The Birmingham age-herald., 1908-06-21

suggesting pointedly that 1t had been long since he could get a gentleman to play with him, since he was suspected of be- ing too successful most times and of
 never paying when, by an unusual chance, he lost. She was even more plain about
 Cousin Will, since there was nothing so
 bad about him that it was not said open
 ly in every club in London, most of
 which he dared not enter.
 Harry was nobodys fool. He had not
 been dissolute at home; but in the man.
 ner of the times he had played his part at gaming, drinking, and measuring his | wits against his neighbor. If he was not | very wise in books or very deep in phil osophy, he was a very keen, alert, skill full young fellow, as Cousin Will soon learned when Harry caught him neatly
 in cheat and punished. him still more neatly in game of fight.
 For while, too, he escaped Castlewood;
 and indeed, that bankrupt, bespattered, | conscienceless ornament of the nobility kept his hands off in the beginning, after a talk with the Baroness.
 But Harry was not so fortunate with the female portion of the plotting Castle woods. Else why should Harry one day fall to kissing withered vegetable which he carried in his breast, and which had heen a rose when 1t was pluclzed for him by the fair hands of the Lady Maria? And If his eyes, looking through love, could translate the amputated greens into the glooming glory they had been. why could they not translate the Lady Maras some- what yellow neck and her somewhat too blooming complexion into what they had been once when the charmer was 20 in- stead of the 2S that she owed to Harry fand the 42 that she really was)? So Harry wrote to her as his angel, and Lady Maria, whose tattered and scared heart still had enough passion to feel true lcve for the handsome, flushed, eager lad, forgave the bad spelling for the sentiment. It was lucky for the peace of mind of the Princess Pocahontas that she did not know how well her heir was progressing in the arts of society, which she had laid 1. on him to learn. The Baroness Bern stein, vastly proud of him, introduced him to all the gay world that came thronging to her rooms none the less eagerly for lcsing no opportunity to retail her past career
 Castlewood introduced him at court, which was almost the only place in Lon don where he could stiu appear without too much danger of being cut dead In London Harry fell in with she Earl of March and Ruglen. who laid Harry three bets the moment he met him, all of which the Virginian won. He was equally successful at cards. My Lord of March was then the widest bettor and gamestor in England, willing to 4bet on anything from fly to the death of his friends. "The Fortunate Youth,'' they christened him.
 "The Iroquois won a3OO very gentellcy last night at Whites from my nephew" wrote Sir Horace Wa!pole about that time 1 In letter to a friend. "They say he has bled Lord March of thousands-Lord March by whom so much blood has been shed that he has quarreled with every 1 body"
 "The Fortunate Youth" wrote Lord i March in letter to George Selwyn, tho famous wit, whose jokes as we read them now seem so sadly like corked wine, ''has | an estate in Virginia as big as Yorkshire. He has had the devils luck here, and if you can settle our Epson account please hand him G35O, which I still owe him, after pretty well emptying my pocket book. Lord Chesterfield has dropped six hundred to him, too. He has won our money in very gentlemanlike man. ner."
 He fought his battles like hero, game- sters battles though they were. He was not Mustered by good luck or cast down by bad By George" said MT. Selwyn, in rare fit of enthusiasm, you deserve to win! You treat your fortune as
 gentleman should!'
 Now, how did Harry get the capital to begin his gaming? In his stately letters to the Princess Pocahontas he did not enlarge on this part of his career nor suggest to her that he was living in a fashion which even the simple Virginia lady would perceive as incompatible with an allowance of R250 a year.