t 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