To these summer-flies which infest royalty, and often turn greatness to corruption, were added the gay, volatile, voluptuous part of the officers, who had obtained leave of absence from their respective cantonments, and who thought the hardships of a soldier excused the excesses of a libertine. These were chiefly young men of high birth, neglected education, and unsound principles; unacquainted with the nature of the church and government for which they professed to fight, and so ignorant of religion and morality, as to be perpetually confounding them with fanaticism and hypocrisy, those constant topics of their abuse and ridicule. With them to be a republican or a sectary, was to be a knave, a cut-throat, nay, a devil; and to fight for the King conferred the privilege of violating those laws, which his supremacy was designed to guarantee. How dangerous was such society to the impetuous Eustace Evellin, whose passions unfolded with an ardour, proportioned to his quick vivacious temper. Dr. Beaumont would have preferred seeing his charge in the field of battle, to beholding him in this scene of moral peril, particularly if he could have placed him under the command of the noble Lord Hopton, who was alike skilled to subdue the enemies of his King, and to suppress his own resentment at the injuries which he suffered from those who should have been his coadjutors. But the die was cast, and there was no retreating; Eustace had accepted the Queen's invitation, and now complained, with less deference than he usually shewed for his uncle's judgment, of the superfluous caution which kept him wrapped up like a shivering marmoset, and even refused to expose him to the slight hazard of an holiday soldier. Could he not mount guard, go through the manual exercise, or gallop at a review without endangering his precious life? Isabel, who had parted with some valuable trinkets, to purchase materials for his regimentals, and was now busy in working his ruff, declared it would be hard to restrain him. Constance had embroidered a scarf, which she tied around him; and after seeing him in his hat and plume, thought he looked so like a hero, that he might be indulged in just such a circumscribed sphere of glory as Andromache would have allowed to Hector, namely, to brace on his arms, and defend the walls of the city. Even Mrs. Mellicent observed, that her nephew made a very comely soldier. Dr. Beaumont, therefore, finding that he could not withhold Eustace from the temptations which surrounded him, had only to counsel him to resist them.