HE WAS
A —— FOOL,
BUT
HE DID HIS BEST.
DOROTHY OSBORNE.
Iachimo. Here are letters for you.
Posthumus. Their tenor good, I trust.
Iachimo. ’Tis very like.
Cymbeline ii. 4.
They had set (it is years ago now) the Period of the Restoration as subject for the Historical Essay Prize at Oxbridge. I had been advised to read Courtenay’s Life of Sir William Temple. It would give me an insight into the times, and a thorough knowledge of the Triple Alliance.
It was in my uncle’s library that I found the book—two octavo volumes of memoirs bound in plain green cloth, with mouldy yellow backs. I remember it well, and the circumstances surrounding it.
I threw open the windows, piled all the red cushions into one window seat, placed a chair for my feet, and took up the volumes. I cast my eyes over the contents of Vol. I.: a portrait of Temple—a handsome fellow—engraved by one Dean, after Sir Peter; a genealogical table. Ugh! And twenty chapters of negotiations to follow. My uncle was right, it was undoubtedly a dull book.