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Volume I Volume II

The Gaming Table by Andrew Steinmetz

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THE UNIVERSAL PASSION OF GAMING OR, GAMING ALL THE WORLD OVER

CHAPTER I. page 3

[3] Herod. 1. ii.

[4] Plutarch, _De Isid. et Osirid._

But not only did the gods play among themselves on Olympus, but
they gambled with mortals. According to Plutarch, the priest of
the temple of Hercules amused himself with playing at dice with
the god, the stake or conditions being that if he won he should
obtain some signal favour, but if he lost he would procure a
beautiful courtesan for Hercules.[5]

[5] _In Vita Romuli_.

By the numerous nations of the East dice, and that pugnacious
little bird the cock, have been and are the chief instruments
employed to produce a sensation--to agitate their minds and to
ruin their fortunes. The Chinese have in all times, we suppose,
had cards--hence the absurdity of the notion that they were
`invented' for the amusement of Charles VI. of France, in his
`lucid intervals,' as is constantly asserted in every collection
of historic facts. The Chinese invented cards, as they invented
almost everything else that administers to our social and
domestic comfort.[6]

[6] Observations on Cards, by Mr Gough, in Archaeologia, vol.
viii. 1787.

The Asiatic gambler is desperate. When all other property is
played away, he scruples not to stake his wife, his child, on the
cast of a die or on the courage of the martial bird before
mentioned. Nay more, if still unsuccessful, the last venture he
makes is that of his limbs--his personal liberty--his life--which
he hazards on the caprice of chance, and agrees to be at the
mercy, or to become the slave, of his fortunate antagonist.

The Malayan, however, does not always tamely submit to this last
stroke of fortune. When reduced to a state of desperation by
repeated ill-luck, he loosens a certain lock of hair on his head,
which, when flowing down, is a sign of war and destruction. He
swallows opium or some intoxicating liquor, till he works himself
up into a fit of frenzy, and begins to bite and kill everything
that comes in his way; whereupon, as the aforesaid lock of hair
is seen flowing, it is lawful to fire at and destroy him as
quickly as possible--he being considered no better than a mad
dog. A very rational conclusion.

Of course the Chinese are most eager gamesters, or they would not
have been capable of inventing those dear, precious killers of
time--cards, the EVENING solace of so many a household in the
most respectable and `proper' walks of life. Indeed, they play
night and day--until they have lost all they are worth, and then
they usually go--and hang themselves.

If we turn our course northward, and penetrate the regions of ice
perpetual, we find that the driven snow cannot effectually quench
the flames of gambling. They glow amid the regions of the
frozen pole. The Greenlanders gamble with a board, which has a
finger-piece upon it, turning round on an axle; and the person to
whom the finger points on the stopping of the board, which is
whirled round, `sweeps' all the `stakes' that have been
deposited.

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