that
walks the earth.

I tell the story as nearly as I can as he related it to me. "I used to
play a good deal with Rechberg," said he, "and took pleasure in worrying
him, for he was a great purist in his play, and was outraged with
anything that could not be sustained by an authority. In fact, each
game was followed by a discussion of full half an hour, to the intense
mortification of the other players, though very amusing to me, and
offering me large opportunity to irritate and plague the Austrian.

"One evening, after a number of these discussions, in which Rechberg
had displayed an even unusual warmth and irritability, I found myself
opposed to him in a game, the interest of which had drawn around us a
large assembly of spectators--what the French designate as _la galerie_.
Towards the conclusion of the game it was my turn to lead, and I played
a card which so astounded the Austrian Minister, that he laid down his
cards upon the table and stared fixedly at me.

"'In all my experience of Whist,' said he, deliberately, 'I never saw
the equal of that.'

"'Of what?' asked!

"'Of the card you have just played,' rejoined he. 'It is not merely
that such play violates every principle of the game, but it actually
stultifies all your own combinations.'

"'I think differently, Count,' said I. 'I maintain that it is good play,
and I abide by it.'

"'Let us decide it by a wager,' said he.

"'In what way?'

"'Thus: We shall leave the question to the _galerie_. You shall allege
what you deem to be the reasons for your play, and they shall decide if
they accept them as valid.'

"'I agree. What will you bet?'

"'Ten napoleons--twenty, fifty, five hundred if you like!' cried he,
warmly.

"'I shall say ten. You don't like losing, and I don't want to punish you
too heavily.'

"'There is the jury, sir,' said he, haughtily; 'make your case.'

"'The wager is this,' said I, 'that, to win, I shall satisfy these
gentlemen that for the card I played I had a sufficient and good
reason.'

"'Yes.'

"'My reason was this, then--I looked into your hand!'

"I pocketed his ten napoleons, but they were the last I won of him.
Indeed, it took a month before he got over the shock."

It would be interesting if we had, which unhappily we have not, any
statistical returns to show what classes and professions have produced
the best whist-players. In my own experience I have found civilians the
superiors of the military.

Diplomat