y Vivian, Wilson Croker, _Disraeli_,
Horace Twiss, Copley, George Anson, and George Payne _WERE PRETTY SURE
OF BEING PRESENT_, many of them playing high.'

Respecting this statement the _Times'_(137) reviewer observes:--'We
do not know what the Chancellor of the Exchequer will say to this. Mr
Wilson Croker (who affected great strictness) would have fainted away.
But the authority of a writer who does not know Sir St Vincent Cotton
(the ex-driver of the Brighton coach) from Sir _Stapleton_ Cotton (the
Peninsular hero) will go for little in such matters; and as for Copley,
Lord Lyndhurst (just then promoted from the Rolls to the Woolsack), why
not say at once that he attended the nocturnal sittings at Crockford's
in his robes.'

(137) Jan. 7, 1868.

CHAPTER XII. REMARKABLE GAMESTERS. ----MONSIEUR CHEVALIER.

Monsieur CHevalier, Captain of the Grenadiers in the first regiment
of Foot Guards, in the time of Charles II. of England, was a native of
Normandy. In his younger days he was page to the Duchess of Orleans;
but growing too big for that service, he came to England to seek his
fortune, and by some good luck and favour became an ensign in the
first regiment of Foot Guards. His pay, however, being insufficient
to maintain him, he felt compelled to become a gamester, or rather to
resort to a practice in which doubtless he had been early initiated at
the Court of France; and he managed so well that he was soon enabled to
keep up an equipage much above his station.

Among the 'bubbles' who had the misfortune to fall into Chevalier's
hands, was a certain nobleman, who lost a larger sum to him than he
could conveniently pay down, and asked for time, to which Chevalier
assented, and in terms so courteous and obliging that the former,
a fortnight after, in order to let him see that he remembered his
civility, came one morning and told Chevalier that he had a company of
Foot to dispose of, and if it was worth his while, it should be at his
service. Nothing could be more acceptable to Chevalier, who at once
closed for the bargain, and got his commission signed the same day.
Besides the fact that it was a time of peace, Chevalier knew well that
the military title of Captain was a very good cloak to shelter under.

He knew that a man of no employment or any visible income, who appears
and lives like a gentleman, and makes gaming his constant business, is
always suspected of not playing for diversion only; and, in short,