No, it is not quite such a pleasant atmosphere as you thought when you first came in. It is an atmosphere in which vigilance tries to still the pulse. You pass restlessly from one hypnotized table of gamblers to another. The grandeur of gold and heavy glass make you feel as if you were swimming under water in some great untroubled lake. And as you tread softly and silently over the thick carpets it is something like swimming. There is an intense stillness about each roulette table. Even the winners are impassive. And the groups are gloomier still at the stables where they are playing "Trente et Quarante." "Every one came in to win, but nearly every one is losing--isn't it like life?" said a friend. "Worse even than life." Pompous and watchful lackeys dressed as for the stage are walking about, keeping their eyes open for sharps, for possible scandal-raisers, or would-be suicides. The greatest care is taken to preserve decorum. If you lose your whole fortune there you must not shout it out and strike a heroic posture or blow your brains out. These strong lackeys will whisk you dexterously from the scene before the other gamblers realize what you were about to do. There is a sense of being watched all the while. "_Faites le jeu, messieurs!_" "_Le jeu est fait._" "_Rien ne va plus._" The winners get their winnings. The bank rakes in tremendous quantities of money-tokens. Its success is very impressive. You see very clearly demonstrated how poor is the mental apparatus of the average man. No wonder it is difficult to get Europe on to a basis of common sense when _homo sapiens_ has such a limited brain-box. "I'm staking on the number 13 now," says one. "The number 13 has not come up for thirty-four times. It's almost bound to come soon." "Why's that?" "So as to correspond to the theory of chances." "I don't suppose the number 13 is much excited about it." The number 13 comes up. The exultant gambler pockets thirty-six times his stake, and then engrosses himself in his exercise-book of figures to find another number which hasn't come up for a long while. He stakes on 7. Thirteen comes up again. "What a fool I was," he whispers in mortification. "I ought to have known there was a chance of its coming up a second time." To the theory of chances most minds are susceptible and this delightful theory lies at the bottom of most systems. Not in the case, however, of a certain lady who claimed to have considerable success. She played by astrology. She kept the record of the winning numbers. "See," said she, "how many of them are even numbers." "Why is that?" I murmured. "Hercules is in the ascendant this month. That always means more even numbers."