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Updated: May 17, 2025
We spent a pleasant day, and he thanked me heartily for the copy of the Macaronicon, which he promised to read. He introduced me to a Jesuit he had in his household, who was called Adam, and he added, after telling me his name, "not the first Adam." I was told afterwards that Voltaire used to play backgammon with him, and when he lost he would throw the dice and the box at his head.
Boyle came in for his backgammon, he could not, at first, account for the illumination in all their faces, until the three ladies, in a happy chorus, told him how right he had been in his sermon, and how dreadfully they had wronged that poor dear, good young Mr. Warrington. "What shall we do, my dear?" says the Colonel to his wife.
And when he wakes he has just one glass of hot water and sugar, with a little Lochnagar. And then he is equal to any thing backgammon, bezique, or even conversation." Impatient as I was, I saw nothing better; and by this time I was becoming used to what all of us must put up with the long postponement of our heavy cares to the light convenience of others.
His conversation is about the theatre, where he has a season ticket, about an amateur who lately appeared there, and about actresses, with other theatrical scandal. In the smoking-room, two checker and backgammon boards; the landlord a great player, seemingly a stupid man, but with considerable shrewdness and knowledge of the world.
Walking out, drinking tea, country dances, and forfeits, shortened the rest of the day, without the assistance of cards, as I hated all manner of gaming, except backgammon, at which my old friend and I sometimes took a two-penny hit.
The first thing he said was that all games of chance were forbidden, and that the ladies I had met would no doubt be delighted to see me. As for himself, he said that he lived by playing backgammon, though he was not at all lucky at it, as talent went for more than luck at that game.
And as he was sitting on one of the door-steps, with his head between his knees, washing his shoes with his tears and warming the ground with his sighs, behold the bird came flying with a plant in her beak, and throwing it to him, said, "Get up, Miuccio, and take courage! for you are not going to play at unload the ass' with your days, but at backgammon with the life of the dragon.
The count flung himself into an armchair, absorbed in reverie, which his wife, who knew the symptoms of his malady and could foresee an outbreak, was careful not to interrupt. I also kept silence. As she gave me no hint to leave, perhaps she thought backgammon might divert the count's mind and quiet those fatal nervous susceptibilities, the excitements of which were killing him.
Aunt Dorothy having departed into the shadowy realm of dreams, Charlotte and I were left to our own devices. There was a backgammon board on a side-table, surmounted by an old Indian bowl of dried rose-leaves; and, pour nous distraire, I proposed that I should teach my dearest that diverting game.
Our long winter nights we always spend in reading, music, and sometimes in such games as chess, backgammon, drafts, etc. Mother is a most splendid mathematician. She is also quite a linguist. But I am afraid that mother's days of teaching are over in this world. Dr. Jones is exceedingly kind, but do you really think that he has any hopes of curing her?"
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