That hedge was like a drift of
odoriferous snow the hawthorn bloom, and primroses sparkled on its bank
like topazes. The birds chirruped, the sky smiled, the sun burned
perfumes; and there sat my lord and his fellow-maniacs,
snick-snack--pit-pat--cutting, dealing, playing, revoking, scoring, and
exchanging I. O. U. 's not worth the paper."
"All true, but the revoking," said Severne, merrily. "Monster! by the
memory of those youthful days, I demand a fair hearing." Then, gravely,
"Hang it all, Vizard, I am not a fellow that is always intruding his
affairs and his theories upon other men."
"No, no, no," said Vizard, hastily, and half apologetically; "go on."
"Well, then, of course I don't pretend to foreknowledge; but I do to
experience, and you know experience teaches the wise."
"Not to fling five hundred after three. There--I beg pardon. Proceed,
instructor of youth."
"Do listen, then: experience teaches us that luck has its laws; and I
build my system on one of them. If two opposite accidents are sure to
happen equally often in a total of fifty times, people, who have not
observed, expect them to happen turn about, and bet accordingly.
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