England now proceeded to begin the stripping of his dupe by pretending to back him for fifty or a hundred guineas a set, complaining bitterly of his losses when unsuccessful. Mr. Damer meanwhile was losing three, four, and sometimes five thousand guineas in a day; and with such blind avidity did he pursue this destructive game, that he soon found himself a loser of near forty thousand guineas. At last, he found it prudent to resist the propensity to play with England and his band of sharpers, some of whom were constantly at his house in Tilney Street, requesting payment. Mr. Damer offered them post-obits, bonds, or in short the best security he could then offer, his father, Lord Milton, afterwards Lord Dorchester, being alive; no, they would have cash. Mr. Damer could not find it; but, to his high sense of honour be it told, he threw himself at his father's feet; the worthy parent weighed the matter well, and sent his steward from Milton Abbey with power to pay every shilling, though he knew his son had been cheated of every guinea. The steward, however, arrived only in time to learn that his young master, having sent for five girls and a blind fiddler, had blown out his brains after a roystering carouse at a tavern in Covent Garden. According to Horace Walpole it was Fox who, with infinite good nature, went to meet Mrs. Damer on her way to town and prepared her for the dismal news. "Can," says Walpole, "the walls of Almack's help moralizing when £5000 a year in present and £22,000 in reversion are not sufficient for happiness and cannot check a pistol!" England was very fertile in expedients in plucking his pigeons. On one occasion, being with other blacklegs at Scarborough, and a rich dupe, from whom a good deal was expected, refusing to play after dinner, the party, having made the pigeon drunk and given the waiter five guineas to answer any awkward questions which might be asked in the morning, wrote out on slips of paper "D---- (the pigeon's name) owes me a hundred guineas." "D---- owes me eighty guineas," and so on. England, however, wrote "I owe D---- thirty guineas." The next morning England, meeting the guest of the night before on the cliff, said to him: "Well, we were all very merry last night." "We were indeed," replied the pigeon, "and I only hope I did not offend any one, for I must confess that I drank a good deal more than usual." "You were in good spirits, my dear fellow," said England, "that was all; and now, before I forget, let me pay you the thirty guineas I lost to you last night--I am not very lucky at cards."