screetly afterwards, despising Miss Stewart. As soon,
therefore, as she received intimation of these secret practices, under
pretence of attending the king in his parties, she entirely disconcerted
them; so that the earl was obliged to lay aside his projects, and Miss
Brook to discontinue her advances. The king did not even dare to think
any more on this subject; but his brother was pleased to look after what
he neglected; and Miss Brook accepted the offer of his heart, until it
pleased heaven to dispose of her otherwise, which happened soon after in
the following manner.

Sir John Denham, loaded with wealth as well as years, had passed his
youth in the midst of those pleasures which people at that age indulge
in without restraint; he was one of the brightest geniuses England ever
produced, for wit and humour, and for brilliancy of composition:
satirical and free in his poems, he spared neither frigid writers, nor
jealous husbands, nor even their wives: every part abounded with the most
poignant wit, and the most entertaining stories; but his most delicate
and spirited raillery turned generally against matrimony; and, as if he
wished to confirm, by his own example, the truth of what he had written
in his youth, he married, at the age of seventy-nine, this Miss Brook of
whom we are speaking, who was only eighteen.

The Duke of York had rather neglected her for some time before; but the
circumstance of so unequal a match rekindled his ardour; and she, on her
part, suffered him to entertain hopes of an approaching bliss, which a
thousand considerations had opposed before her marriage: she wished to
belong to the court; and for the promise of being made lady of the
bedchamber to the duchess, she was upon the point of making him another
promise, or of immediately performing it, if required, when, in the
middle of this treaty, Lady Chesterfield was tempted, by her evil genius,
to rob her of her conquest, in order to disturb all the world.

However, as Lady Chesterfield could not see the Duke of York, except
in public assemblies, she was under the necessity of making the most
extravagant advances, in order to seduce him from his former connection;
and as he was the most unguarded ogler of his time, the whole court was
informed of the intrigue before it was well begun.

Those who appeared the most attentive to their conduct were not the least
interested in it. Hamilton and Lord Chesterfield watched them narrowly;
but Lady De