`One night I had such a run of luck in the Hazard room, which was
rather thinly attended, that I won everything, and with my load
of treasure collected from the East and West, nay, probably, some
of it from _Finchley Common_ and _Hounslow Heath_, I went, in
the flush of success, to attack the Faro bank.
`It was my determination, however, if fortune favoured me through
the night, never to tempt her more. For some hours I proceeded
in the torture of suspense, alternately agitated by hope and
fear--but by five o'clock in the morning I attained a state of
certainty similar to that of a wretch ushered into the regions of
the damned. I had lost L3500 guineas, which I had brought
with me from the Hazard table, together with L2000 which the
bank advanced me on my credit. There they stopped; and, with an
apathy peculiar to themselves, listened to a torrent of puerile
abuse which I vented against them in my despair.