Page:Reminisences of Captain Gronow.djvu/197

Rh hostile to the court were invited; and among these were Casimir Perier, the Dupins, Lafitte, Benjamin Constant, and a host of others who a few years afterwards drove out the eldest branch that occupied the throne to make way for Louis Philippe.

—The late Lord Thanet, celebrated for having been imprisoned in the Tower for his supposed predilection for republicanism, passed much of his time in Paris, particularly at the Salon des Etrangers. His lordship's infatuation for play was such, that when the gambling-tables were closed, he invited those who remained to play at chicken-hazard and ecarté; the consequence was that, one night, he left off a loser of 120,000l. When told of his folly and the probability of his having been cheated, he exclaimed, "Then I consider myself lucky in not having lost twice that sum!"

—Soon after Lord Granville's appointment, a strange occurrence took place at one of the public gambling-houses. A colonel, on half-pay, in the British service, having lost every farthing that