His dexterity was astonishing; but one day he was taken "flagrante delicto," and condemned to the galleys for a period of twenty years.
The circumstance made a great noise at the time, and, ever since, similar rogues have been termed "Greeks."
Shakspeare asks, "What's in a name?" There is, however, a French proverb which tells us that, "Souvent ce sont les noms qui décident des choses." Many who did not object to be called "Greeks," would have loathed the name of "swindler."
The number of these light-fingered gentry was greatly increased, by the establishment in Paris of two public gambling houses, known as the Hôtel de Gèvres, and Hôtel de Soissons.
Until then, the Greeks exercised their vocation separately; most of them had no arranged method of proceeding, and their tricks were nearly all badly executed.
In fact, the art of cheating was still in its infancy.
The opening of the two hotels above mentioned, caused a complete revolution amongst the Greeks. The cleverest amongst them met, invented new manœuvres, and clubbed together to cheat their neighbours; they imagined, calculated, and invented, all sorts of tricks until then unknown.
Lansquenet, Pharo, Piquet, and Quadrille were the favourite games of that period, and being much in vogue, were golden mines of wealth to these rascals.
The game of roulette, even, which had just been introduced into the fashionable hells, and which the public believed they could play without fear, was tampered with by this fraternity.
One of them, who was a geometrician, had a roulette board made, in which the black divisions were larger than the white ones, so that the chance of the ball entering the latter was diminished.[A]