From The Westminster Review. GAMESTERS AND GAMING-HOUSES. | dislike was attributable, not to the well-known circumstance of his being a gamester, but to 1. Les Faucheurs de Nuit: Joueurs et Joueu- the general belief that he was a cheat. What Par Edouard Gourdon. Deuxième was then only suspected, was afterwards Edition. Paris: A. Bourdillat et Cie. clearly demonstrated. He was not only a 1860. card-sharper, but a card-sharper of an excep ses. 2. Die Homburger Spielhölle in geschichtlicher tionally bold and original kind. On one ocund aktenmässiger Beleuchtung. Aus casion he proceeded to Havana, and bought dem in Frankfurt, a. M. erscheinenden. “Volksfreund für das Mittlere Deutch-up every pack of cards in the place. He had land," abgedruckt. Frankfurt-am-Main: previously freighted a vessel with marked Wilhelm Küchler. 1862. 3. Jeu de la Roulette. Par J. H. BHomburg-ès-Monts; Fred Fraunholz. 1858. 4. Guide du Spéculateur au Trente-et-Quarante, avec la Manière de faire en Six Mois plus de 50 Capitaux. Par un Ancien Notaire. Seconde Edition. Hombourgès-Monts Louis Schick. 1860. playing-cards, which arrived opportunely to supply the dealers whose stocks were completely exhausted. When the cards he had prepared and imported were in common use, he played incessantly and for high stakes, and, as a matter of course, was invariably a winner. The most welcome of all the guests was Signor Miranda, gentleman of the Queen of Spain's household. He had previously distinguished himself by his alacrity in gaming on every occasion, and for his capacity to lose large sums of money. That he was prepared to play high on this evening was proved by his coming to the party with one hundred thousand francs in his pockets. FOUR months ago the gossips of Paris were regaling their acquaintances with a story which, though strongly resembling a cleverly concocted fiction, was yet proved in a court of justice to be true to the letter. It ran thus. On the 4th of February last, a Madame Julia Barucci, having taken possession As soon as the guests had assembled, Signor of a new house, celebrated the event by in- Garcia arranged a rouge-et-noir table. His viting about thirty guests to supper. The countrymen, Signors Calzado and Miranda, lady's antecedents are unknown to us. Our took part in the game, and the latter soon knowledge of her is limited to these few facts; won thirty thousand francs. The serious. she was twenty-five years of age; though un- business of the evening was then interrupted married, she had changed her name repeat- by the announcement that supper was ready. edly, and was an object of attraction to a After supper, when the guests were suitably large circle of gentlemen. We may justly heated and excited with wine, they engaged infer that she was a prominent member of in a game of baccarat. This game is prohibthat sisterhood of Love which, unbound by ited in France as hazard is in England, and vows, and untrammelled by principles, de- for the like reason, that it is a game of chance. votes its energies to the attainment of the Signor Garcia absented himself from the room. seemingly incompatible ends of assiduously for half an hour. Under the pretext of wishpursuing pleasure, and rapidly accumulating ing to smoke a cigar, he went into a private gold. The hostess and her guests were well chamber, where he disposed about his person matched. Among the latter was a Signor several packs of cards which he had brought Garcia, who had achieved a temporary noto- with him. On returning to the gaming-tariety at Homburg and Baden, by winning ble he began to play for high stakes. His seventy-five thousand pounds in the course of success was extraordinary. In a short time two seasons, and then being reduced to beg- he won one hundred and forty thousand francs, gary after a few months' play, and who, in chiefly from Signor Miranda. Signor Caladdition to the vicissitudes of fortune, had zado, who followed Garcia's lead, won a experienced the extremes of popular feeling large sum also. The exceptionally good forby being envied and extolled when rich, and tune of Garcia, and the marvellous character heartily despised when impoverished. Signor of the cards which he held, aroused the asCalzador, the manager of the Italian Theatre tonishment of the players, and drew forth at Paris, was a guest whom the others re- comments from the onlookers. At length it garded with dislike, and with whom Signor was perceived that some of the cards in GarGarcia alone was on terms of intimacy. This cia's hand were of different colors, and did not belong to the packs provided by the host-ited games to be played at her house, she will ess. Thereupon he was charged with foul be apprehended without hesitation and punplay. He admitted having introduced cards ished without mercy. of his own; but alleged that he had played fairly, and had brought certain packs from his club merely because they always proved lucky cards to him. Of the reality of his luck there could be as little question as of the infamy of his conduct. He offered as a matter of favor, and on condition that the affair should be hushed up, to refund his winnings, and produced the sum of fifty thousand francs. Those whom he had cheated once, were not to be deluded now into accepting a third part in place of the whole. A scene then occurred which, if represented on the stage, would be hissed because of its improbability, and if described in a novel would he censured by the critics because of its absurdity. Fearing lest he should be forcibly despoiled of his ill-gotten winnings, Garcia tried to escape from the house. Finding the door bolted, he rushed into a room and hid himself in a corner. After being chased by his lynx-eyed and enraged pursuers from room to room, and from one hiding-place to another, he was finally stripped of all the money in his possession. Signor Calzado was then asked to display the contents of his pockets, or suffer himself to be searched. He refused to do either; but stealthily allowed a roll of bank notes, to the value of sixteen thousand francs, to slip down his trousers and fall on the floor. The roll was picked up and handed to him, but he denied all knowledge of it. The brother cheats were then permitted to leave the house. It was found, after their departure, that they had carried with them at least forty thousand francs. Neither the severity of the law of France, nor the vigilance of the French police, can check the frequent occurrence of scenes like the one we have just described; yet the formidable obstacles put in the way of gamesters deter many from commencing to play, even while they do little to hinder those who habitually game, from persevering in the practice. M. Gourdon, in his instructive work on this subject, tells us, that in order to avoid inevitable detection, professional gamesters change their quarters weekly, and even nightly; hence it is a matter of some difficulty for the initiated themselves to discover, on any given evening, where their fellowgamesters will assemble. The most ardent and persistent gamesters are women. Both the young and the old, the comely and the ill-favored, hazard everything in order to gratify this taste, and usually succeed in gratifying it to the full. To the young, who deny themselves no sensual delight, this furnishes an additional pleasure, while the old who can no longer practise the degrading vices which they love, find in gaming a fresh and unfailing excitement. There exist in Paris female associations for the indulgence of the taste for play. M. Gourdon contrived to attend a meeting of one of these societies. If his description of what took place be a truthful one, the votarics of pleasure who thus assemble are the victims of the cruellest of punishments. In Paris, as elsewhere, gaming having ceased to be a fashionable vice, is no longer commended or tolerated by good society. To The result of this scandalous affair was the become rich by gaming is considered disrepupublic trial of the offenders. Calzado ap- table; but to acquire wealth by speculating peared in person; Garcia had fled the coun- at the Bourse is regarded as both honorable try. Both were convicted of malpractices. and legitimate. The speculator has superGarcia was sentenced to five years, and Cal- seded the gamester. Lewis the Fourteenth zado to thirteen months' imprisonment, in accorded his favor to Dangeau, who had made addition to fines of three thousand francs a fortune by play, while Napoleon the Third each. Moreover, they were ordered to pay patronized Mirès, the notorious speculator. jointly the sum of thirty-one thousand francs There is this difference between the two monto Signor Miranda. Although on this occa-archs; the former induced his subjects to sion Madame Barucci escaped punishment, game, by setting them the example; the latyet it will fare worse with her should she ter merely affords his subjects every possible again be placed in a similar position. The facility for risking and losing their money in police will henceforward keep both herself gambling speculations. and her visitors under a supervision so strict, The passionate fondness of Lewis the Fourthat should she a second time permit prohib-teenth for play was partly attributable to his early training. Cardinal Mazarin, himself a | sums to each other. They carefully avoided confirmed gamester, lost no opportunity of using the phrase" interchange of winnings." imbuing the young king with a taste for play, What they did were acts of pure charity. and did not scruple to profit by his skill, and A confessor could hardly reproach the peniwin large sums from the king. It was notori- tent who confessed to having cheated at play, ous that Mazarin would resort to foul means but who had at once distributed in charity the when by playing fairly he could not win. Of sums she had improperly acquired! Cercourse he did not know what cheating meant: tainly, the elasticity of the female conscience ecclesiastics always affect ignorance of the is only less wonderful than the depths of fereal names of vices. He admitted that "he male ingenuity. made proper use of his advantages," and The famous Law first gained notoriety by maintained that he was justified in so doing. his extravagant play and his extraordinary On one occasion the principal personages of good fortune. He was the most daring and the time were the admiring spectators of successful of gamesters. So uniform and rea performance which might be accurately markable was his success, that he became an styled-" -" Diamond cut Diamond." The spec-object of suspicion to M. d'Argenson, chief tacle was Mazarin and the Chevalier de Gram- of the police. Law had the skill, however, mont playing together at cards, and each to gain millions at play, and to escape being trying to gain the advantage over the other detected and convicted as a cheat. The rage by cheating! for gaming which prevailed during the reDuring the seventeenth and eighteenth cen-gency was not modified when Lewis' the Fifturies, the surest passport to public notice teenth became king. The latter monarch was and distinction in France was to play des- too much the slave of his appetites to take perately, to lose freely or to win largely. delight in gaming; but he neither disapMontesquieu satirizes this with his usual proved of it, nor did his subjects refrain from force and point. in his "Persian Letters." indulging in it. On the contrary, they In the sixty-fourth letter, Usbek informs gamed with an effrontery altogether unparIbben that" gaming is commonly practised alled, and almost inconceivable. Foreign and in Europe. It is even followed as a profes- impartial testimony fully corroborates the sion, and the title of gamester is held to be statements of French writers on this point. equivalent to birth, to possessions, and to Horace Walpole, who visited Paris in 1739, probity. Its holder is ranked, without in- thus relates in a letter to Richard West his quiry, among honorable men, notwithstand-impressions of what he witnessed there: ing everybody is aware that to judge thus is" You would not easily guess their notions of to be frequently deceived. Still, in this mat- honor: I will tell you one : it is very dishonter, people are determined to remain incorri- orable for any gentleman not to be in the gible." St. Simon records that the most distinguished member of Lewis the Fourteenth's court was a duke who had the reputation of cheating at play, and that a Princess Harcourt openly cheated, and on being detected manifested neither shame nor concern, but simply laughed and pocketed her winnings. However, it was necessary for the ladies of that age to reconcile piety with avarice, to quiet their consciences and fill their purses. If, on going to confession they acknowledged having won unfairly, absolution was either refused them, or else a severe penance was enjoined. To prevent unpleasant scenes with their spiritual guides, without abandoning their malpractices, the following plan was devised and executed. Those who had won equal sums at play formally presented these army, or in the king's service, as they call it : and it is no dishonor to keep public gaminghouses: there are at least one hundred and fifty of the first quality in Paris who live by it. You may go into their houses at all hours of the night, and find hazard, pharaoh, etc. The men who keep the hazard-table at the Duke de Gesvre's pay him twelve guineas each night for the privilege. Even the Princesses of the Blood are dirty enough to have shares in the banks kept at their houses." Lewis the Sixteenth was the reverse of a profligate, and he detested gaming. His queen, on the other hand, was devotedly attached to faro and lansquenet, and counteracted by her daily practice the good example set by her husband. During the reign of Lewis the Sixteenth, as well as the reigns of his predecessors, various laws had been proprietor of its gaming-house is a Frenchman; the majority of its visitors come from France; French is the language principally spoken; French plays are performed in its theatre; in short, Baden is simply a portion of the most disreputable part of the Palais Royal planted on German territory. Homburg, its chief rival, is less exclusively French, yet it owes nearly as much to France as Baden does. A Frenchman founded and now conducts the Homburg gaming-house. Of this house, which is at once the principal attraction and the greatest curse of Homburg, we shall proceed to give an account. passed against gaming, and had been rigor- | objections of those who hold that to increase ously enforced against the middle and poorer the revenue in such a way is both immoral classes. The revolution came, and the laws and impolitic. Curiously enough, these ́eswhich prohibited gaming were broken with tablishments are usually owned and manthe same impunity as laws of every other de-aged by Frenchmen. For example, Baden scription. A gaming-house was opened in is more a French than a German town. The every street, and the people gave free scope to their passion for play. Up to the time of the directory, there were four thousand of these houses in full operation in Paris alone. When Bonaparte rose to power, one of his first acts was to grapple with the crying evil. His first thought was to suppress gaminghouses altogether; but he abandoned this project and resolved to license them. The arrangement which he made continued till 1838, when public gaming was prohibited by law. The last company which farmed the Parisian gaming-houses paid the government two hundred and seventy thousand pounds for the privilege. There were six housesFrascati's, the Salons, and four in the Palais Royal. The daily average number of players was three thousand, while one thousand were generally refused admittance. The clear profit made in 1837 was seventy-six thousand pounds sterling. Of this sum three-fourths were handed over to the city of Paris, leaving nineteen thousand pounds for distribution among the members of the company. Homburg, though half the size and containing half the population of Richmond-onThames, is a capital city, the seat of a court, and the head-quarters of an army. HesseHomburg, of which it is the capital, is a little larger than Richmond Park. The destinies of this State are guided by a landgrave, who has a castle to dwell in and a ministry to assist him in discharging his arduous duties. Were his State invaded, his army could make but a feeble resistance, seeing that it consists of one infantry regiment only. The manufactures for which Homburg is famous are stockings; the natural products with which it has been enriched are mineral waters. It has to thank its landgrave for the gaminghouse which has made it renowned throughout the world. The French, having signally failed in subjugating Europe, are wont to console themselves with the thought that those who successfully defied their arms have been forced to copy their fashions and adopt their language. With equal truth, they might boast of having invented and named nearly all those games of chance which the laws of any enlightened nation prohibit being played in In 1840 two Frenchmen, named Francis public, and which are never played at all and Lewis Blanc, having acquired thirty by civilized and sensible men in any part of thousand florins by play, wished to invest the world. But the governments of several their capital in a gaming-house, and asked minor German States openly sanction and sup- the Landgrave of Hesse-Homburg for permisport what the governments of greater nations sion to establish such a house in his capital. denounce as an incalculable evil. Although On what terms their request was granted we the inhabitants of those States in which do not know. But the house was opened; games of chance are publicly played, regard play commenced, and the capital was lost. In gaming establishments with a well-founded this emergency the Government advanced abhorrence, yet they have hitherto been un- them, without interest, from one to one hunable to persuade their rulers to suppress dred and fifty thousand florins. Most probthem. It is argued that as the owners of ably, the price of this advance was a share in these establishments pay large sums of money the profits. In 1847 the brothers Blanc obto the State for the privilege of conducting tained the consent of the Government to form them, the rulers of the State act rightly in a company for the purpose of extending the receiving the money and in disregarding the operations of the gaming-house and of con ducting its affairs. The name of the company | ever, either risk large sums or incur heavy was cleverly chosen to cloak the designs of losses. When a Frenchman does lose, the loss its promoters-it was called, a "Scrip Company for leasing conjointly the Pump-room and Mineral Springs." is serious. In his estimation, life without the means for enjoying it is not worth having; consequently after losing his last guinea he generally meditates, and often commits suicide. With a fondness for theatrical display which characterizes his nation, a Frenchman studies effect even in death. At Homburg, the favorite mode of ending his existence is The original capital was one million of florins, divided into two thousand shares, of five hundred florins each. Twelve years after the company was established, the capital had been increased by successive issues of shares to four millions two hundred thousand flor-blowing out his brains with a pistol, in the ins, equal to three hundred and fifty thousand room where his ruin has been effected. When pounds sterling. The market value of the such a catastrophy happens, the gamesters capital in 1862 was ten millions of florins, first exhibit a momentary surprise, and then equal, in round numbers, to eight hundred manifest considerable annoyance at the temand thirty thousand pounds. Fifty florins porary suspension of the game. No sooner per share was the average dividend. The has the palpitating corpse been removed, the shares had been reduced in value from five to blood-stained and brain-strewn floor washed one hundred florins, and every holder of an and polished than the game is resumed and original five hundred florin share had ex- the dead man forgotten. All these things changed it without additional payment for have been known to occur within the brief fifteen one hundred florin shares. The divi- space of ten minutes. Prominent among the dends which the holders of the original shares frequenters of the rooms by the readiness had received, amounted to one hundred and with which they stake considerable sums, disfifty per cent. on their outlay. It is alleged tinguished from all the others by the external by the author of a pamphlet on the "Hells equanimity with which they bear alike the of Homburg," that dividends even more enor- smiles and the frowns of fortune, are those mous have been earned, but not paid, because players whom their apparel, demeanor, and of the manager and directors having appro-accent emphatically proclaim to be Englishpriated sums which ought to have been dis-men. They meet their losses without repintributed among the shareholders. What ing, because their purses are generally wellgives a color to this allegation is, that M. Blanc, the managing director, is said to have accumulated a fortune of eight hundred thousand pounds sterling. Seeing that, shortly after founding the gaming-house, he lost his entire capital, he has been unusually fortunate to acquire so large a fortune within less than twenty years. It is quite certain that the company's annual profits exceed a quarter of a million sterling. Surely the gamesters at Homburg pay a very heavy tax for their enjoyment! filled, and because they know that the loss of fifty or a hundred pounds will merely result in the shortening of their tour and the hastening of their return home. If a Frenchman or German loses a similar amount, he will be greatly inconvenienced, and perhaps seriously embarrassed. Now and then an Englishman of rank and wealth leaves behind him an amount which of itself adds considerably to the dividends of the company. There is a tradition at Homburg, that not many years ago an impulsive and reckless member of the At Homburg, and elsewhere, the Russians House of Commons, who now exercises conare notable for prodigality in squandering siderable authority over the United Kingdom money; as gamesters, they play with persis- inhabited by men as reckless and impulsive as tence, and lose with indifference. Equally himself, frequented the gaming-rooms for a reckless, but far more excitable and demon- few days, and lost the large sum of six thoustrative, are the Americans. Whether Con- sand pounds. Whether this be true or the federates or Federals, they dearly love play, reverse, it is unquestionable that the comand indulge their passion for it without pany never had so prosperous a year as that scruple. Frenchmen and Germans compose in which this visit is reported to have ocone-half of the floating population of Homburg, and are the most untiring frequenters of the gaming-rooms. Few of them, how curred. But men do not visit Homburg for the sole purpose of enriching a gaming company. |
