There are men selling purses containing a sovereign for sixpence, loud, fat cosmopolitans on a cockney basis with a ceaseless flow of cajolery intermingled with sly indecency; the country policeman in the background puzzling over his duty in the matter, but in the end paralyzed by the showmen’s gift of words. One man has before him a counter on which he asks you to cover a red-painted disc with five smaller discs of zinc, charging twopence for the attempt and promising a watch to the great man who succeeds. After a batch of failures he himself, with good-natured but bored face, shows how easily it is done, and raising his eyes in despair craves for more courage from the audience. The crowd looks on, hesitating, until he singles out the most bashful countryman at the back of the throng, saying: “I like your face. You are a good sort. You have a cheerful face; it’s the rich have the sad faces. So I’ll treat you to a go.” The hero steps forward and succeeds, but as it was a free trial he receives no watch; trying again for twopence he fails. Another tries: “By Jove! that was a near one.” A woman tries, and just as she is finishing, “You’re a ’cute one, missus,” he ejaculates, and she fails. Another tries, and the showman has a watch ready to hand over, and only at the last moment says excitedly (restoring the watch quietly to its place): “I thought you’d got it that time.... Come along! It’s the best game in the world.” Once more he repeats the trick himself without looking, and then exclaims as he sweeps the discs together: “It’s a silly game, I call it!” He is like the preachers who show the stupid world how virtue is won: he has a large audience, a large paunch, and many go away disappointed. The crowd stares, and has the one deep satisfaction of believing that the woman who travels with him is not his wife.