GAMBLING ITALY.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXI, Issue 24, 13 September 1911, Page 3

GAMBLING ITALY.

While visiting Italy Mr Booker Washington, the American freedman, round, to Ins evident surprise, one oi the principle forms of amusement, of the most poverty-stricken people is gambling. What seems stranger still, tnis vice is in Italy a Government monopoly. The State, through its control oi l.ne lottery, adds to too other revenue widen it extracts from the people not less than £1,000,000 a year, and this sum comes, for the most part, from the poorest of the population. There are, it seems, something like 1700 or 1800 offices scattered through the several large cities of Italy where people niay buy lottery tickets. These lottery offices were so interesting that Mr Washington determined to visit one and learn how the game was played. It seems that there is a drawing every Saturday. Anyone may hot whatever amount lie Chooses that a 'number somewhere between one and ninety will turn up in tlic drawing. Five numbers are drawn. If you win, the lottery pays ten to one. iou may also bet that any two of tne five milliners drawn wo. turn up hi succession. In -that-'case the bank pays the winner something like fifty to one. You may also bet that three out of the live will turn up, and in case you win the bank pays 250 limes the amount you bet. Of course, the odds are vlry, nigcli against the player, and it is estimated that the State gets 50 per cent of all tlie money that is paid in. The art of the game consists, according to popular superstition, in picking a lucky number. In order to pick a lucky number, however, one must go to a fortune teller and have one's dreams interpreted, or one must pick a number according to some striking event, for it is supposed every e.yen of any importance suggests some lucky number. Of course all this makes the game more interesting and complicated, hut it is, after all, a very expensive form of amusement for poor people.. ,