ever, to find the room where
the ordinary was served filled with odd-looking creatures. My host,
after presenting me to the company, assured me that there were but
eighteen or twenty of those gentlemen who would have the honour to sup
with me. I approached one of the tables where they were playing, and
thought I should have died with laughing: I expected to have seen good
company and deep play; but I only met with two Germans playing at
backgammon. Never did two country boobies play like them; but their
figures beggared all description. The fellow near whom I stood was
short, thick, and fat, and as round as a ball, with a ruff, and
prodigious high crowned hat. Any one, at a moderate distance, would have
taken him for the dome of a church, with the steeple on the top of it.
I inquired of the host who he was. 'A merchant from Basle,' said he,
'who comes hither to sell horses; but from the method he pursues, I think
he will not dispose of many; for he does nothing but play.' 'Does he
play deep?' said I. 'Not now,' said he; 'they are only playing for their
reckoning, while supper is getting ready; but he has no objection to
play as deep as any one.' 'Has he money?' said I. 'As for that,'
replied the treacherous Cerise, 'would to God you had won a thousand
pistoles of him, and I went your halves; we should not be long without
our money.' I wanted no further encouragement to meditate the ruin of
the high-crowned hat. I went nearer to him, in order to take a closer
survey; never was such a bungler; he made blots upon blots; God knows, I
began to feel some remorse at winning of such an ignoramus, who knew so
little of the game. He lost his reckoning; supper was served up; and I
desired him to sit next me. It was a long table, and there were at least
five-and-twenty in company, notwithstanding the landlord's promise. The
most execrable repast that ever was begun being finished, all the crowd
insensibly dispersed, except the little Swiss, who still kept near me,
and the landlord, who placed himself on the other side of me. They both
smoked like dragoons; and the Swiss was continually saying, in bad
French, 'I ask your pardon, sir, for my great freedom,' at the same time
blowing such whiffs of tobacco in my face as almost suffocated me. Mr.
Cerise, on the other hand, desired he might take the liberty of asking me
whether I had ever been in his country? and seemed surprised I had so
genteel an air, without having travelled in Switzer