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her favourite authors, to which she obliged her son to attend; and as I had rather the advantage in mental acquirements, she was pleased to say that I contributed to his improvement. In a word, I may truly assert that the happiest moments of my life were spent in this amiable family.
At the period of which I am now writing, the parents of my young friend had determined on settling him at the University of Oxford, in order to complete his education: and the regret they felt at parting with their beloved child, was scarcely more poignant than that of the latter, at his approaching separation from me, so ardent was our juvenile friendship. In this state of affairs, his father knowing my situation, and the circumstances of my grandfather, who by his liberality towards me, had much impaired his private fortune, which consisted at his retirement, of but a few thousand pounds stock in the 3 per cent consols, a considerable part of which he had sold out at a very disadvantageous rate, by reason of the great depression in stocks at the commencement of the French war: knowing all this, and that my settlement in life was at this moment the subject of much perplexity, Mr. Moultrie, with a most unparalleled generosity, offered to place me at college on the same terms with his son, and at the end of three years, if he then withdrew the latter, to take upon himself the charge of my future fortune. Here was an offer from a gentleman of 2,000l. a
