Meanwhile we continued to reside at Barryville, and, considering the
smallness of our income, kept up a wonderful state. Of the half-
dozen families that formed the congregation at Brady's Town, there
was not a single person whose appearance was so respectable as that
of the widow, who, though she always dressed in mourning, in memory
of her deceased husband, took care that her garments should be made
so as to set off her handsome person to the greatest advantage; and,
indeed, I think, spent six hours out of every day in the week in
cutting, trimming, and altering them to the fashion. She had the
largest of hoops and the handsomest of furbelows, and once a month
(under my Lord Bagwig's cover) would come a letter from London
containing the newest accounts of the fashions there. Her complexion
was so brilliant that she had no call to use rouge, as was the mode
in those days. No, she left red and white, she said (and hence the
reader may imagine how the two ladies hated each other) to Madam
Brady, whose yellow complexion no plaster could alter. In a word,
she was so accomplished a beauty, that all the women in the country
took pattern by her, and the young fellows from ten miles round
would ride over to Castle Brady church to have the sight of her.

But if (like every other woman that ever I saw or read of) she was
proud of her beauty, to do her justice she was still more proud of
her son, and has said a thousand times to me that I was the
handsomest young fellow in the world. This is a matter of taste. A
man of sixty may, however, say what he was at fourteen without much
vanity, and I must say I think there was some cause for my mother's
opinion. The good soul's pleasure was to dress me; and on Sundays
and holidays I turned out in a velvet coat with a silver-hilted
sword by my side and a gold garter at my knee, as fine as any lord