Mingot, the Great French Billiard Player

A history and description of Billiards. Samuel May, Billiard Table manufacturer. 1867

Inventor of the cue leather

To the famous Mingot is attributed the invention of the cue leather, such as it now is. But this is not his only title to the fame acquired by him a half century ago, as will be shown by the following anecdote, given in Monsieur Jules Rostaing’s preface to the “Manual of Billiards” of M. Desire Lemaire, one of the billiard notabilities of France.

It was at a time, says M. Jules Rostaign, alluding to the revolution of 1798, when it was a rather serious matter for anyone to express certain opinions. Politics led Mingot soon to become a billiard-player of the first water. Nevertheless, I would not advise the reader to follow the same road to reach the summit of the glories of carom.

Before politics led Mingot to acquire the skilfulness for which he was so distinguished, it took him into a state prison. Living as is the custom with prisoners, he soon felt the pangs of sameness and solitude, and hypochondria grew upon him like the spleen of an Englishman. But, singular to say, when the hour of deliverance came, Mingot requited his jailor and the prison director to allow him to remain a few days longer. This director was a man of some good sense in his own way. He thought that as it frequently happened to be a matter of some difficulty to secure the persons of incorrigible conspirators, it would be well to detain this one, since it was his own wish to be detained, and the request was granted. Within another, week, however, Mingot desired to be set free, and his jailor opened the prison gates, although not without expressing regret at his departure.

Mingot’s friends now discovered the secret of his sudden affection for prison life. He had found there a complete billiard table, which was left at bis disposal. After playing upon it, for want of anything better to do, he took a liking for the noble game, which afterwards became his ruling passion. It proved to him the revelation of his vocation. Nature, as was the case with Chamillard, the minister of Louis XIV., had made him that he should become a billiard hero. Maybe, as a minister, he might have been neither better nor worse than Chamillard. The fact is that on the day when he was to have received his pardon and was to have made bis exit from the state prison, he was studying and inventing, and on the point of discovering, a new stroke that was to add a remarkable prestige to the game of billiards. And this is why the political prisoner requested a prolongation of his detention. Under lock and key the wings of his celebrity were growing like those of the butterfly in its narrow cell.

What was this remarkable stroke, the discovery of which was more dear to him than the recovery of his liberty? You will soon learn it; and since I have promised an anecdote, let us proceed.

Shortly after emerging from prison, Mingot happened to be at a cafe in one of the southern cities of France, the people of which are known for their bragging propensities. Several times Mingot hears his name pronounced by a gentleman who was telling his friends that while in Paris he had been playing a game with Mingot, whose reputation was fast travelling over the country. He further asserts that he had learned from the new master several remarkable strokes. Mingot casts a look upon the southerner, and, satisfied that he had never met the man before, he sidles up to the table at which the conversation took place. Men soon become acquainted in the south. Scarcely ten minutes had elapsed when Mingot proposed a game, which was eagerly accepted by the gentleman in question. The ivory balls are placed upon the table. Mingot drives carelessly one of the white balls upon the red, as if he were simply trying his cue. But lol the former, instead of following the latter, returns towards the player after hitting the ball.

“What singular balls those are yon have given us! ” says Mingot to the waiter, who stood stupefied.

“Why, sir, they are the regular balls.”

“What! balls that come back when you push them forward?”

“Is the gentleman sure that he struck the ball?”

“I will try again.”

Mingot plays a second time, with the same result.

The waiter was staring at the balls with his mouth as wide open as a pocket, and the people present in the room were overwhelmed.

“Now, I won’t play with those balls,” says Mingot.

“Nor I either, by Jove!” adds his new friend. “The balls are bewitched, and one must be gifted with immortality to finish a game at that rate.”

While these balls are being examined, weighed, turned, and handled in every sense with a certain amount of reluctance and fear, a new set is brought upon the table. These seem to run as usual, and the game begins. But upon the second stroke Mingo’s ball returns like the former, and achieves a splendid carom.

“The devil!” exclaimed the southerner. “There must be hangman’s rope for luck in your pocket.”

“The dev himself is in it! ” says the waiter, fervently crossing himself.

“Stuff!” says Mingot. “Let us finish the game anyhow.”

And thanks to the drawing effect of his cue, which never misses his aim, Mingot scored the twenty points of the game, after his adversary— a good player, by the way—had scored but six.

“Now,” said the ex-political prisoner, turning to his new acquaintance, who looked somewhat confused—”now you may tell your friends that you have had a game with Mingot!”

And upon this he left the room, in order to evade an ovation which was in store for him.— Translated for the Billiard Cue, from “Manuel du Jue de Billiard” by Desire Lemaire,