begins: you are cheated, at best, of all the money in your pocket, and if
you stay late, very probably robbed of your watch and snuff-box, possibly
murdered for greater security. This I can assure you, is not an
exaggerated, but a literal description of what happens every day to some
raw and inexperienced stranger at Paris. Remember to receive all these
civil gentlemen, who take such a fancy to you at first sight, very
coldly, and take care always to be previously engaged, whatever party
they propose to you. You may happen sometimes, in very great and good
companies, to meet with some dexterous gentlemen, who may be very
desirous, and also very sure, to win your money, if they can but engage
you to play with them. Therefore lay it down as an invariable rule never
to play with men, but only with women of fashion, at low play, or with
women and men mixed. But, at the same time, whenever you are asked to
play deeper than you would, do not refuse it gravely and sententiously,
alleging the folly of staking what would be very inconvenient to one to
lose, against what one does not want to win; but parry those invitations
ludicrously, 'et en badinant'. Say that, if you were sure to lose, you
might possibly play, but that as you may as well win, you dread
'l'embarras des richesses', ever since you have seen what an encumbrance
they were to poor Harlequin, and that, therefore, you are determined
never to venture the winning above two louis a-day; this sort of light
trifling way of declining invitations to vice and folly, is more becoming
your age, and at the same time more effectual, than grave philosophical
refusals. A young fellow who seems to have no will of his own, and who
does everything that is asked of him, is called a very good-natured, but
at the same time, is thought a very silly young fellow. Act wisely, upon
solid principles, and from true motives, but keep them to yourself, and
never talk sententiously. When you are invited to drink, say that you
wish you could, but that so little makes you both drunk and sick, 'que le
jeu me vaut pas la chandelle'.