he Neck,
are in a sort of barrack-room, fitted up with bunks and benches, and
filled with a grotesque assembly, making night jubilant--eating,
drinking, smoking, and singing. "A jolly set of fellows," says Mr.
Snivel, with an expression of satisfaction. "This is a decoy crib--the
vagabonds all belong to the party of our opponents, but don't know it.
We work in this way: we catch them--they are mostly foreigners--lock
them up, give them good food and drink, and make them--not the half can
speak our language--believe we belong to the same party. They yield, as
submissive as curs. To morrow, we--this is in confidence--drug them all,
send them into a fast sleep, in which we keep them till the polls are
closed, then, not wanting them longer, we kick them out for a set of
drunkards. Dangerous sort of cribbing, this. I let you into the secret
out of pure friendship." Mr. Snivel pauses. George has at heart
something of deeper interest to him than votes and vote-cribbers. But
why, he says to himself, does Mr. Snivel evince this anxiety to befriend
me? This question is answered by Mr. Snivel inviting him to take a look
into the Keno den.

CHAPTER XXXI.

THE KENO DEN, AND WHAT MAY BE SEEN IN IT.

The clock has just struck twelve. Mr. Snivel and George, passing from
the scenes of our last chapter, enter a Keno den,[5] situated on Meeting
street. "You must get money, George. Here you are nothing without money.
Take this, try your hand, make your genius serve you." Mr. Snivel puts
twenty dollars into George's hand. They are in a room some twenty by
thirty feet in dimensions, dimly-lighted. Standing here and there are
gambling tables, around which are seated numerous mechanics, losing, and
being defrauded of that for which they have labored hard during the
week. Hope, anxiety, and even desperation is pictured on the
countenances of the players. Maddened and disappointed, one young man
rises from a table, at which sits a craven-faced man sweeping the
winnings into his pile, and with profane tongue, says he has lost his
all. Another, with flushed face and bloodshot eyes, declares it the
sixth time he has lost his earnings here. A third reels confusedly about
the room, says a mechanic is but a dog in South Carolina; and the sooner
he comes to a dog's end the better.

[Footnote 5: A gambling den.]

Mr. Snivel points George to a table, at which he is soon seated.
"Blank--blank--blank!" he reiterates, as the numbers turn up, a