Modern literature: a novel, Volume 3 (of 3)

Printed by A. Strahan, Printers-Street.
MODERN LITERATURE:
A NOVEL ,
IN THREE VOLUMES.
VOL. III.
By ROBERT BISSET, L.L.D.
Non ignota loquor.
LONDON: PRINTED FOR T. N. LONGMAN AND O. REES, PATERNOSTER-ROW. 1804.
Hamilton, possessed of his lovely and beloved Maria, was stimulated to more constant and vigorous intellectual exertions than at any former period of his life. He consulted with his friends, and balanced with himself, whether he should persevere in the study of the law, or entirely devote himself to literature. To the latter his inclinations prompted; but the former appeared the more conducive to his interest. The ability and industry which would enable an Erskine to acquire twelve thousand in one year, could scarcely earn so much to a Robertson or a Gibbon in the course of a literary life. He had been the means of preventing Maria from affiancing herself to opulence; ought not he to attempt to supply the defect? His friends thinking that no attainments were beyond his reach, if directed to the study of the law, very strongly urged him to be called to the bar. He at length determined to persevere in his legal studies, but at the same time to carry on his other pursuits. He made very great progress in the work which he had undertaken, and by the approach of winter an octavo volume was ready for publication.
Maria, considering the world as centered in her husband, desired no amusements or pleasures that could interfere with his engagements, duties, and ardent wish to fulfil them speedily and effectually; and except two or three plays, a party to Vauxhall, jaunts for a day to some of the adjacent villages, she was entirely domesticated. About the middle of August, however, William finding that his labours were so far advanced as to afford him respite for a few weeks, proposed to carry his wife and Charlotte an excursion, by a route of which the greater part would be new to him, and all beyond the first stage to his fair fellow travellers. The ladies had never seen Windsor; this, therefore, was the first object of their destination. On a Sunday morning early they took the road to Hounslow; changing horses at Cranford Bridge, they hurried over the bleak and dreary heath; and turning Colnbroke, were gladdened with the prospect of the grand and commanding battlements of Windsor Castle, amidst scenery striking and magnificent, at once uniform and diversified; VARIED in the distribution and assortment of the beautiful, the romantic, the sublime, ONE in the interest and impressiveness of the whole. The first care of their conductor was to give them a complete and comprehensive view of the situation and prospects of the royal residence. He therefore led them to the super-eminent elevation of the round tower; where such an extent of space opens on every side to the astonished spectator, and exhibits such a multiplicity of objects, as fill him with amazement, which subsiding sufficiently to permit distinct attention to the several compartments, is changed into delight. After viewing in succession the verdant and wooded ridge of St. Leonard’s Hill; the more gentle eminences, that diversified with dales, line the approaches from the great park; the romantic environs of Runymede, the sacred theatre of vindicated rights; the pastoral scenery of Frogmore; the rich fertility of the northern view long level, by its mantling corns that had now assumed their ripened yellow hue, diversifying the verdure of the southern prospect; fringed with distant woods, and bounded by acclivities, which, without lessening the interest of the nearer scenery, served to limit contemplation to definite objects. Immediately under the eye occupied in that direction, the nurse of British learning raised her venerable head; the Thames, meandring through those woods and dales and lawns, and washing the glittering towers and hills with its gilded streams, beautiful itself, and enhanced every other beauty, and, like the poet’s magic pen, whatever it touched adorned.