 proceeded to work; after which our hero went to bed, where a comfortable potation, advised by a physician, and prepared by an apothecary, who, seeing their brother professor enter the Fleming's house, from the corner of a street, where they were in deep consultation, about the different construction of syringes, dropt their controversy to follow him.
These precautions operating with some calm, undisturbed advice, which our hero had by this time whispered to himself, brought him into such a state of tranquillity, that he pursued his journey the next morning, and, in due time, arrived at the ancient city of Ghent. Here he immediately looked for a lodging, and, at length, fixed himself to his satisfaction, in the upper apartments of an upholsterer, where the first floor was occupied by a French widow lady, who had been settled there about a year and a half. She was in but an indifferent state of health, and paid an extraordinary price for her

apartment, that she might not be disturbed with the noise of a family over her head. This was however no objection to her landlord's reception of Charles, who, she was told, was a perfect stranger, and had no attendants. Nor perhaps was it a bar to his accommodation; for ladies, sick or well, never start at a handsome young fellow: that is to say, as they do at toads and beetles. The lady also first sighed, and then smiled, when her landlord added that the young gentleman seemed to be very unhappy, but that he was certainly a man of some consequence, and a most elegant and comely figure.


CHARLES, as had been his intention, proclaimed himself to his landlord as a painter, and expressed a wish to copy a few pictures, if there could be any way of getting at them. The landlord told him that the very lady who lodged in the first floor had two very capital ones, and, he had no doubt, would lend them with great pleasure.
The request was made to her, and she returned for answer that the gentleman might see the pictures, and, if then they were found to answer his purpose, he was very welcome to copy them.
To say truth, both the gentleman and the lady, though neither knew why, were charmed at this incident of the pictures; for the lady had heard of nothing but the gentleman's parises, and particularly

of the beauty of his person, ever since he had come into the house, and he had an irresistible curiosity to see a person as much
