There was something very attractive in this use of the word pocket. There was an appropriateness, an harmony about the idea that imposed upon the understanding. There was such a thing, to be sure, as an empty pocket,—but the old grandam earth had lived a great many years,—she had always been a saving sort of a body, and must have hoarded up quite a handsome pennyworth; it would certainly be a fine thing to have the ransacking of her chinks and crannies.
But the gambling-houses presented scenes of yet fiercer excitement. The finest buildings in the city were devoted to this purpose. Wide doors, standing constantly open, admitted the visitor at once into spacious apartments, where, for every hour in the twenty-four, except a short interval in the morning twilight, were heard the chink of gold and silver, and the confused hum of voices. There is no employment so thirsty as gambling; and the large and splendidly appointed bar was the most striking feature in these establishments. Here the fever-and-aguish gamester sought by one fire to put out another; one drank because he was hot, another because he was cold,—this one because he was losing, that because he had gained.
A curious crowd of spectators circled among the little tables, watching, with an interest second only to that of the principal performers, the movements of the game; or gazing boldly, or with modest obliquity of vision, upon the lascivious pictures that hung on the walls. Little boys of ten or twelve called imperiously for brandy smashes, and staked their all on the turn of a card, or the rolling of a ball with hideous nonchalance; while the next moment oaths as big as cannon balls rolled from their hard lips to testify their impish malice or exultation. The simple novice from some New England village, who has never before been farther from home than the nearest town, proud of his first beard, and champing the ends of his moustache between his lips, sidles timidly up to the bar, and calls in a low voice for a glass of lemonade.
"Yes," cries his Mephistopheles, with a patronizing laugh, "and put a stick in it."
"Well," he replies, laughing in his turn, but more feebly than the other, "I guess I will have a stick in it."
Delighted with the puzzling novelty of the phrase, that, without seeming to mean anything, means so much, he soon repeats the experiment, partly to show he is not afraid, and partly from an indescribable, often unconscious pleasure of doing what he would hardly have dared even to think of at home. He thinks of his mother and sisters and aunt Mary, and wonders what they would say, if they saw him in such company and drinking brandy, at a bar! and in a gambling house besides!! The idea of their horror and incredulous wonder is rather pleasing to his selfish vanity; one is very apt to be vain of such loving tender pity. He has learned to put a stick in it; well for him if he does not ere long put in his whole foot.
After several hours thus spent in wandering from one centre of attraction to another, we returned to the ship, weary of excitement, and hoping to find there at least one place free from the general infection. On reaching the deck, however, a hubbub of voices assailed our ears in which every other word seemed to be diggins, holes, lumps, pockets, &c., &c. Other parties had been like ours wandering through the city; each had brought on board its own budget of news, and now poured them out before us in bewildering confusion.
One had a long story to tell of a lump found in the southern mines. The man who told him knew the man who saw the lucky fellow that found it. Most of these stories were in this respect, too much like the final clause of the story of the house that Jack built.
Others were more interested in the price current of different articles. Saleratus was eight dollars a pound, and everybody wondered he had not brought a few barrels; it would have been the easiest thing in the world, and would have made his fortune at once. Salt, on the other hand, which we had all taken care to bring with us, was worth nothing. On hearing this, Charley Bainbridge hastily descended into the cabin, and presently returning with a bag containing some twenty or thirty pounds, plunged his knife into its belly, and triumphantly emptied the salt into the sea.
"What are you doing there?" cried Busby, who had just come aboard.