A CASE of some interest to Self-made Men, the conviction of a boy fined
half-a-crown for playing, with some other boys, the game of "brag,"
occasioned Mr. SHIEL, on the Southwark Bench, to observe that "Gambling
was the first step towards crime. Boys who began with gambling, very
often ended by being thieves." Too often, perhaps, but, it may be hoped,
not always. The boy who begins by playing at pitch-and-toss, surely
doesn't always grow up to be a man who actually commits manslaughter. He
may possibly stop short of larceny, burglary, or housebreaking, and do
nothing worse than getting a useless, but not absolutely criminal
livelihood, by betting on the Derby and the St. Leger, or speculating on
the Stock Exchange.
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[Illustration: FORM.
_Public School Boy (to General Sir George, G.C.B., G.S.I., V.C., &c. &c.
&c.)_ "I SAY, GRANDPAPA,--A--WOULD YOU MIND JUST PUTTING ON YOUR HAT _A
LITTLE STRAIGHTER?_ HERE COMES _CODGERS_--HE'S AWFULLY PARTICULAR--AND
HE'S THE _CAPTAIN OF OUR ELEVEN, YOU KNOW!_"]
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