IT is the Night before the Derby. The West End is thronged with men. The streets are perceptibly more thronged with well-dressed males than at any other time in the year. The May meetings brought enough of parsons and sober-coated laity to dull the living tide—to almost make us Londoners a mournful people (which we are, naturally, not, despite what Frenchmen say); but those grave ones have either departed from us, or are now lost and undistinguishable in this influx of gay company. All the newcomers are in their most gorgeous raiment, for is not this the great “gaudy” week of the Wicked? Half the officers of cavalry in her Majesty's sendee have obtained leave of absence for eight-and-forty hours upon urgent private affairs; and a fourth of the infantry have done the like; they have come up from every station within the four seas to see the great race run, which is to put in their pockets from five pounds to fifty thousand. Over their little books they shake their shining heads, and stroke their tawny moustaches in a deprecating manner, but each one has a secret expectation that “he shall pull it off this once;” for, upon the whole, our military friends have not been fortunate in turf transactions. There is a fair sprinkling, too, of respectable country gentlemen, who rarely leave their families to occupy their old-bachelor quarters at Long's or the Tavistock, except on this supreme occasion. Every fast university-man who can obtain an exeat upon any pretence whatever—from sudden mortality in the domestic circle down to being subpoenaed by a friendly attorney in the supposititious case of Hookey (a blind man) v. Walker—is up in town resplendent, confident, Young. Every sporting farmer, save those in the north, who have a private saturnalia of their own in the mid-autumn, has left his farm for two nights and a day, and is seeing life in London. Besides these, an innumerable host of well-dressed scoundrels—for whom the word “Welcher” is altogether too commendable—have come up from country quarters, where they have been playing various “little games,” all more or less discreditable, to work together for evil with their metropolitan confreres for four days.

Every haunt of dissipation is holding highest holiday. The stupid, obscene Cider Cellars find, for one night at least, that they have attractions still; the music-halls are tropical with heat and rankest human vegetation; Cremorne, after the crowded theatres have disgorged their steaming crowds, is like a fair. The strangers' room at all the clubs has been bespoken this night for weeks. In the card-rooms, the smoking-rooms, the billiard-rooms, there is scarcely space to move, far less to breathe in; yet there is everywhere a babblement of tongues, and the words that are most bandied about from feverish mouth to mouth, are first, The King, and secondly, Menelaus. The tout had kept his word—either from fear or nicest honour—until the stipulated week had elapsed, and then the news of the trial-race began to circulate: from his outsiders' place, to that of fourth favourite, then of third, and at last to that of second had “the French horse” gradually risen. A curious and illogical position enough—but then the turf-people are illogical—for if the news that he had beaten The King was true, he ought to have been first favourite; and if the news was not true, he had no reason to find favour at all. As it was, however, The King had come down half a point as if to meet him, to 9 to 2; while Menelaus stood at 5 to 1.

And had that trial-race really taken place or not? and if so, Was it on the Square? was the question which was just then agitating the Houses of Lords and Commons (nay, it was whispered, Marlborough House itself), and all the mess-tables in her Majesty's service, more than any other subject in this world. There was also a vague rumour that the favourite's “understandings” were not as they should be; that there was a contraction that might be fatal to his prospects; that the idol's feet were of clay.

Ralph Derrick had “put the pot on” his Many Laws, and would be a millionaire if he won; but Walter Lisgard had put more than the pot. If the French colours did not shew in front at the winning-post, the captain, still to use the elegant metaphor of the sporting fraternity, would be in Queer Street. So infatuated had the young man grown, that he had absolutely hedged even that one bet which insured him a thousand pounds in case The King should win the race. Notwithstanding his coyness in accepting the first offer of a loan from his uncultivated friend, he had borrowed of him twice since, in each case giving his I.O.U., whereby he endeavoured to persuade himself that he was liquidating all obligation; yet, unless he considered his mÈre autograph was worth the sums for which it was pledged, I know not how he succeeded in this. For if Menelaus did not happen to win, he not only would not have enough to discharge his debts of honour for nearly two years—when he would come into possession of his patrimony of five thousand pounds—but even a great portion of that would be bespoken. Thus, of course, he had placed himself, through mÈre greed, in a most unpleasant position; but at the same time it must be allowed that he had yielded to a great temptation, such as would probably have made the mouth of any financier water, had the opportunity offered in his particular line; for with the exception of mÈre outsiders, The King had beaten every horse that was to contend with him on the morrow; and Menelaus, to Walter's certain knowledge, had beaten The King.

Equinely speaking, then, it was a certainty that the French horse should win the Derby, in which case the young man's gains would be prodigious; for not only had he taken advantage of the original position of the animal in the betting, but as the odds grew less and less, had still backed him, until his possible winnings reached, on paper, to five figures; on the other hand, by this last piece of imprudence, his possible——But no, it was not possible. “Things surely wouldn't go so devilish cross with a fellow as that or to put the captain's thought in other words, the Government of the Universe being founded upon just principles, would never permit such a stupendous misfortune to overwhelm him; or, it might be, the gallant captain believed that Fortune was indeed a female, and would therefore hesitate to inflict calamity upon so pretty a fellow as himself. At the same time, the event of the morrow was so big with fate, that it was not pleasant to dwell upon it; and anything which could have prevented his mind from recurring to the same, would have been welcomed gladly. But there was but one thing that had the power to do this. His anxiety was far too deep to be flattered away by the smile of Beauty, or lost in the sparkle of Wine. The homoeopathic treatment, similia similibus, he felt was the only one that could now give him relief, and he therefore sought for rest from the cares of the racecourse in the excitement of the gaming-table. Do not, however, let it be supposed that the captain sought out any of those convenient establishments for the immediate transfer of property, which are guarded by iron doors, and always liable to the incursions of the police, who, upon breaking in, discover four-and-twenty gentlemen (one of whom has swallowed the dice), sitting round a green baize table in conversation about Music and the Fine Arts. Master Walter was rash in his speculations, but he was not madman enough to play chicken-hazard against foxes.

“I think I shall try my luck with the Landrails to-night,” observed he to his companion Derrick, stopping short in flaring Piccadilly, and biting-his nails. The two men had been occupying lodgings in the same house, the Turf Hotel being full; the younger finding a species of comfort in the society of the part-owner of Menelaus, who was even more confident of the success of that noble quadruped than himself.

“By all means, my lad,” returned the gold-finder simply, “although I don't know what they are; and so as you take me with you, I don't care.”

Three weeks ago, such a proposition would have, staggered the captain, or rather, he would have rejected it point-blank. To be seen in public with his uncouth and flashily-attired friend, was at that time a considerable trial to the fastidious light dragoon; but the immense interest which they had in common, had rendered the familiarity of the once odious Orson at first tolerable, and eventually welcome, and even necessary. He had taken him with him into quite exclusive circles, and, except on one occasion at the Rag, where Derrick, having drunk more champagne than was good for him, had offered to fight Major Pompus of the Fusiliers for what he liked, nothing unpleasant had taken place in consequence. Men observed: “What a deuced rum fellow Lisgard brought with him the other night;” but the said stranger had lost his money very good-naturedly at the whist-table, and it was understood that he had more to lose.

Under such circumstances, the gentlemen-players were very charitable. Mr Ralph Derrick did not play a first-rate game at whist; very few persons who have not been brought up in good society do; but his performance was not so inferior as to make success impossible for a night or two, however certain the ruin that would have overtaken him in the long-run. Moreover, he was never “put off his head” by the largeness of the stake, his habitual lavishness in money-matters rendering him indifferent to that matter. Captain Lisgard, on the other hand, though an excellent player, considering his tender years, was liable to have his nerves disorganised at any crisis of a rubber upon which an unusual amount depended.

“Yes,” repeated Master Walter, “I'll try my luck at the Landrails, and you shall come, too, Ralph. Any member has a right to introduce whom he likes.”

“Even a miner from Cariboo—eh, Master Walter, provided he's got money in his pocket? Well, I'm their man, whether it's for whist or all-fours.”

“All-fours!” repeated the captain with irritation. “Who ever heard of a gentleman playing at that game? Do, pray, be particular in what you say to-night. Whatever you do, call a knave a knave, and not a Jack. The Landrails is a very select place, Ralph, where men who like to play their whist more quietly than at the Rag look in for an hour or two rather late.”

“Heavier stakes, I suppose?” observed Derrick bluntly.

“Yes, rather. You see, there's always some row with the committee, if play gets beyond a certain height at the regular clubs. Now, this is a sort of friendly circle where the points are quite optional, and the bets too. Yes, I think I shall try my luck for a pony or two.”

“I don't think you look quite fit for whist, my lad, to-night,” returned Derrick, gazing gravely into the young man's haggard face. “To-morrow will be a trying day, remember; I think you had much better get to bed.”

“I couldn't do it, man!” replied Walter vehemently—“I dare not. I should never sleep a wink, and perhaps go mad with thinking before the morning. Look here, how my hand trembles. I have not nerves of iron, like you.”

“Poor lad, poor lad!” ejaculated the other with affectionate compassion. “Nothing, as you say, ever makes me tremble—except D. T. Ah, Heaven, but that is terrible! Never drink, lad, never drink;” and something like a shudder throbbed through the speaker's brawny frame.

“The Landrails meet here,” said Walter, stopping at the door of a private house in the neighbourhood of St James's Palace; “it is past eleven, and I daresay play has begun.”

“Who owns this house?” asked Derrick carelessly, surveying the unpretending tenement in question—“or rather, who pays the rent?”

“Well, I hope we shall, Ralph, this evening. The fact is, the hire of the rooms, the attendance, and even the cost of the refreshments, are all defrayed each night by the winners in proportion to their gains. Money does not change hands until the ensuing week, but the secretary enters all accounts in his ledger, and sees that they are duly squared. I am answerable for your liabilities to-night, so do you be careful with the liquors.”

As the youthful Mentor administered this wholesome piece of advice to his senior, the door opened, and they were admitted. It was a most respectable house, neither very large nor very small, and neatly but inexpensively furnished. The butler was a man who might have been the body-servant of an evangelical bishop, and whose conscience was troubled by the spiritual shortcomings of his right reverend master. To come upon so grave and sad a man upon the eve of the Derby Day, was quite a homily in itself. Through the open door of the dining-room could be seen a cold collation, at which men dropped in from above-stairs if they felt so disposed; but there were light refreshments in the drawing-room also, and a great variety of pleasant drinks. The Landrails were thirsty folks, and imbibed gallons of iced hock and Seltzer water; but they had not, as a rule, good appetites. There were three tables for whist, and one dedicated to piquet or ÉcartÉ. All these had massive candlesticks screwed into their wood-work—perhaps only to prevent their falling off; but it also put a stop to any possible use of them as a weapon or missile, and I think that contingency had been also taken into account. A candlestick comes uncommonly handy to the fingers when luck has gone pertinaciously against one, and the man who has won all the money is personally hateful. Above all things, it was important, in that quiet, friendly circle, to repress all ebullition of temper, and to steer clear of all disputes. Nobody, one would hope, who was in a position to be admitted to that society, would stoop to cheating; but a little strap was inserted at the opposite corners of each table for the convenience of marking the score, wherein, when the counters were once placed, they could not he accidentally removed by the elbow. *

* Persons who are acquainted with the game of whist have informed me, that it is sometimes better—in the case of holding two by honours, for instance—to be at three than four.

The spacious room—for it was a double drawing-room—was by no means brilliantly lit up; a couple of bare wax-candles stood upon the refreshment-table, where, by the by, there was no attendant, each man helping himself at pleasure; but the other four pair in the room had shades over them, which dulled their radiance, although it caused them to throw a very bright light upon the tables themselves. When the new-comers entered, which they did quite unannounced, the sight struck one of them at least as a very strange one: three shining isles of light—for one whist-table was not in use—amid a sea of gloom; ten thoughtful faces with a sort of halo round them, and one or two sombre ones standing by like their evil genii, and watching, the play. There was not a sound to be heard at first, except the dull fall of the pieces of pasteboard, but presently a hand being finished in their neighbourhood, a sort of hushed talk began about what would have happened if somebody had under-played the diamond.

“What are the points?” whispered Derrick in his companion's ear.

“What are the points to-night, Beamish?” inquired Walter of one of the four, a very unimpassioned-looking young man, who replied with a most unpleasant and ghastly smile—as though he had cut his throat a little too high up: “Fives and fifties, my gallant captain, with the odds in ponies; so, being a younger son, I advise you to go to some other table.”

“Never mind, I am going to make a good marriage,” returned Walter coolly. Mr Beamish had been a penniless government clerk until he wedded the widow of an opulent builder with half a town for her jointure. “If you are not full,” added the captain, “I declare in here, for myself and friend.”

All four looked up for an instant at the threatened stranger; for your good player, intent on gain, detests the introduction of an unknown hand. Somehow or other, although the odds are two to one, “it's always his cursed luck to have him for a partner.” General Prim, who had been a martinet in the Peninsula, and as offensive to his fellow-creatures as less favourable circumstances had permitted ever since, gave a ferocious grin, and shook his single scalp-lock of gray hair like a malignant pantaloon. The Hon. Pink Hawthorne, attache at the court at Christiana, but absent from that lively capital upon sick-leave, wrenched his fair moustache this way and that, and frowned as gloomily as his foolish forehead would permit. The dealer, a Mr Roberts, an ancient bencher of one of the Inns of Court, paused with the trump card in his fingers still unturned. “Does your friend know what the Blue Peter means, Lisgard?”

“I've been a sailor half my life, sir, and it's devilish odd if I did not.” returned Ralph Derrick grimly.

“What the devil did the fellow mean?” added he to Walter as the game began, and all the four became at once automatons.

“It's the new system of asking for trumps,” answered Walter peevishly. “The same thing that they called the Pilot the other night. How ridiculous you have made yourself. See, there's another table up. Bless the man, not there, that's the piquet place.”

Ralph had quietly seated himself next to Major Piccalilli, of the Irregular Cavalry, Cayenne Station, Upper India, and had already disturbed his marking-cards, whereby that gallant officer was reduced to the verge of apoplexy with speechless rage.

“Stay, you shall stick to this one,” continued Walter in a low voice; “that fellow Beamish is hateful to me—and I will cut in yonder. There is not a muff-table in the room—all these beggars play too well.” With these words, the captain hurried away; and as soon as the rubber he had been watching was finished, Derrick was admitted of the conclave, to the exclusion of General Prim, who cursed that circumstance very audibly, and for a man of his advanced years, with considerable emphasis and vigour. Derrick fell as a partner to the lot of the gentleman who had inquired as to his proficiency in the art of asking for trumps.

“If you would only hold your cards a little more on the table, I should be able to see them myself,” remarked Mr Roberts with severity.

“If they look over my hands, sir,” returned Derrick reassuringly, “I'll forgive 'em: that's all.—If you won't take that old gentleman's bets”—referring to the general, who seemed extremely anxious to back their adversaries—“then I will;” and he did it—and luck went with him. There was nothing stronger than champagne to be got at in that respectable place of business, so Ralph kept his head, and won—a hundred and fifty pounds or so. Then, the table breaking up, he rose and stood over his young friend, to see how the cards were going with him.

“Bad,” muttered Derrick to himself, as he watched Walter running through his hand with eager haste, as a woman flirts her fan. His beautiful face was dark with care, his eyes flashed impatiently upon the man whose turn it was to lead.

“Our odds are in fifties, eh, Lisgard?” drawled his right-hand adversary, Captain and Lieutenant Wobegon of the Horse Guards' azure.

“The same as before, I suppose,” returned the young man haughtily.

Ralph gave a prolonged whistle. His young friend had a treble up, and the others nothing, so that he must be betting two hundred and fifty pounds to one hundred; and “the same as before” too! Within the next minute, the cards were thrown down upon the table, and the adversaries scored a treble likewise. “That's been my cursed luck, Ralph, all to-night!” cried the young man with a little grating laugh. “Four by honours against one every deal.”

“You must have been doing something devilish bad, Lisgard,” observed the Guardsman.

“Yes, I have—playing!” answered Walter bitterly. “But no fellow can play with sixes and sevens; it demoralises one so.”

“All cards do, my grandmother says,” answered Wobegon, who for a Guardsman was not without humour. “She made me promise, when she paid my debts, my first Derby, that I would never back anything again; and I never have, except my luck and bills.”

Captain Lisgard had naturally a keen appreciation of fun, but he did not vouchsafe a smile to the facetious Guardsman, who himself joked like an undertaker, and had never been known to laugh in his life. The fact was, that nothing could just now commend itself to Master Walter except winning back his money.

Reader, did you ever play for more than you can afford? Pardon me the inquiry; there is no occasion to be Pharisaical; for it is even possible to do worse things than that in your line: moreover, the question of what is more than you can afford is such a large one, and affords such opportunities for a nimble conscience to escape. I remember in Lord Houghton's Life of Keats, that that gallant nobleman, in defending the poet from the charge of dissipation and gambling, remarks that it all arose from his having lost ten pounds upon a certain evening at cards. How, considering that the author of Hyperion had no income, nor any bank except his Imagination to apply to—and it was notorious that he could never put a cheque even upon that—I take his Lordship to be a very charitable peer. Ten pounds must have been, for Keats, a large sum.

But, undoubtedly, the matter is one for a man to decide for himself; the whole question is relative; and if you are apt to lose your temper, then remember you play for more than you can afford, although your stakes are but—penny-stamps. Captain Walter Lisgard had lost his temper and his money also. There was a numbed sense of misfortune pervading him; it seemed to him as though he was Predestinated to lose. I am much mistaken if he had not a sort of humming in his ears. One of the most religious men whom it has been my fortune to meet, has informed me that, in his unregenerate days, when he was a gambler and everything else, * he once prayed to win at cards.——

* “Every sin, sir, in the Decalogue, I am glad to say, have I committed”—meaning that the present change in him was rendered thereby all the more satisfactory—“with the sole exception of murder.”

“Then it strikes me.” said I, “in addition to your other backslidings at the time you speak of, you were just a trifle blasphemous.”

“No, sir,” said he; “I think not. All that I possessed in the world was depending upon the result of a certain game at ÉcartÉ. If I had lost it, I should have been a beggar. If I won it, I resolutely resolved never to touch a card again—never to run the risk of experiencing a second time the mental agony I was then undergoing. I am not ashamed to confess, sir, that in such a strait I prayed to win; and I did win.”

“All I have to say, sir,” replied I, “is this: that it was uncommonly hard upon the other man.”

Good resolutions are indeed by no means uncommon among tolerably young persons in positions of pecuniary peril, such as that of Captain Lisgard. They vow their candles to this and that patron saint if they should but escape shipwreck upon the green baize this once. Master Walter's bid was confined to a few “dips,” if one may use so humble a metaphor, of which about fifty went to the pound, and even those were not offered in a penitent spirit. He would never play whist with the Landrails any more. He would never lay the long odds beyond “couters”—a foolish word he and his set used for sovereigns. He would never back himself at all when playing with “that fool Pompus”—his present partner. He would become, in short, exceedingly wise and prudent, if he should only “pull off” this present rubber. There was “life in the Mussel” yet. They were at “three all” when Pompus led his knave instead of his ten, from ten, knave, king, and only got the trick when he should have got the game.

“We shall never have another chance now,” sighed Walter, as his left-hand adversary turned up the queen. But privately he thought that fortune would not be quite so cruel as all that came to; moreover, he had an excellent hand. His fingers trembled as he arranged the long suit of clubs, headed by tierce major, and saw that he had four trumps to bring them in with.

As the game went on, however, Pompus exhibited his usual feebleness, and things began to look very black indeed. In the third round of trumps, Master Walter's memory left him sudden as an extinguished taper. It is sad to have to say it of so excellent a player, but he recollected nothing whatever, except that, if he lost that rubber, it would be an addition of three hundred pounds to the sum he already owed Captain Wobegon. It was his turn to play, and he was third hand. He had the king and ten of trumps. The ace had been played; ay, he remembered that after a struggle, and the knave too. Yes, his left-hand adversary had played the knave. Should he finesse his ten or not? That was the question, upon the decision of which depended some five hundred pounds. Whist is not always a game of pleasure. Master Walter finessed the ten. “Thousand devils!” cried Derrick with a tremendous imprecation, “why, the queen was turned up on your left, lad: you have thrown away the game.” And it was so. Walter Lisgard did not speak a word; but having compared his note-book with that of Captain Wobegon, retired into a little office out of the back drawing-room, where the secretary of the Landrails entered the members' somewhat complicated little accounts with one another in a very business-like-looking ledger. “You have had a bad night of it for you, sir,” remarked this gentleman quietly; “you generally hold your own.”

“Yes. What is the cursed total?”

“Eighteen hundred.”

“Ralph Derrick,” said Walter Lisgard, as the two walked up St James's Street towards their lodgings for bath and breakfasts, but scarcely for bed, since the morning was already far advanced—“if any horse but Menelaus wins the race, I am a ruined man.”