Not but that this sage was
occasionally useful to his fellow-creatures, by these connections
with people of fortune; for he often undertook to solicit charity
in behalf of distressed objects, with a view of embezzling one-half
of the benefactions. It was an errand of this kind that now brought
him to the house of her grace.
After having sat a few minutes, he told the company that he would
favour them with a very proper opportunity to extend their benevolence,
for the relief of a poor gentlewoman, who was reduced to the most
abject misery, by the death of her husband, and just delivered of
a couple of fine boys: they, moreover, understood from his information,
that this object was daughter of a good family, who had renounced
her in consequence of her marrying an ensign without a fortune; and
even obstructed his promotion with all their influence and power;
a circumstance of barbarity which had made such an impression upon
his mind, as disordered his brain, and drove him to despair, in a
fit of which he had made away with himself, leaving his wife, then
big with child, to all the horrors of indigence and grief.
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