The "sawdust game," was a confidence scam that only swindled those who deserved to be swindled.
The term “bunco” has come to mean to any type of swindle, but in the 19th century it usually referred to a confidence game involving crooked gambling.
The Audacity of a Professional Thief.

How the dudes of Chicago embrace each other whenever two of them meet.
A Chicago railroad man and a Chicago porter both say that it is becoming fashionable for young men of that city to kiss each other vigorously when they part for any length of time and when they meet again. The railroad man says it makes him sick to see the fools.
Reprinted from the National Police Gazette, January 15, 1887.

