Martingale.

"I bet you a thousand ponies I stop a week in the heiress's house before
the season's over," Lord Bagnigge replied with a yawn; and the bet was
registered with shouts of applause.

But it seemed as if the Fates had determined against Lord Bagnigge, for
the very next day, riding in the Park, his horse fell with him; he
was carried home to his house with a fractured limb and a dislocated
shoulder; and the doctor's bulletins pronounced him to be in the most
dangerous state.


Martingale was a married man, and there was no danger of HIS riding
by the Fitzbattleaxe carriage. A fortnight after the above events, his
lordship was prancing by her Grace's great family coach, and chattering
with Lady Gwinever about the strange wager.

"Do you know what a pony is, Lady Gwinever?" he asked. Her ladyship said
yes: she had a cream-colored one at Castle Barbican; and stared when
Lord Martingale announced that he should soon have a thousand ponies,
worth five-and-twenty pounds each, which were all now kept at Coutts's.
Then he explained the circumstances of the bet with Bagnigge. Parliament
was to adjourn in ten days; the season would be over! Bagnigge was lying
ill chez lui; and the five-and-twenty thousand were irrecoverably his.
And he vowed he would buy Lord Binnacle's yacht--crew, captain, guns and
all.

On returning home that night from Lady Polkimore's, Martingale found
among the many billets upon the gold plateau in his antichambre, the