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IN THE MATTER OF BETTING Under the above heading a writer iu The English ¬ man a weekly published in the interests of labor and trade and the protection of land has an eminently sensible article on the question of betting bettingBetting Betting he says is simply u practical and businesslike manifestation of the gambling spirit The gambling spirit is the recognition of the law of chance It is more than that it is the invocation of the law of chance The obvious abuses need no enlargement at my hands The law of chance is an uncertainty and applied in exaggerated doses fatal I may say the same of all the many bottles of medicine that I have had to take without the slightest chance of getting a farthing of the money back backBirth Birth has a great deal to do with gambling One crowd gambles because it has been born into the means of doing so another because it sees iu the accident of meaner birth just so much chance How ¬ ever it may be the gambling spirit and its expres ¬ sion in betting has always existed and in the na ¬ ture of things always will exist existClearly Clearly there is more in this matter of betting than appears at tirst sight I for my part would like to set the little business cleared up anil bereft of some of the externals that opponents of wagering in any shape wrap round the subject and are most ¬ ly cant or at all events look like it Far be it from me to impugn any objectors honesty of purpose but a good many people indulge in cant tiuite innocently they were brought tip to it They dont know that they are canting humbugs in appearance if not in reality and nowadays of course appearance is everything How many people are there who before voicing an opinion ask themselves whether they are not speaking by way of prejudice or saying some ¬ thing that might very easily be construed into mere cant of the bestV I hold no brief for betting quite the reverse it owes me money But I do think that a subject of the kind should bo approached with a calm judicial mind and discussed not as a canker which it is not but as a pursuit that is liable to abuse abuseCuriously Curiously enough the legislature has made an enactment which tends most of all to render betting dangerous There must be no passing of money when the bet is made or words to that effect The biggest mistake in the world 1 should propose that there be no betting of any kind without the absolute deposit of the entire snm staked When it comes to paying out the actual meaning of betting Is clearly understood by all parties and I do not think that anyone will deny to twentieth century men the right to do that which they clearly realize and understand It is a huge subject and will not spoil for a little more light to be cast upon It London Sporting Life
