Online Casino Players.com

Volume I

The Gaming Table by Andrew Steinmetz, Volume II

I | II | III | IV | V | VI | VII | VIII | IX | X | XI | XII | XIII | XIV

Doings In Gaming Houses

The same gentleman remembered the time when gambling tables were
kept in private houses.

'It is a fact that most of those who played very high were pretty
well cleaned out.'

'Crockford increased gambling everywhere.' 'Persons of the
middling classes, butchers, and gentleman's servants went to the
low gambling houses.'

These places held out inducements to robbery. 'If a servant or
shopman could scrape together L200 or L300, he had, by the agency
of the keepers of these houses, the opportunity of lending out
his money to the losers at 60 per cent.'

DESPERATION AT GAMING HOUSES.

The most particular inspection was made of the player's person by
the gaming house keeper's spies, and even his dress was strictly
observed. He was obliged, before entering the saloon, to deposit
his great coat and cane, which might perchance afford the
introduction of some WEAPON; and the elegance of the covering did
not save him from the humiliation of having it taken from him at
the door. The attempts which were sometimes made on the lives of
the bankers led to these precautions--like the indignities which
are practised only in prisons for the security of the unhappy
inmates. It is certain that gamesters, reduced to desperation,
and on the eve of committing suicide, have conveyed into these
places infernal machines with an intention of destroying at once
their cruel plunderers and themselves.

Previous ... Next
Page 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33