I was born to a life of wandering, yet my heart was ever at home. Though the country that gave me birth gave me but few friends, and of those few the greatest part were early lost, yet the remembrance of her was present with me in every clime to which my fate conducted me; and the idea of those, whose ashes reposed in that humble spot, where they had often been the companions of my infant sports, hallowed it in my imagination with a sort of sacred enthusiasm. I had not been many weeks an inhabitant of my native village, after that visit to the lady mentioned in the First Part, which procured me the information I have there laid before my readers, till I found myself once more obliged to quit it for a foreign country. My parting with Mrs Wistanly was more solemn and affecting than common souls will easily imagine it could have been, upon an acquaintance accidental in its beginning, and short in its duration; but there was something tender and melancholy in the cause of it, which gave an impression to our thoughts of one another, more sympathetic perhaps than what a series of mutual obligations could have

effected.

Before we parted, I could not help asking the reason of her secrecy with regard to the story of Annesly and his daughter. In answer to this she informed me, that, besides the danger to which she exposed herself by setting up in opposition to a man, in the midst of whose dependants she proposed ending her days, she was doubtful if her story would be of any service to the memory of her friend: That Camplin (as she supposed by the direction of Sir Thomas Sindall, who was at that time abroad) had universally given out, that Miss Annesly's elopement was with an intention to be married to him; on which footing, though a false one, the character of that young lady stood no worse, than if the truth were divulged to those, most of whom wanted discernment, as well as candour, to make the distinctions which should enable them to do it justice.

Several years elapsed before I returned to that place, whence, it is probable, I shall migrate no more. My friend, Mrs Wistanly, was one of the persons after whom I first inquired on my arrival. I found her subject to the common debility, but not to any of the acuter distresses of

VOL. V.

age; with the same powers of reason, and the same complacency of temper, I had seen her before enjoy. "These," said she, " are the effects of temperance without austerity, and ease without indolence: I have nothing now to do, but to live without the solicitude of life, and to die without the fear of dying."

At one of our first interviews, I found her accompanied by a young lady, who, besides a great share of what is universally allowed the name of beauty, had something in her appearance which calls forth the esteem of its beholders, without their pausing to account for it. It has sometimes deceived me, yet I am resolved to trust it to the last hour of my life; at that time I gave it unlimited confidence, and I had spoken the young lady's eulogium before I had looked five minutes in her face.

Mrs Wistanly repeated it to me after she was gone. "That is one of my children,” said she, "for I adopt the children of virtue; and she calls me her mother, because I am old, and she can cherish me."- "I could have sworn to her goodness," I replied, "without any information besides what her countenance afforded me."— ""Tis a lovely one," said she, " and her mind is not flattered in its portrait: though she is a member of a family with whom I have not much intercourse, yet she is a frequent visitor at my little dwelling; her name is Sindall."-" Sindall," I exclaimed.-"Yes," said Mrs Wistanly, "but she is not therefore the less amiable. Sir Thomas returned from abroad soon after you left this place; but for several years he did not reside here, having made a purchase of another estate in a neighbouring county, and busied himself during that time, in superintending the improvement of it. When he returned hither, he brought this young lady, then a child, along with him, who, it seems, was left to his care by her father, a friend of Sir Thomas's, who died abroad; and she has lived with his aunt, who keeps house for him, ever since that period."

The mention of Sir Thomas Sindall naturally recalled to my mind the fate of the worthy, but unfortunate, Annesly. Mrs Wistanly told me, she had often been anxious in her inquiries about his son William, the only remaining branch of her friend's family; but that neither she, nor Mr Rawlinson, with whom she had

2 G

corresponded on the subject, had been able to procure any accounts of him; whence they concluded, that he had died in the plantation to which he was transported in pursuance of his mitigated sentence.

She farther informed me, "that Sindall had shown some marks of contrition at the tragical issue of the scheme he had carried on against the daughter's innocence and the father's peace; and to make some small atonement to the dead for the injuries he had done to the living, had caused a monument to be erected over their

graves in the village church-yard, with an inscription, setting forth the piety of Annesly, and the virtues and beauty of Harriet. But, whatever he might have felt at the time," continued she, "I fear the impression was not lasting."

From the following chapters, containing some farther particulars of that gentleman's life, which my residence in his neighbourhood, and my acquaintance with some of the persons immediately concerned in them, gave me an opportunity of learning, my readers will judge if Mrs Wistanly's conclusion was a just one.

CHAP. I.

Some account of the Persons of whom Sir Thomas Sindall's Family consisted.

THE Baronet's family consisted, at this time, of his aunt, and the young lady mentioned in the Introduction, together with a cousin of his, of the name of Bolton, who was considered as presumptive heir of the Sindall estate, and whose education had been superintended by Sir Thomas. This young gentleman had lately returned from the university, to which his kinsman had sent him. The expectations of his acquaintance were, as is usually the case, sanguine in his favour; and, what is something less usual, they were not disappointed. Beside the stock of learning, which his studies had acquired him, he possessed an elegance of manner, and a winning softness of deportment, which a college life does not often bestow, but proceeded in him from a cause the least variable of any, a disposition instinctively benevolent, and an exquisite sensibility of heart.

With all his virtues, however, he was a dependant on Sir Thomas Sindall; and their exercise could only be indulged so far as his cousin gave them leave. Bolton's father, who had married a daughter of the Sindall family, had a considerable patrimony left him by a parent, who had acquired it in the sure and common course of mercantile application. With this, and the dowry he received with his wife, he might have lived up to the limits of his utmost wish, if he had confined his wishes to what are commonly considered the blessings of life; but, though he was not extravagant to spend, he was ruined by an avidity to gain. In short, he was

of that order of men, who are known by the name of projectors; and wasted the means of present enjoyment, in the pursuit of luxury to come. To himself indeed the loss was but small; while his substance was mouldering away by degrees, its value was annihilated in his expectations of the future; and he died amidst the horrors of a prison, smiling at the prospect of ideal wealth and visionary grandeur.

But with his family it was otherwise; his wife, who had often vainly endeavoured to prevent, by her advice, the destructive schemes of her husband, at last tamely yielded to her fate, and died soon after him of a broken heart, leaving an only son, the Bolton who is now introduced into my story.

The distresses of his father had been always ridiculed by Sir Thomas Sindall, as proceeding from a degree of whim and madness, which it would have been a weakness to pity; his aunt, Mrs Selwyn, joined in the sentiment; perhaps it was really her own: but at any rate she was apt to agree in opinion with her nephew Sir Thomas, and never had much regard for her sister Bolton, for some reasons no less just than common. In the first place, her sister was handsomer than she; secondly, she was sooner married; and, thirdly, she had been blessed with this promising boy, while Mrs Selwyn became a widow, without having had a child.

There appeared then but little prospect of protection to poor Bolton from this quarter; but, as he had no other relation in any degree of propinquity, a regard to decency prompted the Baronet to admit the boy into his house. His situation, indeed, was none of the most agreeable; but the happy dispositions which nature had given him, suited themselves to the harshness of his fortune; and, in whatever society he was placed, he found

himself surrounded with friends: there was not a servant in the house, who would not risk the displeasure of their master, or Mrs Selwyn, to do some forbidden act of kindness to their little favourite, Harry Bolton.

Sir Thomas himself, from some concurring accidents, had his notice attracted by the good qualities of the boy; his indifference was conquered by degrees, and at last he began to take upon himself the charge of rearing him to manhood. There wanted only this to fix his attachment; benefits to those whom we set apart for our own management and assistance, have something so particular in their nature, that there is scarce a selfish passion which their exercise does not gratify. Yet I mean not to rob Sindall of the honour of his beneficence; it shall no more want my praise, than it did the gratitude of Bolton.

CHAP. II.

Some further particulars of the Persons mention

ed in the foregoing Chapter.

BOLTON, however, felt that uneasiness which will ever press upon an ingenuous mind along with the idea of dependence; he had therefore frequently hinted, though in terms of the utmost modesty, a desire to be put into some way of life, that might give him an opportunity of launching forth into the world, and freeing his cousin from the incumbrance of a useless idler in his family.

Sir Thomas had often made promises of indulging so laudable a desire; but day after day elapsed without his putting any of them in execution; the truth was, that he had contracted a sort of paternal affection for Bolton, and found it a difficult matter to bring himself to the resolution of parting with him.

He contented himself with employing the young man's genius and activity in the direction and superintendence of his country affairs; he consulted him on plans for improving his estate, and intrusted him with the care of their execution he associated him with himself in matters of difficult discussion as a magistrate; and in the sports of the field, he was his constant companion.

It was a long time before Mrs Selwyn, from some of the reasons I have hinted, could look on Harry with a favourable eye. When Sir Thomas first began to take notice of him, she remonstrated the danger of spoiling boys by indulgence, and endeavoured to counterbalance the estimation of his good qualities, by the recital of little tales which she now and then picked up against him.

It was not till some time after his return from the university, that Harry began to gain ground in the lady's esteem. That attachment

and deference to the softer sex, which, at a certain age, is habitual to ours, is reckoned effeminacy amongst boys, and fixes a stain upon their manhood. Before he went to the university, Harry was under this predicament; but, by the time of his return, he had attained the period of refinement, and shewed his aunt all those trifling civilities, which it is the prerogative of the ladies to receive; and which Mrs Selwyn was often more ready to demand, than some males of her acquaintance were to pay. In truth, it required a knowledge of many feminine qualities, which this lady doubtless possessed, to impress the mind with an idea of that courtesy which is due to the sex; for her countenance was not expressive of much softness, the natural strength of her features being commonly heightened by the assistance of snuff, and her conversation generally turning on points of controversy in religion and philosophy, which, requiring an intense exertion of thought, are therefore, I presume, from the practice of the fair in general, no way favourable to the preservation or the improvement of beauty.

It was, perhaps, from this very inclination for investigating truth, that Bolton drew an advantage in his approaches towards her esteem. As he was just returned from the seat of learning, where discussions of that sort are common, she naturally applied to him for assistance in her researches: by assistance, I mean opposition; it being the quality of that desire after knowledge with which this lady was endued, to delight in nothing so much, as in having its own doctrines confronted with opposite ones, till they pommel, and belabour one another without mercy; the contest having one advantage peculiar to battles of this kind, that each party, far from being weakened by its exertion, commonly appears to have gained strength, as well as honour, from the rencounter.

Bolton indeed did not possess quite so much of this quality as his antagonist: he could not, in common good-breeding, refuse her challenge; but he often maintained the conflict in a manner rather dastardly for a philosopher. He gave, however, full audience to the lady's arguments; and if he sometimes shewed an unwillingness to reply, she considered it as a testimony of her power to silence. But she was generous in her victories: whenever she conceived them completely obtained, she celebrated the prowess of her adversary, and allowed him all that wisdom which retreats from the fortress it cannot defend.

There was, perhaps, another reason, as forcible as that of obliging Mrs Selwyn, or attaining the recondite principles of philosophy, which increased Bolton's willingness to indulge that lady in becoming a party to her disquisitions. There was a spectatress of the combat, whose company might have been purchased at the expence of sitting to hear Aquinas himself dispute upon

theology-Miss Lucy Sindall. My readers have been acquainted, in the Introduction, with my prepossession in her favour, and the character Mrs Wistanly gave in justification of it. They were deceived by neither.

With remarkable quickness of parts, and the liveliest temper, she possessed all that tenderness which is the chief ornament of the female character; and, with a modesty that seemed to shrink from observation, she united an ease and a dignity, that universally commanded it. Her vivacity only rose to be amiable; no enemy could ever repeat her wit, and she had no friend who did not boast of her good-humour.

I should first have described her person: my readers will excuse it; it is not of such minds that I am most solicitous to observe the dwellings: I have hinted before, and I repeat it, that her's was such a one, as no mind need be ashamed of.

Such was the attendant of Mrs Selwyn, whose company the good lady particularly required at those seasons, when she unveiled her knowledge in argument, or pointed her sagacity to instruction. She would often employ Bolton and Miss Lucy to read her certain select passages of books, when a weakness in her own sight made reading uneasy to her the subjects were rarely of the entertaining kind, yet Harry never complained of their length. This she attributed to his opinion of their usefulness; Lucy called it goodnature. He thought so himself at first; but he soon began to discover, that it proceeded from some different cause; for when Miss Lucy was, by any accident, away, he read with very little complacency. He never suspected it to be love: much less did Lucy; they owned each other for friends; and when Mrs Selwyn used to call them children, Bolton would call Lucy sister; yet he was often not displeased to remember, that she was not his sister indeed.

CHAP. III.

A Natural consequence of some particulars contained in the last.

THE state of the mind may be often disguised, even from the owner, when he means to inquire into it; but a very trifle will throw it from its guard, and betray its situation, when a formal examination has failed to discover it.

Bolton would often catch himself sighing when Miss Sindall was absent, and feel his cheeks glow at her approach; he wondered what it was that made him sigh ard blush.

He would sometimes take solitary walks, without knowing why he wandered out alone: he found something that pleased him, in the melancholy of lonely recesses, and half-worn paths, and his day-dreams commonly ended in some

idea of Miss Sindall, though he meant nothing less than to think of such an object.

He had strayed, in one of those excursions, about half a mile from the house, through a copse at the corner of the park, which opened into a little green amphitheatre, in the middle of which was a pool of water, formed by a rivulet that crept through the matted grass, till it fell into this basin by a gentle cascade.

The sun was gleaming through the trees, which were pictured on the surface of the pool beneath; and the silence of the scene was only interrupted by the murmurs of the water-fall, sometimes accompanied by the querulous note of the wood-pigeons, who inhabited the neighbouring copse.

Bolton seated himself on the bank, and listened to their dirge. It ceased; for he had disturbed the sacred, solitary haunt. "I will give you some music in return," said he; and drew from his pocket a small-piped flute, which he frequently carried with him in his eveningwalks, and serenaded the lonely shepherd returning from his fold. He played a little plaintive air which himself had composed; he thought he had played it by chance: but Miss Sindall had commended it the day before; the recollection of Miss Sindall accompanied the sound, and he had drawn her portrait listening to its close.

She was indeed listening to its close; for accident had pointed her walk in the very same direction with Bolton's. She was just coming out of the wood, when she heard the soft notes of his flute; they had something of fairy music in them that suited the scene, and she was irresistibly drawn nearer the place where he sat, though some wayward feeling arose, and whispered, that she should not approach it. Her feet were approaching it whether she would or no; and she stood close by his side, while the last cadence was melting from his pipe.

She repeated it after him with her voice. "Miss Sindall!" cried he, starting up with some emotion. "I know," said she, you will be surprised to find me here; but I was enchanted hither by the sound of your flute. Pray touch that little melancholy tune again." He began, but he played very ill. "You blow it," said she, "not so sweetly as before; let me try what tone I can give it."-She put it to her mouth, but she wanted the skill to give it voice." There cannot be much art in it;"-she tried it again"and yet it will not speak at my bidding." She looked stedfastly on the flute, holding her fingers on the stops; her lips were red from the pressure, and her figure altogether so pastoral and innocent, that I do not believe the kisses, with which the poets make Diana greet her sister huntresses, were ever more chaste than that which Bolton now stole from her by surprise.

Her cheeks were crimson at this little violence of Harry's. "What do you mean, Mr Bolton ?"