FOURTH PERIOD : VICTORIA 271 



horse-racing, insomuch that his executors had 

 very Httle to show for his horse-racing and 

 betting at his death in November, 1883, and his 

 favourite nephew and right-hand man, Comte 

 Gouy D'Arsy, was said in the newspapers to have 

 died, not so very long after his uncle, in a state of 

 impoverishment bordering upon destitution. 



So much for racing-^?^;^-gambling and racing- 

 sans-gdiTwhYmg. 



There are symptoms, too, of a panic among the 

 members of the betting ring ; the voice of the 

 'bookie' is heard complaining that the 'gentle- 

 man welsher,' that is, the ' backer' who pays the 

 entrance -money at the so-called ' Tattersall's 

 rings ' and bets on credit, but does not ' part,' is 

 becoming more and more common, having never 

 been so rare as a blue moon, and that many 

 ' book-makers ' consequently are overtaken, and 

 many more are pursued, by ruin. The fact being 

 that ' the ring,' like every other ' profession,' is 

 overstocked, and this leads to competition among 

 the members, who are only too glad to trade with 

 anybody whom they have reason to consider able 

 (if not willing) to pay ; the persons who are im- 

 portuned to bet find it pleasant to take the 



