His life for several weeks may be thus described. The ordinary was no
bad introduction to the business of the day; and the young lord
quickly found, that if the society there was not always
irreproachable, still it formed the most convenient and agreeable
place of meeting with the fashionable parties, with whom he visited
Hyde Park, the theatres, and other places of public resort, or joined
the gay and glittering circle which Lady Blackchester had assembled
around her. Neither did he entertain the same scrupulous horror which
led him originally even to hesitate entering into a place where gaming
was permitted; but, on the contrary, began to admit the idea, that as
there could be no harm done in beholding such recreation when only
indulged in to a moderate degree, so, from a parity of reasoning,
there could be no objection to joining in it, always under the same
restrictions. But the young lord was a Scotsman, habituated to early
reflection, and totally unaccustomed to any habit which inferred a
careless risk or profuse waste of money. Profusion was not his natural
vice, or one likely to be acquired in the course of his education;
and, in all probability, while his father anticipated with noble
horror the idea of his son approaching the gaming-table, he was more
startled at the idea of his becoming a gaining than a losing
adventurer. The second, according to his principles, had a
termination, a sad one indeed, in the loss of temporal fortune--the
first quality went on increasing the evil which he dreaded, and
perilled at once both body and soul.
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