“GAIETY” ABROAD . 
279 
“ YOU PRESENT YOUR VISITING-CARD.” 
La Boule must bring in quite a respectable 
revenue to the Dieppe Casino. Still, it is not 
from that that the major part of the profits 
i; derived, but from “ Le Ccrcle.” Cercle 
means club. The dictionary nearest to hand 
defines a club as “ an organization of persons 
who meet for social intercourse or other 
common object, the members of which are 
usually limited in number and chosen by 
ballot.” That certainly does not define a club 
as it is found in a Continental Casino. 
There a club is simply a gambling- hell. It 
is not a pretty phrase, but that is what it is. 
Everyone is 'admitted. You present your 
visiting-card; they 
give you, on the in- 
stant, a card of mem- 
bership — for w h i c h 
sometimes you pay 
something, and some- 
times nothing. In the 
club at the Conti- 
nental Casino they 
play baccarat, with 
occasional excursions 
into chernin de jer. 
They play for all 
sorts of stakes — it 
depends. Sometimes 
a bank is opened for 
fifty francs, s 0 m e- 
times for fifty thou- 
sand. A figure some- 
where between those 
two may be regarded 
as the average. The 
Casino takes ten per 
cent, on whatever 
sum the bank is 
opened for. As there 
are gentlemen whose 
only ostensible pro- 
fession is to act as 
banker, and who are 
to be found acting in 
that capacity in 
Casinos all over 
Europe at different 
seasons of the year, 
it is to be presumed 
that the profession is 
a lucrative one. 
You do not find 
much gambling at 
Fecamp, though you 
can get it if you are 
there at the right 
moment ; norat Etre- 
tat, which place is a 
curiosity. It is a sort of gingerbread village, 
its normal population is under two thousand, 
but into it, in the summer, they cram 
goodness knows how many. It is situated in 
a sort of hole in the cliff ; a bridge might, be 
slung from cliff to cliff, and you might run over 
it without knowing that Etretat was there. 
The same people go year after year, 'lhere 
is the kind of golf which one does get abroad, 
and sports are got up by the visitors, in which 
nearly everyone takes a part. The country 
round is not pretty or interesting. Etretat 
may be unique, but it is scarcely fci gay. ’ 
Some twenty-five kilometres off is Sainte 
