CHAPTER XII. SWINDLES AND HOAXES.

were against them, and of backers ‘having’ the ring all round without a sovereign in their pockets? Nay, cannot even the general public who are not initiated into such mysteries remember numbers of men who have ruined themselves and others under the system in which Mr Anderson ‘does not feel there is any immorality,’ because in it ‘the element of fraud is not introduced,’ and because under it ‘people who cannot afford to lose’ are not induced to bet? The result of his bill will be that he will drive men from one style of betting, in which they lose or win, knowing the extent of their gains or their losses, to another, under which they may be drawn into hopeless speculation, and perhaps concomitant fraud, simply because they are not called on for ready money. We do not propose to follow Mr Anderson through his ingenious and amusing descriptions of the advertisements of tipsters and ‘discretionary-investment’ people. He was good enough to introduce ourselves as a striking example of the facility with which such persons could foist their schemes on the public, and of the large profits which were derived by certain newspaper proprietors from them. He had the honesty to acknowledge that we had refused to take any further announcements with respect to ‘discretionary investments,’ and that we had persistently cautioned our readers to have nothing to do with them.... As for tipsters, who merely offer to give information for a shilling’s worth of stamps, what immorality can there be in that which is not to be found in the ‘selections’ of the daily newspapers? Even the Times, in a roundabout ‘respectable’ way, now and then indicates horses which, in the opinion of its sporting writer, will win certain races, and there is hardly a daily paper in town or country which has not its regular ‘prophet,’ who from day to