this beauty stood weeping by his chair, and faid, "My love, forgive me, as it was in raillery only I spoke, and let our pleasures and pains be hereafter honeftly fhared," I remember the tears burst from my eyes, and in that condition I went away. It was frightful to look at Euftace, as he shook, started, and wildly stared; and the diftrefs his lady appeared in, was enough to make the most stoney heart bleed: it was a difmal scene.

This happened at nine at night, and at ten Orlando withdrew to bed, without fpeaking one word, as I was informed. Soon after he lay down, he pretended to be fast asleep; and his wife rejoiced to find him fo, as she believed, or was in hopes that nature's foft nurse would lull the active inftruments of motion, and calm the raging operations of his mind; fhe then refigned herself to flumbers, and thought to abolish for that night every disagreeable fenfation of pain: but no fooner did this furious man find that his charming wife was really afleep, than he plunged a dagger into her breaft. The monfter repeated the strokes while fhe had life to speak to him in the tendereft manner, and conjured him, in regard to his own happiness, to let her live, and not fink himself into perdition here and hereafter by her death. In vain fhe prayed; he gave her a thousand wounds, and I saw her the next morning a bloody, mangled corpfe, in the great houfe in Smithfield, which stood at a diftance from the street, with a wall before it, and an avenue of high trees up to the door.

Euftace fled, when he thought fhe was expiring, (though the lived for an hour after, to relate the cafe to her maid, who heard her groan, and came into her room,) and went from Dublin to a little lodge he had in the country, about twenty miles from town, The Magiftrates, in a fhort time, had information where he was : and one John Manfel, a conftable, a bold and ftrong man, undertook, for a reward, to apprehend him. To this purpose he fet out immediately, with a cafe of piftols, and a hanger, and lurked feveral days and nights in the fields, before he could find an opportunity of coming at him; for Euftace lived by himself in the house, well fecured by ftrong doors and bars, and only went out now and then to an ale-houfe, the mafter of which was his friend. Near it, at laft, about break of day, Manfel chanced to find him, and, upon his refufing to be made a prifoner, and cocking a pistol to fhoot the Officer of juftice, both their piftols were discharged at once, and they both dropped down dead men. Euftace was shot in the heart, and the conftable in the brain. They were both brought back to Dublin on one of the little low-backed cars there ufed; and I was one of the boys that followed the car from the beginning of James-ftreet, the out-fide of the city, all through the town. Euftace's head hung dangling near the ground, with his face upwards, and his torn bloody breast bare; and of all the

faces

faces of the dead I have feen, none ever looked like his. There was an anxiety, a rage, a horror, and a defpair, to be seen in it, that no pencil could exprefs.

Thus fell Euftace, in the 29th year of his age, and, by his hand, his virtuous, beautiful, and ingenuous wife and what are we to learn from thence? Is it, that on fuch accounts we ought to dread wedlock, and never be concerned with a wife? No, furely; but to be from thence convinced that it is neceffary, in order to a happy marriage, to bring the will to the obedience of reafon, and acquire an equanimity in the general tenour of life. Of all things in this world, moral dominion, or the empire over ourselves, is not only the moft glorious, as reafon is the fuperior nature of man, but the most valuable, in refpect of real human happiness. A conformity to reason, or good sense, and to the inclination of our neighbours, with very little money, may produce a great and lasting felicity; but without this fubfervience to our own reafon, complaifance to company, and foftnefs and benevolence to all around us, the greatest mifery does frequently fprout from the largest stock of

fortunes.

It was by ungoverned paffions that Euftace murdered his wife, and died himself the most miferable and wretched of all human beings. He might have been the happieft of mortals, if he had conformed to the dictates of reafon, and foftened his paffions, as well for his own ease, as in compliance to a creature formed with a mind of a quite different make from his own. There is a fort of sex in fouls; and, exclufive of that love and patience which our religion requires, every couple fhould remember, that there are things which grow out of their very natures that are pardonable, when confidered as fuch. Let them not, therefore, be fpying out faults, nor find a fatisfaction in reproaching; but let them examine to what confequences their ideas tend, and refolve to cease from cherifhing them, when they lead to contention and mifchief. Let them both endeavour to amend what is wrong, teach others, and act as becomes their characters, in practising the focial duties of married perfons, which are fo frequently and ftrongly inculcated by Revelation and natural reason; and then, inftead of matrimony's being. a burthen, and hanging a weight upon our very beings, there will be no appearance of evil in it; but harmony and joy will fhed unmixed felicities on them: they will live in no low degree of beatitude in the fuburbs of Heaven.

A fignal Inftance of the INGRATITUDE and TREACHERY of KINGS FAVOURITE S.

T is hardly poffible for a man in a public ftation, especially if he is vefted with regal authority, not to discover partialities in

favour

favour of thofe by whom he is plentifully flattered, and who do all in their power to make him believe that he is fo clear in his high office, as to be fomething more than mortal in conducting the machine of government, under his royal direction. When fuch men are fo flattered, they are too apt to liften to the groffeft falfehoods, as if they were the moft indifputable truths, and to think themselves beloved by their subjects, when they are really detefted by them.

No man was ever more flattered by his Courtiers than Wil liam, Duke of Aquitain, a Prince naturally difpofed to adminifter juftice with an equal hand, and poffeffed of many virtues, which made him appear in an amiable light; but being too much under the guidance of one of his Nobles, who did not make a proper use of the great influence he had over him, he was fometimes led to act in a manner which rendered his paternal regard for the welfare of his people very problematical, and exhibited him to their eyes rather as a fevere master, than an affectionate parent. The following anecdote of him will fhew him at once in colours unpleafing and advantageous. Happily, indeed, for his subjects, he was, upon the whole, much more to be praised than condemned.

The name of the man who had fo far infinuated himself into William's favour, as to govern with almoft a plenitude of power, was Gerbert, nearly related to a Monk of the fame name, and was by him furnished, from time to time, with inftructions to preserve the authority of a favourite without abufing it.

Gerbert, prefuming too much upon his parts and address, which were, indeed, confiderable, proceeded, at length, to imagine that hemight attempt to remove his benefactor from his exalted feat, and place himself in his room. This project was certainly bold in the conception; but there was a weaknefs in the execution of it, which plainly proved that he was by no means capable, with all his fancied abilities, of bringing about the wifhed-for revolution.

William, notwithstanding the complaints which his partial adminiftration of juftice fometimes occafioned among certain individuals, who fuffered immediately by it, was, in general, beloved; and as his moft cenfured deviations from the rule of right were rather imputed to the ftrength of his attachment, than to the corruption of his heart, he was pitied when he could not be applauded.

When a favourite is arrived at fuch a pitch of felf-fufficiency, as to imagine that none of his requests can be denied, his prefumption is furely more confpicuous than his discretion. With regard. to Gerbert, he one day difcovered a no small want of prudence, by foliciting a complete pardon for one of his creatures who had been guilty of crimes of the blackeft die, and for which the whole Dukedom demanded an exemplary punishment. By foliciting the pardon of such a delinquent, Gerbert discovered a daring spirit,

i

and

and a feeble understanding. He made his requeft with his ufual boldness, but he was not heard with the ufual attention. William, provoked---for the first time---at the nature of his petition, as well as the infolence in the mode of delivery, refused to grant the prayer of it, and commanded him never to fay a fyllable more to him upon a fubject so painful to his ear; doubly painful, indeed, he added, from his appearing in defence of a man who was a difgrace to his country, and who merited no indulgence from the

throne.

. Mortified by this repulfive anfwer, delivered in ftern accents, and in a full Court, Gerbert (pride now throwing prudence off her guard) retired from the prefence with a contemptuous abruptnefs, and from that inftant planned his dethronement.

Animated by this project, he repaired to the Monk, of whose political talents he had the higheft opinion. To this Monk Gerbert related---with many fevere reflections as he proceeded-- the treatment he had met with from the Duke, and the affront he had received from him in the moft public manner.-----When he had finished his communications, he acquainted him with the defign he had formed with regard to his elevation, and then requested him to forward the execution of it by his wife admonitions and secret affiftance.

The Monk was ftruck with the boldness of the favourite's defign; and told him, haftily, that he hoped he had not given the finalleft hint of his intentions to any of his friends; adviling him, at the fame time, to proceed with the utmost caution, as few men were to be trufted with a fecret of fuch importance. "As the Duke is generally beloved," continued he, "though he has made himself many enemies, by fome tyrannical exertions of his power, you may find it difficult to bring over a fufficient number of the difcontented to your intereft, who are, at the fame time, fufficiently able, both with refpect to their abilities and perfonal confequence, to promife fuccefs. You must confider alfo, that the prejudices which the majority of the nation have conceived againft you as a favourite, will operate, it is probable, ftrongly against your designs: your enemies will rejoice at your fall; they will take no iteps, you may be affured, to inveft you with the power which fo much flatters your ambition. Diffatisfied as many of our countrymen are with the prefent adminiftration of affairs, the number of those who wifh to fee the government in your hands, is, I imagine, but fmall. If you will liften, therefore, to my advice, you will endeavour to regain the Duke's favour by a fubmiffive deportment: from fuch a deportment you may reap confiderable advantage; but if you think of producing a revolution in the ftate, you will involve yourself in difficulties not to be furmounted,, and run head-long to deftruction. From the numberlefs proofs

which you have received of the Duke's liberality, you have the greatest reafon to impute the behaviour, by which you are so much mortified, to that regard for juftice, of which he has been, in confequence of fome partial decifions, suspected: by returning immediately, and frankly owning that you were to blame for your ill-timed interceffions, you will, it is most likely, blunt the edge of that refentment, which it is certainly your intereft to difarm. By encreafing the sharpness of it, you will make your enemies triumph, and yourself defpifed---fetting afide all pecuniary confiderations, though they also should have their due weight upon this occafion."

The Monk's advice was prudent, but it was not palatable: Gerbert could not relish it; his pride had been fo deeply wounded by the Duke's mortifying behaviour to him, that he could not bear the thoughts of appearing before him in the form of a fupplicant, to acknowledge himfelf guilty of an error, and to fue for the return of his favour. The idea of fuch an humiliating fituation was inexpreffibly galling; but the good Monk at laft, by the combined force of his reafoning and his rhetoric, prevailed on him to act agreeably to the fuggeftions of discretion, and not to give himfelf up to the inftigations of temerity. Gerbert accordingly returned to Court, in order to conduct himself in the way which the pious Monk had recommended.

William, after having refufed to comply with the favourite's requeft, relented. It was not, however, the mere refusal of it which had occafioned his repentance; it was the manner in which he had corrected him for his unfeasonable folicitations, before his whole Court. He could not help marking the contemptuous looks with which he retired from his prefence; but as he had provoked them by the roughness of his reprimand, he forgave them, and fecretly wifhed for an opportunity to convince him that he was ftill his favourite. Thefe penitential recollections may draw upon the Duke an imputation of imbecility; but fuch is the inconfiftency of the human head, fuch is the weaknefs of the human heart!

As Gerbert found the Duke in this favourable frame of mind, when he re-appeared before him, he was relieved from the disagreeable neceffity of making thofe fubmiffions which, while he deemed them politic, he could not digeft.

William, upon his entering the room in which he was fitting, rofe up, without thinking he demeaned himself by fuch a condefcenfion, embraced the man whom he had fo much mortified, and told him how much he had been pained at being obliged to refufe his laft requeft; affuring him, that whenever the public good was not immediately concerned in the denial, his every other future request should be granted.

Gerbert,