CHAP. IV.

THE STORY OF MISS WILMOT: FAMILY MISFORTUNES: A FATHER'S DEATH: A BROTHER'S DISAPPOINTMENT: INTELLIGENCE THAT ASTONISHES ME: WAKEFIELD CHARACTERIZED: THE DEATH OF MISS WILMOT'S MOTHER; AND THE DREAD OF FATAL CONSEQUENCES: PIETY AND COMPASSION OF A BISHOP: DEEP DESIGNS OF WAKEFIELD: THE GOOD FAITH AND AFFECTION OF A POOR ADHERENT.

MY father was an officer in the army, in which, though he served all his life, he only attained the rank of major. He was twice married, the second time to my mother at the age of thirty, by whom he had five children, who, except my brother and myself, did not arrive at maturity. Being reduced to the income of half-pay, they retired into their native county, where they lived with such strict œconomy that they contrived to educate

us better perhaps than the children of people of much larger fortune.

My brother was the eldest child, and I the youngest, so that there was an interval of fifteen years between us. My father had been well educated, loved letters, and undertook to be my brother's instructor himself to the age of fourteen. At this period my brother was admitted a chorister at the cathedral of at which city my parents had fixed their residence. They were respected by all the inhabitants, whose wealth, birth, and pride, did not place them at too great a distance; and it was a severe mortification to be unable to provide better for their son; but there was no remedy.

The disappointments of my father's life had given him a melancholy cast, with an aptitude to be dissatisfied; and this propensity was strongly communicated to my brother. The danger of a war between England and Spain called

my father up to town, in the hope of being once more put on actual service. But in this his hopes again were frustrated; and expence without benefit was incurred. Early, however, in the American war, he obtained his wishes; unhappily obtained them, for, having been long unused to the baneful severity of camps, he and many more brave men were carried off, by the damps of the climate to which he was sent. This happened when I was but nine years old; and my mother was left with what little their œconomy had collected, and such scanty provision as is made for officers widows.

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My brother, however, who was truly affectionate, and active in efforts to protect us, afforded my mother some aid. From being a chorister, he had gained admission into the grammar-school; of which, while he remained there, he was the pride and boast. Immediately after our father's death, from the recommendation

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dation of his own merit and the misfortunes of the family, he was appointed a Latin usher in the same school; in which station he remained five years. The difference of our age made him consider himself something rather like a father than a brother to me: he loved me tenderly, took every method to improve and provide for me, and expected in return something like parental obedience. The manners of my mother were of the mild and pleasing kind, with which qualities she endeavoured to familiarize me, and the behaviour of the whole fafamily gained general approbation and

esteem.

My brother was deeply smitten with the love of letters: his poetical essays were numerous, many of them were sent up to London and readily admitted into periodical publications.

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Anxious to place his family in that rank which he had been taught to suppose it deserved, for my father and mo

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ther were both, though not noble, well born, he did not rest satisfied with these

attempts he wrote a tragedy, and, by the advice of people who pretended to have a knowledge of such affairs, deter mined to go to London, that he might, if possible, get it on the stage. From this my mother would fain have dissuaded him, but his arguments and importunity at length prevailed. He was then but nine and twenty, and I fourteen.

'I could ill describe to you the state of anxiety and suspence in which his various literary efforts involved him, while he remained in London: but in about two years he returned to the country, despairing of that pleasure, profit, and fame, which hope had delusively taught him to consider as his due. This was the period at which he once more became an usher of the school where you were educated. This too was the period at which my misfortunes began.