to sustain.

Mrs. Middleton received the chevalier with good grace; but he found
her more ready to receive the presents he offered, than to grant the
privileges he required. Miss Kirk, on the other hand, was not only
flattered by his attentions, but was willing to use every means in her
power to preserve a continuance of his friendship; Therefore out of
gratitude for graces received from one of the ladies, and in expectation
of favours desired from the other, Grammont made them the handsomest
presents. Perfumed gloves, pocket looking-glasses, apricot paste,
came every week from Paris for their benefit; whilst more substantial
offerings in the shape of jewellery, diamonds, and guineas were procured
for them in London, all of which they made no hesitation to accept.

It happened one night, whilst Grammont was yet in pursuit of Mrs.
Middleton, that the queen gave a ball. In hope of winning her husband's
affection, by studying his pleasures and suiting herself to his ways,
her majesty had become a changed woman. She now professed a passion
for dancing, wore decollete costumes, and strove to surpass those
surrounding her in her desire for gaiety. Accordingly her balls were the
most brilliant spectacles the court had yet witnessed; she taking care
to assemble the fairest women of the day, and the most distinguished
men. Now amongst the latter was the Chevalier de Grammont; and amidst
the former, Mrs. Middleton and Miss Hamilton.

Of all the court beauties, "la belle Hamilton" was one of whom Grammont
had seen least and heard most; but that which had been told him of her
charms seemed, now that he beheld her, wholly inadequate to express
her loveliness. Therefore, his eyes followed her alone, as her graceful
figure glided in the dance adown the ball-room, lighted with a thousand
tapers, and brilliant with every type of beauty. And when presently she
rested, it was with an unusual flutter at his heart that this gallant,
heretofore so daring in love, sought her company, addressed her, and
listened with strange pleasure to the music of her voice. From that
night he courted Mrs. Middleton no more, but devoted himself to "la
belle Hamilton," who subsequently became his wife.

Meanwhile, the merry monarch behaved as if he had no higher purpose in
life than that of following his pleasures. "The king is as decomposed
[dissipated] as ever," the lord chancellor writes to the Duke of Ormond,
in a letter preserved in the Bodleian libra