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At the head of these children, who have very plentiful fortunes, provided they marry with mine and their mother's consent, is my lady Lizard; who, you cannot doubt, is very well visited. Sir William Oger, and his son almost at age, are frequently at our house on a double consideration. The knight is willing, (for so he very gallantly expresses himself) to marry the mother, or he will consent, whether that be so or not, that his son Oliver shall take any one of the daughters Noll likes best.

Mr. Rigburt, of the same county, who gives in his estate much larger, and his family more ancient, offers to deal with us for two daughters. Sir Harry Pandolf has writ word from his seat in the country, that he also is much inclined to an alliance with the Lizards, which he has declared in the following letter to my lady; she showed it me this morning.

of good-nature and generosity; she is the perfect The estate at present in his hands is above picture of her grandfather; and if one can ima-three thousand a-year, after payment of taxes gine all good qualities which adorn human life and all necessary charges whatsoever. He is a become feminine, the seeds, nay, the blossom of man of good understanding, but not at all what them, are apparent in Mrs. Mary. It is a weak- is usually called a man of shining parts. His ness I cannot get over, (for how ridiculous is a virtues are much greater than accomplishments, regard to the bodily perfections of a man who as to his conversation. But when you come to is dead) but I cannot resist my partiality to this consider his conduct with relation to his man. child, for being so like her grandfather; how ners and fortune, it would be a very great injury often have I turned from her, to hide the melt- not to allow him [to be] a very fine gentleman. ing of my heart when she has been talking to It has been carefully provided in his education. me! I am sure the child has no skill in it, for that he should be very ready at calculations. artifice could not dwell under that visage; but This gives him a quick alarm inwardly upon if I am absent a day from the family, she is sure all undertakings; and in a much shorter time to be at my lodging the next morning to know than is usual with men who are not versed what is the matter. in business, he is master of the question before him, and can instantly inform himself with great exactness in the matter of profit or loss that shall arise from any thing proposed to him. The same capacity, joined to an honest nature, makes him very just to other men, as well as to him. self. His payments are very punctual, and I dare answer he never did, or ever will, under. take any piece of building, or any ornamental improvement of his house, garden, park, or lands, before the money is in his own pocket wherewith he is to pay for such undertaking. He is too good to purchase labourers or artifi cers (as by this means he certainly could) at an under rate; but he has by this means what I think he deserves from his superior prudence, the choice of all who are most knowing and able to serve him. With his ready money, the builder, mason, and carpenter, are enabled to make their market of gentlemen in his neigh bourhood, who inconsiderately employ them: and often pay their undertakers by sale of some of their land; whereas, were the lands on which those improvements are made, sold to the arti ficers, the buildings would be rated as lumber in the purchase. Sir Harry has for ever a year's income, to extend his charity, serve his plea sures, or regale his friends. His servants, his cattle, his goods, speak their master a rich man. Those about his person, as his bailiff, the groom of his chamber, and his butler, have a cheerful, not a gay air the servants below them seem to live in plenty, but not in wantonness. As sir Henry is a young man, and of an active dispo. sition, his best figure is on horseback. But be fore I speak of that, I should acquaint you, that during his infancy, all the young gentlemen of the neighbourhood were welcome to a part of the house, which was called the school; where, at the charge of the family, there was a grammar-master, a plain sober man, maintained (with a salary, besides his diet, of fifty pounds a-year) to instruct all such children of gentlemen or lower people, as would partake of his education. As they grew up, they were allowed to ride out with him upon his horses. There were always ten or twelve for the saddle in readiness to attend him and his favourites, in the choice of whom he showed a good disposition, and distri buted his kindness among them by turns, with great good-nature. All horses, both for the saddle and swift draught, were very well bitted, and a skilful rider, with a riding-house, wherein he (the riding master) commanded, had it in orders to teach any gentleman's son of the county

MADAM,-I have heard your daughters very well spoken of: and though I have very great offers in my own neighbourhood, and heard the small-pox is very rife at London, I will send my eldest son to see them, provided, that by your ladyship's answer, and your liking of the rent-roll which I send herewith, your ladyship assures me he shall have one of them, for I do not think to have my son refused by any woman; and so, madam, I conclude, your most humble servant, HENRY PENDOLA.'

No. 6.]

Wednesday, March 18, 1713.

I HAVE despatched my young women, and the town has them among them; it is necessary for the elucidation of my future discourses, which I desire may be denominated, as they are the precepts of a Guardian, Mr. Ironside's Precautions; I say it is, after what has been already declared, in the next place necessary to give an account of the males of this worthy family, whose annals I am writing. The affairs of women being chiefly domestic, and not made up of so many circumstances as the duties of men are, I fear I cannot despatch the account of the males under my care, in so few words as I did the explanation which regarded my women.

Sir Harry Lizard, of the county of Northampton, son and heir of the late sir Marmaduke, is now entered upon the twenty-sixth year of his age, and is now at his seat in the country.

that would please to learn that exercise. We found our account in this proceeding, as well in real profit, as in esteem and power in the country; for as the whole shire is now possessed by gentlemen who owe sir Harry a part of education which they all value themselves upon, (their horsemanship) they prefer his horses to all others, and it is ten per cent. in the price of a steed, which appears to come out of his ridinghouse.

By this means it is, that sir Harry, as I was going to say, makes the best figure on horseback; for his usual hours of being in the field are well known; and at those seasons the neigh. bouring gentlemen, his friends and school-fellows, take a pleasure in giving him their company, with their servants well behaved, and horses well commanded.

I cannot enough applaud sir Harry for a particular care in his horses. He not only bits all which are ridden, but also all which are for the coach or swift draught, for grace adds mightily to the price of strength; and he finds his account in it at all markets, more especially for the coach or troop horses, of which that county produces the most strong and ostentatious. To keep up a breed for any use whatever, he gives plates for the best performing horse in every way in which that animal can be serviceable. There is such a prize for him that trots best, such for the best walker, such for the best galloper, such for the best pacer; then for him who draws most in such a time to such a place, then to him that carries best such a load on his back. He delights in this, and has an admirable fancy in the dress of the riders; some admired country girl is to hold the prize, her lovers to trot, and not to mend their pace into a gallop when they are out-trotted by a rival; some known country wit to come upon the best pacer; these, and the like little joyful arts, gain him the love of all who do not know his worth, and the csteem of all who do. Sir Harry is no friend to the race-horse; he is of opinion it is inhuman, that animals should be put upon their utmost strength and mettle for our diversion only. How ever, not to be particular, he puts in for the queen's plate every year, with orders to his rider never to win or be distanced; and, like a good country gentleman, says, it is a fault in all ministries, that they encourage no kind of horses but those which are swift.

As I write lives, I dwell upon small matters, being of opinion with Plutarch, that little cir. cumstances show the real man better than things of greater moment. But good economy is the characteristic of the Lizards. I remember a circumstance about six years ago, that gave ine hopes he would one time or other make a figure in parliament; for he is a landed man, and considers his interest, though he is such, to be impaired or promoted according to the state of trade. When he was but twenty years old, I took an opportunity in his presence, to ask an, intelligent woollen-draper, what he gave for his shop [at] the corner of Change-alley? The shop is, I believe, fourteen feet long, and eight broad. I was answered, ninety pounds a-year. I took no notice, but the thought descended into the breast of sir Harry, and I saw on his table the

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next morning, a computation of the value of land in an island, consisting of so many miles, with so many good ports; the value of each part of the said island, as it lay to such ports, and produced such commodities. The whole of his working was to know why so few yards near the Change, was so much better than so many acres in Northamptonshire; and what those acres in Northamptonshire would be worth, were there no trade at all in this island. It makes my heart ache, when I think of this young man, and consider upon what plain maxims, and in what ordinary methods men of estate may do good wherever they are seated, that so many should be what they are! It is certain, that the arts which purchase wealth or fame, will maintain them; and I attribute the splendour and long continuance of this family, to the felicity of having the genius of the founder of it run through all his male line. Old sir Harry, the great grandfather of this gentleman, has written in his own hand upon all the deeds which he ever signed, in the humour of that sententious age, this sentence, There are four good mothers, of whom are often born four unhappy daughters; truth begets hatred, happiness pride, security danger, and familiarity contempt.'

No. 7.]

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Thursday, March 19, 1713.

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I THIS morning did myself the honour to visit lady Lizard, and took my chair at the tea-table, at the upper end of which that graceful woman, with her daughters about her, appeared to me with greater dignity than ever any figure, either of Venus attended by the graces, Diana with her nymphs, or any other celestial who owes her being to poetry.

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The discourse we had there, none being present but our own family, consisted of private matters, which tended to the establishment of these young ladies in the world. My lady, I observed, had a mind to make mention of the proposal to Mrs. Jane, of which she is very fond, and I as much avoided, as being equally against it; but it is by no means proper the young la. dies should observe we ever dissent; therefore I turned the discourse, by saying, it was time enough to think of marrying a young lady, who was but three-and-twenty, ten years hence.' The whole table was alarmed at the assertion, and the Sparkler scalded her fingers, by leaning suddenly forward to look in my face: but my business at present was to make my court to the mother; therefore, without regarding the resentment in the looks of the children, Madam,' said I, there is a petulant and hasty manner practised in this age, in hurrying away the life of woman, and confining the grace and principal action of it to those years wherein reason and discretion are most feeble, humour and passion most powerful. From the time a young woman of quality has first appeared in the drawing-room, raised a whisper and curiosity of the

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men about her, had her health drank in gay | nis tamen excidit ausis; though he could not companies, and distinguished at public assem- command the chariot of the sun, his fall from it blies: I say, madam, if within three or four was illustrious. So far as I conceive, Hac est years of her first appearance in town, she is not sola nostra anchora, hæc jacenda est in nobis disposed of, her beauty is grown familiar, her alea;' this is our only anchor, this die must be eyes are disarmed, and we seldom after hear her thrown. In our instability, Unum momentum mentioned but with indifference. What doubles est uno momento perfectum factum, ac dictum my grief on this occasion is, that the more dis- stabilitatem facere potest;' one lucky moment creetly the lady behaves herself, the sooner is would crown and fix all. This, or else nothing her glory extinguished. Now, madam, if merit is to be looked for but continual dalliance and had a greater weight in our thoughts, when we doubtfulness, so far as I can see. Your assured form to ourselves agreeable characters of women, friend, THOMAS SMITH." men would think, in making their choices, of "From Killingworth, Aug. 22, 1572." such as would take care of, as well as supply children for, the nursery. It was not thus in the illustrious days of good queen Elizabeth. I was this morning turning over a folio, called The Complete Ambassador, consisting chiefly of letters from lord Burleigh, earl of Leicester, and sir Thomas Smith. Sir Thoinas writes a letter to sir Francis Walsingham, full of learned gallantry, wherein you may observe he promises himself the French king's brother (who it seems was but a cold lover) would be quickened by seeing the queen in person, who was then in the thirty-ninth year of her age. A certain so-gle life. briety in thoughts, words, and action, which was the praise of that age, kept the fire of love alive; and it burnt so equally, that it warmed and preserved, without tormenting and consuming our beings. The letter I mention is as follows:

Though my lady was in very good humour, upon the insinuation that, according to the Elizabeth scheme, she was but just advanced above the character of a girl; I found the rest of the company as much disheartened, that they were still but mere girls. I went on, therefore, to at tribute the immature marriages which are solemnized in our days to the importunity of the men, which made it impossible for young ladies to remain virgins so long as they wished from their own inclinations, and the freedom of a sin

There is no time of our life, under what cha racter soever, in which men can wholly divest themselves of an ambition to be in the favour of women. Cardan, a grave philosopher and physician, confesses in one of his chapters, that though he had suffered poverty, repulses, ca

was thoroughly dejected, and impatient of life itself, but under a calamity which he suffered from the beginning of his twenty-first to the end of his thirtieth year. He tells us, that the raillery he suffered from others, and the contempt which he had of himself, were afflictions beyond expression, I mention this only as an argument extorted from this good and grave man, to sup port my opinion of the irresistible power of wo men. He adds in the same chapter, that there are ten thousand afflictions and disasters attend the passion itself; that an idle word imprudently repeated by a fair woman, and vast expenses to support her folly and vanity, every day re duce inen to poverty and death; but he makes them of little consideration to the miserable and insignificant condition of being incapable of their favour.

"To the Right Worshipful Mr. Francis Wal-lumnies, and a long series of afflictions, he never singham, Ambassador, resident in France. "SIR,-I am sorry that so good a matter should, upon so nice a point, be deferred. We may say that the lover will do little, if he will not take the pains once to see his love; but she must first say yea, before he see her, or she him: twenty ways might be devised why he might come over, and be welcome, and possibly do more in an hour than he may in two years. Cupido ille qui vincit omnia, in oculos insidet, et ex oculis ejaculatur, et in oculos utriusque videndo non solum, ut ait poeta, fœmina virum, sed vir fœminam; that powerful being Cupid, who conquers all things, resides in the eyes, he sends out all his darts from the eyes: by throwing glances at the eyes (according to the poet) not only the woman captivates the man, but also the man the woman. What force, I pray yon, can hearsay,' and 'I think, and I trust,' do in I make no manner of difficulty of professing comparison of that 'cum præsens præsentem tu- I am not surprised that the author has express. elur et alloquitur, et furore forsitan amoris duc.ed himself after this manner, with relation to tus, amplectitur,' when they face to face see and love: the heroic chastity so frequently professed converse with each other, and the lover in an by humorists of the fair sex, generally ends in ecstacy, not to be commanded, snatches an em- an unworthy choice, after having overlooked brace, and saith to himself, and openly that she overtures to their advantage. It is for this rea may hear, Tencone te me, an etiamnum somno son that I would endeavour to direct, and not volunt fœminæ videri cogi ad id quod maximum pretend to eradicate the inclinations of the sexes capiunt? Are you in my arms, my fair one, or to each other. Daily experience shows us, that do we both dream, and will women even in their the most rude rustic grows humane as soon as sleep seem forced to what they most desire? If he is inspired by this passion; it gives a new we be cold, it is our part, besides the person, the grace to our manners, a new dignity to our sex requireth it. Why are you cold? Is it not minds, a new visage to our persons. Whether a young man's part to be bold, courageous, and we are inclined to liberal arts, to arms, or adto adventure? If he should have, he should have dress in our exercise, our improvement is has but honorificam rcpulsum ;' even a repulse here tened by a particular object whom we would is glorious: the worst that can be said of him please. Cheerfulness, gentleness, fortitude, libe

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is but as of Phacton, Quam si non tenuit mag-rality, magnificence, and all the virtues which

No. 8.]

.

Friday, March 20, 1713.

Animum rege.

Govern the mind.

Hor. Lib. 1. Ep. ii. 62.

adorn men, which inspire herocs, are most con- | during the very time of their mediation for the spicuous in lovers. I speak of love as when such prisoner, he insulted them also, by commanding as are in this company are the objects of it, who with a haughty tone, that his orders should be can bestow upon their husbands (if they follow executed that very instant. This, as it is usual their excellent mother) all its joys without any on such occasions, made the whole town flock of its anxieties. together; but the principal inhabitants, abhor. ring the severity of Licenciado, and pitying a gentleman in the condition of Aguire, went in a body, and besought the governor to suspend, if not remit the punishment. Their importunities prevailed on him to defer the execution for eight days; but when they came to the prison with his warrant, they found Aguire already brought forth, stripped, and mounted on an ass, which A GUARDIAN cannot bestow his time in any is the posture wherein the basest criminals are office more suitable to his character, than in whipped in that city. His friends cried out, representing the disasters to which we are ex-Take him off, take him off,' and proclaimed posed by the irregularity of our passions. I think I speak of this matter in a way not yet taken notice of, when I observe that they make men do things unworthy of those very passions. I shall illustrate this by a story I have lately read in the Royal Commentaries of Peru, wherein you behold an oppressor a most contemptible creature after his power is at an end; and a person he oppressed so wholly intent upon revenge till he had obtained it, that in the pursuit of it he utterly neglected his own safety; but when that motive of revenge was at an end, returned to a sense of danger, in such a manner as to be unable to lay hold of occasions which offered themselves for certain security, and expose himself from fear to apparent hazard. The motives which I speak of are not indeed so much to be called passions, as ill habits arising from passions, such as pride and revenge, which are improvements of our infirmities, and are, methinks, but scorn and anger regularly conducted. But to my story.

Licenciado Esquivel, governor of the city Potocsi, commanded two hundred men to march out of that garrison towards the kingdom of Tueman, with strict orders to use no Indians in carrying their baggage, and placed himself at a convenient station without the gates, to observe how his orders were put in execution; he found they were wholly neglected, and that Indians were laden with the baggage of the Spaniards, but thought fit to let them march by till the last rank of all came up, out of which he seized one man called Aguire, who had two Indians laden with his goods. Within few days after he was taken in arrest, he was sentenced to receive two hundred stripes. Aguire represented by his friends, that he was the brother of a gentleman, who had in his country an estate with vassalage of Indians, and hoped his birth would exempt him from a punishment of so much indignity. Licenciado persisted in the kind of punishment he had already pronounced; upon which Aguire petitioned that it might be altered to one that he should not survive; and though a gentleman, and from that quality not liable to suffer so ig. nominious a death, humbly besought his excellency that he might be hanged. But though Licenciado appeared all his life, before he came into power, a person of an easy and tractable disposition, he was so changed by his office, that these applications from the unfortunate Aguire did but the more gratify his insolence; and

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their order for suspending his punishment; but the youth, when he heard that it was only put off for eight days, rejected the favour, and said, All my endeavours have been to keep myself from mounting this beast, and from the shame of being seen naked; but since things are come thus far, let the sentence proceed, which will be less than the fears and apprehensions I shall have in these eight days ensuing; besides, I shall not need to give further trouble to my friends for intercession on my behalf, which is as likely to be ineffectual as what hath already passed. After he had said this, the ass was whipped forward, and Aguire ran the gantlet according to the sentence. The calm manner in which he resigned himself, when he found his disgrace must be, and the scorn of dallying with it under a suspension of a few days, which mercy was but another form of the governor's cruelty, made it visible that he took comfort in some secret resolution to avenge the affront.

After this indignity, Aguire could not be persuaded (though the inhabitants of Potocsi often importuned him from the spirit they saw in him) to go upon any military undertaking, but excused himself with a modest sadness in his countenance, saying, 'that after such a shame as his was death must be his only remedy and consolation, which he would endeavour to ob. tain as soon as possible.'

Under this melancholy he remained in Peru, until the time in which the office of Esquivel expired; after which, like a desperate man, he pursued and followed him, watching an oppor. tunity to kill him and wipe off the shame of the late affront. Esquivel, being informed of this desperate resolution by his friends, endeavoured to avoid his enemy, and took a journey of three or four hundred leagues from him, supposing that Aguire would not pursue him at such a dis. tance; but Esquivel's flight did but increase Aguire's speed in following. The first journey which Esquivel took was to the city Los Reyes, being three hundred and twenty leagues distant; but in less than fifteen days Aguire was there with him; whereupon Esquivel took another flight, as far as to the city of Quito, being four hundred leagues distant from Los Reyes; but in a little more than twenty days Aguire was again with him; which being intimated to Es. quivel, he took another leap as far as Cozco, which is five hundred leagues from Quito; but in a few days after he arrived there, canic also

Aguire, travelling all the way on foot, without shoes or stockings, saying, that it became not the condition of a whipt rascal to travel on horseback, or appear amongst men.' In this manner did Aguire haunt and pursne Esquivel for three years and four months; who being now tired and wearied with so many long and tedious journies, resolved to fix his abode at Cozco, where he believed that Aguire would scarce adventure to attempt any thing against bin, for fear of the judge who governed that city, who was a severe man, impartial and inflexible in all his proceedings; and accordingly took a lodging in the middle of the street of the great church, where he lived with great care and caution, wearing a coat of mail under his upper coat, and went always armed with his sword and dagger, which are weapons not agreeable to his profession. However Aguire followed hither also, and having in vain dogged him from place to place, day after day, he resolved to make the attempt upon him in his own house, which he entered, and wandered from room to room, till at last he came into his study where Licenciado lay on a couch asleep. Aguire stabbed him with his dagger with great tranquillity, and very leisurely wounded him in other parts of the body, which were not covered with his coat of mail. He went out of the house in safety; but as his resentment was sated, he now began to reflect upon the inexor. able temper of the governor of the place. Under this apprehension he had not composure enough to fly to a sanctuary, which was near the place where he committed the fact; but ran into the street frantic and distracted, proclaiming himsele a criminal, by crying out, Hide me, hide

Ine.'

The wretched fate and poor behaviour of Licenciado, in flying his country to avoid the same person whom he had before treated with so much insolence, and the high resentment of a man so inconsiderable as Aguire, when much injured, are good admonitions to little spirits in exalted stations, to take care how they treat brave men in low condition.

No. 9.1

Saturday, March 21, 1713.

In tantas brevi creverant opes, seu maritimis seu ter restribus fructibus, seu multitudinis incremento, seu snactitate disciplinæ.

Liv.

They rose in a short time to that pitch of wealth and grandeur, by means of an extensive commerce both by sen and Innd, by an increase of the people, and by the rigour of their laws and discipline.

MANY of the subjects of my papers will consist of such things as I have gathered from the conversation, or learned from the conduct of a gentleman, who has been very conversant in our family, by name Mr. Charwell.* This person was formerly a merchant in this city, who, by exact economy, great frugality, and

The person here alluded to, is said to have been the charitable Ellward Colston, of Bristol, member of Par La nant for that city, who died unmarried in October, 12 t close of his eighty-fifth year, without

Le 14 has understanding, without labour of sorrow..

very fortunate adventures, was about twenty years since, and the fortieth year of his age, arrived to the estate which we usually call a plum. This was a sum so much beyond his first ambition, that he then resolved to retire from the town and the business of it together. Accordingly he laid out one half of his morey upon the purchase of a nobleman's estate, not

any miles distant from the country seat of my lady Lizard. From this neighbourhood our first acquaintance began, and has ever since been continued with equal application on both sides. Mr. Charwell visits very few gentlemen in the country;, his most frequent airings in the summer time are visits to my lady Lizard. And if ever his affairs bring him up to town during the winter, as soon as these are despatched, he is sure to dine at her house, or to make one at her tea-table, to take her commands for the country.

I shall hardly be able to give an account bow this gentleman has employed the twenty years since he made the purchase I have mentioned, without first describing the conditions of the estate.

The estate then consisted of a good large old house, a park of two thousand acres, eight thousand acres more of land divided into farms. The land not barren, but the country very thin of people, and these the only consumers of the wheat and barley that grew upon the premises. A river running by the house, which was in the centre of the estate, but the saine not na vigable, and the rendering it navigable had been opposed by the generality of the whole country. The roads excessive bad, and no pos sibility of getting off the tenants' corn, but at such a price of carriage as would exceed the whole value when it came to market. The underwoods all destroyed, to lay the country open to my lord's pleasures; but there was in deed the less want of this fuel, there being large coul-pits in the estate, within two miks of the house, and such a plenty of coals as was sufficient for whole counties. But then the want of water-carriage made these also a mere dag, and almost every man's for fetching. Many timber-trees were still standing only for wsui of chapmen, very little being used for building in a country so thin of people, and those at a greater distance being in no likelihood of buying pennyworths, if they must be at the charge of land-carriage. Yet every tree was valued at a much greater price than would be given for it in the place; so was every acre of land in the park; and, as for the tenants, they were all racked to extremity, and almost every one of them beggars. All these things Mr. Charwell knew very well, yet was not discouraged from going on with his purchase.

But in the first place, he resolved that a hundred in family should not ruin him, as it had done his predecessor. Therefore, pretending to dislike the situation of the old house, he

made choice of another at a mile distance, higher up the river, at a corner of the park, where, at the expense of four or five thousand pound, and all the ornaments of the old house, he built a new one, with all convenient ofices, more suitable to his revenues, yet not mach

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