ABSTRACT
An officer, to whom we shall give the name of Clifford, derived from his ancestors a very honourable descent, being able to trace their possession of an estate in the northern part of England thro’ several centuries. That estate, however, was dissipated by the imprudence and extravagance of his parents; and Captain Clifford, who had received a very liberal education, and was brought up with the expectation of an ample inheritance, found his only remaining possession was his commission in the army. He married a beautiful young woman, the daughter of a neighbouring family, to whom he had been long attached, and who died a few years after their marriage, leaving him one daughter. To this child he transferred the tenderness he had felt for her mother, and undertook himself the charge of her education. Dispirited by his domestic misfortune, wounded by the disappointment of his early views in life, and the mortification of seeing many raised above him in the army, because he was unable to purchase promotion, he retired in disgust, and lived upon a captain’s half-pay, 2 in a small village in the neighbourhood of London, where his father, who was far advanced in years, made a part of his family.
