Mr. Freeman did not deny that cheating was practised by the gamblers.  But Mr. Freeman contended that Mr. Green could not perform the tricks, could not cheat with cards that he was not familiar with.  Mr. Freeman produced a pack which he had just bought, and were otherwise untouched—­and he said that Mr. Green could not operate with that pack.  He defied him.

Mr. Green said that this was no argument.  But if Mr. Freeman would agree, and the meeting would appoint a committee of twelve citizens, he would before that committee meet Mr. Freeman, and with those cards exhibit tricks of gamblers.

Some discussion ensued, and it was agreed that a committee should be appointed.  Subsequently Mr. Green said he would exhibit before the audience; but that if Mr. Freeman shuffled the pack, he might of course disarrange his (Mr. Green’s) play.  But Mr. Green had contended that any gambler in his own play could cheat.  And Mr. Green displayed several extraordinary tricks, in which he was remarkably successful, particularly in illustrating the facility with which two partners in gambling could win from their opponents with certainty.

At the conclusion of the meeting, upon Mr. Freeman submitting to the audience the question—­“Have I sustained my position?”—­it was decided in the negative.  The question however, was not put until the audience had risen to depart—­but the response was general.

    From the Daily Sun.

We have been no inattentive observers of the debate on gambling, between Mr. Green, and his able and plausible antagonist, Mr. Freeman—­who brought to the defence of a bad cause, an energy, an earnestness, and a power of illustration, which, on any other subject, must have crowned him with the laurels of a brilliant victory.  But what power of logic—­what force of elocution—–­ what stretch, of fancy, can defend gambling?—­which, even if right in itself, is yet attended by such baneful consequences—­such appalling effects—­as to strike terror into the hearts of the most reckless, and seal the lips of eloquence by the blood of the unfortunate?  This was illustrated in a most striking manner in the recent debate—­where a long tissue of false logic, on the part of Mr. Freeman, was blown to the winds by the simple recital of a fact, by Mr. Green detailing the death of a ruined gambler by the hands of a prosperous one! Blood dispelled all the illusions of logic.  Argument evaporated before the corpse of the victim.  Applause for ingenious argument was hushed in a moment, when the dead body of the gambler appeared in view!  What a tribute to the power of truth—­what a tremendous triumph of nature, and her sacred laws, over the flimsy artifices of passion, fiction, and a diseased imagination, fevered by habitual vice.