among whom may be classed Sonorians and Chilians, who mine only that they may gamble, whom neither hmiger nor thirst nor any other known incentive could stir up to labor. No matter how purely the game is one of chance, the player arrogates to himself some certain skill. Luck, like the stellar system, has its law which patient study is sure to develop. Then every one has his own individual luck, which like a personal deity, should be conciliated; so that, very naturally and very properly, the player, if he won, could thank himself for it, whereas, if he lost, his luck was at fault.
The gambler, when play grew slack, would stroll away, sometimes leaving his table unguarded in the midst of a heterogeneous crew of cut-throats, temptingly loaded with the stuff all men covet, apparently repfarding: it as safe as if locked in the vaults of the bank of England. Few possessed the temerity to rob a gambler, and least of all in a place where summary justice would be quickly meted out by the bystanders.
In certain localities, various games were paraded in the street, or from low shops opening on the sidewalk. One would deal three-card monte on the head of a barrel; another would tempt the gaping crowd with thimblerig played with a golden pea upon his leg; well-dressed young men and boys, as well as villainous-looking cut-throats would follow soft-looking strangers about the streets offering to bet $100 or $200 on some trick which offered to the outsider an apparently sure thing. On Long Wharf, where at that time were most of the arrivals and departures to and from San Francisco, this base traffic was plied most persistently. At almost every hour of the day or night the cries of the French monte-dealer might be heard: " The ace of spades ! the ace ! the ace ! A hundred dollars to any one who will tell the ace of spades! " But these were the bohemians of the fraternity, of very different metal from the regular artist.
Gathered round the table are men of all nations,
