“When I first came into the world (1751?) there was no such thing as a Faro table admitted into the house of a woman of fashion; in those days they had too much pride to receive tribute[38] from the proprietor of such a machine. In former times there was no such thing as gaming at a private house, although there was more deep play at the clubs at that time than ever was before, or has been since. It is lamentable to see lovely woman destroying her health and beauty at six o’clock in the morning at a gaming-table. Can any woman expect to give to her husband a vigorous and healthy offspring, whose mind, night after night, is thus distracted, and whose body is relaxed by anxiety and the fatigue of late hours? It is impossible.”
CHAPTER VI
The Gambling Clubs—White’s, Cocoa Tree, Almack’s—A few gamblers described—Stories of high play—White’s and its frequenters—Brookes’ and its players—Captain Gronow and his reminiscences of gambling—Gambling by the English at Paris—The Duke of Wellington—Ball Hughes—Scrope Davies—Raggett of White’s.
Hanger speaks of gambling at the clubs, but in his time there were very few of them, and the oldest of all was “White’s” in St James Street. Originally a Chocolate House, established in 1698, it was the rendezvous for the Tories in London. It was destroyed by fire on 28th April, 1733, a fact which is immortalised by Hogarth in his sixth picture of the Rake’s Progress. The earliest record of it, as a Club, that remains, is a book of rules and list of members of the old Club at White’s, dated 30th October 1736. In 1755 it removed to the east side of St James Street to No. 38, and there it still remains. In 1797, according to the rules of the Club, “Every Member who plays at Chess, Draughts, or Backgammon, do pay One Shilling each time of playing by daylight, and half-a-crown each by candlelight.” We have had many references to the gambling that took place at White’s, and when betting is discussed, the Club’s famous betting-book will be duly noticed. It is now one of the most aristocratic clubs in London.
The Cocoa Tree Club, which was, probably, made into a Club before 1746, and was somewhat lower down St James Street than White’s, was the Whig Club, but it does not seem to have been so much used for gambling as its elder confrère.
Almack’s Club was essentially for gambling, and was founded in 1764 by twenty-seven noblemen and gentlemen. Among its original rules are the following:—
“21. No gaming in the eating room, except tossing up for reckonings, on penalty of paying the whole bill of the members present.