Duncombe's 'Life' of his father occurs the following account of

this curious transaction.
'In Graham's Club there was also a good deal of play, and large

sums were lost and won among the noblemen and gentlemen who were
its members. An unpleasant rumour circulated in town in the

winter of 1836, to the effect that a noble lord had been detected
in cheating by means of marked cards. The presumed offender was

well known in society as a skilful card-player, but by those who
had been most intimate with him was considered incapable of any

unfair practice. He was abroad when the scandal was set afloat,
but returned to England directly he heard of it, and having

traced the accusation to its source, defied his traducers. Thus
challenged, they had no alternative but to support their

allegation, and it took this shape:--They accused Henry William
Lord de Ros of marking the edges of the court cards with his

thumb-nail, as well as of performing a certain trick by which he
unfairly secured an ace as the turn-up card. His accusers were

---- ----, who had formerly kept a gaming table; Mr ---- ----,
also a professionalgambler; Lord Henry Bentinck, and Mr F.

Cumming. Lord Henry appears to have taken no very active part in
the proceedings; the other three had lost money in play with Lord

de Ros, and, as unsuccessfulgamblers have done before and since,
considered that they had lost it unfairly.

'Lord de Ros, instead of prosecuting the four for a libel,
brought an action only against Cumming, which permitted the

others to come forward as witnesses against him. The cause came
on in the Court of King's Bench before Lord Denman. The

plaintiff's witnesses were Lord Wharncliffe, Lord Robert
Grosvenor, the Earl of Clare, and Sir Charles Dalbiac, who had

known and played with him from between 20 to 30 years, as a very
skilful but honourable Whist player. The evidence of Mr

Lawrence, the eminentsurgeon, proved that Lord de Ros had long
suffered under a stiffness of the joints of the fingers that made

holding a pack of cards difficult, and the performance of the
imputed trick of legerdemain impossible. For the defence

appeared the keeper of the house and his son; two or three
gamblers who had lived by their winnings; one acknowledged to

have won L35,000 in 15 years. Mr Baring Wall, one of the
witnesses, swore that he had never witnessed anything improper in

the play of Lord de Ros, though he had played with and against
him many years; another witness, the Hon. Colonel Anson, had

observed nothing suspicious; but the testimony of others went to
prove that the aces and kings had been marked inside their edges;

and one averred that he had seen Lord de Ros perform sauter la
coupe a hundred times. The whole case wore much the look of a

combination among a little coterie who lived by gambling to drive
from the field a player whose skill had diminished their income;

nevertheless, the incidents sworn to by some of them wore a
suspicioussignificance, and a verdict was given against Lord de

Ros, which he only survived a short time.'
On this statement the Times' reviewer comments as follows:--

'If many old scandals may be revived with impunity, there are
some that cannot. Mr Duncombe the younger has hit on one which

affects several gentlemen still living, and his injurious version
of it cannot be neutralized or atoned for by an apology to one.

We call attention to it in the hope that any more serious notice
will be rendered needless by the simple exposure of its

inaccuracies.
'It is difficult to conceive a more inexcusable misstatement, for

the case was fully reported,[36] and the public judgment
perfectly coincided with the verdict. Lord de Ros was not abroad

when the scandal was set afloat. He went abroad after the scene
at Graham's had set all London talking, and he returned in

consequence of a peremptory call from his friends. He was most
reluctantly induced to take the required steps for the

vindication of his character; and it is preposterous to suppose
that any little coterie would have dreamt of accusing a man of

his rank and position with the view of driving a skilful player
from the field. His accusers were not challenged. Neither were

they volunteers. They became his accusers, because they formed
the Whist party at which he was first openlydenounced. They

signed a paper particularizing their charge, and offered to refer
the question to a tribunal of gentlemen, with the Duke of

Wellington or Lord Wharncliffe to preside. Would a little
coterie, who lived by gambling, have made this offer? Or would

Lord de Ros have refused it if he had been the intended victim of
a conspiracy? Lord Henry Bentinck signed the paper, appeared as

a witness, and took quite as active a part in the proceedings as
any of the four, except Mr Cumming, who undertook the sole legal

liability by admitting the publication of the paper.
[36] The Times of February 11 and 13, 1837.

'The evidence was overwhelming. Suspicions had long been rife;
and on no less than ten or twelve occasions the marked packs had

been examined in the presence of unimpeachable witnesses, and
sealed up. These packs were produced at the trial. Several

witnesses swore to the trick called sauter la coupe. It was the
late Sir William Ingilby who swore that he had seen Lord de Ros

perform it from 50 to 100 times; and when asked why he did not at
once denounce him, he replied that if he had done so before his

Lordship began to get blown upon, he should have had no
alternative between the window and the door. Of course, every

one who had been in the habit of playing with Lord de Ros prior
to the exposure would have said the same as Sir Charles Dalbiac

and Mr Baring Wall. With regard to the gentlemen whose names we
have omitted we take it for granted that the author is not aware

of the position they held, and continue to hold, or he would
hardly have ventured to describe them so offensively. He has

apologized to one, and he had better apologize to the other
without delay.

'The case was complete without the evidence of either of the
original accusers, and the few friends of Lord de Ros who tried

to bear him up against the resulting obloquy were obliged to go
with the stream. When Lord Alvanley was asked whether he meant

to leave his card, he replied, "No, he will stick it in his
chimney-piece and count it among his honours.' "

Having read through the long case as reported in the Times, I
must declare that I do not find that the evidence against Lord de

Ros was, after all, so 'overwhelming' as the reviewer declares;
indeed, the 'leader' in the Times on the trial emphatically

raises a doubt on the subject. Among other passages in it there
is the following:--

'In the process of the trial it appeared that the most material
part of the evidence against Lord de Ros, that called sauter la

coupe,--which, for the sake of our English readers we shall
translate into CHANGING THE TURN-UP CARD,--the times and places

at which it was said to have been done could not be specified.
Some of the witnesses had seen the trick done 50 or 100 times by

Lord de Ros, but could neither say on what day, in what week,
month, or even year, they had so seen it done. People were

excessively struck at this deviation from the extreme punctuality
required in criminal cases by the British courts of law.'

'The disclosures,' says Mr Grant,[27] 'which took place in the
Court of Queen's Bench, on the occasion of the trial of Lord de

Ros, for cheating at cards, furnished the strongest demonstration
that he was not the only person who was in the habit of cheating

in certain clubs; while there were others who, if they could not
be charged with direct cheating, or cheating in their own

persons, did cheat indirectly, and by proxy, inasmuch as they, by
their own admission, were, on frequent occasions, partners with

Lord de Ros, long after they knew that he habitually or
systematically cheated. The noble lord, by the confession of the