A PALACE OF RUIN.

Otago Witness, Issue 2673, 7 June 1905, Page 70

A PALACE OF RUIN.

By a. Banker.

Nestling 1 beneath, the precipitous spurs of the chain of lofty upreared mountains which, skirt the shores of the Mediterranean, whose blue waters sparkling like diamonds and sapphires vie almost with, the azure of the sky, shaded bsneath tall exotic tress, and beautiful with graceful palms with long drooping fronds, subtropical ferns, and gorgeous flowering shrubs of many-varied hues, lies one of the most attractive resorts of all Europe.

But, though so well favoured by Nature, skilfully reinforced by her handmaid, Art, this terrestrial Eden is the scene of some of the worst passions in man. For in the midst of these beautiful surroundings a great pretentious building, erected in excerable taste, ixplifts its lofty towers, and with wide opened doors, whence issue the strains of exquisite music and song, reminding the wayfarer of the old fable of the spider and the fly, invites the unwary to cuter its palatial portals.

And they are flocking in; crowds of welldressed persons — for the poor are turned away, they are of no use here — Russian princes from the far north, wealthy Americans, titled Germans and French, Austriaus, British, and almost every nationality of Europe, all eager to win money, all expecting to emerge from those halls richer than when they entered.

Aud what a, spectacle! In the centre, the long baize-covered table; rolls of banknotes, piles of gold and silver placed on the numerous compartments marked thereon. And seated and standing around it the crowd of excited gamblers; some staking the income of a whole year upon a single tlirow; some, with more money than brains, piling on heavy suras which time after time are raked in by the imperturbable croupiers; some, especially ladies, staking on several numbers which they scarce remember; but when, hy any chance a winning number is staked, the prize is probably coolly appropriated by one of the numerous harpies who are ever on the look out for those stolen gains. And so they go on, a few, who have won, mostly returning in the fond expectation of winning more, and almost inevitably losing all they have gained, and more besides; but the great majority betrayed as losers by the agitated, enraged expression on their countenances. And there goes one out into the night, blanched pale as death, and quivering with an aching remorse. For lie has lost his all; he has sunk his family into penury and want, and he must face the world as a discredited, starving beggar. And the sound of a distant pistol shot tells those gamblers that perhaps another widowed mother with her orphaned children has been plunged into poverty and distress, another immortal soul has been sunk into perdition.

But in this earth there are many outwardly beautiful traps and pitfalls for the unwary, who, in the vain pursuit of so-called pleasure, grasp at the shadow and lose the substance. Fortunate they who, remembering that as they sow so' must they also reap, have, with the never-refused aid of the Holy Spirit of God, sought first the Kingdom of Heaven. For then in tliis life shall all things needful be ackled unto them, and in tho life to come vill untold pleasures assuredly await them.