e and fortunes which, as the son of
Bellingham, I might claim. Shall I own, though my heart recoils at the
confession, that I strongly fear a base private motive urged my father
to select this victim, as a sacrifice to what he called public
expedience.--Oh! Dr. Lloyd, had I never been born, had my ambitious
parents laid no base projects for my aggrandizement, the noble Eustace
had still lived."

"My good Sir," returned the kind physician, "we must debate this point a
little. In the first place, let me assure you the lots were fairly cast.
I do not justify, indeed I severely reprobate the cruel policy which
required the sacrifice of three victims; but it was resolved on in full
council, the blame therefore is divided among all the officers. I also
know that Lord Bellingham committed his own safety by endeavouring to
preserve the life of Eustace."

An overwhelming load of infamy seemed, at this assurance, removed from
the oppressed De Vallance. "Speak it again, dear worthy man, again
repeat that my father would have saved him. You know he would? You can
swear to the fact? But soft--was not he supreme commander? What, then,
prevented him from signing his pardon?"

Dr. Lloyd replied--"The limited power which a general possesses over
troops, who, in obeying him, have cancelled the previous obligations of
duty and conscience. He who accepts the command of a revolutionary army
is ever fearful of being sacrificed by his own soldiers. His office
makes him the ostensible champion of liberty; but his army claim a
greater licence than consists with the requisite exercise of discipline
and authority. His subordinate officers envy his supremacy; for the
chain of prescriptive gradation is dissolved by the pretext of
preferring merit; and what soldier of fortune is there who does not
think himself equal to the highest posts which his machinations and
enterprize can procure. We Loyalists (for such, Sir, I now in confidence
own myself to be) have often said that Lord Bellingham was only half
wicked. He retained too much of the gentleman to practise extortion, or
to connive at the rapacity by which his subalterns tried to make the
most of their brief authority. He enforced discipline without
condescending to that familiarity and occasional indulgence which make
severity palatable. He was an agent of the new system, trying to
introduce the manners of the old. He saw his own danger when it was too
late. He discovered that he served villa