"Here's some occupation for you—you deal!"
"What, sir!" burst forth Teleki, quite upset by the jest, "play at cards when the enemy stands before us?"
"How can we be better employed when the enemy is not before us? Do you know how to play at landsknecht?"
"Then we'll teach you."
And they did teach him, for in a couple of hours they had won from him a couple of hundred ducats, whereupon Teleki, on the pretext that he had no more money, retired from the game.
It was not the loss of a little money which vexed him so much as the scant respect paid to his counsels.
The other gentlemen continued the game. Heissler suddenly by a grand coup won all the ready-money of the other generals, so that at last there was a great heap of thalers and ducats in front of him, and his three-cornered hat was filled to the brim with money.
The losing party tried to console itself with jests.
"Well, well! lucky at cards, luckless in love!"