Part 43 (2/2)

The negroes of the city are great policy-players. In every district where they live you will find dingy little lottery offices, patronized mostly by them. Some of them make as much as forty or fifty dollars a week. A negro must play his policy even if bread is lacking at home.

Now and then they make a lucky 'gig,' and win a few dollars. Some are born with a policy luck, I do believe. One old darkey woman, a kind, motherly sort of a body, who used to attend to the linen of the house where I resided, has had a wonderful streak of luck in policy. Out of four or five years playing she has obtained money enough to set up a pretty cottage in Harlem, and furnish it well. She says she dreams her numbers! The sale of lottery dream-books is really immense. One firm on Ann street sell several thousand a month of these books, wherein every possible dream is described, and the proper 'policy' attached to it.'

The poverty, the evil, the utter and abominable waste that results from these lotteries, cannot be realized, save by those who have investigated the subject. Hard working, sober men, good citizens, respectable and worthy in every other way, are bound down to this mean gambling, which always keeps them poor, which continually keeps the wolf at their doors. And all for what? That a set of rascals may wear fine linen, and walk Broadway with lofty airs. A man who becomes infatuated in lotteries, becomes lost almost beyond chance. I can count up in pa.s.sing no less than six men who are mad on policy, who save from food, from clothes, from the family, money, to spend in these lottery h.e.l.ls. They never draw anything. The next time it is hoped better luck will come. So they have gone on for years, and are no nearer the prize.

Strange human blindness! They haven't strength enough to dash away from it all; and drop by drop the very life-blood is sucked out of them.

If you want to see anxious faces, drop into one of these 'exchanges'

about the time the drawings come in. The office will be full. All cla.s.ses of men are represented. There is the day-laborer with his tin pail, the merchant with an unmistakable business air, the gambler glittering with diamonds, clerks with inky fingers, men of leisure, cool and vacant looking, and I have even seen very ministerial looking men, who might have been divines, or dealers in a faro bank; it is hard to tell one from the other in New York, where, if a man has a very respectable appearance, he is put down as belonging to one of the two professions. But there is a marked look of concern on all faces, 'waiting for the verdict' on their plays.

The numbers come in from headquarters. One by one they are called off and chalked on the slate, so that he who runs may read. One man has struck something, and his face lights up with joy. It is only a small amount, and instead of blessing his stars that he has been so fortunate, he is bewailing his prudence in staking so little. Another turns away with a dreary sigh, for the slate tells him the same old story of no luck. Another has just hit it--all but one figure! if he had played 'seven' instead of 'six,' what a pile he would have taken in! Yes; but the good managers knew you would play seven, and so were perfectly willing to offer you two hundred dollars for one. A woman crowds her way into the throng. Does she invest in lottery tickets or policy? She has a slip of paper with numbers on, and compares them with the slate. Now she turns away, and there is no light of victory in her eyes.

”Poor fools, waiting, hoping, longing for a prize! The flaring printed poster on the wall tells of fifty thousand dollars to be drawn to-day.

A fortune to be paid to the lucky holder of the right ticket. Of course you will all go in for it, lottery maniacs, as you have done many times before. You will lay out hard-earned money--I pity you, but no urging can stop you; and all the while the lottery is laughing in contempt at you; and the radiant managers are flas.h.i.+ng costly diamonds in your faces, and enjoying themselves in splendid mansions up town, living on the fat of the land--airing themselves in the Park behind blood horses with famous names--all bought with the dollars you have given them so freely! Work for more and give them! Starve your family to add to the spoils! Go ragged yourselves that they may dress richly! Who knows but that you may draw that tempting prize in time!”

CHAPTER LXXII.

GIFT ENTERPRISES.

There are more than two thousand persons in the city of New York, who make their living by conducting gift enterprises. These schemes have various names, but are conducted substantially on the same plan.

THE SYSTEM.

The parties engaged in the swindle open an office in some conspicuous place in the city, and announce a grand distribution of prizes for the benefit of some charitable a.s.sociation, such as ”The Gettysburg Asylum for Invalid Soldiers and Sailors,” ”Southern Orphans' Aid a.s.sociation,”

etc., etc.; or they announce a grand gift concert, to take place at some public hall at a given time. The tickets to this concert are sold at prices ranging from one to five dollars, the former being the usual price. Directions of other cities are procured, mailing clerks of newspapers are paid for copies of the list of subscribers to their journals, and country newspapers are procured for a similar purpose. A large number of names is thus obtained, and a circular issued, setting forth the scheme, the list of prizes, and the manner of procuring tickets. There is scarcely a place in the United States to which these circulars are not sent. Each of the persons so addressed is requested to act as an agent; and is promised a prize in the distribution if he will use his influence to sell tickets and say nothing of the inducements offered to him, as such knowledge would make others dissatisfied. The prize is said to be worth a great deal, and the party requested to act as agent sets to work promptly, and generally succeeds in getting a number of names and dollars, which he forwards to the managers of the grand concert. No concert is ever held, and no drawing takes place. The money is lost to the senders and pocketed by the swindlers who receive it.

THE BANKERS' AND BROKERS' GIFT ENTERPRISE.

During the winter of 1867-68, a swindler or set of swindlers opened an office in the lower part of Broadway, under the t.i.tle of ”The Bankers'

and Brokers' Gift Enterprise.” The affair was ostensibly managed by the firm of Clark, Webster & Co. As many thousand persons were victimized by these villains, it is possible that some of our readers may be able to vouch for the statements contained in the following extract concerning the affair, from the _Missouri Republican_, published in St.

Louis.

For some months, certain papers, both in the East and West, have been displaying an enormously large advertis.e.m.e.nt, of the Bankers' and Merchants' First Grand Presentation Enterprise, to be commenced on Thursday, October 24th, and continued for 'one hundred and fifty days from the date of commencement, at the rate of ten thousand tickets per day.' The scheme was a magnificent one; every ticket holder was ent.i.tled to such a premium as would fully insure him against loss--that is, he would draw a prize equal to the money invested, minus five per cent., and would run a risk of winning an enormous prize, of which there were several 'on the bills.'

Of course this spread like wild-fire, the cholera, or yellow fever; hundreds, who should have possessed some discretion, sent their dollars to Clark, Webster & Co., 62 Broadway, New York, expecting to realize handsome fortunes. How they supposed that the proprietors could ever give such premiums, we cannot say; but certain it is they did, and hundreds and thousands have been most fearfully victimized; how, will be easily explained.

The enormous prizes were not in money; they were stocks, and the like, in fancy companies, somewhere--where, we do not know; where a nominal half a million would not be worth half a dollar.

But it was not in the dollar paid for the original ticket that the chief swindle lay. Nearly every man drew a 'prize' and was at once notified, on receiving the sum of five per cent. of the value, it would be forwarded; and as the nature of the prize was not stated, but only its nominal value in money, thousands of persons have, doubtless, sent the five per cent., and will continue to send it, and receive in exchange some worthless oil stock, or a similar valueless piece of paper.

Even in this city, where the people should read the daily papers, and be posted in such swindles, a large number have been victimized, two of whom have furnished us with their experiences, which we give below:

The first is a young man, the son of a well-known politician in this city, but who requests us to suppress his name. A few days since he received the following note:

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