nificent house in Grosvenor Square; bespoke the most
elegant equipages; bought the finest set of horses he could hear of at
double their real value; and launched into every expense the town
afforded him. He soon became one of the most constant frequenters of
Whites; kept several running horses; distinguished himself at Newmarket,
and had the honour of playing deeper, and betting with more spirit, than
any other young man of his age. There was not an occurrence in his life
about which he had not some wager depending. The wind could not change
or a shower fall without his either losing or gaining by it. He had not
a dog or cat in his house on whose life he had not bought or sold an
annuity. By these ingenious methods in one year was circulated through
the kingdom the ready money which his uncle had been half his life
starving himself and family to accumulate. The second year obliged him
to mortgage great part of his land, and the third saw him reduced to
sell a considerable portion of his estate, of which this house and the
land belonging to it made a part.

I could not help observing the various fate of this mansion, originally
the seat of ancient hospitality; then falling into the hands of a miser
who had not spirit to enjoy it, nor sense enough to see that he was
impairing so valuable a part of his possessions by grudging the
necessary expenses of repairs; from him devolving to a young coxcomb who
by neglect let it sink into ruin and was spending in extravagance what
he inherited from avarice; as if one vice was to pay the debt to society
which the other had incurred; and now it was purchased to be the seat of
charity and benevolence. How directly were we led to admire the superior
sense, as well as transcendent virtue of these ladies, when we compared
the use they made of money with that to which the two late possessors
had appropriated it! While we were in doubt which most to blame, he who
had heaped it up without comfort, in sordid inhumanity, or he who
squandered it in the gratification of gayer vices. Equally strangers to
beneficence, self-indulgence was their sole view; alike criminal, though
not equally unfashionable, one endeavoured to starve, the other to
corrupt mankind; while the new owners of this house had no other view
than to convenience and to reform all who came within their influence,
themselves enjoying in a supreme degree the happiness they dispersed
around them.

It was pleasing to see numbers at