It is deeds alone, and rendering myself worthy of your indulgence, that must preserve your good opinion, and keep you from repenting having overwhelmed me with this profusion of happiness!—­Yet how joyfully could I now pursue the rout to Paris, and content myself with owing every thing merely to your goodness, were I not with-held by all the considerations that ought to have weight with a man of honour!—­My royal general is inflexible to the persuasions of almost all the courts in Christendom, and hurried by his thirst of fame, or some other more latent motive, has given orders to prepare for a march, where, or against whom, is yet a secret to the army; but by the preparations for it, we believe they are not short journeys we are to take.—­Should I now quit a service where I have been promoted so much beyond my merit, what, my lord, but cowardice or ingratitude could be imputed to me as the motive!  —­Not all my reasons, powerful as they are, would have any weight with a prince, who is deaf to every thing but the calls of glory; and I must return loaden with his displeasure, and the reproaches of all I leave behind!—­Now to return is certain infamy!—­To go, is in pursuit of honour!—­Your lordship will not therefore be surprized I make choice of the latter, since no hazard can be equal to that of forfeiting the little reputation I have acquired, and which alone can render me worthy any part of the favours I have received.

I am,

With the extremest respect and submission,

Your lordship’s

Eternally devoted servant,_

HORATIO.”

The last and most difficult task he had to go thro’, was the refusal he must give to Dorilaus, who had laid his commands on him in such express terms; and it was not without a good deal of blotting, altering, and realtering, he at length formed an epistle to him in these terms: 

To my more than father, my only patron, protector and benefactor, the most worthy DORILAUS.

Most dear and ever honoured Sir,

“To hear you are living, and still remember me with kindness, affords too great a transport to suffer me to throw away any thought either on the motives of your long silence, or that happiness, which you tell me, I may expect has been the produce of it:—­it is sufficient for me to know I am still blessed in the favor of the most excellent person that ever lived, and am not in the least anxious for an explanation of any farther good.

To tell you with how much ardency I long to throw myself at your feet, to relate to you all the various accidents that have befallen me since first you condescended to put me in the paths of glory, and to pour out my soul before you with thanksgiving, would be as impossible as it is for me at present to enjoy that blessing!—­The king’s affairs, it is true, would suffer nothing by my absence; but, sir, what would the world say of me, if, after a whole year of inactivity and idleness,