IN the year 1753 a remarkable lottery drawing took 

 place in London. It was authorized, through 

 Parliament, by "his gracious Majesty" King George 

 the Second. Such notables as the archbishop of Can- 

 terbury and the lord chancellor of the realm took 

 official interest in its success. It was advertised far 

 and wide as advertising went in those days in the 

 Gazette, and it found a host of subscribers. Of the 

 fifty thousand tickets each costing three pounds 

 more than four thousand were to be of the class which 

 the act of Parliament naively describes as "fortunate 

 tickets." The prizes aggregated a hundred thousand 

 pounds. 



To be sure, state lotteries were no unique feature in 

 the England of that day. They formed as common a 

 method of raising revenue in the island realm of King 

 George II. as they still do in the alleged continental 

 portion of his realm, France, and in the land of his 

 nativity, Germany. Indeed, the particular lottery in 

 question was to be officered by the standing committee 

 on lotteries, whose official business was to "secure 

 two and a half million pounds for his Majesty" by this 

 means. But the great lottery of 1754 had interest far 

 beyond the common run, for it aimed to meet a na- 

 tional need of an anomalous kind a purely intellectual 



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