Winnings

“ After the first two or three are moved the more seasoned players, who know at a glance what remains, odd or even, push forward their money and move away from the table; or draw out of their sleeves fat notebooks wherein to enter their winnings; but for us the breathless charm holds to the very end ”

“ I remember my father had strong views about the importance of everyone being taught to bet—​or gamble, if you prefer the word—​in youth. My brother and I had always to play whist against our parents for farthing points—​twopence a bumper—​which had to be paid when we lost out of our own pocket-money, and our fellow-gamblers exacted their winnings to the uttermost farthing. ”

“ A reasonable proportion should be observed between what is bet and the probable winnings, and all betting should offer a fair chance of winning. Equality is not necessary, but odds and handicaps should be offered by the favored side. ”

“ They tell them that they might be lucky and win, but that it would not benefit them. And they tell them that it is just as bad to lose. They caution them in this way: “If you win, people will see your winnings and will try to get you to gamble. ”

“ I'm going to give you all to-morrow's winners. You'll go down. You'll take every farthing you can beg, borrow, or steal. You'll put the whole pile on the first race at starting prices. You'll put the whole pile on again, with all your winnings, on the second race; and you'll do the same on every race ”

“ At the termination of every battle, the betters leave their seats to adjust, pay and receive the winnings and losings dependent upon the battle just decided; it being a regular point, that the winner makes application to the better who has lost ”

“ Messenger boys stopped to make a bet. The copper on the beat would walk in and bet “two and a half to win breakfast money.” If he won his “two and a half” he went out satisfied. If he lost it, he got “stuck,” forgot all about his beat, sat down, and “played in” his bankroll.
[186] The town boasted of an all-night barber shop and a clothing store that never closed, for the convenience of late-at-night winners who couldn’t hold on to their winnings till morning.
As I watched a game my first night in Butte, a seedy, torn-out looking chap stepped up to the layout and made a bet. ”

“ Once upon a time, among the infinite events which pass daily in this world, a man took his son and daughter to the racetrack to watch the horses run. After several races, the man announced that he would place a bet. "We want to play, too!" his children cried excitedly.
"Very well," answered the man. "Here are the names of the horses in the coming race: 1. Dotty's Trotter; 2. Sure Win; 3. Also Ran; 4. High Risk; 5. Looking Good; 6. Outside Chance; 7. King Alphonso."
"I want to bet on Sure Win," the boy said eagerly. "There's nothing like the certainty of success." ”

“ If worth thy while the glory and the strife Which fire the lists of actual life— The ardent rush to fortune or to fame, In the hot field where strength and valor are, And rolls the whirling thunder of the car, And the world, breathless, eyes the glorious game— Then dare and strive—the prize can but belong To him whose valor o'er his tribe prevails; In life the victory only crowns the strong— He who is feeble fails. ”

“ Like the gambler, who if he lose to-day, goes off consoling himself, that he may be a winner to-morrow, I had learned never to feel very acutely any misfortune, provided only that I could see some prospect of its not being permanent:—and how many are there who go through the world in this fashion, getting the credit all the while of being such true philosophers, so much elevated above the chances and changes of fortune, and who, after all, only apply to the game of life the same rule of action they practise at the ‘rouge et noir’ table. ”

“ A glad voice within me seemed to be saying, "It's all right, all right—that's money enough to fight him out with—that's ammunition for victory—victory for yourself, for the friends who have banked on your ability to protect them." ”

“ If only the ground had been dry! if only the great gambler—the genius, the hero, call him what you will, but the gambler for all that—if only he had staked his crown, his honour and that of Imperial France on some other stake than his artillery! ”

“ The names of the competitors were given, with their several nationalities and schools of training, the trials in which they had been engaged, the prizes won, and the prizes now offered; under the latter head the sums of money were stated in illuminated letters, telling of the departure of the day when the simple chaplet of pine or laurel was fully enough for the victor, hungering for glory as something better than riches, and content with it. ”

“ Amusement will be the plea. At the beginning the game will excite enthusiasm, pride of skill, the love of mastery, and the love of money. The love of money, at first almost imperceptible, at last will rule out all the rest,—like Aaron's rod,—a serpent, swallowing every other serpent. Generosity, enthusiasm, pride and skill, love of mastery, will be absorbed in one mighty feeling,—the savage lust of lucre. ”

“ Any reasonable contests will please her and please me. But we don't want contests started if they are to turn into a fierce competition, anything to win and all hate to the winner. Let those enter each contest who please and let us all applaud the winner and praise those who did well, all of them, even if they do not win. I myself will provide suitable prizes for all the contests. ”

“ Among the hundreds of thousands of gamblers, you can count the few prosperous ones on your fingers. Whether it be stock-market gamblers, race track gamblers, card gamblers, or what-not, the universal law is that they all must lose in the end. Every once in a while you read of some famous once-rich gambler who has just died poor and forsaken, fortune gone. The few successful ones are successful only for a short time. And the chances of your boy being one of the successful ones is about equal to his chances of becoming the king of England. ”

“ It was a stiff game, a big game even for Johnny's where the stakes were always high. ` I have seen honest men win up into four figures between sunset and dawn, and sometimes they did it in spite of all I could do. Even a gambler who uses art instead of science can't dictate to luck: he can only increase his percentage, or chance of winning. ”

“ Who has ever garlanded with ivy the weakling in War, or decked him with a conqueror's wage? Valour wins the prize, not sloth, and failure lacks renown. For one is followed by triumph and honour, the other by an unsightly life or by a stagnant end. I, who know not which way the issue of this duel inclines, dare not boldly anticipate that as a reward, of which I know not whether it be rightly mine. For one whose victory is doubtful may not seize the assured reward of the victor. ”

“ I bet you that any one of us can swim quicker across the sea than you can fly.—I take that bet, replied the vulture, but what shall I have if I win?—If you win, you will be at liberty to eat me and my people and our children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren and so on and so on to the end of time ”

“ It is but a sixpenny game if you like; but they want to win it. So as regards my friend yonder with the hat. He stakes his money: he wishes to win the game, not the hat merely. I am not prepared to say that he is not inspired by a noble ambition. Caesar wished to be first in a village. If first of a hundred yokels, why not first of two? And my friend the old-clothes'-man wishes to win his game, as well as to turn his little sixpence.
Suppose in the game of life—and it is but a twopenny game after all—you are equally eager of winning. ”

“ Race over. All that are on the course are coming in at a walk; no more running. Who is ahead? Ahead? What! and the winning-post a slab of white or gray stone standing out from that turf where there is no more jockeying or straining for victory! Well, the world marks their places in its betting-book; but be sure that these matter very little, if they have run as well as they knew how!
——Did I not say to you a little while ago that the universe swam in an ocean of similitudes and analogies? ”

“ You see the prizes for which, in the dance, whole crowds seem to be straining and yearning and even struggling, the prize of wealth, of even a little wealth, of a name printed in a newspaper, of a name printed in all newspapers, the prize of fame, of political position, of premiership. You see the wild political campaigns.
You see the places where the ambitious laze by the way, the baseball races where men are shouting themselves and others mad for an empty game, the halls of rag-time and trotting. ”

“ When your table's a hat, and your prize, a dram.
Stake your counter as boldly every whit,
Venture as truly, use the same skill,
Do your best, whether winning or losing it,
If you choose to play—is my principle!
Let a man contend to the uttermost
For his life's set prize, be it what it will! ”

“ You must be declared winner at the stand-house before you have been seen on the ground. If you have to run the gauntlet through all the slanders and stories they will rake up of me,—if, before you reach the goal, you have to fight all the lost battles of my life over again,—you 'll never see the winning-post. ”

“ Big money—sharp, glorious fights—periods of rest and loafing in between—a following of eager flatterers, the slaps on the back, the shakes of the hand, the toffs glad to buy him a drink for the privilege of five minutes' talk—and the glory of it, the yelling houses, the whirlwind finish, the referee's “King wins!” ”

“ We have now to bestow the rewards which have been brilliantly won by the most successful competitors in the society’s lists. I say the most successful, because to-night we should particularly observe, I think, that there is success in all honest endeavour, and that there is some victory gained in every gallant struggle that is made. To strive at all involves a victory achieved over sloth, inertness, and indifference; and competition for these prizes involves, besides, in the vast majority of cases, competition with and mastery asserted over circumstances adverse to the effort made. ”

“ Who fell in the great victory.
I find them in the garden, for
There's many here about;
And often when I go to plough,
The ploughshare turns them out;
For many thousand men, said he,
Were slain in the great victory. ”

“ For show me one trade, one profession, wherein one man's success is not based upon another's failure; all rivalry, all competition, triumph and rapture to the winner, disgrace and anguish to the loser! ”

“ On one side was heard the loud and exultant shout of the winner at his success, and on the other, the low bitter curse of the loser at his disappointment; the countenance of the one, in his joy and exultation, assuming the self-satisfied and domineering air of the victor and master, and the countenance of the other, in his grief and envy, darkening into the mingled look of the demon and the slave. ”

“ I waved my hands and said, "Oh, you have the reputation, you know, for extraordinary luck."
"That isn't the same thing as always winning. Besides, I HAVEN'T extraordinary luck, never HAVE had. Good heavens!" ”

“ There are yet some more genteel and subtle ‘crooks’ whom you shall not distinguish, by their outward demeanor, 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, low fulhams, or by palming, topping, etc. ”

“ I will stake the two thousand crowns you have lost to me, and another thousand besides, against your town. Fool! no one can hear us. If you win you go off a free man with my thousand. If you lose, you put me in possession one of these fine nights. ”

“ The professional sportsmen, which were such a curious feature of your day, we have nothing answering to, nor are the prizes for which our athletes contend money prizes, as with you. Our contests are always for glory only. ”

“ Ah, Madam, let us hope that we may all play the cards which Fortune shall deal to us, so as never to lose the prize we covet! And when they are at last thrown by, and the game of life is over, may we have won those riches which neither moth nor rust will corrupt! ”

“ There, on that most sacred spot in all the universe, in the holiest hour ever marked on the dial of time, when heaven, earth and hell are quick with interest, who is it sits unmoved, unobservant, unstirred, concerned only with the game? Ruthless gamblers sit beneath the lowering skies, and on the palsied earth they shake the dice to win the garments of the man of sorrows. ”

“ The gods are careful that the prizes shall fall to no unworthy aspirant. A victory, then, at Olympia or the Isthmus, proves that the winner has found his true sphere, and is exercising within it, at the prompting of a noble ambition, gifts of inborn prowess, which are daily bringing him towards the point where his nearest possible approximation to deity will be realised. ”

“ Now, were I to advise one to a short cut for public favor, I would say, 'Be a soldier and win.'”
“Especially 'win,'” I returned.
“By all means add the 'win' and emphasize it. That is my rede: Be sure to win. No one is made to explain a victory, no one tries a conqueror; the error of all errors is the black error of defeat.”
“And yet a good man may lose.”
“Sir, the best man may lose. But you are to consider: When he loses, the public owes him nothing. A farmer toils like a slave; a drought kills his crops; is he paid for the corn he does not raise? ”

“ RIVALRY.—To compete for good is famous—such as little boys rivalling one another in a race up the Ladder of Learning—that is exercise of the mind. Here we have a picture of country boys exercising their strength—climbing up a pole covered with grease, for a prize of food for the body. The boy that wins the leg of mutton will be the hero of the fair, and be carried round the place on the shoulders of the men. ”

“ One hears of people winning, though I have never seen it happen. Then I fancy that the novelty has taken with a certain set. It is a thing at the moment to go up there and have the rather bizarre experience. ”