The Gaming Table: Its Votaries and Victims Volume 1 Part 9

(60) Dusaulx, _De la Pa.s.sion du Jeu_, 1779.

Gaming houses in Paris were first licensed in 1775, by the lieutenant of police, Sartines, who, to diminish the odium of such establishments, decreed that the profit resulting from them should be applied to the foundation of hospitals. Their number soon amounted to twelve; and women were allowed to resort to them two days in the week. Besides the licensed establishments, several illegal ones were tolerated, and especially styled _enfers_, or 'h.e.l.ls.'

Gaming having been found prolific in misfortunes and crimes, was prohibited in 1778; but it was still practised at the court and in the hotels of amba.s.sadors, where police-officers could not enter. By degrees the public establishments resumed their wonted activity, and extended their pernicious effects. The numerous suicides and bankruptcies which they occasioned attracted the attention of the _Parlement_, who drew up regulations for their observance, and threatened those who violated them with the pillory and whipping. The licensed houses, as well as those recognized, however, still continued their former practices, and breaches of the regulations were merely visited with trivial punishment.

At length, the pa.s.sion for play prevailing in the societies established in the Palais Royal, under the t.i.tle of _clubs_ or _salons_, a police ordinance was issued in 1785, prohibiting them from gaming. In 1786, fresh disorder having arisen in the unlicensed establishments, additional prohibiting measures were enforced. During the Revolution the gaming-houses were frequently prosecuted, and licenses withheld; but notwithstanding the rigour of the laws and the vigilance of the police, they still contrived to exist.

LOUIS XVI. TILL THE PRESENT TIME.--In the general corruption of morals, which rose to its height during the reign of Louis XVI., gambling kept pace with, if it did not outstrip, every other licentiousness of that dismal epoch.(61) Indeed, the universal excitement of the nation naturally tended to develope every desperate pa.s.sion of our nature; and that the revolutionary troubles and agitation of the empire helped to increase the gambling propensity of the French, is evident from the magnitude of the results on record.

(61) It will be seen in the sequel that gambling was vastly increased in England by the French 'emigres' who sought refuge among us, bringing with them all their vices, unchastened by misfortune.

Fouche, the minister of police, derived an income of L128,000 a year for licensing or 'privileging' gaming houses, to which cards of address were regularly furnished.

Besides what the 'farmers' of the gaming houses paid to Fouche, they were compelled to hire and pay 120,000 persons, employed in those houses as _croupiers_ or attendants at the gaming table, from half-a-crown to half-a-guinea a day; and all these 120,000 persons were _SPIES OF FOUCHE!_ A very clever idea no doubt it was, thus to draw a revenue from the proceeds of a vice, and use the inst.i.tution for the purposes of government; but, perhaps, as Rousseau remarks, 'it is a great error in domestic as well as civil economy to wish to combat one vice by another, or to form between them a sort of equilibrium, as if that which saps the foundations of order can ever serve to establish it.'(62) A minister of the Emperor Theodosius II., in the year 431, the virtuous Florentius, in order to teach his master that it was wrong to make the vices contribute to the State, because such a procedure authorizes them, gave to the public treasury one of his lands the revenue of which equalled the product of the annual tax levied on prost.i.tution.(63)

(62) Nouv. Heloise, t. iv.

(63) Novel. Theodos. 18.

After the restoration of the Bourbons, it became quite evident that play in the Empire had been quite as Napoleonic in its vigour and dimensions as any other 'idea' of the epoch.

The following detail of the public gaming tables of Paris was published in a number of the _Bibliotheque Historique_, 1818, under the t.i.tle of 'Budget of Public Games.'

STATE OF THE ANNUAL EXPENSES OF THE GAMES OF PARIS.

These 20 Tables are divided into nine houses, four of which are situated in the Palais Royal.

To serve the seven tables of _Trente-et-un_, there are:--francs 28 Dealers, at 550 fr. a month, making . . . . 15,400 28 Croupiers, at 380. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10,640 42 a.s.sistants, at 200. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8,400

SERVICE FOR THE NINE ROULETTES AND ONE Pa.s.sE-DIX.

80 Dealers, at 275 fr. a month . . . . . . . . 22,000 60 a.s.sistants, at 150. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9,000

SERVICE OF THE c.r.a.pS, BIRIBI, AND HAZARD, 12 Dealers, at 300 fr. a month. . . . . . . . . 3,600 12 Inspectors, at 120 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1,440 10 Aids, at 100. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1,000 6 Chefs de Partie at the princ.i.p.al houses, at 700 fr. a month . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4,200

3 Chefs de Partie for the Roulettes, at 500 fr. a month. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1,500 20 Secret Inspectors, at 200 fr. a month. . . . . .4,000 1 Inspector-General, at . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1,000 130 Waiters, at 75 fr. a month. . . . . . . . . . .9,750 Cards a month . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1,500 Beer and refreshments, a month. . . . . . . . . . .3,000 Lights. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .5,500 Refreshment for the grand saloon, including two dinners every week, per month . . . . . . . . . 12,000 Total expense of each month . . . .113,930 --------- Multiplied by twelve, is. . . . . . . . . . . .1,367,160 Rent of 10 Houses, per annum. . . . . . . . . . .130,000 Expense of Offices. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50,000 --------- Total per annum. . . . . . . . . 1,547,160 If the 'privilege' or license is . . . . . . . 6,000,000 If a bonus of a million is given for six years, the sixth part, or one year, will be . . . . . . . 166,666

--------- Total expenditure . . . . . . . .7,713,826 The profits are estimated at, per month,. . . . .800,000 --------- Which yield, per annum, . . . . . . . . . . . .9,600,000 Deducting the expenditure . . . . . . . . . . .7,713,826 --------- The annual profits are. . . . . . . . . . . fr.1,886,174 --------- Thus giving the annual profit at L7860 sterling.

We omit the profits resulting from the watering-places, amounting to fr. 200,000.

One of the new conditions imposed on the Paris gaming houses is the exclusion of females.

Thus, at Paris, the Palais Royal, Frascati, and numerous other places, presented gaming houses, whither millions of wretches crowded in search of fortune, but, for the most part, to find only ruin or even death by suicide or duelling, so often resulting from quarrels at the gaming table.

This state of things was, however, altered in the year 1836, at the proposition of M. B. Delessert, and all the gaming houses were ordered to be closed from the 1st of January, 1838, so that the present gambling in France is on the same footing as gambling in England,--utterly prohibited, but carried on in secret.

CHAPTER VI. THE RISE AND PROGRESS OF MODERN GAMING IN ENGLAND.

It seems that the rise of modern gaming in England may be dated from the year 1777 or 1778.

Before this time gaming appears never to have a.s.sumed an alarming aspect. The methodical system of partners.h.i.+p, enabling men to embark large capital in gambling establishments, was unknown; though from that period this system became the special characteristic of the pursuit among all cla.s.ses of the community.

The development of the evil was a subject of great concern to thoughtful men, and one of these, in the year 1784, put forth a pamphlet, which seems to give 'the very age and body of the time, his form and pressure.'(64)

(64) The pamphlet (in the Library of the British Museum) is ent.i.tled:--'Hints for a Reform, particularly of the Gaming Clubs. By a Member of Parliament. 1784.'

'About thirty years ago,' says this writer, 'there was but one club in the metropolis. It was regulated and respectable. There were few of the members who betted high. Such stakes at present would be reckoned very low indeed. There were then a.s.semblies once a week in most of the great houses. An agreeable society met at seven o'clock; they played for crowns or half-crowns; and reached their own houses about eleven.

'There was but one lady who gamed deeply, and she was viewed in the light of a phenomenon. Were she now to be asked her real opinion of those friends who were her former _PLAY_-fellows, there can be no doubt but that they rank very low in her esteem.

'In the present era of vice and dissipation, how many females attend the card-tables! What is the consequence? The effects are too clearly to be traced to the frequent _DIVORCES_ which have lately disgraced our country, and they are too visible in the shameful conduct of many ladies of fas.h.i.+on, since gambling became their chief amus.e.m.e.nt.

'There is now no society. The routs begin at midnight. They are painful and troublesome to the lady who receives company, and they are absolutely a nuisance to those who are honoured with a card of invitation. It is in vain to attempt conversation. The social pleasures are entirely banished, and those who have any relish for them, or who are fond of early hours, are necessarily excluded. Such are the companies of modern times, and modern people of fas.h.i.+on. Those who are not invited fly to the _Gaming Clubs_--

"To kill their idle hours and cure _ennui!_"

'To give an account of the present enc.u.mbered situation of many families, whose property was once large and ample, would fill a volume.

Whence spring the difficulties which every succeeding day increases?

From the _GAMBLING CLUBS_. Why are they continually hunted by their creditors? The reply is--the _GAMBLING CLUBS_. Why are they obliged continually to rack their invention in order to save appearances? The answer still is--the _GAMBLING CLUBS!_

'The father frequently ruins his children; and sons, and even grandsons, long before the succession opens to them, are involved so deeply that during their future lives their circ.u.mstances are rendered narrow; and they have rank or family honours, without being able to support them.

'How many infamous villains have ama.s.sed immense estates, by taking advantage of unfortunate young men, who have been first seduced and then ruined by the Gambling Clubs!

'It is well known that the old members of those gambling societies exert every nerve to enlist young men of fortune; and if we take a view of the princ.i.p.al estates on this island, we shall find many infamous _CHRISTIAN_ brokers who are now living luxuriously and in splendour on the wrecks of such unhappy victims.

'At present, when a boy has learned a little from his father's example, he is sent to school, to be _INITIATED_. In the course of a few years he acquires a profound knowledge of the science of gambling, and before he leaves the University he is perfectly fitted for a member of the _GAMING CLUBS_, into which he is elected before he takes his seat in either House of Parliament. There is no necessity for his being of age, as the sooner he is ballotted for, the more advantageous his admission will prove to the _OLD_ members.

'Scarcely is the hopeful youth enrolled among these _HONOURABLE_ a.s.sociates, than he is introduced to Jews, to annuity-brokers, and to the long train of money-lenders. They take care to answer his pecuniary calls, and the greater part of the night and morning is consumed at the _CLUB_. To his creditors and tradesmen, instead of paying his bills, he offers a _BOND_ or _ANNUITY_. He rises just time enough to ride to Kensington Gardens; returns to dress; dines late; and then attends the party of gamblers, as he had done the night before, unless he allows himself to be detained for a few moments by the newspaper, or some political publication.

'Such do we find the present fas.h.i.+onable style of life, from "his Grace"

to the "Ensign" in the Guards. Will this mode of education rear up heroes, to lead forth our armies, or to conduct our fleets to victory?

Review the conduct of your generals abroad, and of your statesmen at home, during the late unfortunate war, and these questions are answered.(65)