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George Selwyn: His Letters and His Life by Unknown
page 140 of 404 (34%)
favourite amusement. If it was an innocent one also, passe; but it
is not only dangerous, but in its consequences criminal, and there
is no dependence upon any one man breathing, who pursues it with the
chaleur which I have done. How can I expect another man to trust me,
if I cannot trust myself?

Therefore, although March has dissolved the tie,(129) I beg that you
will lay me under some sort of restriction about it. I do not speak
this from having now suffered, for I have not, as I told you before,
since March last; that is, by the event. But I have been susceptible
(since?) then more than once, and it has been my good fortune and
not my prudence which has kept me above water.

What I propose is, to receive a guinea, or two guineas, and to pay
twenty, for every ten which I shall lose in the same day, above 50,
at any game of chance. I reserve the 50 for an unexpected necessity
of playing in the country, or elsewhere, with women. All things
considered, it is the best tie, and the tax the easiest paid, and
restrictive enough, and twenty guineas you will take; and if you tie
me up, I beg my forfeitures may go to the children, and then perhaps
I may forfeit for their sake, you'll say. I really think it will be
a wise measure for me, and a safe one; and let this tie be for this
year only, and then, if it is demonstrable that my fortune is
impaired by not playing, the tie will be over, and not renewed the
next. In the mean time, and till I shall hear your sentiments upon
this, I must avoid going to Almack's, and so I will. . . .

I dine to-day at Harry St. John's, and to-morrow at Eden's(130); and
on Monday all the St. Johns in the world, old and young, dine here.

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