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it is to be lamented that the evil has not diminished. On the contrary it has certainly encreased, and must continue to do so, until the Legislature, by applicable Laws and an improved System of Police, either directly or collaterally attached to these of fences, shall find the means of suppressing them.

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CHAP. VI.

The great anxiety of the Legislature to suppress the coils of Gaming:-The Misery and Wretchedness entailed on many respectable Families from this fatal propensity:-Often arising from the foolish vanity of mixing in what is stiled, Genteel Company; where Faro is introduced.-Games of Chance, though stigmatized by the Legislature, encouraged by high-sounding names, whose houses are opened for purposes odious and unlawful:-The Civil Magistrate called upon by his public duty, as well as by the feelings of humanity, to suppress such mischiefs.-The danger arising from such seminaries-No probability of any considerations of their illegality, or inhumanity, operating as a check, without the efforts of the Magistracy.-The evil tendency of such examples to servants in fashionable Families, who carry these vices into vulgar life; and many of whom, as well as persons of superior education, become Sharpers, Cheats, and Swindlers, from the habits they acquire.-A particular Statement of the proceedings of persons who have set up Gaming Houses as regular Partnership-Concerns; and of the Evils resulting therefrom.—Of Lottery Insurances of the Higher Class.-Of Lottery Offices opened for Insurance-Proposed Remedies. -Three Plans suggested to the Author by Correspondents. GAMING

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GAMING is the source from which has sprung op all that race of cheats, swindlers, and sharpers, some of whose nefarious practices have already been noticed, and the remainder of which it is the object of the Author to develope in this chapter.

Such has been the anxiety of the Legislature to suppress this evil, that so early as the reign of Queen Anne, this abandoned and mischievous race of men seems to have attracted its notice in a very particular degree; for the act of the 9th year of that reign (cap. 14. § 6, 7,) after reciting," that divers lewd and "dissolute persons live at great expences, having no "visible estate, profession, or calling, to maintain * themselves; but support these expences by Gaming

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only; Enacts, that any two Justices may cause to be brought before them, all persons within their limits whom they shall have just cause to suspect to have no visible estate, profession, or calling, to maintain themselves by; but do for the most part support "themselves by Gaming; and if such persons shall not "make it appear to such Justices that the principal part of their expences is not maintained by gaming,

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they are to be bound to their good behaviour for a "twelvemonth; and in default of sufficient security, to be committed to prison, until they can find the "same; and if security shall be given, it will be forfeited on their playing or betting at any one time, for more than the value of twenty shillings." If, in conformity to the spirit of this wise statute, sharpers

Sharpers of every denomination, who support themselves by a variety of cheating and swindling practices, without having any visible means of living, were in like manner to be called upon to find security for their good behaviour, in all cases where they cannot shew they have the means of subsisting themselves honestly, the number of these Pests of Society, under a general Police and an active and zealous Magistracy, would soon be diminished, if not totally annihilated.

By the 12th of George the Second, (cap. 28. § 2, 3,) the Games of Faro, Hazard, &c. are declared to be Lotteries, subjecting the persons who keep them to a penalty of two hundred pounds, and those who play to "fifty pounds."-One witness only is necessary to prove the offence before any Justice of the Peace; and the Justice forfeits ten pounds if he neglects to do his duty under the Act :-and under this Act, which is connected with the statute 8th of George I. rap. 2, it seems that "the keeper of a Faro Table may be prosecuted even for a penalty of five hun"dred pounds."

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Notwithstanding these salutary laws, to the reproach of the Police of the Metropolis, houses have been opened, even under the sanction of high-sounding names, where an indiscriminate mixture of all ranks was to be found, from the finished sharper to the raw inexperienced youth. And where all those evils existed in full force, which it was the object of the Legislature to remove.

Though it is hoped that this iniquitous System of plunder, has of late been somewhat restrained by

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the wholesome administration of the Laws, under the excellent Chief Justice who presides in the High Criminal Department of the Country, in consequence of the detection of Criminals, through the meritorious vigilance and attention of the Magistrates; to which the Author of this work, by bringing the evil so prominently under the view of the Public, may flatter himself in having been, in some small degree, instrumental: Still it is much to be feared, that the time is not yet arrived which would induce him to withhold the following narrative.

GAMING, although at all times an object highly deserving attention, and calling for the exertions of Magistrates, never appeared either to have assumed so alarming an aspect, or to have been conducted upon the methodized system of Partnership-Concerns, wherein pecuniary capitals were embarked, till about the years 1777 and 1778, when the vast licence which was given to those abominable engines of fraud, EO Tables, and the great length of time which elapsed before a check was given to them by the Police, afforded a number of dissolute and abandoned characters, who resorted to these baneful subterfuges for support, an opportunity of acquiring property: This was afterwards increased in low Gaming Houses, and, by following up the same system at Newmarket, and other places of fashionable resort, and in the Lottery; until at length, without any property at the outset, or any visible means of lawful support, a sum of money little short of One Million Sterling, is said to have been acquired by a class of individuals

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