no answer. PARISIAN GAMBLING-HOUSE DINNER. We went down again | entered, and with pantomimic gestures I gave the inquirer to understand, that this was the man who could furnish satisfactory information concerning me. The portly gentleman-a marquis, as I afterwards learned, who is appointed by the society to which the house belongs, to do the honours of it-then asked my companion, who with several bows explained that he had brought me with him, who he was himself. My friend gave his name. The marquis replied, that he had not the honour of his acquaintance; on which Mr. Corduroy for the third time produced his ticket. The marquis then bade to the servants' hall. Being again asked our business, the tickets of admission were once more produced, on which one of these gentry took charge of our hats, and conducted us to the company. On entering, I remarked that several of its members looked gravely at my feet, and I perceived with consternation that I was the only one of the party who appeared in boots. I took a seat at a table on which lay several ultra newspapers, for the purpose of concealing my legs. After conning these journals for some time, a tall portly man, of a majestic figure, which reminded me of the description of Louisus welcome, and on learning that we XIV. came up to me, and inquired who I was, and what was my plea sure. The chin of this personage was buried in his cravat, which was a bad sign: for those who are engaged in the study of mankind may take it for a rule, that people who muffle up their chins in cravats are to be trusted very little, if at all. was instantly aware of my ticklish situation, and had the presence of mind to pretend not to understand him. As, however, it was absolutely necessary to give him some answer, I determined to reply in a language which he did not understand. But what language was that to be? The generality of Frenchmen indeed know none but their mother tongue, but gamblers are cosmopolites, they are polyglots. I therefore hastily dished up for him a lingual ragout, compounded of our English Sir, the German Herr, and the Italian Sig noro. were English, observed that he too had once been in London. We were presently summoned to dinner. During my continental tour I had certainly seen several German courts at table, but I had only a bird's-eye view of them from the gallery. This was the first time that II had actually partaken of so sumptuous an entertainment. Well might it be denominated royal. Luckily I was not that day in a sentimental mood, otherwise I should not have been able to taste a morsel. I should have fancied that all these dishes were steeped in blood and tears shed by the despairing wretches and suicides who are daily plundered in the gambling-houses of Paris. I must, however, observe, that the whole party seemed to have excellent appetites, which was a pleasing sign of some remains of virtue; for consummate gamblers and sharpers live, it is well known, like anchorets, and eat and drink sparingly. This olla podrida produced the desired effect. The grand point namely was, to gain time till my Manchester friend, who had just left the room, should return. At length he At the centre of the oval table was seated the marquis and master of the ceremonies, alike surpassing all in majesty of person and dignity of demeanour. During the whole repast, his aids-de-camp were incessantly bringing him dispatches of all sizes, from duodecimo to the largest folio, with seals of corresponding dimensions. The marquis opened them, perused them without moving a muscle, and then handed them to a footman who stood behind him. It had the air all around him of a general's head-quarters. I asked my philosophy the meaning of this brisk correspondence. It replied, that these were innocent love-letters which the police exchanged with the marquis; for, be it remarked, the former is on the most friendly terms with the directors of the establishment, and they communicate to each other the result of their anthropological observations. For the rest, the conversation at table was dull enough, and I could not help quizzing the company in my own mind by way of pastime. Dinner over, and having taken coffee, play began. My Manchester friend whispered me, that we could not certainly have dined any where in such style as we had done under fifty francs, and it would be exceedingly indelicate if one of us at least did not join in the game. I replied, "that if he chose to be delicate I could have no objection, but that I would not play," My companion accordingly took his seat at the table, and carried his delicacy to such a length, that he lost twelve hundred francs. Meanwhile, I had occasion to confirm observations which I had previously made on games of chance. The first is, that the gravity preserved by the keepers of the bank while following their rascally occupation is quite intolerable. They might sport a joke now and then: the most venomous serpents have at least a beautiful skin. But in fact this provoking gravity is one of the mortal sins in which the innate demon of arrogance speaks most distinctly. Most assuredly, the ancient Roman senators, when the Gauls were before their gates, could not have assumed a more important mien, than a petty clerk in a passport-office puts on when he takes down a description of your person. This importance was always particularly obnoxious to me in bankers and other commercial men. To count and make money, and to calculate the profit, is to be sure a very cheerful business; but there is nothing sublime in it, and I cannot conceive why those gentlemen should assume such a pompous and imposing look. The second reflection which I am accustomed to make at tables where games of chance are played is this: If all the energy and passion, the emotions and exertions, the hopes and fears, the nocturnal vigils, the joys and sorrows, which are annually squandered throughout Europe at the gaming-table; if all these were spared, would they suffice to form a Roman people and a Roman history? But there's the rub! Because every man is born as a Roman, civil society seeks to unromanize him; and therefore we have games of hazard, and novels, and Italian operas, and masquerades, and lotteries, and routs, and attendances, and ceremonies, and the fifteen or twenty articles of dress, which, with salutary loss of time, we have daily to put on and off-therefore are all these things introduced, that the exuberant energies may insensibly evaporate. Fortunately, men have not succeeded in doing that with Nature which they have accomplished with their own kind; otherwise away the ocean in fountains, and frittered away volcanoes in Chinese fireworks, that they might have no more to apprehend from tempests and lava! they would long since have dribbled || play: at length he staked his wife's country-seat against an Englishman, and lost that too. The winner posted away immediately from the gaming-table in the middle of the night to the estate, four leagues distant from Paris, and very early in the morning rang violently at the bell of the house. The dogs barked furi what was his business at so early an hour. Regardless alike of dogs and men, the intruder proceeded at his leisure to inspect the premises. The gardener at length began to be rude; on which the Englishman seized him by the collar, and tumbled him out of the house, with this valediction: "Go to the d-l! I have no occasion for you." The marchioness, roused by the scuffle, ran down stairs We returned home; I, refreshed in body and mind, but my companion exceedingly out of humour. He related to his honest lacquey what ill-ously, and the gardener inquired luck he had experienced. This afforded me a fresh occasion for observing what amiable creatures the French are. A pedantic English moralist, who, like this laquai de place, had warned my friend to beware of gamblers, would have loaded him with reproaches, had he disregarded this warning, and thereby sustained loss, and would have said, "It serves you right! Why did you not follow my advice?" Our gene-in a great fright, half dressed, and rous lacquey pursued a very differ- inquired of the stranger what was ent course. At first, after my coun- his pleasure. He replied, that he tryman's recital of his misfortune, he was merely come to take a walk in smiled without saying a word, proba- his park, and at the same time shewbly calculating in silence the amounted her the paper by which the marof the commission he was to receive from the directors of the gamblinghouse. He then merely observed, "Don't fret, sir! you will have better luck another time." By way of cheer-ever, behaved very generously to the ing up his spirits, he related several marquis, as they sometimes do to anecdotes of gamblers, and among their victims, and appointed him to others the following: The marquis do the honours of that house, with a above-mentioned, formerly an emi- salary of one hundred francs a day. grant, and who returned to France a beggar at the Restoration, had the good fortune to marry a rich wife. In one night he lost all he was worth at quis ceded to him the estate. The unhappy woman died soon afterwards of a broken heart. The directors of the gambling-house, how What effect this story had on the mind of my friend I know not. It was very late: we shook hands and parted. THE COMPLAINTS OF A HALF-PAY OFFICER; "OH! the charms of a country || same eternal park-chaise has passed town!" I exclaimed as I reclined in my easy chair after dinner. "The my door at least half-a-dozen times within this half-hour. There must be a ball in the town. I'll ring and inquire. Betty, what is there going on in the town this evening?"-" La, sir! don't you know? There's a ball given by the officers of the regiment to-night."-"Bless my soul! now I recollect, I had a ticket put into my hand by Captain Clatterbeel the other day at the billiard-table, and I dare say it has lain in my great-coat pocket ever since." The pocket was searched, and forth came the ticket. I had not been at an English ball for near twenty years, having been most part of that time on foreign service. I was quite unused to these things, but I was taken by surprise, and half promised the captain; so I resolved to go, if it was only for the novelty of the thing Forthwith the black breeches and silk stockings are paraded (the latter being carefully examined by Betty), a waistcoat of superior whiteness selected from my scanty wardrobe, and the whole well aired; for as my Peninsular anecdotes had become stale, and as I had neither wit nor blarney to supply their place, these requisites for a dinner or an evening party had long slumbered in ignoble repose. The nether vestments, as I released them from their confinement, methought, assumed a fresher look than when I last drew them on; and the waistcoat, whose wrinkles had not for so long a period been smoothed by the good fare of a rich neighbour, seemed, unconscious of its antique cut, to brighten up at the idea of again appearing in the ranks of fashion. But, alas! their owner did not appear the fresher or the younger for lying by! Time had left its crow's-foot traces on his visage; the autumnal tints of life had already beVol. III. No. XV...... 4 speckled his head; and his frame. could no longer boast the charms of true proportion. The waistcoat and its neighbour required to be slackened ere they could be brought to fit the increased dimensions of my. waist, and what were once such intimate friends seemed now quite on distant terms. This breach it rerequired no small effort to restore; for the shirt, not content with displaying the glories of the washtub in the dogs-ears and frill, seemed deter mined, like an officious go-between, if possible, to perpetuate the unfor tunate separation; while, to increase the general discordance, the coat, taking its example from man, and proving its ignoble birth (for it owed its existence to a country Snip), by the airs it assumed, appeared, withia vulgarity truly provincial, to look down with contempt on the more unex fashionable companions with which necessity had compelled it to associate. The stockings alone appeared quite at ease; they seemed to light up with superior gloss as they again found themselves at home on that limb which used to set all hearts on fire, and which yet stood forth in all the pride of manly beauty. In a twinkling I am dressed; for, thanks to the present fashion, all the trou-ble of ornamenting the person is monopolized by the fair sex, or by that non-descript, the dandy, which can be considered as of no sex at all. Without considering the fashion of my dress, or that I was almost past the age for dancing, I entered the ball-room with the confidence, and, I trust, the air of a gentleman, though not of the modern school, where the Mandarin of a grocer's window is permitted to set the fashion Y.. thought I ought to stop. But all were engaged, and for the whole night. Time was when I did not find the ladies so deeply engaged. Can twenty years have made such a difference? This reflection was followed by a sudden rising in my throat, but I gulped it down with a sigh. observe." My eyes were naturally attracted to a handsome couple, who danced extremely well. I expected to find all the optics in the same di of a bow. The room was nearly the room. Can twenty years have full, but the dancing had not com-made this revolution in my inclinamenced. As all eyes were naturally tions? I began, therefore, at the tipturned towards the door to criticize top of beauty and fashion, and deand pull to pieces the comers-in, I scended in a regular ratio till I reachcould not of course escape the no-ed that term of the series when I tice of the company. Of those who knew me, some recognised me with a slight inclination of the head, others turned their eyes another way, and some tittered and exchanged looks. Those who knew me not I could perceive made interrogatories, in the answers to which I could distinguish the word "only," which magical" N'importe! I will not dance, I will sound effectually prevented a second look from those eyes which, I could observe, often rested on persons whose sole attractions were a title or a fortune. There is something won-rection as my own; but, ho! they derfully bewitching in rank and riches; for, with all my philosophy, I confess I never heard that a man had ten thousand a year or a title without taking a second look at him. I leave those with more reflection than myself to account for this feeling. The striking up of a quadrille announced the preparation for the dance. As I used to be esteemed a good dancer, and had once figured in the native country of the quadrille, I thought myself privileged to stand up. There was a time when I generally selected the plainest partner in the room. Whether this proceed-gy, nobodies. The others were good ed from vanity in shewing the contrast between their deformity and my handsome person, or whether it arose from a feeling of pity springing from a naturally kind disposition, or whether a mixture of both these causes might have influenced me, I leave others to guess. Now, however, I found the case altered. I felt a desire to dance with the prettiest and most distinguished partner in were pointed towards a pair who were excessively plain, and danced most abominably. Surely, thought I, they are looking at these people, and wondering how they can make such fools of themselves; for what else can make them turn from beauty and grace to deformity and awkwardness? A whisper from a brother demiesolde told me the cause. The couple I admired were poor" airy nothings," with scarce " a local habitation or a name," for they had neither possessions nor rank. They were in fact, according to the modern phraseolo solid somebodies, whom every one knew, pretended to know, or wished to know, and possessing "local habitations" of no mean value or extent, and names of high sound and import. " But that very fat lady," said I, "who dances with such agility, and attracts so much notice, surely she is somebody of consequence?"--“You are mistaken," said my friend; " she is the least body in the room. They |