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art of sinking, and it is clear I had stumbled upon it in my description of the dock yard,

viz.

"Here they weave cables, there they main masts form, "Here they forge anchors-useful in a storm.”

My good father however was not to be put by from his defences by trifles, and stoutly stood by my anchors, contending that as they were unquestionably useful in a storm, I had said no more of them than was true, and why should I be ashamed of having spoken the truth? Yet ashamed I was some short time after, not indeed for having violated the truth, but for suppressing it, and my dilemma was occasioned by the following circumstance. I had picked up an epigram amongst my school fellows, which struck my fancy, and without naming the author, (for I knew him not,) I repeated it to my father-it was this

Poets of old did Argus prize.
Because he had an hundred eyes,
But sure more praise to him is due,

Who looks an hundred ways with two.

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In repeating this epigram, which perhaps the reader can find an author for, I did not

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give it out as my own, but it was so understood by my father, and he circulated it as mine, and took pleasure in repeating it as such amongst his friends and intimates. In this state of the mistake, when his credit had been affixed to it, I had not courage to disavow it, and the time being once gone by for saving my honor, I suffered him to persist in his er ror under the continual terror of detection. The dread of thus forfeiting his good opinion hung upon my spirits for a length of time; it passed however undiscovered to the end of his life, and I now implore pardon of his memory for the only fallacy I ever put upon him to the conviction of my conscience,

After the death of Doctor Bentley my family resided in the parsonage house of Stanwick near Higham Ferrers in Northamptonshire; it had been newly built from the ground by my father's predecessor Doctor Needham, from a plan of Mr. Burroughs of Caius College, an architect of no small reputation: it was a handsome square of four equal fronts, built of stone, containing four rooms on a floor with a gallery running through the centre; it was seated on the declivity of a gentle hill with the vil

lage to the south amongst trees and pasture grounds in view, and a small stream in the valley between: on the north, west and south were gardens, on the east the church at some little distance, and in the intermediate space an excellent range of stables and coach houses, built by my father and forming one side of a square court laid out for the approach of carriages to the house. The spire of Stanwick church is esteemed one of the most beautiful models in that style of architecture in the kingdom; my father added a very handsome clock and ornamented the chancel with a railing, screen and entablature upon three-quarter columns with a singing gallery at the west end, and spared no expence to keep his church not only in that neatness and decorum, which befits the house of prayer, but also in a perfect state of good and permanent repair.

Here in the hearts of his parishioners, and the esteem of his neighbours, my good father lived tranquil and unambitious, never soliciting other preferment than this for the space of thirty years, holding only a small prebend in the church of Lincoln, given to him by his uncle Bishop Reynolds. He was in the com

mission of the peace, and a very active magistrate in the reconcilement of parties rather than in the commitment of persons: in those quiet parts offences were in general trivial, and the differences merely such as an attorney could contrive to hook a suit upon, so that with a very little legal knowledge, and a very hospitable generous disposition, my father rarely failed to put contentious spirits to peace by reference to the kitchen and the cellar. In the mean time his popularity rose in proportion as his beer-barrels sunk, and as often as he made peace he made friends, till I may say without exaggeration he had all men's good word in his favour and their services at his command. In the mean time such was the orderly behaviour and good discipline of his own immediate flock, that I have frequently heard him say he never once had occasion during his long residence amongst them to issue his warrant within the precincts of his own happy village, which being seated between the more populous and less correct parishes of Raunds and Higham-Ferrers, he used appositely to call Little Zoar, but made no further allusions to the evil neighbourhood of Zoar.

In this peaceful spot with parents so affectionate I was the happiest of beings in my breakings-up from school. Those delightful scenes are fresh in my remembrance, and when I have occasionally revisited them, since the decease of objects ever so dear to me, the sensations they have excited are not for me to describe. I had inherited an excellent constitution, and, though not robust in make, was more than commonly adroit in my athletic exercises. In swiftness of foot for a short distance no boy in Bury School could match me, and, when at Cambridge, I gave a general challenge to the Collegians, which was decided in Trinity Walks in my favour.

Those field sports, of which the young and active are naturally so fond, I enjoyed by my father's favour in perfection, and in my winter holidays constantly went out with him upon his hunting days, and was always admirably mounted. He was light and elegant in his person, and had in his early youth kept horses and rode matches at Newmarket after the example of his elder brother; but though his profession had now put a stop to those levities, he shared in a pack of harriers with a neighbouring gen

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