BETTIXG. 207 



analogy, between the practice of betting on the one 

 hand, and the consumption of drink on the o'ther. 



Both are considered by different classes of people 

 respectively as a business, an amusement, and a 

 vice. 



Both of them are admissible by law, but both 

 are surrounded by enactments which are certainly 

 restrictive, and often harassing, and sometimes 

 unfair between one set of people and another, and 

 the enactments imposed upon both, at one time or 

 another, have been made a ffood deal at the suo-o-es- 

 tion, and by the influence, of that section of the 

 public who are avowed enemies to them altogether, 

 and wish to see them abolished and prohibited by 

 law, thus giving the legislation the character of a 

 compromise, and making it, like many compromises, 

 difficult either to explain or justify by any rules of 

 sound logic or common sense. 



Now to begin with the similarity in definition. 

 Both wagering and the consumption of wines, spirits, 

 &c., may be considered either as a business, a 

 pleasure, or a vice, according to the people engaged 

 in it. 



To the professional book-maker and the licensed 

 victualler it is a business pure and simple, and a 

 book-maker who confines himself strictly to making 

 his book in a business-like manner, can no more be 

 called a gambler than a licensed victualler can be 

 called a drunkard. 



