"
"Meantime my Lady makes the money fly, by the help of the gallant
Colonel Mar," said Harriet lightly.
"Fie! Harriet!" returned the elder sister; "I have allowed you too far.
My father calls Lady Belamour his commanding officer, and permits no
scandal to be spoken of her."
"Any more than of Prince Eugene?" said Harriet, laughing.
"But oh! sister!" cried Aurelia, "let us stay a little longer. I have
not half braided my hair, and I long to hear who is the gentleman of
whom my father spoke as living in the dark."
"Mr. Amyas Belamour! Sir Jovian's brother! Ah! that is a sad story,"
replied Betty, "though I am not certain that I have it correctly,
having only heard it discussed between my father and mother when I was
a growing girl, sitting at my sampler. I think he was a barrister; I
know he was a very fine gentleman and a man of parts, who had made the
Grand Tour; for when he was staying at the Great House, he said my
mother was the only person he met who could converse with him on the
Old Masters, or any other subject of _virtu_, and that, being reported
to my Lady, increased her bitterness all the more because Mr. Belamour
was a friend of Mr. Addison and Sir Richard Steele, and had contributed
some papers to the _Spectator_. He was making a good fortune in his
profession, and had formed an engagement with a young lady in
Hertfordshire, of a good old family, but one which had always been
disliked by Lady Belamour.
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