"We were to sup somewhere about eleven, and I
resolved that I would do my utmost to discover
her, if in the train; and I occupied myself now
with imagining numerous pretexts for
presuming to offer my services on her behalf. She
will readily comprehend the disinterested
character of my attentions. She will see that I
come in no spirit of levity, but moved by a true
sympathy and the respectful sentiment of one
touched by her sorrows. I can fancy her coy
diffidence giving way before the deferential
homage of my manner; and in this I really
believe I have some tact. I was not sorry to
pursue this theme undisturbed by the presence
of my fellow-travellers, who had now got out at
a station, leaving me all alone to meditate and
devise imaginary conversations with Miss
Herbert. I rehearsed to myself the words by
which to address her, my bow, my gesture, my
faint smile, a blending of melancholy with
kindliness, my whole air a union of the deference
of the stranger with something almost
fraternal. These pleasant musings were now
rudely routed by the return of my fellow-travellers,
who came hurrying back to their places at
the banging summons of a great bell.

"Everything cold, as usual. It is a perfect
disgrace how the public are treated on this
line!" cried one.

"I never think of anything but a biscuit and
a glass of ale, and they charged me elevenpence
halfpenny for that."

"The directors ought to look to this. I saw
those ham sandwiches when I came down here
last Tuesday week."

"And though the time-table gives us fifteen
minutes, I can swear, for I laid my watch on
the table, that we only got nine and a half."

"Well, I supped heartily off that spiced
round."

"Supped, supped! Did you say you had
supped here, sir?" asked I, in anxiety.

"Yes, sir; that last station was Trentham.
They give us nothing more now till we reach
town."

I lay back with a faint sigh, and from that
moment took no note of time till the guard cried
"London!"

SLAVES OF THE RING.

"PRAY tell me," we overheard a country
squire style of man of about thirty, say to a
very excited friend of his, of about twenty
years of age, whom he had stopped, as with
betting-book in hand he was rushing into the
ring at Epsom—"pray tell me from which of
those acute-looking gentlemen do you expect
to win your money?"

Betting is the favourite form of gambling in
modern England; with the help of railroads
and telegraphs, it seems to have almost
absorbed the other dragons that formerly consumed
the fortunes of our aspiring youth. There has
been no successor to the fishmonger who built
the palatial hall in St. James's-street, made it an
exclusive club and hell, and, before his death,
devoured the fortunes of numbers of his customers.
The Jew orange boys, who, by a hundred
arts, rivalled the ghoul Crockford, have
departed without leaving room for imitators.
Swindling speculators in roulette or French
hazard hide in dirty attics, hunted like rats
by the police. Not that it is the police who
have killed the noble games of chance; it is the
taste and fashion that have changed. In days
long gone by,Charles James Fox, and the noblest
and wittiest in the land, sat night and day
up to their knees in cards, at White's, with
gauntlets to protect their ruffled sleeves, and
chairmen's coats to keep out the cold; ruining
each other without its being considered either
novel or strange. There is no "Wattier's"
now where a Brummel could win thirty thousand
pounds in one season. There are neither the
preserves nor the game that formerly tempted
bold sportsmen to cards and dice.

But although England has no Hombourg or
Baden-Baden; although our small shopkeepers
and mechanics are not to be seen, like their
fellows on the Continent, at the billiard-
table, or deep in écarté in an open café, in the
middle of the day; although the "gents" who
pursue such amusements are careful to retire
from public view; although card-playing in a
public-house involves the forfeit of the
landlord's license; we must not plume ourselves on
our superior virtue. The ring—the betting
ring—appears to swallow up all other English
gambling tastes, and to have stomach for them all.
Even of the section who prefer the time bargains
of the Stock Exchange, not a few are found in
both places, and combine the financial respectability
of Capel-court with electrotype fashion of
Hyde Park-corner.

To accommodate the widely pervading taste
which prevails as fiercely in cotton-worshipping
Lancashire and horse-worshipping Yorkshire, as
among the idlest and fastest society of London,
the business instincts of England have created a
class of professionals "who do for a living what
noblemen and gentlemen are supposed to do for
pleasure;" parallel in position and calling to the
brokers and jobbers of the Stock Exchange, they
bet on commission for those who do not wish
to appear, who desire to back or bet against
their own horses, or who are ready, at a price,
to back or lay the odds against any horse for any
race, and thus accommodate the many who,
without being gamblers, once or twice in the
year take a ticket in the turf lottery by risking
a few pounds on a favourite local horse.

Legs—that is Blacklegs—the betting brokers
were formerly called; but now, established
compact and numerous, that title is voted ungenteel,
and they are Turfmen or Commissioners. Among
the motley mob of sharks who live by setting
their polished wits against the folly and
ignorance of young gambling enthusiasts, great
fortunes are realised, and these, chiefly, by
losing, not by winning horses. Hence, familiar
in their mouths are such phrases as "a dead
un," "as good as boiled," and other sentences
expressive of the advantage of betting