(44) Duverdier, Diverses Lecons.
HENRY III.—In the latter part of the sixteenth century Paris was inundated with brigands of every description. A band of Italian gamesters, having been informed by their correspondents that Henry III. had established card-rooms and dice-rooms in the Louvre, got admission at court, and won thirty thousand crowns from the king.(45)
(45) Journal de Henri III.
If all the kings of France had imitated the disinterestedness of Henry III., the vice of gaming would not have made such progress as became everywhere evident.
Brantome gives a very high idea of this king's generosity, whilst he lashes his contemporaries. Henry III. played at tennis and was very fond of the game—not, however, through cupidity or avarice, for he distributed all his winnings among his companions. When he lost he paid the wager, nay, he even paid the losses of all engaged in the game. The bets were not higher than two, three, or four hundred crowns—never, as subsequently, four thousand, six thousand, or twelve thousand—when, however, payment was not as readily made, but rather frequently compounded for.(46)
(46) Henry III. was also passionately fond of the childish toy Bilboquet, or 'Cup and Ball,' which he used to play even whilst walking in the street. Journal de Henri III., i.
There was, indeed, at that time a French captain named La Roue, who played high stakes, up to six thousand crowns, which was then deemed exorbitant. This intrepid gamester proposed a bet of twenty thousand crowns against one of Andrew Doria's war-galleys.
Doria took the bet, but he immediately declared it off, in apprehension of the ridiculous position in which he would be placed if he lost, saying,—'I don't wish that this young adventurer, who has nothing worth naming to lose, should win my galley to go and triumph in France over my fortune and my honour.'
Soon, however, high stakes became in vogue, and to such an extent that the natural son of the Duc de Bellegarde was enabled to pay, out of his winnings, the large sum of fifty thousand crowns to get himself legitimated. Curiously enough, it is said that the greater part of this sum had been won in England.(47)
(47) Amelot de la Houss. Mem. Hist. iii.