fancied, too, he knew some people more agreeable.--Isabel thought when
women were young, they always liked to be called handsome, and
recollected she often heard her aunt say, that before she had the
small-pox, she was thought very comely, and had many lovers. Eustace
burst into a loud laugh, and said so many provoking things on the
misfortune of old maids being reduced to record their own victories,
that his companions protested they would be very angry, and not speak to
him till he sung them a song of his own composition, by way of penance.
He submitted cheerfully to the punishment, and caroled the following
canzonet, as they proceeded in safety to the borders of Yorkshire:--

Once Beauty bade the God of Wit
Appease her anger with his songs;
Love thought the sacrifice unfit,
And cried, "The task to me belongs."

Light flow'd the strain of wayward smiles.
Of blushes and of tears he sung,
Of mournful swains arrang'd in files,
And hearts on eye-shot arrows hung.

But Beauty frown'd; "This lay from thee!
Proud rebel, dost thou break thy chain?
Wit may devise a sportive glee,
But Love should languish and complain."

To whom the God: "When you disguise
Your charms with spleen's fantastic shade,
Insulted Love to Wit applies,
And goes like you in masquerade."

[1] Life of Bishop Sanderson.

CHAP. X.

The noble mind stands a siege against adversity, while the little
spirit capitulates at once.

Murphy's Tacitus.

On the morning after he had wisely sent away his precious charge, Dr.
Beaumont was visited by Dame Humphreys, who was now grown sincerely
penitent for all the insolent demeanour of herself and family, and
desirous to make what reparation was in her power. A revolution had also
taken place in her husband's mind. He had espoused the parliamentary
cause, in the hope of being his own master, and of paying no more taxes;
but he now found that the power assumed by the commissioners, to whom
the Parliament had committed the execution of the ordinance, respecting
the array of the different counties, was far more insupportable (as
being the tyranny of many) than the feudal rights and aristocratic
superiority heretofore exercised by the noble family of Stanley. Those
new men, exercising the powers granted them by the conservators of
public freedom, had, on his refu