'THE BEST HAND AT POKER.'

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3906, 26 January 1884, Page 2 (Supplement)

'THE BEST HAND AT POKER.'

' Dutch llank,' said a gambler of prominence in Albany to a Journal reporter, ' was not only the best hand at poker who ever antied up in a big game, but he was high-toned and straight. You cowld shut your eyes if you were in with him without running the risk of being turned over by crooked work. They tell me lie piled up a snug little fortune of 200,000 dols. I've seen him with half that coin in ;his fist, for he always travelled with a big boodle to back his hand. He'd discount ;vn iceberg for coolness, he would. The little Dutchman would drop 10,000 dols and 20,000 dols at a sitting without winking the eye, and when dead broke would get up with a story that would make a.horee laugh. That was one of the reasons ho was so clever with the cards, you could never sicken him of the game, no matter how steep it was or how bad they gave it to him in the neck. It's a pretty frigid rooster who will see 20,000 dols go into the hole and never peop. That was tho stuff Dutch llank was made of. Square? A fairer hand never cut for a deal. Hut you couldn't do him up on any rocket that was over invented. Although he never dopended upon anything but his own hand and skill to carry him through, ho was a cleaner to tumble to a sniggle. Nobody ever downed him on a cold deck or fancy shuffle. Once he ran afoul of a sharper from Chicago, who had been making himself a millionaire at bho expense of the best of us. Dutch Hank tackled him in tho Brower house, New York. That was his hang out on his periodical voyages to the metropolis. Well, tho Chicagoan was slicker than a wizard. Hank held cracking good fists and didn't want fqr luck when he drew to fill, but somehow or other the chap from Chicago raked in tho pile in the finest stylo of the art. Dutchy only mado a face or two, and took hia gruel. He had dropped a couple of thousand. Tho Chicagoan, whenever a pofc came his*way, coolly pulled it over, and piling one bill on tho others, held it down with a, littlo gold weight. Ib was a pretty little ornament with a diamond on tho top. The game kept on, Hank beingjthe loser at overy turn. Finally, before opening his hand, he said —' My friend, shust sposen you pub dot shiner there into your pocket. Dot diamond he hurts my eyes. I voa blind in yon already and can't see out of the odder. . Hank meant that he wanted the diamond weight removed. Tho Chicago man remonstrated, but Hank insisted in his own good-natured way, saying ho couldn't play until' the shiner ' was put ont of sight. He carried his point, of course. From that point luck changed. Dutch Hank quit the game the winner of nearly 10,000 dols. The weight used by the Chicago gambler was an ingenious reflector, co placed tbnt it. revealed his opponent's hand. He read the reflection with a magnifying glass, which he used on the pretence of being nearsighted. Dutch Hank was the first man tQ tumble to the trick on which tho Chicagoan had won 300,000 or 400,000. dole.'—tAl ban y Journal,: