But the Commons Committee reported on another subject, the Gaming-houses in race towns, and the Gaming-booths on the courses.
“The suppression of Gaming-houses in race towns, and in other places out of the Metropolitan Police District, is to be effected under the common law, and under the enactment of Statutes different from the Metropolitan Police Act. Much laxity and neglect have, hitherto, prevailed in this respect; and your Committee think that the attention of Magistrates might, usefully, be directed to this matter. But, if it should be found that the powers given by the existing law are insufficient, your Committee would recommend that additional powers should be conferred.
“Your Committee have found that it is the practice on some race courses to let out ground for the erection of Gaming-booths, during the races, in order that the high rents paid by the keepers of these booths may be added to the fund from whence prizes to be run for are to be given; and some of the witnesses examined have stated that certain race meetings, which they have named, could not be kept up, if this practice were to be discontinued.”
CHAPTER XV
Gambling on Race Courses—E.O. tables—Description of Race Courses—Evidence before the Committee—Description of the betting-rooms at Doncaster in 1846—Beginning of tipsters and betting-rooms.
This system of gambling on race courses began the previous century. In Canto I. of The Gambler’s, A Poem, Lon. 1777, we read:
“But, chief, we see a bricking, sharping sort,
Span farthing, Hustle Cap, their joy and sport;
The sport of infancy! ‘till riper age
Mature the man, and call him to the stage.
In each shoot forth the dawning seeds of vice,
The growing Jockey, or the man of Dice.
Some prick the Belt, self tutor’d, young in sin,
Anxious to take their wond’ring fellows in.
Here, a surrounding groupe of little Squires,
As chink the brazen belts, Chuck farthing fires:
While Sçavoir-vivres early signs betray
Of bold adventures, and the rage of play.
These, haply shall some future bard engage,
The hopeful Kelly’s[52] of the rising age.
But, when maturer years confirm the sin,
And opening minds suck the dear poison in,
Adieu, Span farthing! Hustle Cap, farewell!
With nobler passions, nobler views, they swell:
Dice, tennis, Cards, inferior sports succeed,
And the gay triumph of the High bred Steed.”
Complaints of racecourse gambling began early in the present century. In the Gentleman’s Magazine for 1801 (p. 327) we read: “Mr Urban—As the quarter sessions will take place in most parts of England in the course of the present month, I wish, through the medium of your extensively circulated Magazine, to submit to the serious consideration of the County Magistrates, the absolute necessity for adopting some vigorous measures, in order to check the career of those infamous swindlers, who are in the constant habit of attending our fairs and races with E.O. tables, &c. It is an alarming fact that there is scarcely a fair, or a race, of the least celebrity, which is not infested with these villains, many of whom clear £500 annually by plundering the unsuspecting rustics, who attend such places, of their property.”