Advertisement.—BE IT KNOWN, that Six Fair Pretty Young Ladies, with two sweet and engaging young children, lately imported from Europe, having roses of health blooming on their cheeks and joy sparkling in their eyes, possessing amiable manners and highly accomplished, whom the most indifferent cannot behold without expressions of rapture, are to be RAFFLED FOR next door to the British gallery. Scheme: Twelve tickets at twelve rupees each; the highest of the three throws takes the most fascinating, &c., &c.—Calcutta Newspaper of September 3rd, 1818.
Ancient Lottery.
In 1612, King James I., "in special favour for the plantation of English colonies in Virginia, granted a Lottery to be held at the west end of St. Paul's; whereof one Thomas Sharplys, a taylor of London, had the chief prize, which was four thousand crowns in fair plate."—Baker's Chronicles.
Child Played For.
In October, 1735, a child of James and Elizabeth Leesh, of Chester-le-street, in the county of Durham, was played for at cards, at the sign of the Salmon, one game, four shillings against the child, by Henry and John Trotter, Robert Thomson and Thomas Ellison, which was won by the latter two and delivered to them accordingly.—Syke's Local Records, page 79.
Lotteries.
The change in public opinion respecting lotteries is strikingly illustrated by the following entry in the day-book kept by the Rev. Samuel Seabury, father of the first Protestant Episcopal Bishop in the United States: "June, 1768. The ticket number 5866, by the blessing of God, in the Lighthouse and Public Lottery of New York, appointed by law, Anno Domini, 1763, drew in my favor £500 0s. 0d., of which I received £425 0s. 0d., which, with the deduction of fifteen per cent., makes £500, for which I now record to my Posterity my thanks and praise to Almighty God the giver of all good gifts. Amen!"
Babes in the Wood.
This popular legend was a disguised recital of the reported murder of his young nephews by Richard III. Throughout the tale there is a marked resemblance to several leading facts connected with the king and his brother's children, as well as a correspondence with historical details. In an old black-letter copy of the ballad there is a rude representation of a stag, which is significant, because a stag was the badge of the unfortunate Edward V.