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wmrn: •.*•••.•' ••*.• • -V - - • R • V _ • • -. ;• . '. •"H, ,....• •' VY ->-•• --.1 . •'• • -:" WHEN MEN PLAYED FOR BIG STAKES | AMBLING for big stakes was a common thing In the west a few years, ago. In nearly all sections the evil has been suppressed by law. In the few portions where It Is still followed It Is carried on under cover and In con­ stant dread of police Inter- ference. Not so long ago, however, the cry of the roulette man and the click of the ball could be heard in the lobbies of many of the principal hotels. This was particularly true of El Paso, Cripple Creek, Leadville, Gold- field, Butte, the Coeur d'Alene, and many other sections. The practice prevailed to a greater or less extent in the larger towns. Everybody has money In the early days of • mining camp. It was an era of speculation. The coun­ try had not "been proven," and hence a "find" la a new section resulted in a great rush to that locality. Property changed hinds at fabulous prices overnight The ragged prospector of today might be roll­ ing in wealth tomorrow. It has happened so many times. When there is money to throw at the Mrds, the gamblers, like so many vultures, assemble at the point to which It is being cast the thoughtless and improvident possessors. Games were played where the stakes ran into the millions. A man wealthy in the morning Sometimes had to borrow money to avoid going to bed hungry at night « A stockman in Colorado "sat Into" a poker Same in Denver, and by midnight had not only lost all the cash he had with him, but had ex­ hausted a large bank balance. He owned, on the range In Colorado, the neu­ tral strip ("No Man's Land," now extreme west­ ern Oklahoma), and In Texas ten thousand head •f cattle, worth twenty dollars a head, or a total •f 1200,000. He possessed land In three states and a hand­ some residence in Denver. He made a bet of a thousand steers--worth twenty thousand dollars --and lost He continued this until the herd of ten thousand head of stock belonged to another laan. Day dawned, and he was still playing. Breakfast was sent in from a restaurant main­ tained at the end of the gambling hall for just such people. "Now," he said to the men who had won his cattle, "you have the critters, but0 no place to keep them. I will play you my Texas ranch." He lost that Then followed the Colorado ranch, finally the residence in Denver, together with the furniture, his horses, his watch and chain. . At eight o'clock at night--twenty-four hours later--he was penniless, and started for the Rio Grande country of Texas, where he found employment hauling logs to a sawmill. He had lost more than a quarter of a million dollars in twenty-four hours! "Will yoi oblige me by taking off your shoes?" asked a road agent politely, while he held a re­ volver menacingly in the face of a passenger who stood up in a line with others. The hold-up man had stopped the stage going l»to Leadville to "coll^bt toll." He had just pur­ chased the road, he said, and needed the money. He passed down the line and, by means of a pasenger whom he forced into service, gathered OP all the money and Jewelry, until he came to the last man in the line. Then he asked the man to take off his shoes. He found four thousand 4ollara under the inner soles! Several nights later the man who had been out­ witted by the hold-up man was sitting In the dealer's chair of a faro game in the "Cloud City." M .3 Leadville Is called. Before him sat a man who lost money steadily. The gambler "raked In" the money carelessly and with the utmost un­ concern. * ^he player lost something like five thousand dollars and then pushed back his chair. "All in?" asked the gambler, arching his fcrows. "Yep--you've cleaned me out." "Then we are even for that little Incident the other night, when you collected your road tax from me." l-up man knocked down half a dozen Ms rush to reach the door and escape, fiiown mining man, who was noted for mi in "knowing a hole in the ground" soked into it, had just made a purchase Creek. He had money, and he was wlll- peiiu it for anything that looked good, /lag tramped over the hills all of one into" a poker game in the lobby incipal hotel that night, and engaged In iy game with a number of acquaintances, "were playing for twenty-flve cents a cor­ ner. While the game was in progress a ragged prospector appeared and attempted to Inject him- aelf into the company. The mining man explain- •ed that It was simply a private game between ^friends--outsiders, and particularly strangers, were, not wanted. "I have money that has nevfer been spent." "We don't know you." ""Oh, that's it! Then let me Introduce my- •elf." There was no way to get rid of him appar­ ently. Then, like an inspiration, and in an an­ noyed manner, the operator said: "How much money have you?" "Eight hundred dollars." **Sit down, and I'l show you how to play poker." In less than fifteen • minutes the prospector withdrew. Shortly after he returned with a thousand dol­ lars more. This was interesting. He lost it Then he lost a diamond pin, following it with a watch and his "cayuse." When he pushed back his chair the operator asked: "Are you broke now?" "I have a claim over on the hill." "What do you value it at?" "One hundred thousand dollars." This staggered the mining man for a moment er AWHHY ca -$r ' ARKINS "You have been a good loser; I'll put In with you and play a hundred thousand against your claim." The prospector lost the claim. "Now I will play you for your services tomor­ row to show me where the claim Is and where to open the ore. For that I will consider that you have five thousand on the table." The prospector lost that. The next day he traced out the lines of the claim for the winner, who organized a company, with a stock of one million, the shares of which went for sixteen dollars each! Millions were taken from the mine within a few years. It became one of the most famous In the entire Rocky Mountain country. In the early days of the Comstock Lode, in Virginia, Nevada, some men made money so fast that they did not know what to do with it Those who were not making it spent their time devising ways and z^eans to talk the others out of a por­ tion of their wealth. Gamblers were In full evi­ dence, and there were some big stakes; but it remained for a bunch of Mexicans to play for the largest stake on record in the United States-- without the use of cards. One of the many claims, located in the midst of the district had not shown any ore. Even the men who had millions hesitated to sink a shaft on it The people were In a fever of excitement The Mexicans owned practicaly nothing. In fact, the "greasers" could not get a "look In." Alto­ gether It was very discouraging--to them. Then it occurred to some bright genius to capitalize the labor of the Mexicans. Gathering a bunch of 'them together, ft was proposed that they sink a shaft on one of the well-known claims, which was twelve hundred feet In length. "For each foot you sink, we will give you a one-foot surface interest in the claim," they were told," provided you sink to ore." In other words, if they abandoned the work at any time before reaching ore, they would get nothing, and the owners would have the shaft It looked like a cheap way to prospect. The Mexicans pow-powed and jabbered at one another for half a night and then started to work. Everybody laughed. They were comparatively poor men. They could ill afford the expense they were undergoing. They drilled by hand, fought the hard granite, and gradually lowered that shaft. . They balled water that flowed in so fast that it threatened to drown them, but they stuck to the work with desperation. At three hundred feet they uncovered the rich­ est portion of the world-famous silver deposit, and, from the vein they opened, more wealth was taken out than from any other portion of that richest single mile of ground In the world. The Mexicans' share was one-quarter. Nearly one hundred million dollars came out of the hole they sank! It was a gamble pure and simple. They played for high stakes--and won. In the Coeur d'Alene, of Idaho, when that min­ ing region was the center of the earth, there were some big games. The story is told of one man who conceived the idea that he could make money in gambling faster than he could take it out of the ground. It was so much easier. With what cash he had, after selling his mine, he could count up to one hundred and fifty thousand dollars. He had evolved a wonderful system. "I simply can't lose," he told his friends. His plan was to play steadily for sixteen hours daily, and, by a complicated series of bets, to retrieve when he lost Everything went along swimingly for the first few days. At times he was as much as twenty- five thousand to the good. Nine days after he started top lay he suddenly found that he was Just where he had started-- he had one hundred and fifty thousand dollars when the cards came a certain way*, which would Involve, according to his system, betting the en­ tire amount on a Blngle "turn." He played the queen to win, and the fickle creature played false to him. "Women are the cause of all trouble, anyway," he muttered, as he rose from the table. "I ought to have known better than that, for that was the queen of Bpades, and I should not have made that bet except when all the queens except the queen of hearts was out." It was the irony of fate that, when the queen of hearts came out of the box. it so happened tnat It won. In the days when Cheyenne. Wyoming, was the headquarters for the cattlemen of the northwest gambling ran wide open. When the cowboys came to town they made things hum. Money grew on trees. The gaming spirit was in the air. A dealer standing behind a roulette table ons night suddenly motioned the proprietor. A few moments later he was paid off. It Is customary to pay a gambler his salary at the end of each day. Many of them have the faculty of losing it back over the v»ry table where they know the odds to be against the player. In roulette there Is a distinct percentage in favor of "the houee." Everybody knows that. This dealer took a seat In front of the table and in the course of a few hours had won fifty dollars. Then he stopped. . He would pass In and out a dozen times a day, play a little here and some there, but always he would bring up la front of the roulette table, and more often than otherwise left It winner. His luck was amazing. He started a bank acocunt He was Baving his money to get Into business with, he said. He won so steadily that It made the proprietor of the place shiver every time he came In. One day, while the ex-dealer was playing, an old man dropped in and, glancing around the room for a moment, asked: "Who runs this place?" "I do," answered a bewhiskered Individual who was watching his former employe rake la the cash, "Will you do me the favor to tell me where you got that wheel?" he asked, pointing to the one that proved such a hoodoo. "I know it's a Jonah. That fellow over there wins all the time." "So?" said the stranger. He walked over and watched the man lay bets. Returning to the proprietor, he said, as he passed out a card: "I represent this house, which, as you see, deals in gaming devices. I take it that the man sitting at the wheel makes a 'killing' every day?" "He does, stranger, to the tune of fifty or a hundred." "For a thousand I can tell you ho^ to bust his luck and make him look the living picture of re­ morse. You would have to agree to purchase a new wheel from me, also." "If you show me, I'm game." "It's a-bargain," said the drummer. Walking over to the wheel, he waited until the ball dropped, stopped it, and turning to the pro­ prietor asked: "See anything strange with that wheel?" "No." "Well, see, there are two nlneteens and two twenty-threes on this wheel. They are unusual numbers so that the fellow who plays them has about the same percentage In his favor, on those numbers, thai yeii have when a man plays on a regular wheel. We made this wheel more than thirty years ago. It was sold to a house by a couple of sure thing' men, who almost broke the outfit. Then we lost trggt, of it" The ex-dealer had noticed the double numbers, and therein was the seoret of his "luck." How the numbers had escaped attention so many years is one of those mysteries of gambling that can never be explained. When Seattle was the big noise in the North­ west gambling world, and the primeval forests were closer to her doors, some big games were played. One night a stranger stepped into one of the principal houses and took a seat at a faro table. An hour later he had lost more than five thou­ sand dollars. The proprietor sent him a fifty- cent cigar. A few moments afterward the stranger had a couple of hundred dollars, and within an hour had regained his five thousand. £hen commenced a streak of hick that has sel­ dom been witnessed in any gambling house. The "roof" had been raised "to the sky" and Mr Stranger "coppered" the king and doubled a bet of five thousand. He tried it again for a repeat- w. with ten thousand, and drew back twenty yel­ low chieps, worth one thousand each. After that he made bets of a thousand each, and before he had smoked the cigar he was twen­ ty-eight thousand to the good! Then he quit Who he was, where he came from, where he went no ons ever knew. His coming and going were as mysterious as his winnings were sens* tlonaL Probably one of the greatest stakes ever hung up was raked down on a mule race in Arizona. A man owned a "hole in the ground." He was satisfied that it was worth a fortune. His friends thought he was crazy. He refused to go to other "diggings" where the, prospects were better. He was more than twenty-flve miles from water, which had to be carried in on the hurricane deck of a mule. He worked away nursing his claim and sticking it out alone. Then he went to a settlement some distance away. He became excited over the performances of a mule owned by another man, and in a moment of ex- «rt)erance bet his claim against one owned by a prospector from another sectton that his mule could outrun the other fellow's. He lost He had the privilege of piloting the winner to the * mine" and saw him take more than seventy thousand dollars' worth of silver, net. out of a pocket, almost on the surface of the ground! Since then the property has produced millions. It all came about because one mule could not ran BO fftflt Aft anAfho** ANCIENT AND MODERN FEET ;*• W v. °oubt That the P«dal Extremities ... °ur Ancestors Were Larger V " » Than Are Those of Today. Artlgt* »s»ure us that no Greek would have ever dreamed ot ~ putting a nine-inch foot on a five-and f* 4»ne-half-foot woman. The types for the s., .<-jpassic marble figures were taken from ^ >fhe most perfect forms of living per- •ons. Unquestionably the humen foot. as represented by the ancient sculp­ tors. was larger than the modern one; and, in fact, the primitive foot of all peoples whereof we have any record, either of statuary or otherwise, was considerably larger than the restrict­ ed foot of later times. The masculine foot, forming an ap­ proximate average of four different j countries, was about 12 Inches long. | This would require at least a No. 10 shoe to cover it comfortably. The av erage masculine foot today Is easily fitted with a No. 84 shoe, and Is therefore not above 10 7-16 inches. Now, by the old sculptural rule of pro­ portion, a man five feet nine inches in height should have a foot 11 Mi inches long, or one^sixth his height. It was of no great consequence what size san­ dal he wore, but he would have requir­ ed a modern shoe of at least a No. 10H for afifitnlugiige fit or aMe. lL tar real comfort. i For' women, allowing (or the dlffer- ence in the relative size of the sexes, which was about the same then as now. a woman of five feet three inches in height would have had a foot ten Inches long, requiring a modern shoe of the size of No. 8 as the most nonv fortable, or a No. 6^ as the limit of comfort.--Harper's Weekly. Real Apprehension. "I am afraid, dear one, pa will put his foot down on our marriage." "I can stand that, darling, as lone aa he doee not pat his toot up." EPS The eloitnft of the year 1911 has brought out the usual bank statements accompanied by the addresses of the Presidents and General Managers ot these institutions. Their reading la Interesting as they show In a striking manner the prosperity of the country, and deal with economic matters in a first hand way. Those who know any­ thing of Canadian banking methods know the stability of these institu­ tions, and the high character of the men who are placed in, charge. In discussing the land situation the Pre#, ident of the Union Bank of Canada. Whose branches are to be found in all Itarts of the Canadian West, said:-- "A good deal has been said about speculation in land. The Increase in land values has added enormously to the assets of Western business, and has to some extent formed a basis for extended credit, but this is not felt to be a drawback when the value is real and convertible. We consider that a business standing which is strength­ ened and enhanced by property hold- ings is entitled to a reasonable en­ largement of credit for legit imate busi­ ness operations." It will thus be seen that the banks recognize the certain rise In the value of farm lands in Western Canada. When the facts are known of the won­ derful producing qualities of farm lands in the Provinces of Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta, it Is sim­ ple to understand the liberal stand taken by the banks. Living not far from Lashburn, Bask., Is a farmer named Clarke who in 1912 secured a crop of Marquis Wheat, yielding 76 bushels per acre. This is spoken of as a record yield, and this is doubtless true, but several cases have been brought to notice where yields almost aB large have been pro­ duced, and In different parts of the country. During the past year there have been reported many yields of from 35 to 45 bushels of wheat to the i ire. Oats, too, were a snceeBg- ful crop, and so was the barley crop. Wheat that would yield 40 bushels per acre, would bring on the market 70c (a fair figure) per bushel, a gross return of $28.00 per acre. Al­ low $12.00 per acre (an outside figure) there would be a balance of $16.00 per acre net profit. This figure should satisfy anyone having land that cost less than $100.00 per acre. Very much less return than this proves satisfac­ tory to those holding lands In Iowa and Illinois worth from $260 to $300 per acre. The latest Government returns give an approximate estimate of four hun­ dred thousand of an Immigration to Canada during 1912. Of thiB number 200,000 will be from the United States. Most of these are of the farming class and It is not difficult to understand why farming lands In Canada will ad­ vance from ten to twenty per cent within the next twelve months. There­ fore Investment in Western Canadian lands Is not looked upon as being in the speculative class. Those fortunate enough to secure free homesteads In Canada will acquire in the Intrinsio value of the land alone the best pos­ sible start for a splendid future. Ad­ vertisement Not on the Program. 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