The good effects of his mother's prudent and exemplary care were not so
conspicuous as she wished and hoped, in the earlier part of her son's
life; yet there is great reason to believe they were not entirely lost.
As they were probably the occasion of many convictions which in his
younger years were overborne, so I doubt not, that when religious
impressions took that strong hold of his heart which they afterwards did,
that stock of knowledge which had been so early laid up in his mind,
was found of considerable service. And I have heard them make the
observation, as an encouragement to parents, and other pious friends, to
do their duty, and to hope for those good consequences of it which may
not immediately appear.

Could his mother, or a very religious aunt, (of whose good instructions
and exhortations I have often heard him speak with pleasure,) have
prevailed, he would not have thought of a military life, from which it
is 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, animated 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