ord that he played more than she liked, he dismissed
her with a "pish", and swore that nothing was more equal than play betwixt
gentlemen, if they did but keep it up long enough. And these kept it up
long enough you may be sure. A man of fashion of that time often passed a
quarter of his day at cards, and another quarter at drink: I have known
many a pretty fellow, who was a wit too, ready of repartee, and possessed
of a thousand graces, who would be puzzled if he had to write more than
his name.

There is scarce any thoughtful man or woman, I suppose, but can look back
upon his course of past life, and remember some point, trifling as it may
have seemed at the time of occurrence, which has nevertheless turned and
altered his whole career. 'Tis with almost all of us, as in Monsieur
Massillon's magnificent image regarding King William, a _grain de sable_
that perverts or perhaps overthrows us; and so it was but a light word
flung in the air, a mere freak of a perverse child's temper, that brought
down a whole heap of crushing woes upon that family whereof Harry Esmond
formed a part.

Coming home to his dear Castlewood in the third year of his academical
course (wherein he had now obtained some distinction, his Latin Poem on
the death of the Duke of Gloucester, Princess Anne of Denmark's son,
having gained him a medal, and introduced him to the society of the
University wits), Esmond found his little friend and pupil Beatrix grown
to be taller than her mother, a slim and lovely young girl, with cheeks
mantling with health and roses: with eyes like stars shining out of azure,
with waving bronze hair clustered about the fairest young forehead ever
seen: and a mien and shape haughty and beautiful, such as that of the
famous antique statue of the huntress Diana--at one time haughty, rapid,
imperious, with eyes and arrows that dart and kill. Harry watched and
wondered at this young creature, and likened her in his mind to Artemis
with the ringing bow and shafts flashing death upon the children of Niobe;
at another time she was coy and melting as Luna shining tenderly upon
Endymion. This fair creature, this lustrous Phoebe, was only young as yet,
nor had nearly reached her full splendour: but crescent and brilliant, our
young gentleman of the University, his head full of poetical fancies, his
heart perhaps throbbing with desires undefined, admired this rising young
divinity; and gazed at her (though only as at some "bright part