As a matter of fact, all other forms of gambling or swindling are commonplace and comparatively innocent when compared to the "bucket shop" which has caused more moral wrecks, more dismantled fortunes and made more of the innocent suffer than any other agency of diabolism. Just why so brazen an iniquity in the guise of speculation should be allowed to exist it is difficult to explain. OPEN GAMBLING UNDER BAN. Open gambling has been placed under the ban of civic reform. While the policy shop, the lottery and other less dangerous methods of swindling have been effectively stamped out of most cities, the "bucket shop tiger" continues to rend the ambitions of young and old, dragging them down to forgery, embezzlement, suicide,--or that which is quite as bad,--broken spirit for legitimate endeavor. Under the circumstances the sympathy of the public should be with the movement to drive "bucket shops" out of business, to close them along with all other gambling institutions. It is time that something was done to check the growing evil of gambling on produce, cotton and stock exchange quotations. A beginning has been made, but the movement has not gone far enough. These excrescences on the body politic have multiplied rapidly and so dangerously near do they come to being popular that the mercantile community owes it to itself to apply the knife at once. Moreover, there is no form of gambling more disastrous to the player than "bucket shop" gambling. Its semi-respectability and likeness in many outward features to regular and reputable commission houses makes it the most insidious of all temptations to the young speculator and aspirant for wealth. It is the open door to ruin. [Illustration: THAT NEW LEAF] OPEN DOOR TO RUIN. Men do not blush at being seen in a "bucket shop" as they would if caught in a faro bank or poker room though they are drawn thither by the same passion for gambling that takes them to the regular gambling den. The "bucket shop" successfully carries on a worse swindling game than the "blacklegs." The wealth the chief "bucket shop" men of the country have acquired proves this. Men can be pointed out in Chicago, New York and other cities of the country who have amassed fortunes at the business while their thousands of victims are impoverished and ruined. Persons desiring to speculate or invest can avoid "bucket shops" and "fake" brokers by making a preliminary and independent investigation into the character of the broker and the merits of the enterprise. If they accept the statements and references of promoters of schemes without making such investigations they are not entitled to sympathy if they are robbed.