Although all the motives of human action have long been known--although
psychology, or the science of soul and sentiment, has ceased to present
us with any new facts--it is quite certain that our edifice of Morals is
not quite built up. We may rest assured that as long as intellectual man
exists the problem will be considered unsolved, and the question will
be agitated. Future generations will destroy what we establish, and will
fashion a something according to their advancement, and so on; for
if there be a term which, of all others, should be expunged from the
dictionaries of all human beings, it seems to be Lord Russell's word
FINALITY. Something NEW will always be wanted. 'Sensation' is the very
life of humanity; it is motion--the reverse of 'death'--which we all
abhor.
The gamester lives only for the 'sensation' of gaming. Menage tells us
of a gamester who declared that he had never seen any luminary above the
horizon but the moon. Saint Evremond, writing to the Count de Grammont,
says--'You play from morning to night, or rather from night to morning.
All the rays of the gamester's existence terminate in play; it is on
this centre that his very existence depends. He enjoys not an hour of
calm or serenity. During the day he longs for night, and during the
night he dreads the return of day.'
Being always pre-occupied, gamesters are subject to a ridiculous absence
of mind. Tacitus tells us that the Emperor Vitellius was so torpid that
he would have forgotten he was a prince unless people had reminded him
of it from time to time.(8) Many gamesters have forgotten that they were
husbands and fathers. During play some one said that the government were
about to levy a tax on bachelors. 'Then I shall be ruined!' exclaimed
one of the players absorbed in the game. 'Why, man, you have a wife and
five children,' said the speaker.
(8) Tanta torpedo invaserat animum Vitellii, ut si principem eum fuisse
non meminissent, ipse oblivisceretur. Hist., lib. iii.
This infatuation may be simply ridiculous; but it has also a horrible
aspect. A distracted wife has rushed to the gaming table, imploring her
husband, who had for two entire days been engaged at play, to return to
his home.
'Only let me stay one moment longer--only one moment. . . . . I shall
return perhaps the day after to-morrow,' he stammered out to the
wretched woman, who retired. Alas! he returned sooner than he had
promised. His wife was in bed, holding the last of her children to her
breast.
'Get up, madam,' said the ruined gambler, 'the bed on which you lie
belongs to us no longer!' . . .
When the gamester is fortunate, he enjoys his success elsewhere; to his
home he brings only consternation.
A wife had received the most solemn promise from her husband that he
would gamble no more. One night, however, he slunk out of bed, rushed
to the gaming table, and lost all the money he had with him. He tried
to borrow more, but was refused. He went home. His wife had taken the
precaution to lock the drawer that contained their last money. Vain
obstacle! The madman broke it open, carried off two thousand crowns--to
take his revenge, as he said, but in reality to lose the whole as
before.
But it is to the gaming room that we must go to behold the progress of
the terrible drama--the ebb and flow of opposite movements--the shocks
of alternate hope and fear, infinitely varied in the countenance,
not only of the actors, but also of the spectators. What is visible,
however, is nothing in comparison to the secret agony. It is in his
heart that the tempest roars most fiercely.
Two players once exhibited their rage, the one by a mournful silence,
the other by repeated imprecations. The latter, shocked at the
sang-froid of his neighbour, reproached him for enduring, without
complaint, such losses one after the other. 'Look here!' said the other,
uncovering his breast and displaying it all bloody with lacerations.
It is only at play that we can observe, from moment to moment, all the
phases of despair; from time to time there occur new ones--strange,
eccentric, or terrible. After having lost quietly, and even with
serenity, half his fortune, the father of a family staked the remainder,
and lost it without a murmur. Facere solent extrema securos mala.(9)
The bystanders looked at him; his features changed not; only it was
perceived that they were fixed. It seemed that he was unconscious of
life. Two streams of tears trickled from his eyes, and yet his features
remained the same. He was literally a weeping statue. The spectators
were seized with fright, and, although gamesters, they melted into pity.
(9) 'Great calamities render us CARELESS.'
At Bayonne, in 1725, a French officer, in a rage at billiards, jammed a
billiard-ball in his mouth, where it stuck fast, arresting respiration,
until it was, with difficulty, extracted by a surgeon. Dusaulx
states that he was told the fact by a lieutenant-general, who was an
eye-witness.
It is well known that gamblers, like dogs that bite a stone flung at
them, have eaten up the cards, crushed up the dice, broken the tables,
damaged the furniture, and finally 'pitched into' each other--as
described by Lucian in his Saturnalia. Dusaulx assures us that he saw
an enraged gambler put a burning candle into his mouth, chew it, and
swallow it. A mad player at Naples bit the table with such violence that
his teeth went deep into the wood; thus he remained, as it were, nailed
to it, and suddenly expired.
The other players took to flight; the officers of justice visited the
place; and the corpse was deprived of the usual ceremony of burial.(10)
(10) Gazette de Deux-Ponts, du 26 Novembre, 1772.
The following strange but apparently authentic fact, is related in the
Mercure Francois (Tome I. Annee 1610).
'A man named Pennichon, being a prisoner in the Conciergerie during the
month of September, 1610, died there of a wonderfully sudden death. He
could not refrain from play. Having one day lost his money, he uttered
frightful imprecations against his body and against his soul, swearing
that he would never play at cards again. Nevertheless, a few days after,
he began to play again with those in his apartment, and on a dispute
respecting discarding, he repeated his execrable oaths. And when one of
the company told him he should fear the Divine justice, he only swore
the more, and made such confusion that there had to be another deal. But
as soon as three other cards were given him, he placed them in his hat,
which he held before him, and whilst looking at them, with his elbows
on the table and his face in the hat, he so suddenly expired that one
of the party said--"Come, now play," and pushed him with his elbow,
thinking he was asleep, when he fell down dead upon the floor.'
In some cases the effect of losses at play is simply stupefaction. Some
players, at the end of the sitting, neither know what they do nor
what they say. M. de Crequi, afterwards Duc de Lesdiguieres, leaving a
gambling party with Henry IV., after losing a large sum, met M. de Guise
in the court-yard of the castle. 'My friend,' said he to the latter,
'where are the quarters of the Guards now-a-days?' M. de Guise stepped
back, saying, 'Excuse me, sir, I don't belong to this country,' and
immediately went to the king, whom he greatly amused with the anecdote.
A dissipated buck, who had been sitting all night at Hazard, went to a
church, not far from St James's, just before the second reading of the
Lord's Prayer, on Sunday. He was scarcely seated before he dozed, and
the clerk in a short time bawled out AMEN, which he pronounced A--main.
The buck jumped up half asleep and roared out, 'I'll bet the caster 20
guineas!' The congregation was thrown into a titter, and the buck ran
out, overwhelmed with shame. A similar anecdote is told of another
'dissipated buck' in a church. The grand masquerade given on the opening
of the Union Club House, in Pall Mall, was not entirely over till a late
hour on the following Sunday. A young man nearly intoxicated--certainly
not knowing what he was about--reeled into St. James's church, in
his masquerade dress, with his hat on. The late Rev. Thomas Bracken,
attracted by the noise of his entrance, looked directly at him as he
chanced to deliver the following words:--'Friend! how camest thou in
hither, not having on a wedding garment?' It seemed so to strike the
culprit that he instantly took off his hat and withdrew in confusion.
At play, a winner redoubles his caution and sang-froid just in
proportion as his adversary gets bewildered by his losses, becoming
desperate; he takes advantage of the weakness of the latter, giving
him the law, and striving for greater success. When the luck changes,
however, the case is reversed, and the former loser becomes, in his
turn, ten times more pitiless--like that Roman prefect, mentioned by
Tacitus, who was the more inexorable because he had been harshly treated
in his youth, co immmitior quia toleraverat. The joy at winning back
his money only makes a gamester the more covetous of winning that of
his adversary. A wealthy man once lost 100,000 crowns, and begged to be
allowed to go and sell his property, which was worth double the amount
he had lost. 'Why sell it?' said his adversary; 'let us play for the
remainder.' They played; luck changed; and the late LOSER ruined the
other.
Sometimes avidity makes terrible mistakes; many, in order to win more,
have lost their all to persons who had not a shilling to lose. During
the depth of a severe winter, a gamester beheld with terror the bottom
of his purse. Unable to resolve on quitting the gaming table--for
players in that condition are always the most stubborn--he shouted to
his valet--'Go and fetch my great sack.' These words, uttered without
design, stimulated the cupidity of those who no longer cared to play
with him, and now they were eager for it. His luck changed, and he won
thrice as much as he had lost. Then his 'great sack' was brought to him:
it was a BEAR-SKIN SACK he used as a cloak!
In the madness of gaming the player stakes everything after losing his
money--his watch, his rings, his clothing; and some have staked their
EARS, and others their very LIVES--instances of all which will be
related in the sequel.
Not very long ago a publican, who lost all his money, staked his
public-house, lost it, and had to 'clear out.' The man who won it is
alive and flourishing.
'The debt of honour must be paid: 'these are the terrible words that
haunt the gamester as he wakes (if he has slept) on the morning after
the night of horrors: these are the furies that take him in hand, and
drag him to torture, laughing the while. . . .
What a 'sensation' it must be to lose one's ALL! A man, intoxicated
with his gains, left one gaming house and entered another. As soon as he
entered he exclaimed, 'Well, I am filled, my pockets are full of gold,
and here goes, ODDS OR EVEN?' 'Odds,' cried a player. It was ODDS, and
the fortunate winner pocketed the enormous sum just boasted of by the
other.
On the other hand, sudden prosperity has deranged more heads and killed
more people than reverses and grief; either because it takes a longer
time to get convinced of utter ruin than great good fortune, or because
the instinct of self-preservation compels us to seek, in adversity, for
resources to mitigate despair; whereas, in the assault of excessive joy,
the soul's spring is distended and broken when it is suddenly compressed
by too many thoughts and too many sensations. Sophocles, Diagoras,
Philippides, died of joy. Another Greek expired at the sight of the
three crowns won by his three sons at the Olympic games.
Many fine intellects among players have been brutified by loses; others,
in greater number, have been so by their winnings. Some in the course of
their prosperity perish from idleness, get deranged, and ruin themselves
after ruining others. An instance is mentioned of an officer who won
so enormously that he actually lost his senses in counting his gains.
Astonished at himself, he thought he was no longer an ordinary mortal;
and required his valets to do him extraordinary honours, flinging
handfuls of gold to them. The same night, however, he returned to the
gaming house, and recovered from his madness when he had lost not only
all his gains, but even the value of an appointment which he held.
UNFORTUNATE WINNING.
M. G--me was a most estimable man, combining in himself the best
qualities of both heart and head. He was good-humoured, witty, and
benevolent. With these qualifications, and one other which seldom
operates to a man's disadvantage--a clear income of three thousand a
year--the best society in Paris was open to him. He had been a visitor
in that capital about a month, when he received an invitation to one of
the splendid dinners given weekly at the salon. As he never played, he
hesitated about the propriety of accepting it, but on the assurance that
it would not be expected of him to play; and, moreover, as he might not
again have so good an opportunity of visiting an establishment of the
kind, he resolved to go--merely for the satisfaction of his curiosity.
He had a few stray napoleons in his purse, to throw them--'just for the
good of the house,' as he considered it--could hardly be called PLAY,
so he threw them. Poor fellow! He left off a winner of fourteen hundred
napoleons, or about as many pounds sterling--and so easily won! He went
again, again, and again; but he was not always a winner; and within
fifteen months of the moment when his hand first grasped the dice-box he
was lying dead in a jail!
LORD WORTHALL'S DESPERATE WAGER.
At a gambling party Lord Worthall had lost all his money, and in a fit
of excitement staked his whole estate against L1000, at cutting low with
cards, and in cutting exclaimed,--
'Up now Deuce, or else a Trey,
Or Worthall's gone for ever and aye.'
He had the luck to cut the deuce of diamonds; and to commemorate the
serious event, he got the deuce of diamonds cut in marble and had it
fixed on the parapet of his mansion.
THE CELEBRATED THADDEUS STEVENS.
He was an inveterate gamester on a small scale, and almost invariably,
after a day's duty in the House, would drop in at a favourite casino,
and win or lose fifty dollars--that being the average limit of his
betting.
A PROVIDENT GAMBLER.
A Monsieur B--, well known in Parisian life, having recently lost every
shilling at a certain sporting club where play is carried on in Paris,
went to the country, where his sister lent him L150.
He won all back again, and got a considerable sum of money in hand. He
then went to his hotel, to his bootmaker, and tailor, paid them, and
made arrangements to be fed, clothed, and shod for ten years.
A MAGNIFICENT FORTUNE WASTED.
Lord Foley, who died in 1793, entered upon the turf with an estate
of L18,000 per annum, and L100,000 ready money. He left with a ruined
constitution, an encumbered estate, and not a shilling of ready money!
AN ENTERPRISING CLERK.
Lord Kenyon, in 1795, tried a clerk 'for misapplying his master's
confidence,' and the facts were as follows. He went with a bank note
of L1000 to a gaming house in Osendon Street, where he won a little.
He also won two hundred guineas at another in Suffolk Street. He next
accompanied some keepers of a third house to their tables, where he
lost above nine hundred pounds. He played there almost every night; and
finally lost about L2500!
GAMBLING FOR RECRUITS FOR THE ARMY.
An Irish officer struck out a mode of gambling, for recruits. He
gave five guineas bounty, and one hundred to be raffled for by young
recruits,--the winner to be paid immediately, and to purchase his
discharge, if he pleased, for L20. The dice-box was constantly going at
his recruiting office in Dublin.
DOUBLING THE STAKES.
A dashing young man of large fortune, about the year 1820, lost at a
subscription house at the West End, L80,000. The winner was a person
of high rank. The young man, however, by doubling the stakes, not
only recovered his losses, but in his turn gained considerably of his
antagonist.
AN ANNUITY FOR A GAMBLING DEBT.
A fashionable nobleman had won from a young and noble relative the sum
of L40,000. The cash not being forthcoming, he accepted an annuity of
L4000.
SIR WILLIAM COLEPEPPER.
It is told of Sir William Colepepper that, after he had been ruined
himself at the gaming table, his whole delight was to sit there and see
others ruined. Hardened wretch--'Who though he plays no more, overlooks
the cards'--with this diabolical disposition!
THE BITER BITTEN.
A certain duchess, of a ci-devant lord-lieutenant, who expected to make
a pigeon of Marshal Blucher, was fleeced of L200,000; to pay which her
lord was obliged to sell a great part of his property, and reside on the
continent.
HUNTED DOWN.
A stout-hearted and gallant military baronet lost an immense sum at a
celebrated gaming house; but was so fortunate as to recover it, with
L1200 more. This last sum HE PRESENTED TO THE WAITERS. He was pursued by
two of the 'play-wrights' to a northern watering-place, where he was
so plucked that all his possessions were brought to the hammer. A
competency was, however, saved from the magnificent wreck.
COMING OF AGE.
When Sir C-- T--, a weak young man, with a large fortune, came of age,
the Greeks, thinking him an excellent quarry, went to York Races, made
him drunk and plundered him of a large sum. The next morning one of the
party waited upon him to acquaint him of his loss--(L20,000 or L30,000),
and brought bonds for his signature to that amount!
HEAVY LIABILITIES TO BEGIN WITH.
In the year 1799, when the Marquis of Donegal succeeded to the title
on his father's death, his debts, principally to gamblers and
money-lenders, amounted to two hundred and fifty thousand pounds
sterling!
A GENTLEMAN TURNED BARBER.
In an old magazine I find the following curious statement:--
'There is now living in Barnaby Street, Carnaby Market, a man who,
although exercising the menial office of penny barber, was in his
younger days in possession of estates and personal property to a large
amount, and is the only lineal descendant remaining of the very ancient
family of the H--s of Bristol.
'His relations dying when he was young, he was placed under proper
guardians, and received a liberal education, first at Westminster, and
afterwards at Cambridge, suitable to his rank and fortune. When of age
he converted his estates into money, and retired to Dublin, where he
remained some time. He then made the tour of Europe, and returned to
Ireland, where he went through all the scenes of dissipation to which
young men are so much addicted, till at last he was beset by those
harpies the gamblers, and stripped of his immense fortune in one single
night!
'He then subsisted for some little time on the bounty of his undoers,
who intended to make him one of them; but, not having sufficient address
for the profession, he was dismissed and "left in the lurch;" and most
of his friends discarding him, he embarked with his last guinea for
England. Here he has encountered many difficulties, often been in gaol
for debt, and passed through various scenes of life, as valet, footman,
thief-taker, and at length, a penny-barber! He has a wife and large
family and lives in a very penurious manner, often lamenting his early
folly.'(11)
(11) 'The Western County Magazine, 1791. By a Society of Gentlemen.'
This well-conducted old magazine was printed and published at Salisbury,
and was decidedly a credit to the town and county.
PENSIONED OFF BY A GAMING HOUSE.
A visitor at Frascati's gaming house in Paris tells us:--
'I saw the Chevalier de la C--(a descendant of the once celebrated
romance-writer) when he was nearly ninety. The mode of life of this old
man was singular. He had lost a princely property at the play-table,
and by a piece of good fortune of rare occurrence to gamesters, and
unparalleled generosity, the proprietors of the salon allowed him a
pension to support him in his miserable senility, just sufficient to
supply him with a wretched lodging--bread, and a change of raiment
once in every three or four years! In addition to this he was allowed a
supper--which was, in fact, his dinner--at the gaming house, whither he
went every night at about eleven o'clock. Till supper-time (two o'clock
in the morning) he amused himself in watching the games and calculating
the various chances, although incapable of playing a single coup. At
four o'clock he returned to his lodging, retired to bed, and lay till
between nine and ten o'clock on the following night. A cup of coffee was
then brought to him, and, having dressed himself, at the usual hour
he again proceeded to the salon. This had been his round of life for
several years; and he told me that during all that time (excepting on a
few mornings about Midsummer) he had never beheld the sun!'
A Mr R--y, son of a baronet, left Wattier's club one night with only L4
in his pocket, saying that he would look in at the hells.
He did so, and, returning after three o'clock in the morning, offered to
bet L500 that he had above L4000. The result proved that he had L4300,
all won at gaming tables, from the small beginning of L4. He then sat
down to play games of skill at Wattier's, and went home at six o'clock
without a single pound! The same man subsequently won L30,000, and
afterwards lost it all, with L15,000 more, and then 'went to the
Continent.'
A major of the Rifle Brigade, in consequence of gambling in London, by
which he lost vast sums of money, went out of his senses and died a
few years ago in an asylum. This occurred within the last ten or twelve
years.
Says Mr Seymour Harcourt, in his 'Gaming Calendar,' 'I have myself seen
hanging in chains a man whom, a short time before, I saw at a Hazard
table!'
Hogarth lent his tremendous power to the portrayal of the ruined
gamester, and shows it to the life in his print of the gaming house in
the 'Rake's Progress.'
Three stages of that species of madness which attends gaming are there
described. On the first shock all is inward dismay. The ruined gamester
is represented leaning against a wall with his arms across, lost in an
agony of horror. Shortly after this horrible gloom bursts into a storm
and fury. He tears in pieces whatever comes near him, and, kneeling
down, invokes curses on himself. His next attack is on others--on every
one whom he imagines to have been instrumental in his ruin. The eager
joy of the winning gamester, the attention of the usurer, and the
profound reverie of the highwayman, are all strongly marked in this
wonderful picture.
HOW MANY GAMESTERS LIVE BY PLAY?
It is an observation made by those who calculate on the gaming world,
that above nine-tenths of the persons who play LIVE by it.
Now, as the ordinary establishment of a GENTEEL gamester, as he is
commonly called, cannot be less than L1000 per annum, luck, which turns
out EQUAL in the long run, will not support him; he must therefore LIVE
by what they call among themselves the BEST OF THE GAME--or, in plain
English, cheating.
So much for the inner and outer life of gamblers. And now I shall
introduce Mr Ben. Disraeli, recounting, in the happiest vein of his
younger days, a magnificent gambling scene, quite on a par with the
legend of the Hindoo epic before quoted,(12) and which, I doubt not,
will (to use the young Disraeli's own words) make the reader 'scud along
and warm up into friskiness.'
(12) Chapter II.
A curious phrase occurs in the 9th chapter of 'The Young Duke,' in the
paragraph at the beginning, after the words--'O ye immortal gods!'
Although the scene of the drama is part of a novel, yet there can be no
doubt of its being 'founded on fact'--at any rate, I think there never
was a narrative of greater verisimilitude.
'After dinner, with the exception of Cogit, who was busied in
compounding some wonderful liquid for the future refreshment, they sat
down to Ecarte. Without having exchanged a word upon the subject, there
seemed a general understanding among all the parties, that to-night was
to be a pitched battle--and they began at once, very briskly. Yet,
in spite of their universal determination, midnight arrived without
anything very decisive. Another hour passed over, and then Tom Cogit
kept touching the baron's elbow, and whispering in a voice which
everybody could understand. All this meant that supper was ready. It was
brought into the room.
'Gaming has one advantage--it gives you an appetite; that is to say,
so long as you have a chance remaining. The duke had thousands,--for
at present his resources were unimpaired, and he was exhausted by
the constant attention and anxiety of five hours. He passed over the
delicacies, and went to the side-table, and began cutting himself some
cold roast beef. Tom Cogit ran up, not to his Grace, but to the baron,
to announce the shocking fact, that the Duke of St James was enduring
great trouble; and then the baron asked his Grace to permit Mr Cogit to
serve him.
'Our hero devoured--we use the word advisedly, as fools say in the House
of Commons--he devoured the roast beef, and rejecting the hermitage with
disgust, asked for porter.
'They set to again, fresh as eagles. At six o'clock, accounts were so
complicated, that they stopped to make up their books. Each played with
his memorandums and pencil at his side. Nothing fatal had yet happened.
The duke owed Lord Dice about L5000, and Temple Grace owed him as many
hundreds. Lord Castlefort also was his debtor to the tune of 750, and
the baron was in his books, but slightly.
'Every half-hour they had a new pack of cards, and threw the used ones
on the floor. All this time Tom Cogit did nothing but snuff the candles,
stir the fire, bring them a new pack, and occasionally made a tumbler
for them.
'At eight o'clock the duke's situation was worsened. The run was greatly
against him, and perhaps his losses were doubled. He pulled up again
the next hour or two; but, nevertheless, at ten o'clock owed every one
something. No one offered to give over; and every one, perhaps, felt
that his object was not obtained. They made their toilets, and went
down-stairs to breakfast. In the mean time the shutters were opened, the
room aired; and in less than an hour they were at it again.
'They played till dinner-time without intermission; and though the duke
made some desperate efforts, and some successful ones, his losses were,
nevertheless, trebled. Yet he ate an excellent dinner, and was not at
all depressed; because the more he lost the more his courage and his
resources seemed to expand. At first, he had limited himself to 10,000;
after breakfast, it was to have been 20,000; then 30,000 was the
ultimatum; and now he dismissed all thoughts of limits from his mind,
and was determined to risk or gain everything.
'At midnight he had lost L48,000.
'Affairs now began to be serious. His supper was not so hearty. While
the rest were eating, he walked about the room, and began to limit his
ambition to recovery, and not to gain.
'When you play to win back, the fun is over: there is nothing to
recompense you for your bodily tortures and your degraded feelings; and
the very best result that can happen, while it has no charms, seems to
your cowed mind impossible.
'On they played, and the duke lost more. His mind was jaded. He
floundered--he made desperate efforts, but plunged deeper in the slough.
Feeling that, to regain his ground, each card must tell, he acted on
each as if it must win, and the consequences of this insanity (for a
gamester at such a crisis is really insane) were, that his losses were
prodigious.
'Another morning came, and there they sat, ankle-deep in cards. No
attempt at breakfast now--no affectation of making a toilet, or airing
the room. The atmosphere was hot, to be sure, but it well became such a
hell. There they sat, in total, in positive forgetfulness of everything
but the hot game they were hunting down. There was not a man in the
room, except Tom Cogit, who could have told you the name of the town
in which they were living. There they sat, almost breathless, watching
every turn with the fell look in their cannibal eyes, which showed their
total inability to sympathize with their fellow-beings. All the forms of
society had been forgotten. There was no snuff-box handed about now, for
courtesy, admiration, or a pinch; no affectation of occasionally making
a remark upon any other topic but the all-engrossing one.
'Lord Castlefort rested with his arms on the table:--a false tooth had
got unhinged. His Lordship, who, at any other time, would have been
most annoyed, coolly put it in his pocket. His cheeks had fallen, and he
looked twenty years older.
'Lord Dice had torn off his cravat, and his hair flung down over his
callous, bloodless checks, straight as silk.
'Temple Grace looked as if he were blighted by lightning; and his
deep-blue eyes gleamed like a hyaena.
'The baron was least changed.
'Tom Cogit, who smelt that the crisis was at hand, was as quiet as a
bribed rat.
'On they played till six o'clock in the evening, and then they agreed
to desist till after dinner. Lord Dice threw himself on a sofa. Lord
Castlefort breathed with difficulty. The rest walked about. While they
were resting on their oars, the young duke roughly made up his accounts.
He found that he was minus about L100,000.
'Immense as this loss was, he was more struck--more appalled, let us
say--at the strangeness of the surrounding scene, than even by his own
ruin. As he looked upon his fellow-gamesters, he seemed, for the first
time in his life, to gaze upon some of those hideous demons of whom he
had read. He looked in the mirror at himself. A blight seemed to have
fallen over his beauty, and his presence seemed accursed. He had pursued
a dissipated, even more than a dissipated, career. Many were the
nights that had been spent by him not on his couch; great had been the
exhaustion that he had often experienced; haggard had sometimes even
been the lustre of his youth. But when had been marked upon his brow
this harrowing care? When had his features before been stamped with
this anxiety, this anguish, this baffled desire, this strange, unearthly
scowl, which made him even tremble? What! was it possible?--it could not
be--that in time he was to be like those awful, those unearthly, those
unhallowed things that were around him. He felt as if he had fallen from
his state, as if he had dishonoured his ancestry, as if he had betrayed
his trust. He felt a criminal.
'In the darkness of his meditations a flash burst from his lurid mind,
a celestial light appeared to dissipate this thickening gloom, and his
soul felt, as it were, bathed with the softening radiancy. He thought
of May Dacre, he thought of everything that was pure, and holy, and
beautiful, and luminous, and calm. It was the innate virtue of the
man that made this appeal to his corrupted nature. His losses seemed
nothing; his dukedom would be too slight a ransom for freedom from these
ghouls, and for the breath of the sweet air.
'He advanced to the baron, and expressed his desire to play no more.
There was an immediate stir. All jumped up, and now the deed was done.
Cant, in spite of their exhaustion, assumed her reign. They begged him
to have his revenge,--were quite annoyed at the result,--had no doubt he
would recover if he proceeded.
'Without noticing their remarks, he seated himself at the table, and
wrote cheques for their respective amounts, Tom Cogit jumping up and
bringing him the inkstand. Lord Castlefort, in the most affectionate
manner, pocketed the draft; at the same time recommending the duke not
to be in a hurry, but to send it when he was cool. Lord Dice received
his with a bow, Temple Grace with a sigh, the baron with an avowal of
his readiness always to give him his revenge.
'The duke, though sick at heart, would not leave the room with
any evidence of a broken spirit; and when Lord Castlefort again
repeated--"Pay us when we meet again," he said, "I think it very
improbable that we shall meet again, my Lord. I wished to know what
gaming was. I had heard a great deal about it. It is not so very
disgusting; but I am a young man, and cannot play tricks with my
complexion."
'He reached his house. The Bird was out. He gave orders for himself not
to be disturbed, and he went to bed; but in vain he tried to sleep. What
rack exceeds the torture of an excited brain and an exhausted body? His
hands and feet were like ice, his brow like fire; his ears rung with
supernatural roaring; a nausea had seized upon him, and death he would
have welcomed. In vain, in vain he courted repose; in vain he had
recourse to every expedient to wile himself to slumber. Each minute he
started from his pillow with some phrase which reminded him of his late
fearful society. Hour after hour moved on with its leaden pace; each
hour he heard strike, and each hour seemed an age. Each hour was only
a signal to cast off some covering, or shift his position. It was, at
length, morning. With a feeling that he should go mad if he remained any
longer in bed, he rose, and paced his chamber. The air refreshed him.
He threw himself on the floor, the cold crept over his senses, and he
slept.'(13)
(13) 'The Young Duke,' by B. Disraeli, chapter VIII. This gambling
is the turning-point in the young duke's career; he proves himself
at length not unworthy of his noble ancestry arm his high hereditary
position,--takes his place in the Senate, and weds the maiden of his
love.