notice of his _Paris_ misfortunes;--he pities him;--and, rather than
see a countryman, or a gentleman of fashion and character in distress,
he would lend him fifty or a hundred pounds. When this is done, every
art is used to debauch his principles; he is initiated into a gang of
genteel sharpers, and bullied, by the fear of a gaol, to connive at, or
to become a party in their iniquitous society. His good name gives a
sanction for a while to their suspected reputations; and, by means of
an hundred pounds so lent to this honest young man, some thousands are
won from the _birds of passage_, who are continually passing thro' that
city to the more southern parts of _France_, or to _Italy_, _Geneva_,
or _Turin_.

This is not an imaginary picture; it is a picture I have seen, nay, I
have seen the traps set, and the game caught; nor were those who set the
snares quite sure that they might not put a stop to my peregrination,
for they _risqued a supper at me_, and let me win a few guineas at the
little play which began before they sat down to table. Indeed, my dear
Sir, were I to give you the particulars of some of those unhappy young
men, who have been ruined in fortune and constitution too, at _Paris_
and _Lyons_, you would be struck with pity on one side, and horror and
detestation on the other; nor would ever risque such a _finished part_
of your son's education. Tell my Oxonian friend, from me, when he
travels, never to let either Lords or Ladies, even of his own country,
nor _Marquises_, _Counts_, or _Chevaliers_, of this, ever draw him into
play; but to remember that shrewd hint of Lord Chesterfield's to his
son;--"When you play with men (says his Lordship) know with _whom_ you
play; when with women, _for what_ you play."--But let me add, that the
only SURE WAY, is never to play at all.

At one of these towns I found a man, whose family I respected, and for