In spite of the doubtful morality of the enterprise carried on by the proprietors of the tables they certainly metamorphosed several miserable German townlets into cities of palaces. They planted the gardens; they imported the orange trees; they laid out the parks; enclosed the hunting-grounds; and, as it were, boarded, lodged, washed, and taxed the inhabitants. Homburg, for instance, was entirely the creation of M. Blanc.
The story of the commencement of the immense fortune accumulated by M. Blanc is curious.
One fine day in 1842 the two brothers Blanc, who were temporarily disgusted with France owing to a daring and unsuccessful speculation connected with the old semaphore telegraph (which electricity rendered obsolete), arrived at Frankfort.
Their stock-in-trade consisted of a few thousand francs, a roulette wheel, and an ancient croupier, a veteran of Frascati's who knew everything worth knowing about gambling and cards.
The purpose of this visit was to convince the authorities of Frankfort that their city would derive great benefit from affording facilities for public play, but with this, however, they were not disposed to agree. In consequence of its cool reception, the little party then wended its way to the obscure village of Homburg, where the elder of the two brothers, after some negotiations, obtained permission to set the roulette wheel going in one of the rooms of the principal inn.
As at Monte Carlo to-day, infallible "guides" to success at the tables were to be obtained in the Homburg book-shops. The above is a facsimile of the title-page of one of the most curious of these booklets.