one having
leisure to examine him, he was taken at his word, and had been made
minister and secretary of state, upon the credit of his own importance.

His ambition soaring still above these high stations, after having
provided himself with a great number of fine maxims, and some historical
anecdotes, he obtained an audience of Miss Stewart, in order to display
them; at the same time offering her his most humble services, and best
advice, to assist her in conducting herself in the situation to which it
had pleased God and her virtue to raise her. But he was only in the
preface of his speech, when she recollected that he was at the head of
those whom the Duke of Buckingham used to mimic; and as his presence and
his language exactly revived the ridiculous ideas that had been given her
of him, she could not forbear bursting out into a fit of laughter in his
face, so much the more violent as she had for a long time struggled to
suppress it.

The minister was enraged: his pride became his post, and his punctilious
behaviour merited all the ridicule which could be attached to it: he
quitted her abruptly, with all the fine advice he had prepared for her,
and was almost tempted to carry it to Lady Castlemaine, and to unite
himself with her interests; or immediately to quit the court party, and
declaim freely in parliament against the grievances of the state, and
particularly to propose an act to forbid the keeping of mistresses; but
his prudence conquered his resentments; and thinking only how to enjoy
with pleasure the blessings of fortune, he sent to Holland for a wife,
in order to complete his felicity.

Hamilton was, of all the courtiers, the best qualified to succeed in
an enterprise, in which the Duke of Buckingham and Lord Arlington had
miscarried: he was thinking upon it; but his natural coquetry traversed
his intentions, and made him neglect the most advantageous prospects in
the world, in order unnecessarily to attend to the advances and
allurements thrown out to him by the Countess of Chesterfield. This was
one of the most agreeable women in the world: she had a most exquisite
shape, though she was not very tall; her complexion was extremely fair,
with all the expressive charms of a brunette; she had large blue eyes,
very tempting and alluring; her manners were engaging; her wit lively and
amusing; but her heart, ever open to tender sentiments, was neither
scrupulous in point of constancy, nor nice in point of sin