The Fortunate Foundlings | Page 5

soon give proofs the extreme desire I have to serve my country that way would well attone for my want of years.
The more he spoke, the more the astonishment of his patron increased: he admired the greatness of his spirit, but was troubled it led him to a desire of running into so dangerous a way of life.--He represented to him all the hardships of a soldier, the little regard that was sometimes paid to merit, and gave him several instances of gentlemen who had passed their youth in the service, and behaved with extreme bravery, yet had no other reward than their fears, and a consciousness of having done more than was their duty: in war, said he, the superior officers carry away all the glory as well as profits of the victory; whereas in civil employments it is quite otherwise: in physic, in law, in divinity, or in the state, your merits will be immediately conspicuous to those who have the power to reward you; and if you are desirous of acquiring a name, by which I suppose you mean to become the head of a family, any of these afford you a much greater prospect of success, and it lies much more in my power of assisting your promotion.
To these he added many other arguments, but they were not of the least weight with the impatient Horatio. He was obstinate in his entreaties, which he even with tears enforced, and Dorilaus, considering so strong a propensity as something supernatural, at last consented.--Never was joy more sincere and fervent than what this grant occasioned, and he told his benefactor that he doubted not but that hereafter he should hear such an account of his behaviour, as would make him not repent his having complied with his request.
The preparations for his going to Oxford were now converted into others of a different nature.--Several of our troops were already sent to Flanders, and others about to embark, in order to open the campaign; so that there was but a small space between the time of Horatio's asking leave to go, and that of his departure, which Dorilaus resolved should be in a manner befitting a youth whom he had bred up as his own. He provided him a handsome field-equipage, rich cloaths, horses, and a servant to attend him; and while these things were getting ready, had masters to perfect him in riding; and those other exercises proper for the vocation he was now entering into, all which he performed with so good a grace, that not only Dorilaus himself, who might be suspected to look on him with partial eyes, but all who saw him were perfectly charmed.
He was more than ordinarily tall for his years, admirably well proportioned, and had something of a grave fierceness in his air and deportment, that tho' he was not yet sixteen, he might very well have passed for twenty: he was also extremely fair, had regular features, and eyes the most penetrating, mixed with a certain sweetness; so that it was difficult to say whether he seemed most formed for love or war.
Dorilaus thinking it highly proper he should take his leave of Louisa, sent for her from the boarding-school, that she might pass the short time he had to stay with her brother at his house, not without some hopes that the great tenderness there was between them might put Horatio out of his resolution of going to the army, who being grown now extremely dear to him, he could not think of parting with, tho' he had yielded to it, without a great deal of reluctance.
It is certain, indeed, that when she first heard the motive which had occasioned her being sent for, her gentle breast was filled with the most terrible alarms for her dear brother's danger; but the little regard he seemed to have of it, and the high ideas he had of future greatness, soon brought her to think as he did; and instead of dissuading him from prosecuting his design, she rather encouraged him in it: and in this gave the first testimony of a greatness of soul, no less to be admired than the courage and laudable ambition which actuated that of her brother.
Dorilaus beheld with an infinity of satisfaction the success of his endeavours, in favour of these amiable twins, and said within himself, how great a pity would it have been, if capacities such as theirs had been denied the means of improvement!
After the departure of Horatio, he kept Louisa some time with him, under pretence of showing her the town, which before she had never seen; but in reality to alleviate that melancholy which parting from her brother had caused in him. He could not have taken a more effectual way; for