in doing the same thing even if it is for a stake of a few
shillings. From playing for small sums, the steps are very easy
which lead to large amounts. And in due time, the young man becomes
a gambler, from no other cause than that he acquired a love for
card-playing, when he engaged in it only as an amusement.

Parents have a responsibility resting on them in this respect, of
which they should not lose sight. They cannot be surprised that
their children imitate their examples. With all the dangerous
associations and tendencies of card-playing, would they have their
children acquire a passion for it? What wise parent can make such a
choice for his son? Ah, how many a young man has become a gamester,
a black-leg, an inmate of the prison cell, because, in the home of
his childhood, he acquired a love of the card-table. He but imitated
the practice of parents, whose duty it was to set him a better
example, and _was led to the path of ruin_!

If, from its influences, card-playing, even for amusement, is
improper for gentlemen, I conceive it much more so for ladies. A
woman--and more especially a young woman--seems entirely out of
place at a card-table. The associations are so masculine--they bring
to mind so much of the cut-and-shuffle trickery, vulgarity and
profanity--so many of the words and phrases of that _hell_, the
gaming-table--that for a lady to indulge in them, appears entirely
opposed to that modesty and refinement, which are so becoming the
female character. I trust all young ladies of discretion will shun
the card-table. I am confident every woman, who possesses a proper
sense of the dignity and delicacy which form the highest attractions
of the female character, will avoid a practice which is made an
instrument of the most despicable uses, and to which the most vile