What more than madness reigns,
When one short sitting many hundreds drains,
When not enough is left him to supply
Board wages, or a footman's livery.

_Dryden's Juvenal._


Gaming finds a man a cully, and leaves him a knave.

_Tom Brown._


The last "nine days' wonder" is the excess to which gaming is carried
among the higher circles of this country; but I much doubt whether the
present expositions of such enormity in a neighbouring nation will work
the desired effect on Englishmen.

Popular prejudices are obstinate points to combat; but every one who has
had opportunities for observation, must allow, that in their _taste
for gaming_, the French and English character are widely different.
In France, every one plays at cards, or dominoes, and at _all hours in
the day_, in every cafè, wine-shop, and road-side inn throughout the
country. I remember to have frequently seen, in the wine-shops at Paris,
carters in blue smock-frocks playing at ecartè and dominoes over a
bottle of _vin ordinaire_ at eleven o'clock in the morning,
particularly in the neighbourhood of the markets. In England such
amusements would be illegal, and the victualler who allowed them in his
house would probably be deprived of his license.