EAUTY.

I was not above twelve Years old, as near as I can remember, when a Lady
of my Acquaintance, who was particularly concern'd in many of the
Passages, very pleasantly entertain'd me with the Relation of the young
Lady _Arabella's_ Adventures, who was eldest Daughter to Sir _Francis
Fairname_, a Gentleman of a noble Family, and of a very large Estate in
the West of _England_, a true Church-Man, a great Loyalist, and a most
discreetly-indulgent Parent; nor was his Lady any Way inferiour to him
in every Circumstance of Virtue. They had only two Children more, and
those were of the soft, unhappy Sex too; all very beautiful, especially
_Arabella_, and all very much alike; piously educated, and courtly too,
of naturally-virtuous Principles and Inclinations.

'Twas about the sixteenth Year of her Age, that Sir _Robert Richland_,
her Father's great Friend and inseparable Companion, but superiour to
him in Estate as well as Years, felt the resistless Beauty of this young
Lady raging and burning in his aged Veins, which had like to have been
as fatal to him, as a Consumption, or his Climacterical Year of Sixty
Three, in which he dy'd, as I am told, though he was then hardly Sixty.
However, the Winter Medlar would fain have been inoculated in the
Summer's Nacturine. His unseasonable Appetite grew so strong and
inordinate, that he was oblig'd to discover it to Sir _Francis_; who,
though he lov'd him very sincerely, had yet a Regard to his Daughter's
Youth, and Satisfaction in the Choice of a Husband; especially, when he
consider'd the great Disproportion in their Age, which he rightly
imagin'd would be very disagreeable to _Arabella's_ Inclinations: This
made him at first use all the most powerful and perswading Arguments in
his Capacity, to convince Sir _Robert_ of the Inequality of such a
Match, but all to no Purpose; for his Passion increasing each Day more
violently, the more assiduously, and with the greater Vehemence, he
press'd his Friend to use his Interest and Authority with his Lady and
Daughter, to consent to his almost unnatural Proposition; offering this
as the most weighty and prevailing Argument, (which undoubtedly it was,)
That since he was a Batchelor, he would settle his whole Estate upon
her, if she surviv'd him, on the Day of Marriage, not desiring one Penny
as a Portion with her. This Discourse wrought so powerfully with her
Mother, that she promis'd the old Lover all the Assistance he could hope
or ex