Now, on the contrary, nothing is considered better form than to talk of one's property, of your lands, the improvements you mean to make, your agricultural experiments, the care of your forests and woodlands, and the beauty of the cattle that you raise in your fields. Every one nowadays talks like an overseer, and every one is right, because these last named personages are the only ones who are living like masters in the few magnificent old residences that yet remain in France. The time that is spent at the country place is prolonged every year, and there is an evident reaction towards the life at the château for eight months of the year, and life at the clubs in Paris during the winter months. But to return to M. de Cernay, he was a very great, and, above all, a very intelligent gambler. This seems in contradiction of those principles of order and economy of which I have just spoken? Not at all. For most men of the world, play is only a frightful challenge that is thrown to fate, a means of burning excitement and terrible emotions; it is more of a necessity than an amusement. Men have their money for play, which is a given sum that they never exceed. It is a capital which they try to render as profitable as possible by good management, by running no great risks, and by studying the chances and combinations of the game with an incredible ardour; in comprehending its every detail, and in playing constantly, so as to keep in good practice; also by experimenting with the deepest attention in order to make new discoveries; so that in this way the capital brings in, if the season has been a good one, from fifteen to twenty per cent, to a cool, prudent, and skilful player. And, besides this, play having become an affair of exact science, of interest, and generally of perfect honesty, the forces of the players are generally so equally matched that one can allow himself the excitement of a stake of twelve or fifteen hundred louis, because it is well known that at the end of a bad season the losses and gains are about equal. Nothing is more curious in our epoch than this strange struggle between a wise and cool forethought which looks to the future, and the ardent passions natural to men; which they find in this way the means of satisfying to a certain degree, by a sort of insurance against bad luck.[1] M. de Cernay, they say, has been very successful with women; but in growing old, as he said, he had found it more satisfactory, as it gave him more liberty and saved him from worry, besides giving him more chances for display (this was one of his salient points), to put to one side a certain sum of money annually, for his favourite of the season. This amount, which he never went beyond, he laid regularly at the feet of one of the theatrical beauties most in vogue.