delity to her rightful sovereign. "The princess is but a puppet in the
hands of that fury of a woman, who comes into my drawing-room and insults
me to my face. What can come to a country that is given over to such a
woman?" says the dowager: "As for that double-faced traitor, my Lord
Marlborough, he has betrayed every man and every woman with whom he has
had to deal, except his horrid wife, who makes him tremble. 'Tis all over
with the country when it has got into the clutches of such wretches as
these."

Esmond's old kinswoman saluted the new powers in this way; but some good
fortune at least occurred to a family which stood in great need of it, by
the advancement of these famous personages who benefited humbler people
that had the luck of being in their favour. Before Mr. Esmond left England
in the month of August, and being then at Portsmouth, where he had joined
his regiment, and was busy at drill, learning the practice and mysteries
of the musket and pike, he heard that a pension on the Stamp Office had
been got for his late beloved mistress, and that the young Mistress
Beatrix was also to be taken into Court. So much good, at least, had come
of the poor widow's visit to London, not revenge upon her husband's
enemies, but reconcilement to old friends, who pitied, and seemed inclined
to serve her. As for the comrades in prison and the late misfortune;
Colonel Westbury was with the captain-general gone to Holland; Captain
Macartney was now at Portsmouth, with his regiment of Fusiliers and the
force under command of his grace the Duke of Ormonde, bound for Spain it
was said; my Lord Warwick was returned home; and Lord Mohun, so far from
being punished for the homicide which had brought so much grief and change
into the Esmond family, was gone in company of my Lord Macclesfield's
splendid embassy to the Elector of Hanover, carrying the Garter to his
highness, and a complimentary letter from the queen.

Chapter IV. Recapitulations

From such fitful lights as could be cast upon his dark history by the
broken narrative of his poor patron, torn by remorse and struggling in the
last pangs of dissolution, Mr. Esmond had been made to understand so far,
that his mother was long since dead; and so there could be no question as
regarded her or her honour, tarnished by her husband's desertion and
injury, to influence her son in any steps which he might take either for
prosecuting or relinquishing his own just claims. It ap