ABSTRACT
Mr. Mortlock, a distant relation of Sir William, made a visit to Eaglefield Castle at this time. As his opinions had a considerable share in forming the colour of young Edward’s future character, it will be necessary to draw his portrait at some length. Mr. Mortlock was the son of an eminent merchant, who had acquired a very ample property, and who rather chose to give his son, though an only one, that kind of education which would fit him for commerce, than a classical one; the consequence of which, he was taught to believe, was a total disregard of that species of attainment which has, more emphatically / than elegantly, been styled the main chance. Young Mortlock was therefore sent to one of those academies near London, where the instruction is chiefly confined to French, writing, and accounts, though English is held out as being taught grammatically; and there is generally some miserable usher who undertakes to qualify young gentlemen for the great schools or the universities; a qualification that subjects them, if removed to either, to begin again with their accidence; and, if they go to neither, enables them to expatiate with some degree of specious confidence on the uselessness of languages, of which they hardly know the common rudiments.
