 cast so favourable
an eye on my Lord of Leicester. I will not forego the chance of being favourite
of a monarch for want of determined measures, should these be necessary. -
Forward, good horse, forward - ambition, and haughty hope of power, pleasure,
and revenge, strike their stings as deep through my bosom as I plunge the rowels
in thy flanks - On, good horse, on - the devil urges us both forward.«
 

                             Chapter Twenty-Second

 Say that my beauty was but small,
 Among court ladies all despised,
 Why didst thou rend it from that hall,
 Where, scornful Earl, 'twas dearly prized?

 No more thou com'st with wonted speed,
 Thy once beloved bride to see;
 But be she alive, or be she dead,
 I fear, stern Earl, 's the same to thee.
                                          Cumnor Hall, by William Julius Mickle.
 
The ladies of fashion of the present, or of any other period, must have allowed,
that the young and lovely Countess of Leicester had, besides her youth and
beauty, two qualities which entitled her to a place amongst women of rank and
distinction. She displayed, as we have seen in her interview with the pedlar, a
liberal promptitude to make unnecessary purchases, solely for the pleasure of
acquiring useless and showy trifles which ceased to please as soon as they were
possessed; and she was, besides, apt to spend a considerable space of time every
day in adorning her person, although the varied splendour of her attire could
only attract the half satirical praise of the precise Janet, or an approving
glance from the bright eyes which witnessed their own beams of triumph reflected
from the mirror.
    The Countess Amy had indeed to plead, for indulgence in those frivolous
tastes, that the education of the times had done little or nothing for a mind
naturally gay and averse to study. If she had not loved to collect finery and to
wear it, she might have woven tapestry or sewed embroidery, till her labours
spread in gay profusion all over the walls and seats at Lidcote Hall; or she
might have varied Minerva's labours with the task of preparing a mighty pudding
against the time that Sir Hugh Robsart returned from the greenwood. But Amy had
no natural genius either for the loom, the needle, or the receipt-book. Her
mother had died in infancy; her father contradicted her in nothing; and
Tressilian, the only one that approached her, who was able or desirous to attend
to the cultivation of her mind, had much hurt his interest with her, by assuming
too eagerly the task
