You who have never been out of your country, know little what it is to
hear a friendly voice in captivity; and there’s many a man that will not
understand the cause of the burst of feeling which I have confessed took
place on my seeing my uncle. He never for a minute thought to question
the truth of what I said. ‘Mother of God!’ cried he, ‘it’s my brother
Harry’s son.’ And I think in my heart he was as much affected as I was
at thus suddenly finding one of his kindred; for he, too, was an exile
from home, and a friendly voice, a look, brought the old country back to
his memory again, and the old days of his boyhood. ‘I’d give five years
of my life to see them again,’ said he, after caressing me very warmly.
‘What?’ asked I. ‘Why,’ replied he, ‘the green fields, and the river,
and the old round tower, and the burying-place at Ballybarry. ‘Twas a
shame for your father to part with the land, Redmond, that went so long
with the name.’
He then began to ask me concerning myself, and I gave him my history at
some length; at which the worthy gentleman laughed many times, saying,
that I was a Barry all over. In the middle of my story he would stop
me, to make me stand back to back, and measure with him (by which I
ascertained that our heights were the same, and that my uncle had
a stiff knee, moreover, which made him walk in a peculiar way), and
uttered, during the course of the narrative, a hundred exclamations of
pity, and kindness, and sympathy. It was ‘Holy Saints!’ and ‘Mother of
Heaven!’ and ‘Blessed Mary!’ continually; by which, and with justice, I
concluded that he was still devotedly attached to the ancient faith of
our family.
It was with some difficulty that I came to explain to him the last part
of my history, viz., that I was put into his service as a watch upon his
actions, of which I was to give information in a certain quarter. When
I told him (with a great deal of hesitation) of this fact, he burst out
laughing, and enjoyed the joke amazingly. ‘The rascals!’ said he; ‘they
think to catch me, do they? Why, Redmond, my chief conspiracy is a
faro-bank. But the King is so jealous, that he will see a spy in every
person who comes to his miserable capital in the great sandy desert
here. Ah, my boy, I must show you Paris and Vienna!’
I said there was nothing I longed for more than to see any city but
Berlin, and should be delighted to be free of the odious military
service. Indeed, I thought, from his splendour of appearance, the
knickknacks about the room, the gilded carriage in the remise, that my
uncle was a man of vast property; and that he would purchase a dozen,
nay, a whole regiment of substitutes, in order to restore me to freedom.
But I was mistaken in my calculations regarding him, as his history of
himself speedily showed me. ‘I have been beaten about the world,’ said
he, ‘ever since the year 1742, when my brother your father (and Heaven
forgive him) cut my family estate from under my heels, by turning
heretic, in order to marry that scold of a mother of yours. Well, let
bygones be bygones. ‘Tis probable that I should have run through the
little property as he did in my place, and I should have had to begin
a year or two later the life I have been leading ever since I was
compelled to leave Ireland. My lad, I have been in every service;
and, between ourselves, owe money in every capital in Europe. I made a
campaign or two with the Pandours under Austrian Trenck. I was captain
in the Guard of His Holiness the Pope, I made the campaign of Scotland
with the Prince of Wales--a bad fellow, my dear, caring more for
his mistress and his brandy-bottle than for the crowns of the three
kingdoms. I have served in Spain and in Piedmont; but I have been a
rolling stone, my good fellow. Play--play has been my ruin; that and
beauty’ (here he gave a leer which made him, I must confess, look
anything but handsome; besides, his rouged cheeks were all beslobbered
with the tears which he had shed on receiving me). ‘The women have made
a fool of me, my dear Redmond. I am a soft-hearted creature, and this
minute, at sixty-two, have no more command of myself than when Peggy
O’Dwyer made a fool of me at sixteen.’
‘’Faith sir,’ says I, laughing, ‘I think it runs in the family!’ and
described to him, much to his amusement, my romantic passion for my
cousin, Nora Brady. He resumed his narrative.
‘The cards now are my only livelihood. Sometimes I am in luck, and then
I lay out my money in these trinkets you see. It’s property, look you,
Redmond; and the only way I have found of keeping a little about me.
When the luck goes against me, why, my dear, my diamonds go to the
pawnbrokers, and I wear paste. Friend Moses the goldsmith will pay me a
visit this very day; for the chances have been against me all the week
past, and I must raise money for the bank to-night. Do you understand
the cards?’
I replied that I could play as soldiers do, but had no great skill.
‘We will practise in the morning, my boy,’ said he, ‘and I’ll put you up
to a thing or two worth knowing.’
Of course I was glad to have such an opportunity of acquiring knowledge,
and professed myself delighted to receive my uncle’s instruction.
The Chevalier’s account of himself rather disagreeably affected me.
All his show was on his back, as he said. His carriage, with the fine
gilding, was a part of his stock in trade. He HAD a sort of mission from
the Austrian Court:--it was to discover whether a certain quantity of
alloyed ducats which had been traced to Berlin, were from the King’s
treasury. But the real end of Monsieur de Balibari was play. There was
a young attache of the English embassy, my Lord Deuceace, afterwards
Viscount and Earl of Crabs in the English peerage, who was playing high;
and it was after hearing of the passion of this young English nobleman
that my uncle, then at Prague, determined to visit Berlin and engage
him. For there is a sort of chivalry among the knights of the dice-box:
the fame of great players is known all over Europe. I have known the
Chevalier de Casanova, for instance, to travel six hundred miles, from
Paris to Turin, for the purpose of meeting Mr. Charles Fox, then only my
Lord Holland’s dashing son, afterwards the greatest of European orators
and statesmen.
It was agreed that I should keep my character of valet; that in the
presence of strangers I should not know a word of English; that I should
keep a good look-out on the trumps when I was serving the champagne and
punch about; and, having a remarkably fine eyesight and a great natural
aptitude, I was speedily able to give my dear uncle much assistance
against his opponents at the green table. Some prudish persons may
affect indignation at the frankness of these confessions, but Heaven
pity them! Do you suppose that any man who has lost or won a hundred
thousand pounds at play will not take the advantages which his neighbour
enjoys? They are all the same. But it is only the clumsy fool who
CHEATS; who resorts to the vulgar expedients of cogged dice and cut
cards. Such a man is sure to go wrong some time or other, and is not fit
to play in the society of gallant gentlemen; and my advice to people who
see such a vulgar person at his pranks is, of course, to back him
while he plays, but never--never to have anything to do with him. Play
grandly, honourably. Be not, of course, cast down at losing; but above
all, be not eager at winning, as mean souls are. And, indeed, with all
one’s skill and advantages, winning is often problematical; I have seen
a sheer ignoramus that knows no more of play than of Hebrew, blunder you
out of five thousand pounds in a few turns of the cards. I have seen a
gentleman and his confederate play against another and HIS confederate.
One never is secure in these cases: and when one considers the time and
labour spent, the genius, the anxiety, the outlay of money required, the
multiplicity of bad debts that one meets with (for dishonourable rascals
are to be found at the play-table, as everywhere else in the world),
I say, for my part, the profession is a bad one; and, indeed, have
scarcely ever met a man who, in the end, profited by it. I am writing
now with the experience of a man of the world. At the time I speak of I
was a lad, dazzled by the idea of wealth, and respecting, certainly too
much, my uncle’s superior age and station in life.
There is no need to particularise here the little arrangements made
between us; the playmen of the present day want no instruction, I take
it, and the public have little interest in the matter. But simplicity
was our secret. Everything successful is simple. If, for instance, I
wiped the dust off a chair with my napkin, it was to show that the enemy
was strong in diamonds; if I pushed it, he had ace, king; if I said,
‘Punch or wine, my Lord?’ hearts was meant; if ‘Wine or punch?’ clubs.
If I blew my nose, it was to indicate that there was another confederate
employed by the adversary; and THEN, I warrant you, some pretty trials
of skill would take place. My Lord Deuceace, although so young, had a
very great skill and cleverness with the cards in every way; and it was
only from hearing Frank Punter, who came with him, yawn three times when
the Chevalier had the ace of trumps, that I knew we were Greek to Greek,
as it were.
My assumed dulness was perfect; and I used to make Monsieur de
Potzdorff laugh with it, when I carried my little reports to him at
the Garden-house outside the town where he gave me rendezvous. These
reports, of course, were arranged between me and my uncle beforehand. I
was instructed (and it is always far the best way) to tell as much truth
as my story would possibly bear. When, for instance, he would ask me,
‘What does the Chevalier do of a morning?’
‘He goes to church regularly’ (he was very religious), ‘and after
hearing mass comes home to breakfast. Then he takes an airing in his
chariot till dinner, which is served at noon. After dinner he writes his
letters, if he have any letters to write: but he has very little to
do in this way. His letters are to the Austrian envoy, with whom he
corresponds, but who does not acknowledge him; and being written in
English, of course I look over his shoulder. He generally writes for
money. He says he wants it to bribe the secretaries of the Treasury,
in order to find out really where the alloyed ducats come from; but,
in fact, he wants it to play of evenings, when he makes his party with
Calsabigi, the lottery-contractor, the Russian attaches, two from the
English embassy, my Lords Deuceace and Punter, who play a jeu d’enfer,
and a few more. The same set meet every night at supper: there are
seldom any ladies; those who come are chiefly French ladies, members of
the corps de ballet. He wins often, but not always. Lord Deuceace is a
very fine player. The Chevalier Elliot, the English Minister, sometimes
comes, on which occasion the secretaries do not play. Monsieur de
Balibari dines at the missions, but en petit comite, not on grand days
of reception. Calsabigi, I think, is his confederate at play. He has
won lately; but the week before last he pledged his solitaire for four
hundred ducats.’
‘Do he and the English attaches talk together in their own language?’
‘Yes; he and the envoy spoke yesterday for half-an-hour about the new
danseuse and the American troubles: chiefly about the new danseuse.’
It will be seen that the information I gave was very minute and
accurate, though not very important. But such as it was, it was carried
to the ears of that famous hero and warrior the Philosopher of Sans
Souci; and there was not a stranger who entered the capital but his
actions were similarly spied and related to Frederick the Great.
As long as the play was confined to the young men of the different
embassies, His Majesty did not care to prevent it; nay, he encouraged
play at all the missions, knowing full well that a man in difficulties
can be made to speak, and that a timely rouleau of Frederics would
often get him a secret worth many thousands. He got some papers from
the French house in this way: and I have no doubt that my Lord Deuceace
would have supplied him with information at a similar rate, had his
chief not known the young nobleman’s character pretty well, and had
(as is usually the case) the work of the mission performed by a steady
roturier, while the young brilliant bloods of the suite sported their
embroidery at the balls, or shook their Mechlin ruffles over the green
tables at faro. I have seen many scores of these young sprigs since,
of these and their principals, and, mon Dieu! what fools they are! What
dullards, what fribbles, what addle-headed simple coxcombs! This is one
of the lies of the world, this diplomacy; or how could we suppose, that
were the profession as difficult as the solemn red-box and tape-men
would have us believe, they would invariably choose for it little
pink-faced boys from school, with no other claim than mamma’s title, and
able at most to judge of a curricle, a new dance, or a neat boot?
When it became known, however, to the officers of the garrison that
there was a faro-table in town, they were wild to be admitted to the
sport; and, in spite of my entreaties to the contrary, my uncle was
not averse to allow the young gentlemen their fling, and once or twice
cleared a handsome sum out of their purses. It was in vain I told him
that I must carry the news to my captain, before whom his comrades would
not fail to talk, and who would thus know of the intrigue even without
my information.
‘Tell him,’ said my uncle.
‘They will send you away,’ said I; ‘then what is to become of me?’
‘Make your mind easy,’ said the latter, with a smile; ‘you shall not be
left behind, I warrant you. Go take a last look at your barracks, make
your mind easy; say a farewell to your friends in Berlin. The dear
souls, how they will weep when they hear you are out of the country;
and, as sure as my name is Barry, out of it you shall go!’
‘But how, sir?’ said I.
‘Recollect Mr. Fakenham of Fakenham,’ said he knowingly. ‘’Tis you
yourself taught me how. Go get me one of my wigs. Open my despatch-box
yonder, where the great secrets of the Austrian Chancery lie; put your
hair back off your forehead; clap me on this patch and these moustaches,
and now look in the glass!’
‘The Chevalier de Balibari,’ said I, bursting with laughter, and began
walking the room in his manner with his stiff knee.
The next day, when I went to make my report to Monsieur de Potzdorff, I
told him of the young Prussian officers that had been of late gambling;
and he replied, as I expected, that the King had determined to send the
Chevalier out of the country.
‘He is a stingy curmudgeon,’ I replied; ‘I have had but three Frederics
from him in two months, and I hope you will remember your promise to
advance me!’
‘Why, three Frederics were too much for the news you have picked up,’
said the Captain, sneering.
‘It is not my fault that there has been no more,’ I replied. ‘When is he
to go, sir?’
‘The day after to-morrow. You say he drives after breakfast and before
dinner. When he comes out to his carriage, a couple of gendarmes will
mount the box, and the coachman will get his orders to move on.’
‘And his baggage, sir?’ said I.
‘Oh! that will be sent after him. I have a fancy to look into that red
box which contains his papers, you say; and at noon, after parade, shall
be at the inn. You will not say a word to any one there regarding the
affair, and will wait for me at the Chevalier’s rooms until my arrival.
We must force that box. You are a clumsy hound, or you would have got
the key long ago!’
I begged the Captain to remember me, and so took my leave of him. The
next night I placed a couple of pistols under the carriage seat; and
I think the adventures of the following day are quite worthy of the
honours of a separate chapter.