"The clerk was broke in two hours' sitting and confessed he had lost sixty dollars, more than three weeks' salary, and while he wore a gold chain over his vest, he had left his watch in pledge with the game-owner for twenty dollars' worth of chips besides. As the reporter and his guide reached the sidewalk, one of the young men who had been in the place was asked what he thought of the place. Not suspecting the reporter's motive, the player answered glibly: 'Oh, that racket in French flats is getting to be all the go now, and I tell you it's immense. The police can't get on to it, and now as all the faro games are closed or not making expenses, and afraid to open, it is doing well. Then there is such a better class of people that go to these places, people who would not care to be seen or caught in a regular concern. Now up in Harry's you see how nice it is. There's your parlor to play in. Then if it's an all-night play you can sleep in turns or lay off during the day, and get anything you want to eat right there. 'Get pulled?' Why, there ain't the ghost of a show for that in those flats. In the first place, no one is let in without he is known or has a card; then a 'copper' can 't go in without forcing an entrance or a warrant, and if he does, what evidence can be produced to show the place is a gambling house? Why, gambling in the Fifth Avenue clubs is no better protected. No one in the house up-stairs suspects what's going on. The halls are all carpeted and so are the stairs, and you never can hear any one pass up and down. Then if any raid is made, can't a man swear he was only having a game of cards in his own house with a party of friends?' In society, next to progressive euchre, poker comes the highest. "'Are there many of these private flat games?' asked the reporter. 'Oh, yes; there's at least half a dozen I know of. There's one on Fifty-ninth street, one on Forty-fifth street, and several more on Sixth Avenue and Broadway, and any quantity now in other private houses run as social club rooms. You see, no games but poker--draw, stud-horse and straight, and hide the heart--are allowed to be run. Now if you never was in Harry's before, and you were seen to be all right, you would be given some cards to pass around to your friends confidentially, which would tell them where to go for play and would get them in without bother." CHAPTER XXII. SLUMMING. _Depravity of Life in Billy McGlory's--A Three Hours' Visit to the Place--Degraded Men and Lost Women Who are Nightly in This Criminal Whirlpool._ The following from the Cincinnati _Enquirer_ tells its own story: