It was soon found useless for any one to play Morphy even, as he scored almost every game. Meeting Monsieur Laroche at the café one morning, that gentleman asked me why our hero did not offer odds to everybody. I replied that no doubt many gentlemen would feel hurt at such a proposition being made to them, and I asked him--"Would you play Morphy at pawn and move?" to which he unhesitatingly replied "Yes." M. Journoud was sitting beside him, and he expressed himself in like manner. On informing Paul Morphy of this conversation, he requested me to inform the proprietor of the café that, in future, he should play no one without giving odds; excepting, however, Herr Harrwitz. He was most desirous of again meeting the Prussian amateur, the latter having made some rather peculiar observations with regard to their match; as, for instance, that he had not lost the affair, Morphy having consented to annul it: that he was not a match player, and played much stronger off-hand: that Morphy did not beat him by combination, _but by sitting him out_, and so forth. But Harrwitz always took care to keep out of harm's way, and although Morphy came day after day to the café, with the avowed intention of meeting him, Herr H. had always got one or the other reason for not playing. Laroche, Budzinsky, Devinck, and other leading amateurs tried their luck at pawn and move, with no better result than contending even. Others tried at pawn and two, as, for instance, Lequesne, Guibert, Lecrivain, and Delaunay. Who of my chess readers does not know this brilliant writer in the Palamède, who has kept everybody on the broad grin throughout his numerous articles? He is always full of fun and sparkling wit, and merrily did he display it with Morphy. The first time they played, Delaunay sacrificed piece after piece, in a way to terrify anybody but his young antagonist, and certainly seemed to occupy a position dangerous to Morphy's peace of mind. The latter made one of his peculiar moves, when Delaunay observed, eyeing the board with one eye, and the spectators with the other--"_Voila un coup du bon Dieu_," and then making his reply, which set our hero reflecting, he added--"_Et, en voila un du diable._" But it was all of no use, and Morphy soon turned the tables upon him. M. Delaunay styles himself "_un casse échiquier_," for he plays as though driving spike nails. At the London Divan some months since he astonished the spectators by breaking one of the pawns, when he immediately cried out--"Oh, that's nothing; I break the rooks in Paris."