e),
loves the same couch for the rest which it affords; but the wide
interval between is that of exertion, of labour, and of labour among
men. The woe which makes our _hearts_ less social, often makes our
_habits_ more so. The thoughts, which in calm would have shunned the
world, are driven upon it by the tempest, even as the birds which
forsake the habitable land can, so long as the wind sleeps and the
thunder rests within its cloud, become the constant and solitary
brooders over the waste sea: but the moment the storm awakes and the
blast pursues them, they fly, by an overpowering instinct, to some
wandering bark, some vestige of human and social life; and exchange,
even for danger from the hands of men, the desert of an angry Heaven and
the solitude of a storm.

I heard no more either of Madame de Maintenon or the King. Meanwhile, my
flight and friendship with Lord Bolingbroke had given me a consequence
in the eyes of the exiled Prince which I should not otherwise have
enjoyed; and I was honoured by very flattering overtures to enter
actively into his service. I have before said that I felt no enthusiasm
in his cause, and I was far from feeling it for his person. My ambition
rather directed its hope towards a career in the service of France.
France was the country of my birth, and the country of my father's fame.
There no withering remembrances awaited me; no private regrets were
associated with its scenes, and no public penalties with its political
institutions. And although I had not yet received any token of Louis's
remembrance, in the ordinary routine of court favours expectation as yet
would have been premature; besides, his royal fidelity to his word was
proverbial; and, sooner or later, I indulged the hope to profit by the
sort of promise he had insinuated to me. I declined, therefore, with all
due respect, the offers of the Chevalier, and continued to live the life
of idleness and expectation, until Lord Bolingbroke returned to Paris,
and accepted the office of secretary of state in the service of the
Chevalier. As he has publicly declared his reasons in this step, I do
not mean to favour the world with his private conversations on the same
subject.

A day or two after his return, I went with him to a party given by
a member of the royal family. The first person by whom we were
accosted--and I rejoiced at it, for we could not have been accosted by a
more amusing one--was Count Anthony Hamilton.

"Ah! my L