CHAPTER III Gambling, early 18th Century-Mrs Centlivre-E. Ward-Steele-Pope--Details of a gaming-house-Grub St.Journal on Gambling-Legislation on gambling -Peeresses as gaming-house keepers-A child played for at cards-Raids on gaming-houses—Fielding. BUT to return to the Chronology of Gambling. From the Restoration of Charles II. to the time of Anne, gambling was common; but in the reign of this latter monarch, it either reached a much higher pitch, or else, in that Augustan Age of Literature, we hear more about it. Any way, we only know what we read about it. In the epilogue to Mrs Centlivre's play of the Gamester, published in 1705, the audience is thus addressed : "You Roaring Boys, who know the Midnight Cares You're Fortune's sporting Footballs at the best, Like Esop's Dog, loses his certain Store. Then the Spung squeez'd by all, grows dry,-And, now, This Itch for Play, has, likewise, fatal been, 1 Cant term for false Dice. A Thousand Guineas for Basset prevails, A Bait when Cash runs low, that seldom fails ; In Sterling Coin, does Sterling Beauty pay." Ward, in a Satire called Adam and Eve stript of their furbelows, published in 1705, has an Article on the Gambling lady of the period, entitled, Bad Luck to him that has her; Or, The Gaming Lady, of which the following is a portion: "When an unfortunate Night has happen'd to empty her Cabinet .. her Jewels are carry'd privately into Lumbard Street, and Fortune is to be tempted the next Night with another Sum borrow'd of my Lady's Goldsmith at the Extortion of a Pawnbroker; and, if that fails, then she sells off her Wardrobe, to the great Grief of her Maids ; stretches her Credit amongst those she deals with, pawns her Honour to her Intimates, or makes her Waiting-Woman dive into the Bottom of her Trunk, and lug out her green Net Purse, full of old Jacobus's, which she has got in her Time by her Servitude, in Hopes to recover her Losses by a Turn of Fortune, that she may conceal her bad Luck from the Knowledge of her Husband: But she is generally such a Bubble to some Smock fac'd Gamester, who can win her Money first, carry off the Loser in a Hackney Coach, and kiss her into a good humour before he parts with her, that she is generally driven to the last Extremity, and then forc'd to confess all to her forgiving Spouse, who, either thro' his fond Affection, natural Generosity, or Danger of Scandal, supplies her with Money to redeem her Moveables, buy her new Apparel, and to pay her Debts upon Honour, that her Ladyship may be in Statu quo, in which Condition she never long continues, but repeats the same Game over and over, to the End of the Chapter: For she is so strangely infatuated with the Itch of Card Playing, that she makes the Devil's Books her very Practice of Piety; and, were she at her Parish Church, in the Height of her Devotion, should any Body, in the Interim, but stand at the Church Door, and hold up the Knave of Clubs, she would take it to be a Challenge at Lanctre Loo; and, starting from her Prayers, would follow her beloved Pam, as a deluded Traveller does an Ignis fatuus.” No. 120 of the Guardian (July 29, 1713), by Steele, is devoted to female Gambling as it was in the time of Queen Anne, and the following is a portion of it: "Their Passions suffer no less by this Practice than their Understandings and Imaginations. What Hope and Fear, Joy and Anger, Sorrow and Discontent break out all at once in a fair Assembly upon So noble an Occasion as that of turning up a Card? Who can consider without a Secret Indignation that all those Affections of the Mind which should be consecrated to their Children, Husbands and Parents, are thus vilely prostituted and thrown away upon a Hand at Loo. For my own part, I cannot but be grieved when I see a fine Woman fretting and bleeding inwardly from such trivial Motives; when I behold the Face of an Angel agitated and discomposed by the Heart of a Fury. "Our Minds are of such a Make, that they, naturally, give themselves up to every Diversion to which they are much accustomed, and we always find that Play, when followed with Assiduity, engrosses the whole Woman, She quickly grows uneasie in her own Family, takes but little Pleasure in all the domestick, innocent, Endearments of Life, and grows more fond of Pamm than of her Husband. My friend Theophrastus, the best of Husbands and of Fathers, has often complained to me, with Tears in his Eyes, of the late Hours he is forced to keep, if he would enjoy his Wife's Conversation. When she returns to me with Joy in her Face, it does not arise, says he, from the Sight of her Husband, but from the good Luck she has had at Cards. On the contrary, says he, if she has been a Loser, I am doubly a Sufferer by it. She comes home out of humour, is angry with every Body, displeased with all I can do, or say, and, in Reality, for no other Reason but because What charming she has been throwing away my Estate. Bedfellows and Companions for Life, are Men likely to meet with, that chuse their Wives out of such Women of Vogue and Fashion? What a Race of Worthies, what Patriots, what Heroes, must we expect from Mothers of this Make? "I come, in the next Place, to consider all the ill Consequences which Gaming has on the Bodies of our Female Adventurers. It is so ordered that almost everything which corrupts the Soul, decays the Body. The Beauties of the Face and Mind are generally destroyed by the same means. This Consideration should have a particular Weight with the Female World, who were designed to please the Eye, and attract the Regards of the other half of the Species. Now, there is nothing that wears out a fine Face like the Vigils of the Card Table, and those cutting Passions which naturally attend them. Hollow Eyes, haggard Looks, and pale Complexions, are the natural Indications of a Female Gamester. Her Morning Sleeps are not able to repair her Midnight Watchings. I have known a Woman carried off half dead from Bassette, and have, many a time grieved to see a Person of Quality gliding by me, in her Chair, at two a Clock in the Morning, and looking like a Spectre amidst a flare of Flambeaux. In short, I never knew a thorough paced Female Gamester hold her Beauty two Winters together. "But there is still another Case in which the Body is more endangered than in the former. All Play Debts must be paid in Specie, or by an Equivalent. The Man who plays beyond his Income, pawns his Estate; the Woman must find out something else to Mortgage when her Pin Money is gone. The Husband has his Lands to dispose of, the Wife, her Person." Almost all writers of the time note and deplore the gambling propensity of Ladies: and Pope, in his Rape of the Lock (Canto III.), gives us a picture of a gambling lady, and a graphic description of the game of Ombre, which was played in the afternoon : "Meanwhile declining from the Noon of Day, Belinda now, whom Thirst of Fame invites, And swells her Breast with Conquests yet to come. The skilful Nymph reviews her Force with Care, Let Spades be Trumps, she said, and Trumps they were. Now move to War her Sable Matadores, In Show, like Leaders of the swarthy Moors. Spadillo first, unconquerable Lord! Led off two captive Trumps, and swept the Board. As many more Manillio forc'd to yield, And march'd a Victor from the verdant Field. Proves the just Victim of his Royal Rage. Ev'n mighty Pam, that Kings and Queens o'erthrew, And mow'd down Armies in the Fights of Loo, Sad Chance of War! now, destitute of Aid, |