Betting book

“ But the betting-lists are the attraction—these are the dice of the betting-man: a section of one of the side-walls within the office is devoted to them. They consist of long strips of paper—each race having its own slip—on which are stated the odds against the horses. Hasty and anxious are the glances which the speculator casts at the betting-lists: he there sees which are the favourites ”

“ But you see, don't you? that gambling, even under its most sordid aspects, is not altogether sordid; it's the mystery, the uncertainty, the hours of "strange surmise" that the smallest bet gives to the bettor that make the real delight of betting. ”

“ Three men are employed at each table to follow all the betting, and they watch like hawks every one playing. So perfectly is the whole thing done that never a word is spoken; it's all action—simply the placing of the coin on the spot. Most of the players have systems they follow, and prick their cards at each play. Hundreds of others who have no money follow their systems, just to see whether they would have won if they had had anything to risk. ”

“ The odds against any number being thrown against another varies from two to one to six to five, and, consequently, keeps all the table engaged in betting. All bets are staked, and the noise occasioned by proposing and accepting wagers is most uproarious and deafening among the low players, each having one eye on the black spots marked on the dice as they land from the box, and the other on the stakes, ready to snatch it if successful. ”

“ After what seemed like an hour, Paul turned around.
"Give me an itemised account of your obligations outside of your gambling expenses."
"I don't call it gambling to bet on the races," said Walter half defiantly.
"It make no difference what you call it," said Paul sternly. "What is all betting but trying to get something for nothing, and what is that but gambling? Every boy in Burrton who bet on the race is a gambler?" ”

“ The backer of horses, as a rule, takes to it as a business by which to make money, as in every other business. Every business and profession (for a master man at any rate) is a speculation. Betting is a business, but a speculative and, I should say, the most speculative kind of business there is. There is nothing wrong or sinful in betting. But it is a business so very speculative, so very much against the backer, that, as I hope I have proved, it is a fool’s game, and for business considerations only it is best left alone. ”

“ Would you have a horse win against its owner’s interest? The thing being settled, the office, in order to ascertain the amount of its winnings, has only to deduct the price of the horse from its aggregate bets, and arrange the remainder in a line of, perhaps, five figures. Whereupon the betting men grow seedier and more seedy: some of the more mercurial go off in a fit of apoplectic amazement ”

“ Then another'd cry, "I've got you," and the betting had begun.
'Twas a match game at three cushions, fifty points up, for a stake,
'Tween the base-ball man and Carter, and it wan't an even break,
For the odds were all in money and the playing even up,
But the horse that packs the top weight does not always win the cup.
Odds in money cut no figure from a betting point of view,
As I've found in life quite often, and, I doubt not, so have you.
If a man can't win at evens then he cannot win at all,
Be the odds they bet against him very large or very small. ”

“ In this board the bookmaker relies solely upon his percentage, and if the amount set forth be amplified to correspond with the sums usually bet at the race tracks and pool rooms, it will be seen that the profit is not only a handsome one, but it is the only one on the board that has the least “possible, probable shadow” of chance in its favor. The combination on the short horses won’t win once in a thousand times, while the winner on the selling combination gets only a sixth as much as the cosy and certain profits of the book maker. ”

“ Why, in plain language, it is arranging “to win a race.” Listen! What think you? There are very many unfairly run horse-races. Take this statement as gospel from one who knows, but who cannot divulge the secrets of the Turf. Listen again. Betting is simply a speculative business, two parties to a bet. Each tries to win the other’s money, and each party adopts the best expedient to do so. ”

“ I am defying the bank to repeat the same combination of dozens or columns in a comparatively short space of time. The odds are overwhelmingly in my favour. You see in this game one has certain advantages over the bank. One can choose one’s moment to enter, [166] and one can retire when one wants. Also one can make a progression.”
“Are you making one?”
“Yes, I begin by putting a hundred francs between the two dozens on which I am betting. If that should fail, I will increase to three hundred francs, and then if necessary to a thousand. ”

“ During this the clamor of the audience was indescribable, made up, for the most part, of the difficulties of constantly shifting odds and betting. The odds changed practically with every passage of the ball: opening at, say, five to three against the favorites, as they drew steadily ahead in a game of twenty-five points it jumped to eight to four, ten to three, anything that could be placed. On the floor a small company of bookmakers, distinguished by their scarlet caps, shouted in every direction, and betting paper was thrown adroitly through the air in hollow rubber balls. ”

“ When the drawing is all complete, the betting goes around in order, like the drawing, to the left. The ante man is the first to bet unless he has declined to play, and in that case the first bet is made by the player nearest to the dealer on his left. But the player entitled to bet first may withhold his wager until the others have bet round to him, which is called “holding the age,” and this being considered an advantage, is very frequently done. ”

“ A great many of our men naturally went to the Casino to behold the world-famous gambling tables, but if I ever had any worries about their squandering their earnings they quite disappeared. Many only watched at the outer edge, or else bet one chip very timidly. An aged harpy, who looked as though she had played at Monte Carlo since the time of Napoleon III and who kept a note-book of her losses and winnings and never bet less than a hundred francs at a time, took it upon herself to teach one of our talented young flute players how to play with one white chip. ”

“ But evidently the professional betting men were a new growth since the mid-nineteenth century. They were just beginning to assemble, wiping their mouths from the oozings of the last potation; some, the aristocrats of their calling, like sporting peers in dress and appearance; others like knock-about actors on the music-hall stage. ”

“ The plan adopted is a very simple one, but ingenious in its simplicity. The betting office takes a great dislike in its own mind to a particular horse, the favourite of the betting men. It makes bets against that horse, which amounts, in the aggregate, to a fortune ”

“ But why can't we bet some even sum of money—say, twopence?"
"Because ladies don't bet actual money—except with bookmakers."
"I say, Clara, did you ever make a bet with a real bookmaker?"
"Not yet; but I might—if we go to the Derby together."
"Do let's. It would be too thrilling. What colour do you like best for a horse? Oh, yes. But about that bet. It won't do, you see, because, if you win, you'll get two cigarettes, and you don't smoke."
"That's true," said Clara meditatively. "But if you win, you get a tangerine, and you simply hate them. ”

“ The only argument offered by gamblers is that their business keeps money in circulation. It does, indeed, transferring it from the pocket of the fool to that of the knave, and thence to the pockets of the harlot or rum-seller, but there is no gain in this transaction. Better the money had remained where it was, or been put to other uses.
Young men will read these words who know not one card from another; who have no personal knowledge of lotteries, raffles, dice or betting. ”

“ He doesn’t believe in betting on a friendly game; money is not so easily made that it can be thrown away, etc., etc. But this is so artfully said as to stimulate rather than to check the greenhorn’s desire to bet. A little more conversation almost invariably results in the making of a wager, the limit of which is determined by the purse and the verdancy of the victim. The stakes having been placed the game proceeds. ”

“ Unrestrained by Act of Parliament, the bookmakers go from door to door in the streets occupied by the working classes for the purpose of inducing women to bet.... When the workmen are at their work these bookmakers go round and visit the parts where they live, get hold of the wives of the workmen when the husband is at work, and get them to bet. Very often it does not end in betting with spare money: a woman very often takes the things of the house and pawns them to get the money to bet with. ”

“ Now, perhaps, you won't be tempted to bet again."
"I might win next time," he said rather sulkily, half regretful that he had confided in her.
"You might," she agreed, "and then, no doubt, you'd bet again. I do hope you'll stop at once. You don't know what a curse betting and gambling becomes, but I do, from sad experience. I had a brother who commenced making small bets when he was but a little older than you, and the habit of betting took such hold of him that it brought him to beggary. There! ”

“ When any one wishes to leave off playing, he can demand from the bank to the amount specified on the cheques he may then hold.
The simplest method of betting “against faro” is by placing the money on the face of any particular one of the cards that lie on the table. You may choose which you will of the thirteen. Say you have selected the ace, and placed your money upon the face of that card. The dealer then commences, and “draws” the cards out of the box one by one. After drawing each two he makes a pause. Until two aces follow each other, with no other card between, there is no decision. ”

“ I had previously prepared a “cold deck,” with precisely similar backs, by taking all the aces from five packs, and abstracting sixteen cards from the original deck, to make the correct number. After playing a few rounds, the deal coming to me, I gave to each man at the table, including myself, four aces. To see the smile of satisfaction which lighted up each one of those four faces was worth all the money that it cost. Every man believed that he had a “sure thing.” Betting began and the limit of each man’s pile was soon reached. ”

“ To bet legally you must pay your sovereign, half-sovereign, or five shillings for entrance to the various enclosures in the Stand: to lay or take the odds in the open is an indictable offence. Yet there is nothing else but quiet and earnest, but unostentatious, betting going forward all the while among the crowd assembled outside the rails. The bookmakers in the various rings, sanctified and immune from molestation at the hands of the law, by reason of those entrance-fees, may be heard shouting the odds like maniacs, but here the case is indeed altered. ”

“ Coroner for Mid-Surrey.—“The poor lad, like many thousands of others, was led away by the fallacious idea that he was going to make money by backing horses. Men earning fifteen or twenty shillings a week cannot afford to lose sixpence in betting.” ”

“ It surely is reasonable to argue that if betting for ready money be bad, betting on credit is worse. Everything points to the probability of betting when it began being for ready money only, and that as a rule stakes on both sides were deposited pending the event to be decided. ”

“ The National Bank of Augusta, in speaking of these transactions termed 'futures,' declares: 'If this is not a speculation on chances—a wagering and betting between the parties, then we are unable to understand the transaction. A betting on a game of faro or poker cannot be more hazardous, dangerous, or uncertain. ”

“ I see six beautiful noble ladies betting, with their money snugly piled up before them. Their bets generally range from twenty to one hundred francs. But the most amusing part of this crowd’s entertainment is, the airs that the money scampers put on. ”

“ Of course there was a large crowd present, the gambling stands were well patronized, as usual and at one particular table there was a large farmer betting very freely, who seemed to have plenty of money, and a smart fellow who lived in the city observed the way things were running, for every time the farmer put down a bet the dealer would win and raked it in. ”

“ Think what the betting might be between two men each holding a certainty—onward and upward in a mad and monstrous progression, each separate bet transcending the wildest imaginings of the drunkard mathematician! I despise time. I have a contempt for space. Language is no good, and splits as soon as you try to make it fit the unusually large. My eyes are looking toward largeness—towards the conditions under which the perfect betting on the perfect cards would be possible. ”

“ All good S.P. men can as well carry on their business at a race meeting as at home; and if they cannot—well, turn it up! Starting-price bookies are the great sinners with the small backer; it is with them that the workman, the clerk, the shopman, the small tradesman—to sum up, the impecunious backer, all go or do business with, and it is principally and mainly with them that the betting is done; it is they who foster small betting, and thus indirectly are the cause of nearly all the disrepute which hangs around betting revealed from time to time in the police courts and in other ways. ”

“ Thus, if a player starts in, with a wager of one dollar, and continues to double it as he loses until he has risked $100,000 or more, he is still actually betting that enormous sum that he will eventually win the trifling sum of one dollar. ”