Gambling table

“ Runs, intermittencies, and other tendencies of chance at certain tables could be carefully noted; occasionally there would be no play at all at one table, the whole crowd staking on a run at another; as the room was small, anything of the sort soon reached the ears of every one. Play as a rule was high, and the players, for the most part, were well used to gambling. ”

“ The proceedings in the elevator and tunnel were the same as on the previous occasions.
Five minutes later I was seated at one of the tables inside, with five hundred dollars' worth of chips before me, gambling as I never had gambled before in my life. The game into which I went first was straight poker. I chose it because it was the card game with the highest stakes of the evening. I played carefully, yet with a desperation that meant I should win, given an even break in the luck.
That even break did not come to me at the straight poker table. ”

“ The great gambling monopoly is no respecter of persons, and in the Casino, as on the Turf, complete equality prevails.
In the same year, 1892, a curious incident occurred at a trente-et-quarante table. An individual having staked a maximum on the black, red won. ”

“ Then, after dinner, you would go to the subscription rooms and back horses for the Cesarewitch and Cambridgeshire at 100 to 1 to win large stakes, and even small bookmakers thought nothing of starting £20,000 books. After making their bets, people used to go into an inner room where hazard was being played. Hour after hour the game continued in full swing at a table crowded with punters, with green, black, red and white ivory counters [209] before them denoting £10, £5, £25, and £1. ”

“ The business of the place is naked gambling, and there is no effort to hide it or soften it with the "social amenities." The players barely glanced at us as we entered, and the games go on. A man with the appearance of a mechanic, reaches over the monte table and chucks a pile of silver half-dollars down on a particular card. The dealer draws the cards with a steady hand, the player wins, and the assistant, without a word, shoves toward him the amount of his winnings, in gold or silver. ”

“ It follows that the proprietors run no risk, being absolutely certain of winning something each time that the balls are thrown. In “skin” gambling houses, however, the owners are not content with this percentage of profit. A “capper” is called into the game, who usually sits at the end of the table toward the banker’s left hand. The latter finds it necessary to be very cautious in collecting the balls from the players, lest some one who had received a high number might withhold it in order to bet upon it on the next throw. Accordingly, he examines each ball as it is returned to him. ”

“ A man, designated the Groom Porter, is mounted on a stool, with a stick in his hand, having a transverse piece of wood affixed to its end, which is used by him to rake in the dice after having been thrown out of the box by the caster (the person who throws the dice) .
“The avowed profits of keeping a table of this kind is the receipt of a piece for each box hand,—that is, when a player wins three times successively, he pays a certain sum to the table, and there is an aperture in the table made to receive these contributions. ”

“ God never made man strong enough to endure the wear and tear of gambling excitement. No wonder if, after having failed in the game, men have begun to sweep off imaginary gold from the side of the table. The man was sharp enough when he started at the game, but a maniac at the close. At every gaming-table sit on one side Ecstasy, Enthusiasm, Romance—the frenzy of joy; on the other side, Fierceness, Rage, and Tumult. The professional gamester schools himself into apparent quietness. The keepers of gambling rooms are generally fat, rollicking, and obese ”

“ 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. ”

“ The only safety for the unsophisticated youth, the only safe rule for every man, young or old, is to abstain from gambling altogether.
270VINGT-UN, OR TWENTY-ONE. This game of vingt-un, as its name denotes, originated in France, but has achieved wonderful popularity, not only all over the continent of Europe and the kingdom of Great BritainBritain, but also on the shores of the Western Hemisphere.
It is played by any number of persons, seated around a table similar to that used in faro. The banker always deals, and uses one, two, or three packs of cards, according to the number of players. ”

“ If successful, repeat this operation the next day with the winnings alone, and so on until a fairly substantial sum has been amassed, when the wisest course is to cease all further gambling for that visit.
It must never be forgotten that the fewer coups which are played the more chance there is of winning.
Long sittings at the trente-et-quarante or roulette table are absolutely certain to end in loss, besides being inexpressibly tedious, trying to the eyes, and destructive to health. ”

“ Another side table was surrounded by a gathering of Broadway statues and gambling house hangers-on, who were engaged in a game called 'hide the heart,' and the last table had a circle of big, heavy-bodied and solid-looking men about it who were putting up on a game known as 'stud-horse poker.' The reporter and the clerk were quickly accommodated with seats at the center table, where 'draw poker' was in operation. The colored attendant with the white tie was at hand, and pulling out a ten-dollar bill the clerk gave it to the negro with the request to get him that amount of chips in return. ”

“ The gaming-room was comparatively small. Here were card-tables at which whist was [Pg 98] occasionally played, whilst in the centre stood the hazard-table, the real raison d'être of the whole establishment.
The expenses of running this gambling-club were large, the dice alone costing some two thousand a year! Three new pairs at about a guinea each pair were provided at the commencement of every evening's play, and very often as many more were called for either by players or by Crockford himself in order to change the luck. ”

“ My luck at the gambling table was varied; sometimes I was fifty to a hundred dollars ahead, and at other times I had to borrow money from my fellow workmen to settle my room rent and pay for my meals. ”

“ Murray's Handbook for Travellers on the Continent.
'The gambling in Spa is in a lower style than elsewhere. The croupiers seem to be always on the look-out for cheating. You never see here a pile of gold or bank notes on the table, as at Hombourg or Wiesbaden, with the player saying, "Cinquante louis aux billet," "Cent-vingt louis a la masse," and the winnings scrupulously paid, or the losings raked carefully away from the heap. ”

“ Serious investigation of the gambling process discloses the fact that pure gambling does not afford any economic basis of livelihood, save in a few cases where, as at the roulette table or in a lottery, those who gamble know and willingly accept the chances against them. And even in the case of the roulette table the profits to the bank come largely from the advantage which a large fund possesses in play against a smaller fund ”

“ The Casino, however, is a handsome edifice, with spacious grounds and gardens, to which visitors subscribe, and have the privilege of a reading-room, a café, and restaurant; a military band plays morning and evening, and in the dancing and concert halls. The most corrupt places are the public gambling-rooms, where are seen groups of both sexes around the roulette tables, and the bankers with their little rakes in hand drawing in or paying out; the glittering gold dazzles the eye of the novices, and frequently induces them to stake their last Napoleon. ”

“ There is one banker and any amount of players, each one of whom holds the box in turn. When a point under ten is thrown all the players lose their stake. If, however, a point above ten is thrown the banker pays double on all stakes. At private play every player banks in his turn, but in the Palais Royal the bank was, of course, held for the proprietors of the gaming-rooms.
The game of creps or craps mentioned in the list of tolerated games is now obsolete as a medium for any serious gambling in Europe. ”

“ It is only the initiated, however, who are aware that immediately above the pool rooms a gambling hell is in full blast. The up-stairs den is well furnished and the games played include faro, roulette, poker, the wheel of fortune, dice, etc. ”

“ But when I looked at it in this way, the last louis I had to lose had been gathered in by the remorseless rake of the croupier. Probably ‘the Successful Gambler’ would have seen that sunrise in a different light.
Everything is done to force the visitor into the bad atmosphere of the hot, unventilated gambling-rooms. No outside attractions are provided or allowed. Everything that may give pleasure to the visitor who does not wish to gamble is taboo. ”

“ Seems to me every one's travelling on a pivot in the old country. It's no use trying to hammer it into their heads there are more points of view than one. If you don't just see things as they see them, you're troubled with astigmatism. Come, let's go in here."
He pushed his way through a crowded doorway and I followed. It was the ordinary type of combined saloon and gambling-joint. In one corner was a very ornate bar, and all around the capacious room were gambling devices of every kind. There were crap-tables, wheel of fortune, the Klondike game, Keno, stud poker, roulette and faro outfits. ”

“ Millions fly away in great gambling speculations as easily and as swiftly as the penny of the newsboy takes its flight from one to the other of the inveterate little gamblers, to be found among these sharp witted waifs of the street. It goes on in billiard halls, where “hap hazard” is openly played; at saloon bars where the loser at dice “pays for the drinks.” ”

“ I assume that no one can say a word in favour of gambling, nor even excuse it. It is no doubt a feeble apology to claim that there are degrees of gambling, that every race-course and every Bourse exhibits a more pernicious and more damaging form of “play” than can be laid to the charge of the Casino. The gambler at Monte Carlo injures no one directly but himself. ”

“ In the forenoon, when gambling was slack, the gamblers would get up from their tables, and, leaving exposed upon them, at the mercy of the heterogeneous crowd circulating through the room, piles of gold and silver, they would walk away, seemingly as little anxious for the safety of their money as if it were under lock and key in an iron chest. ”

“ After the day's work is ended the workman does not affect a tavern. He dearly loves a game, or, more strictly speaking, a gamble; and while all gambling-houses are put down with a strong hand, no conceivable 124 official ingenuity could circumvent the gambling propensities of a people whose instruments of games of chance are not confined to cards or dice. The number of seeds in a melon, or any other wager on peculiarities of natural objects will do as well, and afford no damning evidence should an officious member of the police force appear. ”

“ If the player dropped any sum, from five cents to twenty-five cents, into the slot, he stood a chance to win about ten times as much as he put in, and the prospect of such a huge percentage upon a small investment fascinated poor people and boys and girls alike. One boy was known to have lost as much as three hundred and fifty dollars in a week through this form of gambling, having resorted to theft in order to obtain the wherewithal to gamble. ”

“ The instruments of gaming may differ, but the principle is the same. The shuffling and dealing of cards, however full of temptation, is not gambling, unless stakes are put up; while, on the other hand, gambling may be carried on without cards, or dice, or billiards, or a ten-pin alley. The man who bets on horses, on elections, on battles—the man who deals in "fancy" stocks, or conducts a business which extra hazards capital, or goes into transactions without foundation, but dependent upon what men call "luck," is a gambler. ”

“ Who does not know how fascinating an excitement gambling is, particularly at watering-places, during the season, where every visitor, having laid aside his ordinary habits and course of life, deliberately gives himself up to leisure and ease and exhilarating enjoyment? then gambling becomes an irresistible attraction. People who at other times never touch a card are to be seen amongst the most eager players; and besides, it is the fashion, especially in higher circles, for every one to visit the bank in the evening and lose a little money at play. ”

“ This percentage is technically known as the “rake-off,” and insures the proprietors of the establishment a handsome royalty on all winnings. In “stud” poker the dealer always represents the “house.” The players are never permitted to handle the cards. To quote Tennyson’s poem of The Brook, the “man in the chair might say—
‘Men may come and men may go,
But I go on forever.’” In the public gambling rooms, also, many of the gaming devices seen upon fair and circus grounds are to be found, notably the wheel of fortune. ”