As for Merl, his well-schooled faculties never were ruffled nor excited. The game had no power to fascinate _him_, its vicissitudes had nothing new or surprising to him; intervals of ill-luck, days even of dubious fortune might occur, but he knew he would win in the end, just as he knew that though there might intervene periods of bad weather and adverse winds, the good ship “Elphinstone” would arrive at last, and, a day sooner or a day later, discharge passengers and freight on the banks of the Thames. You may forgive the man who has rivalled you in love, the banker whose “smash” has engulfed all your fortune, the violent political antagonist who has assailed you personally, and in the House, perhaps, answered the best speech you ever made by a withering reply. You may extend feelings of Christian charity to the reviewer who has “slashed” your new novel, the lawyer whose vindictive eloquence has exposed, the artist in “Punch” who has immortalized, you; but there is one man you never forgive, of whom you will never believe one good thing, and to whom you would wish a thousand evil ones,--he is your natural enemy, brought into the world to be your bane, born that he may be your tormentor; and this is the man who _always_ beats you at play! Happily, good reader, you may have no feelings of the gambler,--you may be of those to whom this fatal vice has never appealed, or appealed in vain; but if you _have_ “played,” or even mixed with those who have, you could n't have failed to be struck with the fact that there is that one certain man from whom you never win! Wherever he is, there, too, is present your evil destiny! Now, there is no pardoning this,--the double injury of insult to your skill and damage to your pocket. Such a man as this becomes at last your master. You may sneer at his manners, scoff at his abilities, ridicule his dress, laugh at his vulgarity,--poor reprisals these! In his presence, the sense of that one superiority he possesses over you makes you quail! In the stern conflict, where your destiny and your capacity seem alike at issue, he conquers you,--not to-day or to-morrow, but ever and always! There he sits, arbiter of your fate,--only doubtful how long he may defer the day of your sentence!