MacGregor's Gaming Hall /

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'Tell me, is this a Gambling House? is it what I have heard called a Hell?'
'It is a Gambling House, if you will, my dear fellow,' was the reply: '
but a respectable one. Besides - you must see life!'
-George Reynolds, The Mysteries of London, 1848-52

A chain withdrawns and the door opens. The way leads up to a suite of rooms on the first floor. These are brilliantly lighted. On one side of the front room stands a buffet covered with wines and liquors. In the middle of the same apartment was the Rouge et Noir table. On each side sat a Croupier, with a rake in his hand, and a green shade over his eyes. Before one of them was placed a tin case; this was the Bank; - and on each side of that cynclosure of all attention, stands piles of markers, or counters.

Scene in a Gaming Hall "Scene in a Gambling Hall," by Wm Hogarth

Keep a close eye on those three men...
-the ones flashily dressed, and exhibiting a profusion of Birmingham jewellery¹, sitting at the table. Those are the "puffs, or bonnets" -they are in the pay of the proprietor of the establishment, their duties consist in enticing visitors to play, and to play deep. The Bonnets are compelled to make the emotions run high at the table, affecting joy when they win, and grief or rage when they lose. When no one save the Croupiers and Bonnets are present, they laugh, joke, chatter, smoke, and drink; but the moment steps are heard upon the staircase, they relapse into their business aspect. -The Croupiers put on their imperturbable countenances as easily as if they were masks; and the Bonnets appear to be as intent on the game, as if its results are to them perspective of life or death. The Croupiers are trustworthy, well known to the proprietor, or shareholders in the establishment. In a better hell such as this, the Bonnets are young men of education and manners, who may have lost the fortunes wherewith they commenced life, and fallen in the whirlpool to which, for a weekly stipend, they are employed to entice others. -Paraphrased from The Mysteries of London, 1848-52.