Rig Poker.

Auckland Star, Volume XXVI, Issue 247, 24 October 1885, Page 5

Rig Poker.

It is no trouble at nil for a man who love i a good stiff game of pokor to. find it in Kansas City, says a letter from that city to " Tho Cincinnati Star." Thero is a state law horo which makes the keeping of a gamblinghouso a felony, butitisnot enforced against poker " dub rooms." Thero is no faro east of tho Kansas elato lino. Tho strictly pro fcsional gambling amounts to almost nothing, but there aro some stockmen's gamos that would mako cold chills run up tho back of tho average bueinc.. man. 1 havo seen $2 .000 change ownership in a littlo friendly game on hands which went back to the pack without ever being seen. Unsuspecting people never dream nf tho extent if tho pokor mania. 1 believo if tho world would look it- up it would find that if tho pokor clearings were included in tho weekly statements they wouldgo a long way toward offsetting the loss of 30 or 40 per cent, that tho motropolis is suffering. At all ovonts it would bo so if poker-plnyintr i" as popular in Now York as it is in Kansas City. Woo unto tho man who jumps tho game ; thrice disgraced is he who jumps the game whon he is winner. Fivo rich stockmen bired a room in tho St James Hotel on a Friday night about a weok ago. They had a poker lay out, and the bluo chips wore worth 25d01, the rod IOJoI, and tho white sdol. It was lOdol ante and no limit. Tho night flow away apaco and tho morning dawnod on tho absorbed players. Somo wero poorer nnd some richer by thousands. Breakfast and dinner and thon supper wore brought up, but tho play went on. Late Saturday night ono of the participants signified his intention to go homo to his wife and babies, but ho was kept by tho promisos of his friends that they did not mean to play much longer. Another day, and still the click of tho chips never ceased. Breakfast, dinner, and supper woro agaiu served. But play was higher and moro reckless. Jackpots that would each buy a ranch were raked in first by ono player and then another. At breakfast-timo Monday morning tho man who wanted to go homo Saturday night sworo that he would wait no longer. As ho plunged through the doorway he was followed by this scathing remark : " a man who would jump a game I" A yoar ago I mot a young man who had come out West to grow up with the country. He was a graduate of Harvard and had pleasant manners, but had evidently left a comfortable Eastorn homo with exaggerated notions of tho West. In throe weeks after his arrival ho was stripped and had all his bost dude pawned. I was somowhat interested in his fato nt tho timo, but did not see him again until a few days ago. He had tho earmarks of prosperity about him, and I was told later on that ho had graduated from a coal-dealer's ollico as a crack pokor player, and he had learned it all within a tew months. Somo wonderful stories were told of this young follows nerve, and it was said thut he had a good fat bank account and sat regularly in a stockman's gamo. Tho tido in his fortune was turnod by his grit in playing two deuces in a big gauio. He had been drifting into gambling for some time, and know a great deal about a deck of cards. Throo of the players had laid down their hands after tho draw, leaving only two contestants. The hero of this story had been winning and bet freely on his hand. His opponent kept seeing himand raising, him andlinally,nfterthe pot had grown big onough to bo worth fighting for, raised him 2,500d01. The clerk in tho coal office put on his thinking cap. He had two deucos unsupported, and he looked at them and then coolly eyed his antagonist. This lasted two or three minutes, and not a facial musc'.o moved. " I call you," he said at last, throwing his deuces down on tho table. Thoy won tho pot Tho other man's hand was not as good as ace high, I am told that this young Harvard graduate is one of the bost poker-players hereabouts. His luck is charmed, and the oldest and most reckless players tremble when they go against him. The great art in poker is to know when to call and when not to call. With lOOdol in the pot and sdol h . t by hi. antagonist, I once caw the best gambler iii Missouri lay down three of a kind. " Why did you not call him, it would only have cost you odd ?" said I. "Ho had a better hand than I did, aul I would have been just sdol out." Men are born gamblors, and it is this intuition to call at- the right timo that m_k ... them successful. In a big game at a hotel bore not long ago, in which fivo or six friends took part, thero was an exciting illustration of this delirious sort of doubt. Every player had mado good his ante, and some of them had put in a few hundred dollars additional before drop-

ping out. At length IO.OOOdoI. lay on the table, with two players fighting for it. 1 stood behind one of them. He had three queens, having drawn to them at the start. His opponent had drawn three cards. The latter at this Juncture coolly announced a rise of 10,00-dol. The man with three queens was fairly staggered. His antagonist might be bluffing. He might have drawn to an acoand king and caught nothing, or he might have caught another king and two moro aces, or he might have drawn to a pair and caught a full hand. Was ho bluffing? That was tho question. After thinking the matter over ho did not consider his queons worth that amount of money, so both hands wont to tho deck, and tho man on the other sido of the table raked in the stakes. I found out afterwards that all this money was won on tho following hand : Ace, jack, ten, and two sixes. Tho three queenß would have won by a largo majority.