thoroughfare was then the promenade of the watchful brotherhood of chance. In that hour, too, it stood more the fashion--for there are fashions in gambling as in everything else--to win and lose money at short-cards, and casino enjoyed particular vogue. There were scores of eminent practitioners about New York, and Joe had little trouble in securing recognition. Indeed, he might have played the full twenty-four hours of every day could he have held up his head to such labors. There was at the advent of our rural Joe into metropolitan circles none more alert or breathless for pastmastery in unholy speculation than myself. About twenty-one should have been my years, and I carried that bubbling spirit for success common to the youth of every walk. _Aut Cosar aut nullus!_ was my warcry, and I did not consider Joe and his career for long before I was slave to the one hope of finally gaining his secret. One might found fortune on it; like the philosopher’s stone it turned everything to gold. With those others who fell before Joe I also believed his success to be offspring of some cheat. And while the rustic Joe was engaged against some fellow immoralist, I’ve sat and watched for hours upon end to discover what winding thing Joe did. There was no villainy of double dealing or chicane of cut-shifting or of marked cards at which I was not adept. And what I could so darkly perform I was equally quick to discover when another attempted it. But, albeit I eyed poor Joe with a cat’s vigilance--a vigilance to have saved the life of Argus had he but emulated it with his hundred eyes--I noted nothing. And the reason was a simple one. There was literally nothing to discover; Joe played honestly enough; his advantage dwelt in his memory and that lay hidden within his head. Despairing of a discovery by dint of watching, I made friendly overtures to Joe, hoping to wheedle a secret which I could not surprise. My proffers of comradeship were met more than half way. Joe was a kindly though a lonely soul and had few friends; his queer garb of the cowpastures together with his unfailing domination at casino kept others of the fraternity at a distance. Also I had been much educated of books by Father Glennon, and put in my spare time with reading. As Joe himself had dived somewhat into books, we were doubly drawn to each other. Hours have we sat together in Joe’s nobly furnished rooms--for he lived well if he did not dress well--and overhauled for our mutual amusement the literature of the centuries back to Chaucer and his Tabard Inn.