STATUTES. 



509 



of skill from wliicli tlie like mischiefs cannot arise ; be it 

 enacted by the queen's most excellent majesty, by and with 

 the advice and consent of the lords spiritual and temporal, 

 and commons, in this present parliament assembled, and by 

 the authority of the same. That so much of an act passed in Repeal of 

 the thirty-third year of the reign of King Henry the Eighth, Pj^i't of 33 

 intituled " The Bill for maintaining Artillery, and the de- ^^"^^ ^' ^- ^• 

 barring of unlawful Games," whereby any game of mere 

 skill, such as bowling, coyting, cloyshcayls, half bowl, tennis, 

 or the like, is declared an unlawful game, or which enacts 

 any penalty for playing at any such game of skill as afore- 

 said, or which enacts any penalty for lacking bows or arrows, 

 or for not making and continuing butts, or which regulates 

 the making, selling or using of bows and arrows, and also 

 so much of the said act as requires the mayors, sheriffs, 

 bailiffs, constables, and other head officers within every city, 

 borough and town within this realm, to make search weekly, 

 or at the farthest once a month, in all places where houses, 

 alleys, plays, or places of dicing, carding or gaming shall 

 be suspected to be had, kept and maintained, shall be re- 

 pealed, and also so much of the said act as makes it lawful 

 for every master to license his or their servants, and for every 

 nobleman and other having manors, lands, tenements, or 

 other yearly profits for term of life, in his own right or in 

 his wife's right, to the j^early value of a hundred pounds 

 or above, to command, aj^point or license, by his or their 

 discretion, his or their servants or family of his or their house 

 or houses to play at cards, dice or tables, or any unlawful 

 game, as therein more fu.lly set forth, shall be rej)ealed ; 

 and that no such commandment, appointment or licence 

 shall avail any person to exempt him from the danger or 

 penalty of playing at any unlawful game or in any common 

 gaming house. 



2. And whereas doubts have arisen whether certain houses, What shall 

 alleged or reputed to be opened for the use of the subscribers he sufficient 

 only, or not open to all persons desirous of using the same, Tl^^l%^ T 



j1 T 1 • 1 /TNT'IT 1 J-lOU.Sc IS at 



are to be deemed common gaming houses (A:) ; be it declared common 

 and enacted. That, in default of other evidence proving any gaming 

 house or jolace to be a common gaming house, it shall be suffi- house, 

 cient, in support of the allegation in any indictment or infor- 

 mation that any house or place is a common gaming house, to 

 prove that such house or place is kept or used for playing 

 therein at any unlawful game, and that a bank is kept there 

 by one or more of the players exclusively of the others, or that 

 the chances of any game played therein are not alike favour- 

 able to all the players, including among the players the banker 

 or other person by whom the game is managed, or against 



{k) See Crockford v. Lord 3Iaidstone, Appendix. 



