In
September the Satirist newspaper published a distinct charge of
unfair play against Lord de Ros, whilst the latter was at Baden,
and he returned to England and commenced an action for libel
against the newspaper.
He was charged with being in the habit of marking the cards, the
effect being to create a very slight and almost imperceptible
indentation, and to make a ridge or wave on the back, so that a
practised eye would be able, on looking at the right place,
knowing where to expect a mark, to discern whether the ace was
there or not. He was also charged with cheating by reversing the
cut--that is, when the cards had come to him, after having been
cut by his adversary, instead of putting the bottom card at the
top, keeping the bottom card at the bottom, by some shuffling
contrivance when he dealt. Another witness said:--
'When he took up the two parcels of cards, after the operation of
cutting the pack by his right-hand adversary, he was always
attacked with a hacking cough, or what I may properly denominate,
especially from the result it produced, a 'king cough,' because a
king or an ace was invariably its effect. The cough always came
on at the most convenient moment to distract the attention of the
other players, and was evidently indulged in for the purpose of
abstracting their attention from the table and from the manoeuvre
he was about to perform.
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