But as I said, this did not suffice, nor cou’d the fires that some more willing Beauties allay’d, hinder me from wishing and burning and persuing those two fair persons with an Ardor that had no appearance of decay from any others goodness to me, but in my daily visits to ’.m I eternally solicited them to suffer me to accompany them to that charming place call’d _Favors_, which is a very Beautiful Castle rais’d in a Vally. I confest to you that my _Coquet Cupid_ advis’d me not to go, for fear of attaching myself too much to a place so extreamly agreeable; the Mountains, that environ this Castle, are very high and full of hollow Rocks, which made the scituation very sullen. The Castle itself was delicately built, and surrounded with tall Trees, so thick that one cou’d hardly see the Edifice, nor cou’d the Sun-beams dart throw the gloomy shade; and eternal Night seem’d to sit there in awful state and pleasure: For the more obscure this place is and secret from all Eyes, the better and more acceptable it is to all that enter there, and thô this Vally have many inhabitants, it appears to have none at all; because they love solitude, and, banishing all Publick society, content themselves only to be but two in company together; if there be more they are receiv’d with a very ill welcome, for a third Person in this place wou’d destroy the Pleasure and the harmony. The Inhabitants of this Castle never shew themselves but to those that are very importune, and then not every day, the Ladies that command there are many Sisters all of the name of the Castle; and all very fair, and still one more fair than the other, and when you visit ‘em you see ‘em not all at once but by degrees and the last you behold is the fairest, and by the pleasure you have in seeing one, you desire to see ‘em all. For there are no limits to be given to desire, and as they are never seen by any body altogether, it happens very often that you see but one, and you must have address and great assiduity, abstinence, and good fortune to obtain one of these _Favors_; but the last will cost you much more trouble than all the rest put together, so very fair, so very nice and coy she is: But when once obtain’d she brings you to the Palace of intire Pleasure; which is neighbouring to the Castle of _Favors_; but I, who wou’d very fain, at once, have brought to this delicate place both _Bellinda_ and _Bellimante_, found myself extream uneasy, because, as I said, only two can be well entertain’d at a time! I found it against my humour and against the advice of _Love_ to abandon all, and retire with one only, for in decency and good manners, those, who go to this Castle of _Favors_, are oblig’d to continue there for some time; and I found, I shou’d be extreamly chagrin after a little with one alone; but both were obstinate and wou’d not suffer a third: and having been so very importune with both, I was asham’d to repent and recant all those things I had said, to