no wonder these ladies endeavoured to dissuade him, considering the mournful experience they had of the dangers attending it, and the dear relatives they had lost already by it. But it suited his taste; and the ardour of his spirit, anifhated by the persuasions of a friend, who greatly urged it,* was not to be restrained. Nor will the reader wonder that, thus excited and supported, it easily overbore their tender remonstrances, when he knows that this lively youth fought three duels before he attained to the stature of a man; in one of which, when he was but eight years old, he received from a boy much older than himself a wound in his right cheek, the scar of which was always very apparent. The false sense of honour which instigated him to it might seem, indeed, something excusable, in those unripened years, and considering the profession of his father, brother, and uncle ; but I have often heard him mention this rashness with that regret which the reflection would naturally give to so wise and good a man in the maturity of life. And I have been informed, that after his remarkable conversion he declined accepting a challenge with this calm and truly great reply, which, in a man of his experienced bravery, was exceedingly graceful: "I fear sinning, though you know I do not fear fighting." He served first as a cadet, which must have been very early; and then, at fourteen years old, he bore an ensign's commission in a Scotch regiment in the Dutch service; in which he continued till the year 1702, when, if my information be right, he received an ensign's commission from queen Anne, which he bore in the battle of Ramillies, being then in the nine * I suppose this to have been brigadier-general Rue, who had from his childhood a peculiar affection for him. teenth year of his age. In this ever-memorable action he received a wound in his mouth by a musket-ball, which has often been reported to be the occasion of his conversion. That report was a mistaken one; but as some very remarkable circumstances attended this affair, which I have had the pleasure of hearing more than once from his own mouth, I hope my reader will excuse me if I give him so uncommon a story at large. Our young officer was of a party in the forlorn hope, and was commanded on what seemed almost a desperate service, to dispossess the French of the churchyard at Ramillies, where a considerable number of them were posted to remarkable advantage. They succeeded much better than was expected; and it may well be supposed that Mr. Gardiner, who had before been in several encounters, and had the view of making his fortune to animate the natural intrepidity of his spirit, was glad of such an opportunity of signalizing himself. Accordingly, he had planted his colours on an advanced ground; and while he was calling to his men, probably in that horrid language which is so peculiar a disgrace to our soldiery, and so absurdly common in such moments of extreme danger, he received a shot into his mouth; which, without beating out any of his teeth, or touching the fore-part of his tongue, went through his neck, and came out about an inch and a half on the left side of the vertebræ. Not feeling at first the pain of the stroke, he wondered what was become of the ball, and in the wildness of his surprise began to suspect he had swallowed it; but dropping soon after, he traced the passage of it by his finger, when he could discover it no other way; which I mention, as one circumstance among many which occur to make it probable that the greater part of those who fall in battle by these instruments of death feel very little anguish from the most mortal wounds. This accident happened about five or six in the evening, on the 23rd day of May, in the year 1706; and the army pursuing its advantages against the French, without ever regarding the wounded, which was, it seems, the Duke of Marlborough's constant method, our young officer lay all night in the field, agitated, as may well be supposed, with a great variety of thoughts. He assured me, that when he reflected upon the circumstances of his wound, that a ball should, as he then conceived it, go through his head without killing him, he thought God had preserved him by a miracle; and therefore assuredly concluded that he should live, abandoned and desperate as his state then seemed to be. Yet (which to me appeared very astonishing) he had little thoughts of humbling himself before God, and returning to him after the wanderings of a life so licentiously begun. But expecting to recover, his mind was taken up with contrivances to secure his gold, of which he had a pretty deal about him; and he had recourse to a very odd expedient, which proved successful. Expecting to be stripped, he first took out a handful of that clotted gore, of which he was frequently obliged to clear his mouth, or he would have been choked; and putting it into his left hand, he took out his money, which, I think, was about nineteen pistoles, and shutting his hand, and besmearing the back part of it with blood, he kept it in this position till the blood dried in such a manner that his hand could not easily fall open, though any sudden surprise should happen, in which he might lose the presence of mind which that concealment otherwise would have required. In the morning, the French, who were masters of that spot, though their forces were defeated at some distance, came to plunder the slain, and seeing him to appearance almost expiring, one of them was just applying a sword to his breast, to destroy the little remainder of life, when, in the critical moment upon which all the extraordinary events of such a life as his afterwards proved were suspended, a cordelier, who attended the plunderers, interposed, taking him by his dress for a Frenchman, and said, "Do not kill that poor child." Our young soldier heard all that passed, though he was not able to speak one word, and, opening his eyes, made a sign for something to drink. They gave him a sup of some spirituous liquor, which happened to be at hand; by which, he said, he found a more sensible refreshment than he could remember from anything he had tasted either before or since. Then signing to the friar to lean down his ear to his mouth, he employed the first efforts of his feeble breath in telling him, what, alas! was a contrived falsehood, that he was nephew to the governor of Huy, a neutral town in the neighbourhood, and that, if he could take any method of conveying him thither, he did not doubt but his uncle would liberally reward him. He had, indeed, a friend at Huy (who, I think, was governor, and, if I mistake not, had been acquainted with the captain, his father), from whom he expected a kind reception; but the relation was only pretended. On hearing this, they laid him on a sort of hand-barrow, and sent him by a file of musqueteers towards the place; but the men lost their way, and got into a wood towards the evening, in which they were obliged to continue all night. The patient's wound being still undressed, it e wondered at that by this time it raged violently. The anguish of it engaged him earnestly to beg that they would either kill him outright, or leave him there to die, without the torture of any farther motion; and, indeed, they were obliged to rest for a considerable time, on account of their own weariness. Thus he spent the second night in the open air, without anything more than a common bandage to stanch the blood. He hath often mentioned it as a most astonishing providence, that he did not bleed to death; which, under God, he ascribed to the remarkable coldness of these two nights. Judging it quite unsafe to attempt carrying him to Huy, from whence they were now several miles distant, his convoy took him early in the morning to a convent in the neighbourhood, where he was hospitably received, and treated with great kindness and tenderness; but the cure of his wound was committed to an ignorant barber-surgeon, who lived near the house-the best shift that could then be made, at a time when it may easily be supposed persons of ability in their profession had their hands full of employment. The tent which this artist applied was almost like a peg driven into the wound; and gentlemen of skill and experience, when they came to hear of the manner in which he was treated, wondered how he could possibly survive such management. But, by the blessing of God on these applications, rough as they were, he recovered in a few months. The lady abbess, who called him her son, treated him with the affection and care of a mother; and he always declared that everything which he saw within those walls was conducted with the strictest decency and decorum. He received a great many devout admonitions from the ladies there; and they would |