An Heir Apparent.

country, and bereft her of many of her bravest defenders.

A noble author has said, that "Edward's good qualities were courage and beauty; his bad qualities, every vice." This expression is too strong; for though vice certainly predominated in his character, he yet gave evident and frequent proofs of the goodness of his heart: But, misled by evil counsellors during his minority, he plunged into every species of dissipation; amongst which, inebriety, that disgusting vice, unhappily took the lead, and promised, long before his coming to the crown, to undermine that beauty, for which he was so particularly famed. By his precepts and example, he set at nought the principles of purity, and laughed at conjugal fidelity. His superb and elegant mansions were the scenes of riot and excess; and it is a maxim ever held by the

An Heir Apparent.

wise, in all ages, that, when the morals of the prince are corrupt, the nobles and plebeians generally follow the same fatal propensities, and thus the nation gradually sinks into effeminacy and consequent decay. In vain are exhortations from the pulpit; in vain may arts and learning improve; the pillars of the state are undermined, and ruin threatens to ensue. Thus, while the nation was revelling in excess, the heirs of Lancaster prevailed, and harrassed the people with all the sufferings of a cruel and disastrous contest. A noble ardour seemed kindling, amidst all his depravity, in the breast of Edward, worthy of the hero and the prince; cool and determined, he wished to appear at the head of his whole army, and confront the enemy. This noble emulation was, however, checked in its spring, by his brother the Duke of Gloucester; who,

An Heir Apparent.

fearful of losing that military fame he had already acquired, and which gave him the command of the army, or from what other motive is unknown, kept back the talents of the young prince ('till he determined to throw off the yoke of submission), and gave him only the command of a chosen set of warriors, youthful and prone to pleasure as himself. The discipline of these few troops left Edward sufficient time to pursue those gratifications, on which he set the highest value, and which he followed with ardent avidity; and, rioting in the midst of dissipation, his pernicious parasites smoothed instead of stopping the career of vice. roving from one frail fair to another, had, as yet, felt no fixed attachment. In the just expanded blossom of youth, "the expectancy and rose of the fair state," the heir of England's throne was immer

Edward,

1

An Heir Apparent.

sed in that sensuality, which threatened
the oblivion of every princely and manly
acquisition that he once appeared in
possession of, and which prognosticated
the most auspicious omens to the partizans
of the house of York, who looked forward
with prophetic pleasure to his future
exaltation.
But while his fine person,

his high accomplishments, and the splen-
did situation he filled, gained him every
outward homage from his subjects, and
all combined to captivate yielding beauty;
the professed libertines of either sex used
every endeavour and alluring art, to de-
grade the prince to a level with the
meanest of his subjects, and to vitiate
his morals as a man.

A tender Attachment.

CHAP. II.

A TENDER ATTACHMENT.

She seem'd

Fairer than fam'd of old, or fabled damsels
Met in forest wide by errant knights.

MILTON.

THE fascinating charms of Maria de Rosenvault seemed destined, by the powerful hand of fate, to snatch the prince, for a short period, from the slothful rust of apathetic gallantry; a failing, dictated by fashion, matured by vice, and which can afford only satiety, and give a precarious satisfaction in which the heart has no share; never leaving those soul-satisfying remembrances, which