Forty Years a Gambler on the Mississippi Part 29

Jack gave me $100 to hold. He threw the tickets.

The lady reached over and turned one of them. She threw up both hands and said: "Mercy on me! What shall I do? I have lost my dear Tommy."

I handed Jack the $100 and the twelve-pound Tommy.

The pa.s.sengers all roared with laughter.

The lady scolded her hubby very badly. She cried, sobbed, and wrung her hands, saying: "I have lost my Tommy! Oh, my dear Tommy, Tommy; I will never see you any more!"

Jack could stand it no longer. He handed his Thomas cat over to the lady.

First she smiled, then she laughed, and then she said: "Hubby, get out your bottle and give this dear, good, nice gentleman a drink."

The pa.s.sengers all roared again.

Jack took a drink. The train rolled into the depot. We all bid the lady and gentleman and "Tommy" good-bye and got off. "Selah."

KICKERS.

All men that bet should not be cla.s.sed as gamblers, for some _things_ that style themselves _men_ will bet (to win, of course), and kick if they lose, which a gambler will never do, although he may sometimes be sucker enough to bet (to win) against a sure thing, like old monte, or a brace game.

A kicker, or squealer, always speaks of the money he has lost, against any game, as his money; while the gambler considers the money he loses, against any game, as lost; and it belongs to the person who won it, and you never hear one of them do any kicking.

"Old Rattlesnake" and I left New Orleans one evening on the steamer _Robert E. Lee_.

We played the good old game in the usual way, and caught quite a number of good sized suckers, among which was one from St. Joseph, La. We got off at Baton Rouge, and took another boat back to New Orleans. The next trip we made on the _Lee_ we learned from my old friend Carnahan, the steward, that the St. Joseph sucker, whom we had downed on the last trip, made a big kick when he learned that we had left the boat at Baton Rouge. He said he would get a lot of the St. Joseph boys, go back to where we got off, and make us give up his money, or he would kill us.

The steward told him not to do it, for said he:

"Those fellows are bad men to fool with. I have seen twenty suckers try to make them give up, but I never saw them do it."

As we were not within miles of this kicker, who, I have no doubt, styled himself a man, of course he could do a great deal of blowing; but when a short time afterwards we met him with a lot of St. Joseph boys at his back, we could not get within speaking distance of him.

I was glad of it, as they were a bad crowd.

Old Carnahan and I were cabin boys on the same boat before the Mexican war. He is dead now, but I shall always remember him for telling the kicker, "Those fellows are bad men to fool with."

Old Jack and I traveled North during the summer season, playing the boats and railroad trains.

We were going out of Detroit, Mich., on the Great Western Railroad, over into Ontario, one night, when there was quite a number of half- breed (French and Irish) Canadians on board. They had six or seven bull-dogs with them that had been fighting against some dogs in Detroit, and from their talk we learned that they downed Uncle Sam.

So we thought (as we were Americans) that we would try and down them; not with bull-dogs, but with the good old game.

Jack was soon among them, and in a short time, with my a.s.sistance as capper, he had downed several of the Canucks for a few hundred.

They were kickers from the old house. They all got together and began cackling like a lot of old hens when a hawk is after them.

No one but themselves could understand a word they said; but they soon made a rush for Jack and demanded, in English, that he give up their money, or they would kill him. Their bull-dogs wanted to take part in the fight, and I guess they would have done it if it had not been for their owners, for if a dog's master runs he will be sure to run after him. Old Jack whipped out that big, long six- shooter of his, and the instant they saw it they all started and made a regular stampede for the other car. The dogs took after their masters, and it was fun to see the pa.s.sengers climbing upon the seats. The men and the dogs rushed into the ladies' car, and you would have thought it was on fire if you had heard the screams and yells that the pa.s.sengers set up when the men and bull-dogs rushed in among them. The poor dumb brutes were frightened as much as their owners, and they set up the d----dest howl I ever heard in all my life. We were just nearing a station, so I told old Jack to drop off, which he did, and then he got onto the hind sleeper. The people at the station had heard the screams, and came running to see what was the matter.

The railroad boys had hard work to get the dogs and men out of the ladies' car, but they could not get one of the dogs back into the cars he had been run out of. I did not blame the brutes much, for they had been badly frightened.

We were coming out of Chicago at one time on the Burlington & Quincy Railroad, and had downed some suckers, when one of them began to kick like a bad mule. He told the conductor that old Jack had robbed him out of his money. The conductor told him he could do nothing except turn the gambler over to the police at the next station. He locked the doors to keep Jack from jumping off, and the sucker quieted down, thinking he would be O. K. when he reached the station. I saw two gentlemen from Quincy in the car that I was acquainted with, so I wrote a note to them, requesting that they tell the kicker he was in the same boat with the gambler, as he would be fined just as much as the man who got his money, and that the fine in Illinois was $100. The result was the fellow hid himself, and when the conductor pointed old Jack out he could not find the kicker. We got off with the officers, and as no one was on hand to testify, of course we only had to treat until the next train arrived.

WILLIAM JONES. (CANADA BILL.)

Canada Bill--peace to his ashes--is dead. He died in Reading, Penn., about ten years ago, and, poor fellow, he did not leave enough money of all the many thousands he had won to bury him. The Mayor of Reading had him decently interred, and when his friends in Chicago learned the fact, they raised money enough to pay all the funeral expenses and erect a monument to the memory of one who was, while living, a friend to the poor. I was in New Orleans at the time of his death, and did not hear the sad news for some months after.

I hope the old fellow is happy in a better land. If kind acts and a generous heart can atone for the sin of gambling, and ent.i.tle men to a mansion in the skies, Canada Bill surely got one, "where the wicked cease from troubling, and the weary are at rest."

There never lived a better hearted man. He was liberal to a fault.

I have known him to turn back when we were on the street and give to some poor object we had pa.s.sed. Many a time I have seen him walk up to a Sister of Charity and make her a present of as much as $50, and when we would speak of it, he would say:

"Well, George, they do a great deal for the poor, and I think they know better how to use the money than I do."

Once I saw him win $200 from a man, and shortly after his little boy came running down the cabin, Bill called the boy up and handed him the $200 and told him to give it to his mother.

He was a man, take him for all in all, that possessed many laudable traits of character. He often said suckers had no business with money. He had some peculiar traits. While he was a great man at monte, he was a fool at short cards. I have known men who knew this to travel all over the country after Bill, trying to induce him to play cards with them. He would do it, and this is what kept him poor.

Mason Long, the converted gambler, says of William Jones (Canada Bill):

"The confidence men and monte players were in clover. Among them was the most notorious and successful _thief_ who ever operated in this country, Canada Bill. He was a _large_ man, with a nose _highly illuminated_ by the joint action of _whisky_ and heat.

Bill squandered his money very lavishly, and _drank_ himself to death in about a year after the incident I have related. He died a pauper."

"But by all thy nature's weakness, Hidden faults and follies know.

Be thou, in rebuking evil, Conscious of thine own."

Is Mason Long converted? G.o.d and himself only know.

Was he fully converted when he wrote "The Converted Gambler"?

If the Bible be true, and it was left for me to decide, I would answer in the language of St. Paul:

"Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding bra.s.s or a tinkling cymbal."

A true Christian will exercise charity toward all offenders, granting a boon of pity to the erring, and cast a glance of mercy upon the faults of his fellows. He will cherish a recollection of his virtues, and bury all his imperfections.

Is Mason Long a true Christian? Read his description of Canada Bill. Then read a true description of Bill's personal appearance on page 190 in this book. If Mason Long had never seen Canada Bill, I would excuse him, but he said he capped for him once, or at least he tried to do so.

Has he shown any Christian charity in speaking of a man in his grave? Read what he says, and you will see that he or I are mistaken.

Bill was not a thief, he was honest to a fault. He was not a large man, for he never weighed over 130. He did not have a nose highly illuminated by the joint action of whisky and heat. He did not drink himself to death within a year of 1876, for he visited me in New Orleans in 1877. He did not drink whisky at all. His great drink was Christian cider, and it was very seldom I could get him to drink wine. He did die a pauper, and G.o.d bless him for it, for he gave more money to the poor than a thousand professed Christians that I know, who make a great parade of their reformation.

The public put all sporting men into one cla.s.s, called gamblers; likewise they put all church members into cla.s.ses and call them Christians, etc.

There is as wide a difference between a true gambler and one who styles himself a sport, as there is between a true Christian and one who puts on the cloak of Christianity to serve the devil in.

There is an old saying, "Honor among thieves." I will add a maxim or two: There is honor among gamblers, and dishonor among some business men that stand very high in the community in which they live.

THE TWO JUDGES.