LIFE'S JUNGLE

Evening Star, Issue 18137, 29 November 1922, Page 3

LIFE'S JUNGLE

AND THK HUMAN TiGKR. " Tho most dangerous form of gambling, because of the surroundings in which it is played, is,” writes Seymour Hicks, tho actor, “chcitiin do fer.” He says: “Every gambling-house keeper has his fonts, male and female, at the smartest restaurants and most fashionable hotels, and they receive a fee for every player they introduce to the game. You would never dream, probably, and be indignant if you were told, that'the smart young man about town who says ‘Lot’s go on and have a bit of supper at fio-and-So’s,’ and ‘Let’s play ehemie for a bit,’ is earning his living by that indifferent remark. But it is so.” “ off you go, and find yourself _at a house in nu extremely fashionable neighborhood, where everything is perfectly done. There are men servants to wait on you, beautiful ladies to smile at you, and gathered round the green baize you will meet old friends, slight acquaintances, and celebrities whom you known only by sight, but whose names are household words. You are given your supper-free, gratis, and for nothing—and you can have the best cigars and vintage wines, and not- bo culled upon to pay a sou for them. You are, delighted, and you wonder how it is all done You do not realise that you are the welcome guest of Monsieur Cagnotte—an invisible gentleman of French extraction—who milks every coup of something like 20 per cent, before Ihe players receive their wiimihgs.' 1 Mr Hicks expresses the hope that, " a word of warning may, perhaps, be the means of helping the thoughtless and preventing the reckless, who, while shunning a smallpox ward, knock about indiscriminately with women, and embark, unarmed, on adventures in life's jungle, which, alas! is inhabited by every form of human tiger,”