It may be inferred from these two examples of Ensign Spoonbill’s ideas of discipline and the service, what was the course he generally adopted when _on_ duty, without our being under the necessity of going into further details. What he did when _off_ duty helped him on still more effectually. Lord Pelican’s outfit having “mounted” the young gentleman, and the credit he obtained on the strength of being Lord Pelican’s son, keeping his stud in order, he was enabled to vie with the crackest of the crack Hundredth; subject, however, to all the accidents which horseflesh is heir to—especially when allied to a judgment of which green was the prevailing colour. A “swap” to a disadvantage; an indiscreet purchase; a mistake as to the soundness of an animal; and such other errors of opinion, entailed certain losses, which might, after all, have been borne, without rendering the applications for money at home, more frequent than agreeable; but when under the influence of a natural obstinacy, or the advice of some very “knowing ones,” Ensign Spoonbill proceeded to back his opinion in private matches, handicaps, and steeple-chases, the privy purse of Lady Pelican collapsed in a most unmistakeable manner. Nor was this description of amusement the only rock-a-head in the course of the Honourable Ensign. The art or science of betting embraces the widest field, and the odds, given or taken, are equally fatal, whether the subject that elicits them be a match at billiards or a horse-race. Nor are the stakes at blind-hookey or unlimited loo less harmless, when you hav’n’t got luck and _have_ such opponents as Captain Cushion. In spite of the belief in his own powers, which Ensign Spoonbill encouraged, he could not shut his eyes to the fact that he was every day a loser; but wiser gamblers than he—if any there be—place reliance on a “turn of luck,” and all he wanted to enable him to take advantage of it, was a command of cash; for even one’s best friends prefer the coin of the realm to the most unimpeachable I. O. U.