muft allow me to fay, fhe muft not be terrified. I do affure you, that her life has been once in danger already: All the care and kindness of my fifter and a physician could hardly restore her.

Sir Har. The most inflexible man, devil I should fay, I ever faw in my life! But you have no objection to my feeing her. She fhall fee (yet how can I forgive you that?) what I have fuffered in my perfon for her fake. If the will not be mine, thefe marks fhall be hers, not yours. And though I will not terrify her, I will fee if the has no pardon, no pity for me. She knows, she very well knows, that I was the most honourable of men to her, when the was in my power. By all that's facred, I intended only to make her Lady Pollexfen. I faw fhe had as many lovers as vifiters, and I could not bear it. -You, Sir Charles, will ftand my friend, and if money and love will purchase her, fhe fhall yet be mine.

Sir Ch. I promise you no friendship in this cafe, Sir Hargrave. All her relations leave her, it seems, to her own discretion; and who fhall offer to lead her choice? What I faid below, when you would have made that a condition, I repeat-I think she ought not to be yours; nor ought you, either for your own fake or hers, to defire it. Come, come, Sir Hargrave, confider the matter better. Think of fome other woman, if you are difpofed to marry. Your figure

Sir Har. Yes, by G-. I make a pretty figure now, don't I.

Sir Ch. Your fortune will make you happier in marriage with any other woman, after what has happened, than this can make you. For my own part, let me tell you, Sir Hargrave, I would not marry the greatest princess on earth, if I thought fhe did not love me above all other men, whether I deferved her love or not.

Sir Har. And you have no view to yourself in the advice you give?-Tell me that-I infilt upon your telling me that.

Sir Ch. Whenever I pretend to give advice, I fhould abhor myself, if I did not wholly confider the good of the person who confulted me; and if I had any retrofpection to myself, which might in the leaft affect that person.

The breakfast was then brought in. This that follows was the converfation that paffed at and after breakfast.

Mr Bag. See what a Christian can do, Merceda. After this will you remain a Jew?

Mr Mer. Let me fee fuch another Chriftian, and I will give you an answer. You, Bagenhall, I hope, will not think you yourself intitled to boast of your christianity?

Mr Bag. Too true! We have been both of us fad dogs.

Sir Har. And I have been the most innocent man of the three, and yet, that's the devil of it, am the greatest sufferer. Curse me, if I can bear to look at myself in the glass!

You

Mr Jor. You fhould be above all that, Sir Hargrave. And let me tell you, you need not be ashamed to be overcome, as you are overcome. really appear to me a greater, and not a less man, than you did before, by your compromifing with fuch a noble adversary.

Sir Har. That's fome comfort, Jordan. But, d-n me, Sir Charles, I will fee the lady: And you fhall introduce me to her too.

Sir Ch. That cannot be-What! Shall I introduce a man to a woman, whom I think he ought no more to fee than fhe fhould fee him? If I thought you would go, I might, if he requested it, be there, left, from what she has fuffered already, she should be too much terrified.

Sir Har. What, Sir! You would not turn Quixotte again?

Sir Ch. No need, Sir Hargrave. You would not again be the giant who should run away with the lady.

The gentlemen laughed.

Sir Har. By G-, Sir, you have carried your matters very triumphantly.

Sir Ch. I mean not to triumph, Sir Hargrave. But where either truth or justice is concerned, I hope I shall never palliate.

Mr Bag. Curfe me, if I believe there is such another man in the world!

Sir Ch. I am forry to hear you say that, Mr Bagenhall. Occafion calls not out every man equally. Sir Har. Why did I not strike him? D-n me, that must have provoked you to fight.

Sir Ch. Provoked, in that cafe, I fhould have been, Sir Hargrave. I told you, that I would not bear to be infulted. But, fo warranted to take other methods, I should not have used my fword : The case has happened to me before now: But I would be upon friendly terms with you, Sir Hargrave.

Sir Har. Curse me, if I can bear my own littlenefs!

Sir Ch. When you give this matter your cool attention, you will find reason to rejoice, that an enterprize begun in violence, and carried on fo far as you carried it, concluded not worse. Every opportunity you will have for exerting your good qualities, or for repenting of your bad, will contribute to your fatisfaction to the end of your life. You could not have been happy, had you prevailed over me. Think you, that a murderer ever was a happy man? I am the more ferious, because I would have you think of this affair. It might have been a very ferious one.

Sir Har. You know, Sir Charles, that I would have compromifed with you below. But not one point

Sir Ch. Compromise, Sir Hargrave !—As I told you, I had no quarrel with you: You propofed conditions, which I thought thould not be complied with. I aimed not to carry any point. Selfdefence, I told you, was the whole of my system.

Mr Bag. You have given fome hints, Sir Charles, that you have not been unused to affairs of this kind.

Sir Ch. I have before now met a challenger; but it was when I could not avoid it; and with the refolution of standing only on my own defence, and in the hope of making an enemy a friend. Had I

Mr Bag. What poor toads, Merceda, are we! Mr Mer. Be filent, Bagenhall; Sir Charles had not done speaking. Pray, Sir Charles—

Sir Ch. I was going to fay, that had I ever premeditatedly given way to a challenge that I could have declined, I fhould have confidered the acceptance of it as the greatest blot of my life; I am naturally choleric; yet, in this article, I hope, I have pretty much subdued myself. In the affair between Sir Hargrave and me, I have the pleasure to reflect, that paffion, which I hold to be my moft dangerous enemy, has not had, in any one moment, an ascendency over ine.

Sir Har. No, by my foul! And how should it? You came off too triumphantly. You were not hurt: You have no marks to fhew. May I be curfed, if, in forgiving you, which yet I know not how to do, I do not think myfelf the greater hero!

Sir Ch. I will not conteft that point with you, Sir Hargrave. There is no doubt but the man, who can fubdue his paffion and forgive a real injury, is a hero. Only remember, Sir, that it was

not

not owing to your virtue that I was not hurt; and that it was not my intention to hurt you.

Mr For. I am charmed with your fentiments, Sir Charles. You must allow me the honour of your acquaintance. We all acknowledge duelling to be criminal: But no one has the courage to break through a bad custom.

Sir Ch, The empty, the falfe glory, that men have to be thought brave, and the apprehenfion of being deemed cowards among men, and among women too, very few men aim to get above.

Mr For.

But you, Sir Charles, have fhewn that reputation and confcience are entirely reconcileable.

Mr Bag. You have, by heaven! And I beg of you, Sir, to allow me to claim your further acquaintance. You may fave a foul by it.-Merceda, what say you?

Mr Mer. Say! What a devil can I fay? But the doctrine would have been nothing without the example.

Sir Har. And all this at my expence !-But, Sir Charles, I must, I will have Mifs Byron.

Mr Jor. I think every thing impertinent, that hinders me from asking questions for my information and instruction, of a man fo capable of giving both, on a fubject of this importance. Allow me, Sir Charles, to afk a few questions, in order to confirm me quite your profelyte.

Sir Ch. [taking out his watch, as I faw] Time wears. Let my fervant be called in. The weather is cold. I directed him to attend before the door.

It was immediately ordered, with apologies. Sir Ch. Afk me, Mr Jordan, what questions you please.

Mr for. You have been challenged more than once, I prefume.

VOL. II.

E

Sir