Bavolet or Curtain.

PRESENTED GRATIS WITH “THE LONDON

THE LONDON AND PARIS

LADIES' MAGAZINE OF FASHION,

POLITE LITERATURE,

DANGER OF CARD-PLAYING.

AVE often heard persons speak of their game at cards--how they were led from to a second, and a third, and so on, from e to game, till the vice of gambling became nfirmed habit, and almost an essential ion of their existence.

uly, there is a fascination and a charm in ing which none but devotees of the cards nobly appreciate, and which but few, with que or pen can adequately portray. xperienced as I am, and have been, in all ramifications of gambling, it may rightly inferred that I am able to speak advisedly cerning its soul-destroying influence on akind. Yes, I have seen father and sonwhole families, swept to ruin and horror the demon vice, in whose deadly grasp they unhappily fallen! men of fine talents and es, even moral and upright individuals in ther respects, professors of religion also, I sorry to affirm, have gone down to infamy destruction through the enticements and inations of the card-table. lethinks I could whisper into the ears of se who play cards solely for amusement's tales of woe and terror that would make blood run cold and the heart beat in wildpulsation, from their mere recital. How much worse would the scene have

MAY, MDCCCL.

beloved family circle, and brought sorrow and
desolation in its wake.

ET C.

About half an hour passed in this way, when a female rushed into the room, and threw her arms around the neck of the gambler's victim "Great God! My husband! What are you doing here?"

The daughter had reached her thirteenth
year and gave developments of beauteous-it was his wife.
womanly maturity, anon, when she was seized
with consumption, which painful disease soon
left its withering power on her fragile frame.
Though rapidly sinking into the grave, she for
some time retained her seat at the card-table;
at length, however, her malady increasing, she
retired from the fascinating amusement and
sought preparations for death and immortality.

She now requested that cards might no
longer be the pastime of the evening beneath
their roof, and her father, loving tenderly,
readily complied with her request, and the card-
table was accordingly set aside. It was now
that parent realized the fascination of the
games, and found that a passion for gambling
had insensibly become a rooted principle of
his breast.

He sought the gambling-table abroad, and spent his evenings in the fashionable gamblinghouses of the place.

He continued as usual to play for pastime; but becoming a wine-bibber, one night, while merry in his cups, he was induced to hazard money in a game of Faro! He lost his money, not only on this occasion but on almost every other evening afterward. Still he persisted in his recklessness, and played deeper and deeper in ruin; till, one Friday evening, he came into a room where several individuals and myself were , and the heart-strings torn, by the wit-seated at a game of cards. He offered to stake sing of many a painful scene in the career five dollars on a game; and, being permitted, he inveterate gambler ! his money was won from him. He then bet care not whether a man plays for pastime ten dollars, which he also lost. Becoming exprofit, from the very first game he is apt to cited, he continued to bet; and, as a matter of ome enveloped in the fold of a master more course, where all were sharpers, he was well rible than the hydra; and when so ensnared, supplied with liquor, and cheated not only of vain will be the lopping off of any of its what funds he had, but forced to give a check leous heads that serve to snare the hapless for money thus won from him. He became tim. No! the vice should and must be drunk, and remained with the gamblers during shed in its inception, or there can be no the night. vation from death and condemnation here hereafter.

Fearful thought! Would to God that all ight realize the truth of the evil effects arising m card-playing, in whatever aspect presentas a source of pastime merely, when pured for emolument. Fathers, good worthy izens, would be spared disgrace and crime; d widows and children might be saved from werty and woe and the scoffings of a heartless

orld.

knew a happy and worthy family, whose absequent misery and sorrow arose from the cial card-table, as a source of entertainment ad amusement for themselves and friends. This family consisted of, besides the parental rain, three sons and a daughter, all of whom ave promise of a life of usefulness and honour the insidious vice of gaming crept into the

The following day the check was cashed, and a portion of the money used in keeping him intoxicated, so that he was kept away from his family for several days.

Great excitement prevailed on account of his absence in the community, while his friends and family suffered painful anxiety in regard to his fate.

I was seated at a table playing with him on a Sunday evening, the third day since he entered the gambler's den, when his family physician entered, and inquired of the unfortunate and inebriated man if he knew where he was, and if he would not return to his stricken daughter and distressed family.

"Yes, yes, doctor; I'll be there presently. Go, and say that I will soon be with them." The physician left; but the poor man continued the game, and speedily forgot his promise.

Beloved, my wife! What seek you; and why come to this place?" said the man, bending his head, and reeking with shame and mortification.

"Oh, my dear husband, come home instantly; our poor child is dying! Her only prayer for two days has been for your welfare. Come, dear husband, now. Our daughter may not live till our return."

The wife, husband, and physician immediately left the place.

A short time again elapsed, when that deluded man returned, and composedly resumed his seat at the gaming-table. I incidentally inquired of him how he had left his daughter.

"Oh, God! remind me not of that, sir. She is dead-she is dead; and died while I was seated here at cards! I could not remain ; the tempter drove me back. I could not see her dead. Oh, God! I could not stay and see my child a cold and lifeless corpse.'

While he raved and wept, his wife appeared the second time, and dragged him from that pandemonium to his now hapless home.

Four years after this affecting circumstance, while I was sojourning in the same city, lecturing on gambling, I received a visit from that unfortunate man. His appearance before me recalled to my mind at once the painful incident just detailed, and I inquired what were his feelings when he visited home and found his daughter a corpse.

"Oh, sir, I left your table thinking it was but a ruse to bring me home; but I cannot tell the horror that filled my soul, when I realized that my child was dead. I clasped her lifeless form in my arms and implored her to speak, if but one word, that I might know that I had not lost her for ever. There came no response. I cast the dead body from me, and rushed out wild and frantic, yet voiceless myself, determined on self-destruction.

"I felt that I was her murderer, and the terrible thought drove me mad. Scarcely knowing what I did, but impelled by the foul fiend, I found myself in the street, hastening away to the wharf with purposes of fearful consequence; but, strange to say, that bright lamp at the door of the gambling-house diverted me from a watery grave, and turned my feet into the den itself, where I sat abstractedly, I have no doubt, for I knew nothing until your inquiry about my dead child restored me to consciousness.

"Providence taught me an awful lesson; and, from that hour to the present, I have never allowed cards in my house, nor played any my

self abroad, nor touched the intoxicating bowl; and, God help me, I never shall."

This incident is sufficient of itself to show the consequence of indulging in card playing and gaming,

We could sincerely wish that it might lead every one to serious reflection, and induce a return to the paths of rectitude and honor, ere that terrible desolation follow which most certainly attends, as we know full well, the course of the Gambler and Drunkard.

FREEDOM OF THE MIND.

"FREE is the eagle's wing,
Cleaving the sun's warm ray;
Free is the mountain spring,
As it rushes forth to-day.
But freer far the mind,-
Priceless its liberty;

No hand must dare to bind-
God made it to be free!

"You may chain the eagle's wing,
No more on clouds to soar:
You may seal the mountain spring,
That it leap to light no more.
But the mind let none dare chain-
Better it cease to be !

Born not to serve, but reign-
God made it to be free!

"Free is the mountain breeze,
Floating from airy height;
Free are the rushing seas,
And free heaven's golden light.
But freer than light or air,
Or the ever-rolling sea,

Is the mind beyond compare

God made it to be free!

"Then guard the gem divine,

Than gems or gold more rare;
Keep watch o'er the sacred shrine,
No foe must enter there:
Oh, let not error bind,
Nor passions reign o'er thee!
Keep the freedom of the mind-
God made it to be free !"

THE LITTLE MATCH-GIRL.

It was so terribly cold-it snowed, and the
evening began to be dark; it was, also, the last
evening in the year-New Year's eve. On this
cold, dark evening, a poor little girl went into
the street with bare head and naked feet. It is
true she had shoes on when she went from home,
but of what use were they? They were very
large shoes; her mother had worn them last;
they were too large, and the little one lost them
in hurrying over the street as two carriages
passed quickly by. One shoe was not to be
found, and the other a boy ran away with, say-
ing he could use it for a cradle when he had
children himself. The little girl now went on
her small naked feet, which were red and blue
with the cold. She carried a number of matches
in an old apron, and held one bundle in her
hand. No one had bought of her the whole
day, no one had given her a farthing. Poor
thing! She was hungry and benumbed with
cold, and looked so downcast. The snow-flakes
fell on her yellow hair, which curled so prettily
around her neck, but she did not heed that.

The light shone out from all the windows,
and there was such a delicious smell of roast
beef in the street-it was a New Year's eve, and
she thought of that. She sat down in a corner
between two houses, the one stood a little more
forward in the street than the other, and drew
up her legs under her to warm herself; but she
I was still colder, and she durst not go home; she
had not sold any matches nor got a single far-
thing. Her father would beat her, and it was
also cold at home; they had only the roof di-
rectly over them, and there the wind whistled
in, although straw and rags were stuffed in the
largest crevices.

-

Her little hands were almost benumbed with cold. Ah! a little match might do some good; durst she only draw one out of the bundle, strike it on the wall, and warm her fingers. She drew one out-rich!-how it burnt! It was a warm, clear flame, like that of a candle, when she held her hand around it; it was a strange light! The little girl thought she sat by a large iron stove, with brass balls on the top, the fire burned so nicely and warmed so well. Nay, what was that? The little girl stretched out her feet to warm them, too. When the flame went out, the stove vanished, and she sat with a stump of the burnt match in her hand.

Another was struck; it burnt, it shone, and where the light fell on the wall it became as transparent as crape. She looked directly into the room where the roasted goose, stuffed with apples and prunes, steamed so charming on the table which was laid out and covered with a shining white cloth and fine porcelain service. What was still more splendid, the goose sprung off the dish and waddled along the floor with knife and fork in its back; it came directly up to the poor girl. Here the match went out and there was only the thick, cold wall to be seen.

SOUND MINDS. A perfectly just and sound mind is a rare and invaluable gift. But it is still much more unusual to see such a mind unbiassed in all its actions. God has given this soundness of mind but to few; and a very small number of those few escape the bias of some predilection, perhaps habitually operating; and none are at all times perfectly free. I once saw this object forcibly illustrated. A watchmaker told me that a gentleman had put an exquisite watch into his hands that went irregularly. It was as perfect a piece of work as was ever made. He took it to pieces and put it together again twenty times. No manner of defect was to be discovered, and yet the watch went in- She struck another match. Then she sat tolerably. At last it struck him that, possibly, under the most charming Christmas-tree-it the balance-wheel might have been near a mag- was still larger and more ornamental than that net. On applying a needle to it he found his she had seen through the glass door at the rich suspicions true. Here was all the mischief. merchant's the last Christmas; a thousand The steel work in the other parts of the watch candles burnt on the green branches, and mothad a perpetual influence on its motions, and ley pictures, like those which ornament the the watch went as well as possible with a new shop-windows, looked down at her. The little wheel. If the soundest mind be magnetized girl lifted up both her hands-then the match by any predilection, it must act irregularly. was extinguished-the many Christmas candles Cecil. rose higher and higher; she saw that they were

bright stars-one of them fell, and made a fiery stripe in the sky. "Now one dies," said the poor girl; for old grandmother, who alone had been kind to her, but who was now dead, had told her that when a star falls, a soul goes up to God.

She again struck a match against the wall; it shone all around, and her old grandmother stood in the lustre, so shining, so mild and blissful."Grandmother!" exclaimed the little girl, "Oh! take me with you! I know you will be gone away when the matches go out-like the warm stove, the delicious roast goose, and the delightful Christmas-tree!" and she struck in haste the whole remainder of matches that was in the bundle-she would not lose sight of grandmother, and the matches shone with such brilliancy, that it was clearer than in broad day. light. Grandmother had never before looked so pretty, so great; she lifted the poor girl up in her arms and they flew so high, in splendour and joy; where was no cold, no hunger, no anxiety-they were with God!

But the little girl sat in the corner by the house in the cold morning hour, with red cheeks, and with a smile round her mouth-deadfrozen to death, the last evening of the old year.

New Year's morning rose over the little corpse, as it sat with the matches, of which a bundle was burnt. "She had been trying to warm herself," said they. But no one knew what beautiful things she had seen-in what splendour and gladness she had entered with her old grandmother into New Year's joys.

A QUAKER'S LETTER TO HIS WATCH MAKER.-I herewith send my pocket clock, which greatly standeth in need of thy friendly correction. The last time he was at thy friendly school, he was no ways reformed, nor in the least benefited thereby for I perceive by the index of his mind that he is a liar, and the truth is not in him; that his motions are wavering and irregular; that his pulse is sometimes slow, which betokeneth not an even temper; at other times it waxeth sluggish, notwithstanding frequently urge him; when he should be on his duty, as thou knowest his usual name denoteth, I will find him slumbering or sleeping

I

or, as the vanity of human reason phrases it, catch him napping. Examine him, therefore, and prove him, I beseech thee, thoroughly, that thou mayest, by being well acquainted with his inward frame and disposition, draw him from the error of his ways, and show him the path wherein he should go. It grieves me to think, and when I ponder thereon I am verily of opinion that his body is foul, and the whole mass is corrupted. Cleanse him, therefore, with thy charming physic, from all pollution, that he may vibrate and circulate according to the truth. I will place him a few days under thy care, and pay for his board as thou requirest it. I entreat thee, friend John, to demean thyself on this occasion with right judgment, according to the gift which is in thee, and prove thyself a superior workman. And when thou layest thy correcting hands on him, let it be without passion, lest thou drive him to destruction. Do thou regulate his motion for the time to come, by the motion of the light that ruleth the day, and when thou findest him converted from the error of his ways, and more conformable to the above-mentioned rules, then do you send him home with a just bill of charges, drawn out by the spirit of moderation, and it shall be sent to thee in the root of all evil.