s. Why do you not take the bank yourself?"

"It would be too much trouble, and these gentlemen do not punt high
enough for me, but if that sort of thing amuses you, take the bank and I
will punt."

"Captain," I said, "will you take a fourth share in my bank?"

"Willingly."

"Gentlemen, I beg you to give notice that I will lay the cards down after
six games."

I asked for new packs of cards, and put three hundred sequins on the
table. The captain wrote on the back of a card, "Good for a hundred
sequins, O'Neilan," and placing it with my gold I began my bank.

The young officer was delighted, and said to me,

"Your bank might be defunct before the end of the sixth game."

I did not answer, and the play went on.

At the beginning of the fifth game, my bank was in the pangs of death;
the young officer was in high glee. I rather astonished him by telling
him that I was glad to lose, for I thought him a much more agreeable
companion when he was winning.

There are some civilities which very likely prove unlucky for those to
whom they are addressed, and it turned out so in this case, for my
compliment turned his brain. During the fifth game, a run of adverse
cards made him lose all he had won, and as he tried to do violence to
Dame Fortune in the sixth round, he lost every sequin he had.

"Sir," he said to me, "you have been very lucky, but I hope you will give
me my revenge to-morrow."

"It would be with the greatest pleasure, sir, but I never play except
when I am under arrest."

I counted my money, and found that I had wan two hundred and fifty
sequins, besides a debt of fifty sequins due by an officer who played on
trust which Captain O'Neilan took on his own account. I completed his
share, and at day-break he allowed me to go away.

As soon as I got to my hotel, I went to bed, and when I awoke, I had a
visit from Captain Laurent, the officer who had played on trust. Thinking
that his object was to pay me what he had lost, I told him that O'Neilan
had taken his debt on himself, but he answered than he had only called
for the purpose of begging of me a loan of six sequins on his note of
hand, by which he would pledge his honour to repay me within one week. I
gave him the money, and he begged that the matter, might remain between
us.

"I promise it," I said to him, "but do not break your word."

The next day I was ill, and the reader is aware of the nature of my
illness. I immediately placed myself under