oposed Play. Behold them, arranged symmetrically in a line.

'My Lord. The Baron. The Courier. The Doctor. The Countess.

'I don't trouble myself, you see, to invest fictitious family names.
My characters are sufficiently distinguished by their social titles,
and by the striking contrast which they present one with another.

The First Act opens-- 'No! Before I open the First Act, I must
announce, injustice to myself, that this Play is entirely the work of
my own invention. I scorn to borrow from actual events; and, what is
more extraordinary still, I have not stolen one of my ideas from the
Modern French drama. As the manager of an English theatre, you will
naturally refuse to believe this. It doesn't matter. Nothing
matters--except the opening of my first act.

'We are at Homburg, in the famous Salon d'Or, at the height of the
season. The Countess (exquisitely dressed) is seated at the green
table. Strangers of all nations are standing behind the players,
venturing their money or only looking on. My Lord is among the
strangers. He is struck by the Countess's personal appearance, in
which beauties and defects are fantastically mingled in the most
attractive manner. He watches the Countess's game, and places his
money where he sees her deposit her own little stake. She looks round
at him, and says, "Don't trust to my colour; I have been unlucky the
whole evening. Place your stake on the other colour, and you may have
a chance of winning." My Lord (a true Englishman) blushes, bows, and
obeys. The Countess proves to be a prophet. She loses again. My Lord
wins twice the sum that he has risked.

'The Countess rises from the table. She has no more money, and she
offers my Lord her chair.

'Instead of taking it, he politely places his winnings in her hand, and
begs her to accept the loan as a favour to himself. The Countess
stakes again, and loses again. My Lord smiles superbly, and presses a
second loan on her. From that moment her luck turns. She wins, and
wins largely. Her brother, the Baron, trying his fortune in another
room, hears of what is going on, and joins my Lord and the Countess.

'Pay attention, if you please, to the Baron. He is delineated as a
remarkable and interesting character.

'This noble person has begun life with a single-minded devotion to the
science of experimental chemistry, very surprising in a young and
handsome man with a brilliant future before him. A profound knowledge
of the occult sci