ABSTRACT
The fortunate events that followed each other so quickly in the Ellesmere family, had hardly ceased to occupy the good sort of middle-aged women and amiable young ladies in the neighbourhood of Eddisbury-hall; the very visits were but just over; and the remarks not yet finished of – ‘Dear, how lucky some people are! well, there are people who are born to be fortunate, and it is better to be fortunate than rich,’ when a very heavy calamity clouded the satisfaction of Sir Maynard and his eldest son: this was the death of his only grandson, who had never been a strong child, and whose feeble health had been injured by the extreme care that had been given to its preservation. Mr. Ellesmere had five daughters; but this boy was the hope of his family – he was, therefore, extremely afflicted by his death, and whether the fatigues of his place (for he had now a place of fifteen hundred a year), or the deep thought on political matters, to which he gave himself up; whether it was that his frame was calculated only to last a certain number of years, or that its decay was accelerated by sorrow, certain it is, that he was immediately attacked by a lurking fever, which undermined his constitution; and the wasting atrophy seized him so quickly, that in five weeks he followed his son to the grave.
