WHO is there who has "been in the habit of playing billiards frequently in public rooms in London who does not know "the captain"?
How many are there, too, who have only too good cause to remember him!" Now, although there are a variety of grades of captains, there is a very strong family likeness between them all.
First, there is the well-to-do captain, always clean-shaven, neat as to his personal appearance, and particularly given to patent-leather boots, or those with drab cloth tops. He smokes cigars with a genuine air of thorough enjoyment.
Secondly, there is the captain who would, bear about the same comparison to the above as a militia to a crack cavalry regiment.
The patent boots are gone, and in their place rather square-toed half-wellingtons appear, a well-coloured meerschaum, and a well-worn hat, with the inside brim somewhat the same colour as the meerschaum. He is decidedly more affable than the former, and is perhaps a trifle more addicted to gin-and-water than his superior is to brandies and soda, Thirdly, there is a rarer bird to be met with occasionally, whose characteristics are very strongly marked indeed. No one ever saw him in a new suit of clothes, or without a short clay pipe. His boots are generally on the verge of sprouting, and the rim of his hat is so limp that it is impossible for him to put it on without using both hands. His drink is whatever he can get, but what he orders is invariably "a pint of cooper." He will borrow a pipe of tobacco from, any one, but when asking a stranger for the first time, there is something indescribable in the tone that betrays that, at any rate, he was once a gentleman, though his walk is gradually more and more approaching a shuffle. Now the family likeness between all these is, that no one of them was ever seen to play a game for nothing, or with the marker. No one of them was ever seen to play a game unless he had decidedly the best of it.
Captain No. 1 will play with about twenty in a hundred to the good, and the marker—who is generally a deadly but secret enemy—himself does not know how well the captain can play when really pushed.
Captain No. 2 will not play without at least thirty in a hundred the best of it, and conciliates the marker by letting him stand in in odd sixpences and shillings. He has an agreeable way of winning money, is decidedly popular, and has a large collection of facetious stories, which no one better than himself knows when to tell, and when not. He has, however, a great contempt for the man who will never bet or play pool, and will sometimes show it in a certain kind if not over good-tempered chaff, which his age, experience, and thorough knowledge of the world renders peculiarly effective, especially when directed towards one rather young.
Captain No. 3 rarely plays at all, and then only with enormous odds in his favour, and with a secret understanding with the marker that he does not pay for the table should he by chance lose. The outside bet that lie makes is a shilling, and as the loss of means no dinner, he plays & somewhat anxious game. There are evident signs that he played well once, but his nerves are evidently shaken with drink and trouble. The marker is his decided friend, and is perhaps the only man in the room who knows where lie lives or what is his real name.
What is his history God knows, but there is the decided stamp of better days—a certain air of refinement, coupled with a look that tells the fact that lie would prefer death itself to work of any description, mental or bodily.
It is not, however, of this class of captain— who, by-the-by, is often one who can fairly claim the title—that novices need be on their guard, but of the other two, especially the first. He is generally found seated quietly by the fire in the billiard-room reading the paper, from of? which he will steal one rapid but searching glance to take stock of a new comer. But he is far too much of a man of the world to instantly propose a game himself. He waits quietly until the welcome words from the marker, "Will you play this gentleman a game, sir?" cause him to lookup, and say, in a careless, languid way, "Yes, I don't mind." Still he betrays not the slightest sign of impatience; he finishes, or pretends to finish, leisurely the piece he is reading, and walks quietly to the wall where his cue-case is hanging, taking out a small bunch of keys as he goes along. His first words addressed to the stranger are probably, "Have you any choice of balls?" But his next sentence is extremely characteristic of the captain, as he observes, in a sort of off-hand tone, "Half-a-crown, I suppose?" We are supposing the stranger to be rather young. Now had the captain said, "Do you care to play for anything?" the answer, ten to one, would be "No." But putting it this way, often a novice finds himself playing for half-a-crown before he quite knows where he is, and even if possessed of ordinary presence of mind, he probably compromises the half crown by saying, "I'll bet you a shilling, if you like." At any rate, the captain's object is attained; he does not play for nothing. It is a sweet thing to see the captain caught. It happens very rarely, but when it does it is a treat, as the captain has by no means invariably the best of nerves. To see the coat come off half way through the first game, to watch the repeated anxious looks at the scoring-board, to listen to the irritable tone in which he admonishes the slightest mistake on the part of the marker—a, mistake the wrong way, of course—all this is very fine, but unfortunately it but seldom happens. Never shall we forget a certain captain's face at a billiard-room in the Strand about ten years ago. His off-handed observation, "Half-a-crown, of course?" had been answered in the affirmative. The stranger was young, and young-looking for his age, but a decidedly good player, the best in one of the Universities. His reply to the proposal of half-crown was, "If you like," accompanied with, a break of over sixty off the balls. Now, although the stranger did not perhaps make a break of sixty even once in a month, the captain did not know this. Not one word did the captain say again; lie played 011 quietly to the finish of the game, which he lost. He placed the half-crown 011 the edge of the table, he resumed his seat and his newspaper, but not one word did he speak. Even the marker, who would have given worlds to have laughed, was awed, and spoke in a subdued voice.
The captain's face bespoke resignation, but wrath; it would have been an exceedingly unfavourable moment to have trod on his corns. He is still living, perhaps he may recollect the circumstance.