_Lord Townley_.--Why, at best, women that lose their money, and men that win it; _or, perhaps, men that are voluntary bubbles at one game, in hopes a lady will give them fair play at another._ 'The facts,' says Mr Massey,(98) 'confirm the theory. Walpole's Letters and Mr Jesse's volumes on George Selwyn and his Contemporaries, teem with allusions to proved or understood cases of matrimonial infidelity; and the manner in which notorious irregularities were brazened out, shows that the offenders did not always encounter the universal reprobation of society. (98) History of England, ii. 'Whist was not much in vogue until a later period, and was far too abstruse and slow to suit the depraved taste which required unadulterated stimulants.' The ordinary stakes at these mixed assemblies would, at the present day, be considered high, even at the clubs where a rubber is still allowed. 'The consequences of such gaming were often still more lamentable than those which usually attended such practices. It would happen that a lady lost more than she could venture to confess to her husband or father. Her creditor was probably a fine gentleman, or she became indebted to some rich admirer for the means of discharging her liabilities. In either event, the result may be guessed. In the one case, the debt of honour was liquidated on the old principle of the law-merchant, according to which there was but one alternative to payment in purse. In the other, there was likewise but one mode in which the acknowledgment of obligation by a fine woman would be acceptable to a man of the world.' 'The pernicious consequences of gambling to the nation at large,' says another writer, 'would have been intolerable enough had they been confined to the stronger sex; but, unfortunately, the women of the day were equally carried away by this criminal infatuation. The disgusting influence of this sordid vice was so disastrous to female minds, that they lost their fairest distinction and privileges, together with the blushing honours of modesty. Their high gaming was necessarily accompanied with great losses. If all their resources, regular and irregular, honest and fraudulent, were dissipated, still, _GAME-DEBTS MUST BE PAID!_ The cunning winner was no stranger to the necessities of the case. He hinted at _commutations_--which were not to be refused. "So tender these,--if debts crowd fast upon her, She'll pawn her _VIRTUE_ to preserve her _HONOUR!_" Thus, the last invaluable jewel of female possession was unavoidably resigned. That was indeed the forest of all evils, but an evil to which every deep gamestress was inevitably exposed.'