plunder of those who go there to empty
their money on the tables.
Les Spélunges, a rocky promontory, full of holes and cracks, like a
petrified sponge, on which formerly shepherds pastured their goats,
has become the world-famed Monte Carlo; and La Condamine, once the
flower-garden that supplied the House of Rimmel with perfumes, is now
occupied by houses of those who live more or less directly on the
tables. Charles III., who made the concession, has not left a very
savoury recollection behind him. Whilst his father was reigning prince,
he tired of being only heir apparent, and stirred up a revolt against
his father; but the National Guard arrested him, and he was conducted
to Genoa, where he was set at liberty.
His son, Albert Honoré Charles, the present Prince, married Lady Mary
Victoria, daughter of the Duke of Hamilton and Brandon, on September
21st, 1869, and by her had a son, born in 1870.
But they apparently got tired of each other, for the Pope was
approached by Lady Mary, with the full consent of the Prince, to get
the marriage annulled.
Now the Church of Rome holds very strict views as to the indissoluble
nature of marriage. Even the successor of S. Peter protests his
inability to pronounce a divorce. _But_, he can annul a marriage on
various grounds; and to help this out, all sorts of bars to legitimate
marriage have been devised, as consanguinity within seven degrees of
relationship, affinity, spiritual relationship through sponsorship
at the font, or legal relationship through guardianship, beside many
others, by means of some of which, with a little greasing of palms,
hardly a legitimate union cannot be annulled. Accordingly, on January
3rd, 1880, after eleven years of married life, the Pope declared the
marriage to have been void, on the plea put forward by Lady Mary that
she had been over-persuaded to marry the Prince, by her mother. But
the Papal Court laid down that although the connexion had been one
of mere concubinage, yet, nevertheless, the son was to be regarded as
legitimate. “Which is the humour of it,” as Corporal Nym would say.
It further ordered that the re-marriage of either party must take
place where the State did not require civil marriage, as civil courts
considered the first marriage as valid. “Which,” again as Nym would
say, “is the humour of it.”
Eleven months after this decree Lady Mary Hamilton married Count
Tassilo Festitics, at Pesth; and the Prince married, October 30th,
1889, Alice, dowager duchess of Richelieu, a Heine of New Orleans. The
name is Jewish.
The Pope seems to have felt that his proceeding in this matter had
made the sensitive consciences of Roman Catholics wince, for he
shortly after issued an Encyclical on Marriage, and pointed out what
were the pleas on which the Papal Court was justified in dissolving
existing marriages. The _Tablet_ also, on March 31st, 1894, published
an apologetic article, in which it assured the world that the official
fees paid to the Propaganda for annulling a marriage were trifling,
that, in a word, a marriage could be dissolved at Rome, dirt-cheap, for
£120. More shame to it, if true. But “Credat Judæus Apelles non ego.”
This Court, as we know, will allow, for a handsome consideration, an
uncle to marry his niece, whereas formally it forbids an union within
the seven degrees.
High aloft, towering above Monaco, 1,270 feet from the sea-level,
accessible by a cog-railway, is La Turbie, the point where the old
Roman Via Aurelia and the modern Corniche Road cross a neck that is the
natural division between France and Italy; the point where, in Roman
times before the Empire, Gaul ended, and Italy began.
La Turbie is a corruption of Tropaïa—the Trophy, for here stood the
monument erected by Augustus about the year B.C. 13, commemorative
of his victories over the Ligurian natives of the coast. For some
seventeen years the empire had existed. All exterior marks of flattery
and submission had been accorded to him. To him had already been given
an official worship, as if he were a god. Even that “white soul” Virgil
thus speaks of the living emperor:—“A god has vouchsafed us this
tranquillity; for to me he (Augustus) shall always be a god. A tender
lamb from our folds shall often dye his altar with its blood.”
Ancient writers have left us no description of the monument. Pliny
records the inscription it bore in seventy-eight words, of which
thirty-three were devoted to the official dedication to the divine
Augustus and to record his dignities, and forty-five to the enumeration
of the conquered peoples.
The monument has gone through a period of sad wreckage. The Genoese
pillaged it of marbles wherewith to decorate the palaces of the citizen
nobles; and in the period of the furious struggles between Guelfs
and Ghibellines it was converted into a fortress. It now presents a
substructure of the period of Augustus, above which rises the shattered
fragment of a mediæval tower.
Before the year 1869 only fourteen letters of the inscription had been
recovered. Since then five more have been found, which had been built
into a wall surrounding the village. From a description of the monument
as it existed in the sixteenth century, before it was such a complete
wreck as it is at present, written by a Franciscan, Antonio Boyer, of
Nice, it had a square basement about twenty-four feet high, above which
rose a circular structure sixty feet high, divided into two stages,
with marble columns ranging one above another. Between these columns
were niches once adorned with statues, and the whole was capped by a
cupola surmounted, probably by a statue of Victory, or of Augustus. In
the basement were two doors, and above the north door was the tablet
inscribed with the dedication to Augustus. The upper portion, converted
into a tower in the Middle Ages, was destroyed in 1705 by order of
Louis XIV. Mines of gunpowder were exploded under it.
The church, erected in 1777, and the houses of La Turbie are built
out of the stones pillaged from this monument. In the church is a
copy of the S. Michael of Raphael, given by the Musée S. Germain in
exchange for a statue and the fragments of the inscription, from the
Trophy of Augustus.[16] It is worth while to sit on the rock and
look at this ruin—the ruin of an immense monument set up to honour
a mortal deified, and to whom sacrifices were offered, who gathered
into his own hands all the authority and power of the known world for
his own selfish glorification—and think, that at the same time He was
born who made Himself of no reputation and took on Him the form of a
servant, and was made in the likeness of man—who humbled Himself and
became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. The Trophy of
Augustus is a heap of ruins, but the Catholic Church, the trophy of Him
who was born under Cæsar Augustus, is everywhere, and imperishable.
Sitting on the honeycombed limestone rock, looking on that wreckage,
and hearing the bells of all the church towers for miles around break
out in musical call to the Angelus, this thought rises and fills the
mind: Selfishness has but its day; self-sacrifice establishes an
everlasting reign.
Monte Carlo occupies, as already said, a limestone headland, forming
the horn of the bay opposite Monaco, but not projecting to anything
like its extent into the sea. Between the two is the ravine through
which a little stream decants into the harbour. Here is the Church of
Ste. Devota.
Devota was a girl brought up from childhood in the Christian faith.
When she was quite young she was taken into the house of Eutyches, a
senator, and probably a relation. Eutyches was not a Christian, but
he was a kindly disposed man, and loathed the idea of persecution. On
the publication of the edict of Diocletian in 303 against Christians,
he sacrificed along with other senators; but the governor of Corsica,
where he lived, hearing that he harboured in his house a little
Christian maiden, had her brought forth and ordered that she should be
executed. Her feet were tied together, and she was dragged over rough
ground till she was cut and bruised through her entire body. Then she
was stretched on the rack, and expired. According to the legend, as
she died a white dove was seen fluttering over her; it expanded its
pure wings, and, soaring, was lost in the deep blue of the sky. The
following night a priest rescued the body, placed spices about it, laid
it in a boat, and bade a boatman named Gratian carry it away. Then the
white dove appeared again, skimming over the water; and so Gratian,
following the bird, rowed till he reached Monaco, and there the body
was laid. Her festival is on January 27th, and on that day a procession
leaves the cathedral at Monaco and descends to the Church of Ste.
Devota in the gulley.
The great charm of Monte Carlo consists in the gardens with tropical
plants. As to the buildings of Casino and Theatre, they are by Charles
Garnier, who was also the architect of the Grand Opera House at
Paris,—enough to say that they are vulgar and display no token of
genius and sense of beauty. They are appropriate to a gambling hell.
That is all that can be said of them.
“The Casino,” says Miss Dempster, the authoress of _Vera_, “is the
thing that all Europe, Asia, and America talk of, that all moralists
decry, and that all pleasure-seekers declare to be a paradise. It
is the Casino that gives wealth and fashion to this section of the
coast. It is the Casino that causes a dozen trains to stop daily
at Monte Carlo; that keeps up the palace, the army, the roads, the
opera-house, and the Hôtel de Paris. It is the green table that keeps
the gardens green and the violins in tune; that has brought 3,000
residents and so many hundred prostitutes to the town; that gives
work to 1,000 servants, and causes the annual issue of about 335,000
tickets. When we consider these facts, the fabulous beauty of the
site, the mildness of the climate, the good dinners, the better music,
the pigeon-shooting, and the many exciting chances, can we wonder that
Monte Carlo is in every mouth?”
[Illustration: LA VACHERIE DE MONTE CARLO
POST CARDS NOT ADMITTED INTO MONACO]
It is just the fact that the site is so exquisitely beautiful that
is the pity of it all. Why should the moral cesspool of Europe be
precisely there? How much better were it in the Maremma or the
Campagna, where the risk to health and life would add zest to the
speculation with gold. As long as men people the globe there will be
gambling, and it is in vain to think of stopping it. All the lowest
types of humanity, the Lazaroni, the North American Indians, the
half-caste Peruvians and Mexicans, resort to it with passion, and the
unintellectual and those without mental culture throughout Europe will
naturally pursue it as a form of excitement. It is therefore just as
well that there should be places provided for these individuals of low
mental and moral calibre to enjoy themselves in the only way that suits
them, but again, the pity is that one of the fairest spots of Europe,
this earthly paradise, should be given over to harlots and thieves, and
Jew moneylenders, to rogues and fools of every description. The entire
principality lives on the tables, the prince, the bishop, the canons,
the soldiery, the police, the hotel-keepers, those who have villas,
the cabdrivers, the waiters, the boatmen, all are bound together by a
common interest—the plunder of such as come to Monte Carlo to lose
their money. The institution must be kept going, every scandal must
be hushed up. If a case of suicide occur, in ten minutes every trace
disappears, and no public notice is given of what has occurred. It is
against the interest of every one connected with the place, with Nice
also and Mentone, to allow such an event to transpire.
If any trust may be reposed in the assertions of Captain Weihe, a
German naval artillery officer who has resided at Monte Carlo for three
seasons, the cases are far more numerous than is supposed. According
to him, directly a man has shot or hung himself, he is whisked away by
the police and the body concealed till it is ascertained that no one is
particularly interested in his fate. Then, at the end of the season,
the bodies of the suicides are packed in cases that are weighted, and
the boatmen sink them far out at sea between Monte Carlo and Corsica.
According to the same authority, the bodies were formerly thrust
into the holes and cracks in the limestone on which the Casino and
the tributary buildings of Monte Carlo stand, but the condition in
consequence became so insanitary that the place had to be cleared of
them, and a large body of workmen was imported from Italy and employed
on this work, and the corpses removed were disposed of at sea. Captain
Weihe asserts as a matter of his own knowledge or observation that from
the upper part of the rift of Pont Larousse, in 1898, sixty corpses,
from the lower by Villa Eden ten or twelve were removed.
The game of roulette is composed of two distinct divisions, that of
numbers and that of _cadres_. Upon the former it is possible for the
player to win thirty-five times the value of his stake; but then, the
bank has thirty-six chances against him. Upon the _cadres_ there is not
so great a risk; for _rouge_ or _noir_, _pair_ or _impair_, _passe_ or
_manque_, there are nearly the same chances for the players as there
are for the bank; but then, on the other hand, the player can win no
more than the value of his stake.
The bank, with the odds on zero, normally absorbs one-seventieth of
all the money staked on each table during the course of the year; that
would be against constant players with capital behind them equal to the
bank; but the majority of players take a comparatively limited sum with
them and play without a system, until it is lost, and then perforce
stop; whereas if they had the bank’s unlimited time and capital, they
would play, losing only one-seventieth of their stake on each coup,
and prolong the time required to lose a given capital. This constant
game of what would in America be called “freeze out,” enormously
increases the bank’s chances over the calculable one-seventieths of
the staker, and is doubtless the main cause of its large winnings. The
_profits_ of the company were, in 1904, something like £1,250,000.
This, at the calculable odds, would mean the staking during the year
of the enormous sum of £87,500,000. But owing to the way the usual
player stakes, as above described, probably a small fractional part of
that sum would be sufficient to provide that amount of revenue. As M.
Blanc was wont to say: “Rouge gagne quelque fois; noir aussi quelque
fois—mais _Blanc_ toujours.”
If players had unlimited capital, and were allowed without check to
adopt the martingale or pyramid system, they would run small chance
of losing. This consists in choosing a _cadre_ and playing resolutely
upon it, each time doubling the stake, until that which is backed wins,
which it is certain to do if continued long enough. When it wins, the
player has recovered the total of his stakes plus one, except the toll
on zero, whereupon he would revert to the minimum stake. But the bank
knows this as well as any one, and draws a line beyond which there is
no doubling allowed.
At roulette, the minimum stake is five francs; but at
trente-et-quarante, a game at cards, the lowest stake is twenty
francs. The amount of systems proposed, published, and advertised, is
prodigious: every one has his system, who is an enthusiastic gambler,
and every one has led to confusion and loss. One hears at intervals
of lucky players who have broken the bank. But what guarantee have we
that these are not decoy ducks, or at all events persons allowed to
do so, as an advertisement, and a means of luring other persons to try
their chance to do the same? The last of those who has written is one
Josephine Lorenz, _Schaff dir Gold in Monte Carlo_, published at Munich
in 1905. Sir Hiram Maxim in his _Monte Carlo_, London, 1904, tells a
significant story about the breaking of the bank by Lord Rosslyn and
the late Mr. Sam Lewis. After about seven consecutive wins, it was said
that the bank had been broken; a bell was rung, and a factor of the
bank was summoned and required to bring a fresh supply of money. It was
delivered, the play proceeded, and a second time the bank was broken.
This led to immense excitement: hundreds of people crowded about the
table and followed the lead of the two lucky stakers, with their
smaller ventures. The next time they won on seventeen coups; after
that, however, each lost 12,000 francs, and those who had docilely
followed them lost also. The bank was not really broken the third time,
but pretended and proclaimed that it had been.
“However,” says Sir Hiram, “my suspicions were excited; I did not
believe for a moment that the bank had actually been broken. I knew
that there had been a great deal of play during the day, and that the
winnings at this particular table must have been very heavy indeed. I
therefore remained to see the money taken from the table, when I found
it was exactly as I had expected; there was at least a peck of large
bank notes. It had not been necessary for the bank to send for money
at all; this had been done for effect. It was telegraphed all over the
world that Lord Rosslyn and Mr. Sam Lewis had broken the bank three
consecutive times in a single evening. True, the bank had lost money,
but they turned it into a valuable advertisement.”
[Illustration: GAMBLING SALOON, MONTE CARLO]
That is not all. Next day Lord Rosslyn and Mr. Lewis again tried
their luck, and lost at whatever they tried, whether at roulette or
at trente-et-quarante. Lord Rosslyn staked fifteen times in as many
minutes, and never won a single “coup.”
Sir Hiram drily observes:—
“Considered from a purely mathematical standpoint, it would appear
very remarkable that he should win seventeen consecutive times in the
evening, and lose fifteen consecutive times the following morning.”
Captain Weihe of Hamburg, of the German Marine Artillery, has published
in German and Italian a _brochure_, entitled, in the former language,
_Das Falschspiel in Monte Carlo_, in which he brings a charge of fraud
against the company, based on his observation during three seasons of
steady watching the play. Now the chances of the ball entering a given
pocket are calculable. According to him, the number of times, say in a
thousand, in which, by the law of chances, the ball ought to enter a
given number is calculable, here, however, it does not obey the law of
chances.
Further, he says that he noticed that wealthy players were encouraged
to proceed, by winning stake after stake, and then, all at once, luck
would declare against them. Why, he wonders, should such men be lucky
at first and only unlucky afterwards?
Then, he asserts that the agents of the company occasionally encourage
a timorous player by advice, given with all secrecy, to stake on a
certain number, and that then, by some remarkable coincidence, this
number will win. These observations, he says, led him to the conclusion
that there existed some method whereby the ball could be directed to
go where the croupiers desired that it should go. Then he asserts that
he assured himself that a piece of steel was inserted in a certain
number of the balls, and that these loaded balls could be drawn into
any pocket desired, by the _chef de partie_, by means of an electro
magnet manipulated by himself. He further asserts that by close
observation during three seasons, he was able, by watching the fingers
of the _chef_, to predicate with something approaching to certainty
into which number the ball would run.
The pamphlet in question is not sold at Nice or Mentone, and it
need not be said is not allowed to pass over the frontier of the
principality of Monaco, but it can be procured at Bordighera.
However, it appears very improbable that the bank would run such a
risk. It is true that detection of roguery is not easy, where the
tables are in a principality under an absolute monarch, and where
police and every authority are interested in the continuance of
the gambling. There is, however, the risk of some croupier “giving
away the show”; and there is also the risk of detection. But—is
cheating necessary? Is it worth its salt? Let us look closer into the
acknowledged system. While playing on the even chances gives 1·35 per
cent. in favour of the bank, playing on any other gives the bank 2·70;
and as many fools play on those chances that favour the bank most
highly, it is probably safe to assume that the odds in favour of the
bank will average 1·66 on all the tables, both trente-et-quarante and
roulette. If individuals playing would take in _all_ the money they
could afford to lose, divide this into so many maximums (if one did not
suffice) and stake the full maximum on each chance, and then retire,
whether winners or losers, they would then have given the bank the
least possible advantage, as they would have subjected themselves to
the chances of the zero appearing the least possible number of times.
As, however, almost every player wishes to have as long a run for his
money as possible, almost all players, whether playing by a so-called
system or not, divide their stakes, whether made on an increasing or on
a decreasing scale, or haphazard, into a number of comparatively small
stakes, so as to stay in the game as long as possible, with the result
that the bank’s percentage is constantly working against them. The
thinner they spread out their money, and the longer they stay in the
game, the greater are the chances of their losing their money.
If you go into the stock-market and buy the first stock your eye
happens to catch on the list, you at least stand an even chance of
its going up or down, while your brokerage and stamp charges will
not amount to the 1·66 per cent. charged as brokerage by the Casino;
whereas in the stock market the action will be comparatively slow, at
Monte Carlo the brokerage charge is approximately 1·66 per minute. If
fifty _coups_ are played per hour, it means that as brokerage the bank
each hour absorbs 83 per cent. of all the money staked for one _coup_,
while each day the bank takes for its commission for permitting you
to play there, about ten times the average amount staked on the table
at any one time. As Sir Hiram Maxim says, the martingale is the least
defective of all the systems. Were there no limit and no zero, this
system of 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, etc. must infallibly win, as, whenever
a gain is made, no matter how many previous losses there have been,
it lands the player a winner of one unit. The defect, however, is
that, starting with the minimum stake, the maximum is reached at the
eleventh doubling, and a run of eleven is of by no means an infrequent
occurrence. Against this the bank protects itself in its most
vulnerable place; even then, were its limits removed, yet it would be
steadily levying its 1·66 commission.
It is accordingly not necessary for the company to have recourse to
underhand work as charged by Captain Weihe; the income of £1,245,008
realised without trickery, on an average stake per table would be
611·55 fr. Any one who has been at Monte Carlo will admit that this
is probably very much below the average amount of money on the table
at each spin of the wheel; and with such an income, where arises the
occasion for illicitly supplementing it? The following is a table of
stakes needed to realise the known _profits_ of the company:
611·55 fr., average stake each Bank percentage, 10.15 fr.
of 14 tables
8,561·70 fr. total stakes at 14 ” ” 142·69 fr.
tables, 50 _coups_ per hour
428,085·00 fr., average stakes ” ” 7,134·75 fr.
each 12 hours the Casino
is open
5,137,020·00 fr., total daily ” ” 85,617·00 fr.
stakes, 365 days a year
Casino is open
1,875,012,300·00 fr., total ” ” 31,250,205·00 fr.
yearly stakes
£75,000,492 sterling equivalent ” ” £1,245,008
Thus enabling the bank on average stakes of 611·55 francs to realise
£1,245,008. But it must be remembered that it is only during the
winter season that considerable play takes place at Monte Carlo.
Also that before profits are declared the prince has to pocket his
share, all the officials have to be paid, the police, the lighting,
the gardens have to be kept going, and the scores of unacknowledged
dependents on the Casino have to receive enough to maintain them. Every
season a little book appears, advocating an infallible system, and some
of these cost twenty-five francs. Of course, every system is based on
the assumption that there is no trickery. But if there be trickery, not
one of these systems is worth the cost of the book that advocates it.
[Illustration: THE CONCERT HALL, MONTE CARLO]
“Le rouge gagne quelque fois, le noir gagne quelque fois, le _blanc_
toujours.”
A very good story is told by “V. B.” in _Monte Carlo Anecdotes_,
London, 1901. A few years ago a nobleman attended the English chapel
and slipped out as the hymn was being sung before the sermon, as he
went for worship and not be bored with the discourse. Now the hymn was
No. 32, Ancient and Modern. He sauntered up to the Casino whistling
the tune, and as he entered the rooms he heard, “Trente-deux, rouge,
pair et passe!” sung out from the table on his right; and then from
that on his left, “Trente-deux, rouge, pair et passe.” “Bless my soul!”
said he, “that is the number of the hymn; be hanged if I won’t stake
on it.” He hurriedly felt in his pocket, and going to the third table
he announced, “Trente-deux en plein, les quatres chevaux, et quatres
carrés par cinq francs”; and up rolled the number. To make a long story
short, by passing from table to table, and by constantly clinging to 32
with gradually increasing stakes, he left the rooms with over £500 in
his pocket. But this got wind, and, to the perplexity of the chaplain,
next Sunday half his congregation left the chapel during the hymn
before the sermon and rushed off to the Casino to back the number of
the hymn.
After this it became the rule at the Monte Carlo English chapel never
thenceforth to give out a number under thirty-seven before the sermon.
On the promontory of La Veille at the water’s edge is a grotto. When
Edward Augustus, Duke of York, brother to George III., was on his way
to Italy on a man-of-war, feeling too ill to proceed he was landed at
Monaco and received into the palace, where he died in 1767. The body
was embalmed and taken to London.
Fishermen always make the sign of the cross when passing the entrance
of the Grotte de la Veille, for they say that when the vessel on
which was the Duke of York arrived in the bay, a white form was seen,
as that of a woman, at the entrance, watching the evolutions of the
ship. After the Duke was removed she still remained visible, with her
face turned towards the palace. She was again seen when the cannon
announced his death, and again when his body was removed. The sailors
hurry by the cave, and will on no account enter it. It might be as well
if travellers crossed themselves and hurried by, instead of allowing
themselves to be drawn into the halls of the Circe of Gambling on the
top of the cliff.