" SUCH A GETTING" DOWN " STAIKS." 315 



DEALER. I do not mean to say but that once or twice 

 during a long life (if a very long one) a man may get 

 a fair or advantageous exchange, but depend on it, if 

 you take rny advice au pie de la lettre, you will do by 

 far the best and wisest thing. I must mention an 

 anecdote, where it should seem a man did himself a 

 benefit by tumbling from the top of a high flight of 

 stairs to the bottom ; still it is an experiment, that, 

 like swapping with a dealer, I strongly recommend 

 my friends to avoid making. 



My father and a friend, sitting in an hotel, were 

 startled by hearing a tremendous fall on the stair- 

 case : they rushed out, fearing to find some one with 

 broken bones; but no, it was a French Gentleman, 

 who had come from the top of the house rather faster 

 than he had intended, by tumbling headlong from it. 

 " Monsieur, vous vous avez fait du mal," said my 

 father. " Au contraire, je vous remercie," cried the 

 Frenchman. Another inmate now came and inquired 

 what was the matter. " Oh ! nothing," says my father, 



" but a d d Frenchman has frightened us to death 



by tumbling down stairs, and says he has done him- 

 self a great deal of good by it." 



So you may by swapping with a dealer : but don't 

 try it ! Swapping, I believe, is exchanging one thing 

 for another ; and this the dealer perfectly understands. 

 A fair swap should be, if two things are of equal value, 

 the giving one for the other ; or, if of unequal value, 

 giving or receiving the fair difference in value : this 

 the dealer does not understand : at least he won't, 

 which is the same thing to you. The first thing 

 dealer does, and will do under almost any circum- 

 stances in swapping, is to draw money. In this 

 particular, I care not be he of the highest or lowest 



