betted on races, and lost; he played billiards, and lost; he ran fox
terriers, and lost; he played Nap for hours at a stretch, and generally
lost. He was only successful in games that required strength and daring.
Then, of course, he must needs emulate the true sporting men in amorous
achievements, and thus his income bore the drain of some two or three
little establishments. Bob would always try to drink twice as much as
any other man, and he treated himself with the same liberality in the
matter of ex-barmaids and chorus girls. The Wicked Nobleman was a
somewhat reckless character in his way, but his feats would not bear
comparison with those performed by many and many a young fellow who
belongs to the wealthy middle class. Alas! for that splendid middle
class which once represented all that was sober and steady and
trustworthy in Britain! Go into any smart billiard-room nowadays, or
make a round of the various race meetings, and you will see something to
make you sad. You see one vast precession of Rakes making their mad
Progress.

Bob was always kindly with me, as, indeed, he was with everybody. The
very bookmakers scarcely had the heart to offer him false prices, and
only the public-house spongers gave him no law. But, then the sponger
spares nobody. On this memorable morning the lad was rigged in orthodox
flannels, and he looked ruddy and well, but the ruddiness was not quite
of the right sort. He had begun drinking early, and his eye had that
incipient gloss which always appears about the time when the one
pleasurable moment of drunkenness has come. There is but one pleasant
moment in a drinking bout, and men make themselves stupid by trying to
make that fleeting moment permanent. Bob cried, "Come on, sonny. Oh!
what would I give for your thirst! Mine's gone! I'm three parts copped
already. Come on. Soda, is it?"