Oft do the purses of the victims fail, Their fury oft on box and dice they wreak How jocund look they if their luck prevail! How grand their manner when they deign to speak! Let not the legislator deem it harm That _others_ trifle with the laws _he_ breaks; Nor rich knaves hear, with counterfeit alarm, That men distress’d will often _make mistakes_. The boast of honesty, the laws dread power, And all that pride of feeling can achieve, Await alike the inevitable hour, The rage for gaming leads us all to thieve. Nor scorn, ye rulers of the states’ finance, The prompt expedients of these pilfering scenes, Where thro’ the aid of rapine they enhance The scanty budget of their ways and means. Can stories sad, or supplicative grief, Back to the owner bring his valued dross? Can blunt rebuffs administer relief, Or aidless pity compensate his loss? Perhaps, amidst that motley group there stand Some who once graced far other scenes of life; Dupes, that have mortgaged the last rood of land, Or lost the fortune of some hapless wife. But rife examples, which bid wisdom think, Their frantic folly never can appal, Blind avarice leads them to the ruin’s brink, And dark _despair_ accelerates their fall. Full many a trinket, pledged for half the cost, Hath raised the means of venturing _once_ more; Full many a _watch_ is destined to be lost, And run its time out in some broker’s store. Some fancy shirt-pin that hath deck’d the breast, On plaited cambric, starch’d in spruce array; Some ring, memento of a friend at rest, Some seal, or snuff box, of a better day. The servile tongues of borrowers to command, The tributary dues of boxes to evade, To spread the paper’d plunder in the hand, And read their consequence in homage paid, Their luck forbids; nor circumscribes alone To them its evils, but its range extends; Forbids the needful purchases at home, And shuts the door of welcome on their friends. The petty processes of law to stop, To prove how groundless are the landlords fears; Or gain fresh credit at the chandler’s shop, By paying off the grocery arrears. Far from all dreams of splendid opulence, Their wish is answered if their way they clear; Well can they dine for twelve or thirteen pence, Including waiter, and a pint of beer. Yet e’en their painful efforts to exist, Some _Knaves in heart_, as yet _unskilled_ to cheat, With secret whisper when a piece is missed, Will strive from pique, or envy, to defeat. Their _names_, their means, on which at large they dwell, Invade at intervals the startled ear, And many an anecdote in point they tell, That teaches gaping _novices_ to fear. For who, to damn’d fatality a prey, Gives his last piece, without concern or pain, Leaves the warm circle of the crowded play, Nor asks the table if a chance remain?