WHIST AND "BUMBLE-PUPPY." 309 



the Eev. J. Gr. Wood should sing ! This proposition 

 naturally had the effect of closing the controversy ; and 

 ever afterwards the conductor's task was an easier and 

 a more agreeable one. 



Among other amusements my father was very fond 

 of whist. But it had to be whist, true and serious, for 

 nothing of the " bumble-puppy Border would he endure. 

 The game was a game to be played in silence, with 

 due regard for the solemnity of the occupation ; fail- 

 ing to return a partner's lead was a great and grievous 

 fault, requiring to be expiated by due penitence and 

 contrition, with much self-abasement and promise of 

 amendment ; and a call for trumps unobserved was 

 regarded with a sort of wistful sorrow, as of one who 

 feels deeply, but is too saddened to scold. Scold, how- 

 ever, my father never did, at whist or at anything else. 

 He erred, indeed, if he erred at all, rather on the side of 

 over-indulgence ; and I do not think that in all my life 

 I more than once heard angry words from his lips 

 and then only under circumstances of the very greatest 

 provocation. 



Chess he used to play at one time, and he played it 

 well ; but he gave it up on account of the strain which 

 . it caused on an already sufficiently taxed brain. But of 

 backgammon which he played after a fashion of his 

 own he was extremely fond ; and while he was laid 

 up with the accident to his hand we played almost every 

 evening, he having instructed me in the game for 

 this special purpose. And at one time he devoted 

 some little attention to mistram, which he tried with 



