All the women of my family are born
gamblers. My mother has often told me that regularly, when she was a
girl, the day after she received her allowance she had either doubled
it or lost it all; and before she was twenty she hadn't a jewel worth
anything in her possession--and my aunts were as bad. One of them
staked herself one night to a gentleman she was playing with, and he
won, and married her. Gambling was more the custom then than it is now,
but for me it is as much in the air as if it were still the fashion.
When there is any talk of play I feel fascinated, and when I see a pack
of cards the temptation is so irresistible that I have often to go away
to save my resolution."
Which made me think of a favourite quotation of Lessing's from
_Minna_:--"_Tout les gens d'esprit aiment le jeu ? la folie_."
CHAPTER IX.
Ideala's low esteem for "mere animal courage" was probably due to the
fact that she possessed it herself in a high degree. Yet soon after I
met her I began to suspect, and was afterwards convinced, that
something in her manner which had puzzled me at first arose from fear.
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