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ll's more than once. He was not in the least emblematic like the old fox, but a man of sound sense, with no poetry, of an extremely good nature, and full of anecdote. You might follow his advice, and it would be well with you; or you might follow your opinion in opposition to his and take your chance. His name was Hill--Harry Hill they familiarly called him--and although you might have many a grander acquaintance, you could never meet a truer friend. He was an old and much-respected friend of the Baron, and that says a great deal for him; for if anybody in the world could understand a _man_, it was Baron Martin. Whether it was the Prime Minister or the unhappy thief in the dock, he knew all classes and all degrees of criminality. He was not poetical with regard to landscapes, for if one were pointed out to him by some proprietor of a lordly estate, he would say, "Yes, a vera fine place indeed; and I would have the winning-post _there_!" The old fox and Harry Hill! The two characters at Tattersall's in those days can never be forgotten, by those who knew them. It may seem strange in these more enlightened days that at that time I was under the impression that no one could make a bet unless he had the means of paying if he lost. This statement will provoke a smile, but it is true. The consequence was that I was debarred from speculating where I thought I had a most excellent chance of winning, having been brought up to believe that the world was almost destitute of fraud--a strange and almost unaccountable idea which only time and experience proved to be erroneous. Judge of the vast unexplored field of discovery that lay before me! Harry Hill was better informed. He had lived longer, and had been brought in contact with the cleverest men of the age. He knew at a glance the adventurous fool who staked his last chance when the odds were a hundred to one, and also the man of honour who staked his life on his honesty--and sometimes _lost_! There were "blacklegs" in those days who looked out for such honest gentlemen, and _won_--scoundrels who degrade sport, and trade successfully on the reputations of men of honour. You cannot cope with these; honesty cannot compete with fraud either in sport or trade. It was a very brief Sunday sermon which Harry preached to me this afternoon, but it was an effective one, and out of the abundance of his good nature he gave me these well-remembered words of friendly warning,-- "
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