would not have been likely to take in the other players: it would not have much impressed such an expert practitioner as 'Bill Nye.' But when we read:

In his sleeves, which were long,

He had twenty-four packs-
Which was coming it strong,

Yet I state but the facts;

And we found on his nails, which were taper,

What is frequent in tapers-that's wax,

our sense of justice is outraged; we not only readily acquiesce in the judgment of Truthful James,' that it was coming it strong,' but we also feel, I think, that the judg ment is sadly lacking in vigour. If anything can reconcile us to so mild a pronouncement, it is our knowledge that at least one of the Heathen Chinee's antagonists was quite as great a rogue as he. For do we not read:

Yet the cards they were stocked

In a way that I grieve,

And my feelings were shocked

At the state of Nye's sleeve :

Which was stuffed full of aces and bowers,

And the same with intent to deceive.

There was a difference between the rogues: the Heathen Chinee was the cleverer rogue of the two. As to how he himself played the game, Truthful James' maintains a rigid silence. In another of Bret Harte's poems, 'Truthful' gives himself an excellent character:-

I reside at Table Mountain, and my name is Truthful James,
I am not up to small deceit, or any sinful games.

But, however innocent he may have been of 'small deceit, or other sinful games,' I shrewdly suspect he must have received such an initiation into the wicked ways of the world as would have protected him against 'Ah Šin's' simulated ignorance. And so Bret Harte's famous poem may serve, I think, to illustrate tricks and wiles and dodges which may not in justice be practised, and other tricks and wiles and dodges which may be practised without any violation of justice. When I say this, I must not be taken as recommending them. So far from recommending them, I distinctly say that I think such wiles are very dishonourable: it is one thing to say they are not positively unjust; it is quite another thing to recommend them.

A fourth condition, necessary, according to some writers,

for the justice of the game, is equality between the players. If one of the players is notably superior to the other in knowledge and skill, the inequality renders the game unjust. Consequently, if the man of notably superior knowledge win, he is bound to make restitution. So argue

those writers. Other writers, also of great name and fame, deny this. They maintain that, provided there is not fraud, mere superiority of knowledge and skill does not make the game unjust, and therefore does not carry with it the obligation of making restitution. They prove, or try to prove, their point in the following way: At the beginning of the game, the loser either was aware of the superior knowledge and skill of his antagonist, or he was not. If he was aware of it, then he cannot have been the victim of injustice. In proof of this, they rely on the consecrated ethical maxim, Scienti et volenti non fit injuria. If he was not aware of his antagonist's superiority, he is in that case to ascribe his losses to his own rashness: he engaged in play with one, about whose knowledge and skill he ought to have made inquiries, and did not.

There are yet other conditions which ought to be observed. The neglect of them may not be a sin against justice, but is yet sinful, as being a violation of at least some other virtue. A man sins, if he expends on gaming the money that ought to go to the support of his family. He sins if, on one and the same occasion, he risks a very large sum of money on a bet or a game. Some say the sin is one of injustice; others, with greater probability, hold it only a sin of prodigal expenditure. A very large sum' is a relative term. At any rate, it seems such to me. I think that, before condemning a man as guilty of mortal sin for having on one and the same occasion risked a very large sum on a game or bet, we ought to consider the magnitude of the sum relatively to the wealth of him who ran the risk. Perhaps, as in the case of theft, it is possible to fix an absolute sum, the risking of which would always be a mortal sin-Sapientes dixerint. A conflict between moral writers, if the dissentients can claim that their respective views are truly probable, is of very great practical importance when, in any given case, we come to determine, for example, whether a man is under obligation to pay or not, to make restitution or not. But the detailed apportioning of obligations would take me too far afield, and might prove somewhat tiresome.

Throughout, I have kept to my game of cards as an example. But the principles I have been discussing are equally applicable to all games: to games that depend more on skill than on chance, as chess and billiards; to games that depend exclusively on chance, such as dice; and to games that depend equally, or almost equally, on skill and on chance. Perhaps, a game of cards may be classed under this last head.

To the moralist, a game and a bet are specifically different contracts; specifically different, and yet very closely allied. So closely allied, that the principles which govern the gambling contract, in due proportion govern the betting contract also: betting on boat-races and horse-races ; betting on football matches, cricket matches, and the other various events on which men put their money.

When discussing the morality of games, I said that the hope which the loser had of winning, and the risk to which the winner exposed his money, are the latter's justification for pocketing the stakes. The same holds in the betting contract. It was my good fortune to have backed the winning horse; but, antecedently, I exposed my money to risk. Antecedently, he, from whom I have_won the bet, had his hope and his chance of winning. I have so often insisted on this risk and this hope as things of marketable value that I am afraid I have left myself open to the charge of what Falstaff would call damnable iteration.' But I have a special reason for harking back to it at this particular point. Ethical writers ask if a man may make a bet on an event of which he is certain beforehand; on the result of a horse-race, for example, if he is already absolutely certain that he is backing the winning horse: we may at least suppose the case to be possible. Many writers maintain that such a bet is unjust, and, if paid, ought to be restored to the loser. In such a contract, they say, the loser's hope of winning was nil, and was known as such to the winner of the bet. Therefore, he sold a thing which was of absolutely no value; and consequently, if he has taken the bet, he is bound to make restitution. Other writers deny that there is any injustice in the contract, provided he who is certain of the result declares beforehand to the other that he is certain of it, and provided the other, notwithstanding, persists in making the bet. To me this seems to be a controversy about words or names. I should not hesitate to say that, in this last

case, the winner may keep the bet, but I very much doubt if we have in the transaction an example of the betting contract at all. If the money is made over to the winner, it is made over-so it seems to me-as a gift, not as a bet. In my opinion, for a bet, there ought to have been antecedent uncertainty on both sides. What is certain is this, that, in the betting contract, either there ought to be antecedent uncertainty on both sides; or, at least, if one of the parties is sure of the result beforehand, he ought to make that fact known to the other. If he does not, it seems to be perfectly clear that he cannot accept the bet, and that, if he has already accepted it, he is strictly bound to restore it. If, on the contrary, he made it known to the other beforehand that he was certain what the event would prove to be, and, if the other, in spite of the protestation, persisted, the winner may take the money and retain it. Whether the transaction ought to be called a betting transaction, or a free gift, is a matter of only secondary importance.

I may state broadly that the civil law under which we live will not help you to recover money won in gambling or betting. Not being counsel learned in the law, I will not go beyond that broad, general statement. I leave those who are interested in knowing the betting and gambling laws in greater detail to consult Every Man's Own Lawyer, price 6s. 8d. net. Perhaps a still more prudent advice would be: pay the 6s. 8d. to an attorney. Certainly more prudent, if what I have heard be true, that the reading of Every Man's Own Lawyer has caused more lawsuits than has the reading of any other book.

I have said that unqualified condemnation of gambling would spell the condemnation of dealings on the Stock Exchange, of insurance contracts, and of every contract into which the element of chance enters. This statement is borne out by the fact that writers on morals put them into the same class. They call them aleatory contracts, because they all depend more or less on the cast of the die. If I were to condemn absolutely playing a game of cards for moderate stakes, or putting a moderate bet on a horse-race, how ought I not to condemn the infinitely more reckless gambling of the Stock Exchange? I am far from suggesting that it is practised by all who trade at that mart; or by the majority of them, but I have it on very excellent authority that it is freely indulged in by many frequenters of the Rialto.

Let us take, however, as an example, the insurance contract, a contract which even the most puritanical regard as perfectly harmless; and we shall see that it involves quite as great an element of chance as is involved in either betting or gambling. We commonly hear of fire insurance, life insurance, or marine insurance: but let us not imagine that this list is exhaustive. In the article on insurance, in the latest edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica there is a section headed Casualty and Miscellaneous Insurance,' in which there is a lengthy enumeration: as, for example, insurance of plate glass against fracture; insurance against damage by the explosion of steam boilers; insurance against burglary; insurance against damage to growing crops by hail, and so on. The section ends as follows: 'Other minor forms of insurances are against bad debts, bonds and securities in transit, earthquakes, failure of issue, loss on investment, leasehold redemption, non-renewal of licences, loss of or damage to luggage in transit, damage to pictures, loss of profits through fire, imperfect sanitation, birth of twins, etc.'

Multiform, then, is the insurance contract; and every such contract is largely subject to chance. A tradesman insures his shop and his stock of goods against fire for £100,000. The building and all the goods are accidentally destroyed by fire the very week after the insurance contract was made. The insurance company pay in compensation the full £100,000. What can the owner of the shop set out as an equivalent for this huge amount? It was partly represented on his side by the yearly sum he was to pay the company which, in the event, was a mere nothing; it was chiefly represented by the hope of profit which he gave the company; by the hope that the premises would not be accidentally destroyed by fire, and that they would, year after year, receive their big premium. The hope proved elusive, it is true, but we are not to estimate it by the event, but by the value which a prudent judgment attached to it at the time that the insurance contract was consummated. At that time the shopkeeper also took upon himself his proper risk; the risk of having to pay the company a large, annual sum. His property might never have been destroyed. If it had not been destroyed what would the company have had to show as a set-off against the large, yearly sum paid them by the shopkeeper? The danger to the property, which was