CAPT. JOHN G. BOURKE
1870
From “On the Border with Cook.” Reprinted by permission of the publishers, Charles Scribner’s Sons, New York.[26]
It has been shown that Tucson had no hotels. She did not need any at the time of which I am writing, as her floating population found all the ease and comfort it desired in the flare and glare of the gambling hells, which were bright with the lustre of smoking oil lamps and gay with the varicolored raiment of moving crowds, and the music of harp and Pan’s pipes. In them could be found nearly every man in the town at some hour of the day or night, and many used them as the Romans did their “Thermæ”—as a place of residence.
All nationalities, all races were represented, and nearly all conditions of life. There were cadaverous-faced Americans, and Americans whose faces were plump; men in shirt sleeves, and men who wore their coats as they would have done in other places; there were Mexicans wrapped in the red, yellow, and black striped cheap “serapes,” smoking the inevitable cigarrito, made on the spot by rolling a pinch of tobacco in a piece of corn shuck; and there were other Mexicans more thoroughly Americanized, who were clad in the garb of the people of the North. Of Chinese and negroes there were only a few—but their place was occupied by civilized Indians, Opatas, Yaquis, and others, who had come up with “bull” teams and pack trains from Sonora. The best of order prevailed, there being no noise save the hum of conversation or the click of the chips on the different tables. Tobacco-smoke ascended from cigarritos, pipes, and the vilest of cigars, filling all the rooms with the foulest of odors. The bright light from the lamps did not equal the steely glint in the eyes of the “bankers,” who ceaselessly and imperturbably dealt out the cards from faro boxes, or set in motion the balls in roulette.
There used to be in great favor among the Mexicans, and the Americans, too, for that matter, a modification of roulette called “chusas,” which never failed to draw a cluster of earnest players, who would remain by the tables until the first suggestion of daylight. High above the squeak of Pan’s pipes or the plinkety-plink-plunk of the harps sounded the voice of the “banker”: “Make yer little bets, gents; make yer little bets; all’s set, the game’s made, ’n th’ ball’s a-rollin’.” When, for any reason, the “game” flagged in energy, there would be a tap upon the bell by the dealer’s side, and “drinks all round” be ordered at the expense of the house.
It was a curious exhibit of one of the saddest passions of human nature, and a curious jumble of types which would never press against each other elsewhere. Over by the faro bank, in the corner, stood Bob Crandall, a faithful wooer of the fickle goddess Chance. He was one of the handsomest men in the Southwest, and really endowed with many fine qualities; he had drifted away from the restraints of home life years ago, and was then in Tucson making such a livelihood as he could pick up as a gambler, wasting brain and attainments which, if better applied, would have been a credit to himself and his country.
There was one poor wretch who could always be seen about the tables; he never played, never talked to any one, and seemed to take no particular interest in anything or anybody. What his name was no one knew or cared; all treated him kindly, and anything he wished for was supplied by the charity or the generosity of the frequenters of the gaming-tables. He was a trifle “off,” but perfectly harmless; he had lost all the brain he ever had through fright in an Apache ambuscade, and had never recovered his right mind.
Then one was always sure to meet men like old Jack Dunn, who had wandered about in all parts of the world, and has since done such excellent work as a scout against the Chiricahua Apaches. I think that Jack is living yet, but am not certain. If he is, it will pay some enterprising journalist to hunt him up and get a few of his stories out of him; they’ll make the best kind of reading for people who care to hear of the wildest days on the wildest of frontiers. And there were others—men who have passed away, men like James Toole, one of the first mayors of Tucson, who dropped in, much as I myself did, to see what was to be seen. Opposed as I am to gambling, no matter what protean guise it may assume, I should do the gamblers of Tucson the justice to say that they were as progressive an element as the town had. They always had plank floors, where every other place was content with the bare earth rammed hard, or with the curious mixture of river sand, bullock’s blood, and cactus juice which hardened like cement and was used by some of the more opulent. But with the exception of the large wholesale firms, and there were not over half a dozen of them all told, the house of the governor, and a few—a very few—private residences of people like the Carillos, Sam Hughes, Hiram Stevens, and Aldrich, who desired comfort, there were no wooden floors to be seen in that country.
The gaming establishments were also well supplied with the latest newspapers from San Francisco, Sacramento, and New York, and to these all who entered, whether they played or not, were heartily welcome. Sometimes, but not very often, there would be served up about midnight a very acceptable lunch of “frijoles,” coffee, or chocolate, “chile con carne,” “enchiladas,” and other dishes, all hot and savory, and all thoroughly Mexican. The flare of the lamps was undimmed, the plinkety-plunk of the harps was unchecked, and the voice of the dealer was abroad in the land from the setting of the sun until the rising of the same. Sunday or Monday, night or day, it made no difference—the game went on; one dealer taking the place of another with the regularity, the precision, and the stolidity of a sentinel.