University of Virginia Library

OSTENTATIOUS GAMESTERS.

CERTAIN grandees and wealthy persons, more through vanity or weakness than generosity, have sacrificed their avidity to ostentation — some by renouncing their winnings, others by purposely losing. The greater number of such eccentrics, however, seem to have allowed themselves to be pillaged merely because they had not the generosity or the courage to give away what was wanted.

The Cardinal d'Este, playing one day with the Cardinal de Medicis, his guest, thought that his magnificence required him to allow the latter to win a stake of 10,000 crowns — `not wishing,' he said, `to make him pay his reckoning or allow him to depart unsatisfied.' Brantôme calls this `greatness;

`the following is an instance of what he calls `kindness.'

`Guilty or innocent,' he says, `everybody was well received at the house of this cardinal, who kept an open table at Rome for the French chevaliers. These gentlemen having appropriated a portion of his plate, it was proposed to search them: `No, no!' said the cardinal, `they are poor companions who have only their sword, cloak, and crucifixes; they are brave fellows; the plate will be a great benefit to them, and the loss of it will not make me poorer.'

Vigneul de Marville tells us of certain extravagant abbés, named Ruccellai and Frangipani, who carried their ostentation to such a pitch as to set gold in dishes on their tables when entertaining their gaming companions! Were any of these base enough to put their hands in and help themselves? This is not stated by the historian. These two Italian abbés were ne plus ultras in luxury and effeminacy. In the reign of Henry IV., they laid before their guests vermilion dishes filled with gloves, fans, coins to play with after the repast, essences and perfumes.[25] I wonder if the delightful

scent called Frangipani, vouchsafed to us by Rimmel and Piesse and Lubin, was named after this exquisite ecclesiastic of old?
[25] Mélanges d' Hist. et de Lit.

One day when Henry IV. was dining at the Duc de Sully's, the latter, as soon as the cloth was raised, brought in cards and dice, and placed upon the table two purses of 4000 pistoles each, one for the King, the other to lend to the lords of his suite. Thereupon the king exclaimed: — `Great master, come and let me embrace you, for I love you as you deserve: I feel so comfortable here that I shall sup and stay the night.' Evidently Sully was more a courtier than usual on this occasion — as no doubt the whole affair was by the king's order, with which he complied reluctantly; but he made the king play with his own money only. The Duc de Lerme, when entertaining Monsieur the brother of Louis XIII. at his quarters near Maestricht, had the boldness to bring in, at the end of the repast, two bags of 1000 pistoles each, declaring that he gave them up to the players without any condition except to return them when they pleased.[26] [26] Mem. de Jeu M. le Duc d'Orleans.

This Duc de Lerme was at least a great lord,

and the army which he commanded may have warranted his extravagance; but what are we to think when we find the base and mean-spirited Fouquet giving himself the same princely airs? During certain festivities prepared for Louis XIV., Fouquet placed in the room of every courtier of the king's suite, a purse of gold for gambling, in case any of them should be short of money. Well might Duclos remark that `Nobody was shocked at this magnificent scandal![27] [27] Consideration sur les Mœeurs,

They tell of a certain lordly gamester who looked upon any money that fell from his hands as lost, and would never stoop to pick it up! This reminds us of the freedman Pallas mentioned by Tacitus, who wrote down what he had to say to his slaves, lest he should degrade his voice to their level — ne vocem consociaret![28] [28] Ann. l. xiii