g. Lord Henry appears to have taken no very
active part in the proceedings; the other three had lost money in play
with Lord de Ros, and, as unsuccessful gamblers have done before and
since, considered that they had lost it unfairly.

'Lord de Ros, instead of prosecuting the four for a libel, brought an
action only against Cumming, which permitted the others to come forward
as witnesses against him. The cause came on in the Court of King's Bench
before Lord Denman. The plaintiff's witnesses were Lord Wharncliffe,
Lord Robert Grosvenor, the Earl of Clare, and Sir Charles Dalbiac, who
had known and played with him from between 20 to 30 years, as a very
skilful but honourable Whist player. The evidence of Mr Lawrence, the
eminent surgeon, proved that Lord de Ros had long suffered under a
stiffness of the joints of the fingers that made holding a pack of
cards difficult, and the performance of the imputed trick of legerdemain
impossible. For the defence appeared the keeper of the house and
his son; two or three gamblers who had lived by their winnings; one
acknowledged to have won L35,000 in 15 years. Mr Baring Wall, one of the
witnesses, swore that he had never witnessed anything improper in the
play of Lord de Ros, though he had played with and against him many
years; another witness, the Hon. Colonel Anson, had observed nothing
suspicious; but the testimony of others went to prove that the aces and
kings had been marked inside their edges; and one averred that he had
seen Lord de Ros perform sauter la coupe a hundred times. The whole case
wore much the look of a combination among a little coterie who lived
by gambling to drive from the field a player whose skill had diminished
their income; nevertheless, the incidents sworn to by some of them wore
a suspicious significance, and a verdict was given against Lord de Ros,
which he only survived a short time.'

On this statement the Times' reviewer comments as follows:--

'If many old scandals may be revived with impunity, there are some that
cannot. Mr Duncombe the younger has hit on one which affects several
gentlemen still living, and his injurious version of it cannot be
neutralized or atoned for by an apology to one. We call attention to it
in the hope that any more serious notice will be rendered needless by
the simple exposure of its inaccuracies.

'It is difficult to conceive a more inexcusable misstatement, for the
case was fully reported,(36) and the public judgm