| Share page |
|
A Day at Tunbridge Wells
offered either for E or 0; but if the ball falls into either of the bar holes, they win all the bets upon the opposite letter, and do not pay to that in which it falls, an advantage in the proportion of two to forty, or five per cent, in their favour." This game, so advantageous to the banker, was invented by a man called
Cook, who, in conjunction with one A------e,
the proprietor of the Tunbridge Wells Assembly-room, set up a table in that place. The profits
during the first year were very great, and A------e
saw no reason, except common honesty, which troubled him not at all, why Cook should in future share these. He therefore turned the inventor away and played the game the next year entirely in his own interest. Cook, however, was not content quietly to be ousted, and Goldsmith states, " he and his friends hired the crier to cry the game down." The
only way for A------e to prevent this was to
secure Nash's influence, which, to the Beau's shame, he contrived to do by a promise of a fourth share of the bank.
Hearing of this, Cook now endeavoured to outbid his rival by offering half the profits of his bank, but this Nash declined, being at all events honest enough to stand by the arrange-
267 |
||