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hands on the back of the chimney, and with these his face for a disguise, and some person had disorderly cut off his locks of hair: his majesty having put off his blue riband, buff coat, and other princely ornaments, and distributed the gold he had in his pocket among his servants, put on a noggen coarse shirt, which was borrowed of Edw. Marten, who served in the house, and Rich. Penderel's green suit and leather doublet, but had not time to be so exactly disguised as he was afterwards.

"Rich. Penderel conducted the king out at a back dore, and carried him into an adjacent wood belonging to Boscobel, call'd Spring Coppice. By the time Rich. Penderil had convey'd him into the obscurest part of it, it was about sunrising on Thursday morning; and the heavens wept bitterly at these calamities; insomuch as the thickest tree in the wood was not able to keep his majesty dry, nor was there any thing for him to Wherefore Rich. went to Francis Yates house (a trusty neighbour, who married his wife's sister), where he borrowed a blancket, which he folded and laid under a tree for his majesty to sit on.

sit on.

"At the same time Rich. spoke to the goodwife Yates, to provide some victuals, and bring it into the wood at a place he appointed her. She

presently made ready a mess of milk and some butter and eggs, and brought them to his majesty in the wood; who, being a little surpriz❜d to see the woman (no good concealer of a secret) said chearfully to her: 'Good woman, can you be faithful to a distressed cavalier?' She answered, Yes, Sir; I will die rather than discover you:' with which answer his majesty was well satisfied.

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"On Thursday night his majesty resolved to go from those parts into Wales, and to take Richard Penderel with him for his guide; but before they began their journy, his majesty went into Richard's house at Hobbal Grange. Here his majesty had time and means better to complete his disguise; his name was agreed to be Will. Jones, and his arms a wood-bill ...

"At Evelin mill, Richard, thinking the miller had pursued them, quitted the usual way in some haste, and led his majesty over a little brook, which they were forced to wade through. Here his majesty (as he afterwards pleasantly observed) was in some danger of losing his guide, but that the rusling of Richard's calves-skin breeches was the best direction his majesty had to follow him in that dark night."

All the passes of the Severn being guarded Penderel resolved to proceed to Boscobel House, where his brother William lived. Here the wife

of the latter "made his majesty a posset of thin milk and small beer, and got ready some water to wash his feet, not onely extreme dirty, but much galled with travail. Colonel Carlis [who had also escaped from Worcester and rejoined the king at Boscobel] pull'd off his majestie's shoos, which were full of gravel, and stockens which were very wet, and there being no other shoos in the house that would fit his majesty, the good-wife put some hot embers in those to dry them, whilst his majesties feet were washing and his stockens shifted."

I now take up another historian. I once had a friend in common with M. de Fontanes; I know not whether, in the silence of his tomb, he would be beholden to me for revealing the pure and generous career which he concealed from the public gaze. His only productions were a few articles, without his signature, which appeared in various newspapers; amongst these was an essay on Boscobel. Be it permitted to friendship to quote some short fragments from this essay: they will raise the regret of all men of feeling at the loss of real merit; they are the only vestige of the steps imprinted by solitary and unknown talent on the shore of life during the progress of its career.

"Carless," says Mr. Joubert, "was one of the most distinguished leaders of the king's army; he

had fought to the last extremity at the battle of Worcester. Finding that all was lost, he had boldly placed himself, with the Earl of Clive and James Hamilton, at one of the gates of the conquered city, to arrest the victors, and check the pursuit of the vanquished. He maintained his post, which was of his own selection, until he hoped that his master had found time to escape, and was beyond the reach of danger: then, alone, he effected his retreat, and was proceeding to seek an asylum at his own habitation, not knowing the fate of Charles, or whether he should ever behold him again, when chance presented him to his view.

"Their delight at the unexpected meeting may readily be imagined. Then it was that they dwelt in that celebrated oak, which was ever after held in such admiration, and which, when pointed out to the traveller, was called The King's Palace. This oak was of such dimensions, and so loaded with branches, that it would have held twenty men on its top. Exhausted with fatigue, Charles needed repose; he dared not indulge in it on the tree, or quit it without danger of being discovered : suspended as it were over an abyss, and concealed among the branches, the slightest slumber might have hurled him to the ground. Carless was strong; he undertook to keep watch. The King

placed himself in his arms, leant on his breast, and, supported by his valiant hands, fell asleep in the air.

"How affecting was the sight! A prince in the bloom and vigour of youth, reduced by somnolency to the weakness of childhood, giving way in drowsiness, with all the facility of that age, quietly sleeping, amidst so many dangers, in the arms of an austere man, of a vigilant warrior, watching over his king of one-and-twenty with all the anxiety of a mother! Thus places, trees, and forests, have their destiny as well as men.

"Charles soon quitted Boscobel. One day, in the parlour of an inn, as he took off his hat to the lady of the house who happened to pass by, the butler attentively fixed and recognised him. This man drew him aside, begged him to go down to the cellar with him, and there, filling a cup with wine, drank success to the king. I know who you are,' he then said, bending his knee to the ground, and shall be true to you unto death.""

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The friend I have lost has thus recalled to my mind those forgotten scenes: he is gone to join those men of former days.

Does not the reader picture to himself in this narrative an episode of our wars in the western provinces during the revolution? Fidelity seems to be one of the virtues peculiar to the old Chris

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