months, however, fled without this plan being executed. We had often during that time to change our quarters; passed through more than one adventure; were involved in more than one severe struggle, and encountered as many hardships as a longer campaign could have inflicted. My father found that I bore up stoutly against them all, that I was not so great an encumbrance, in moments of danger and haste, as he had expected; and that in those lapses of inaction which will break in upon a soldier's life, I afforded him amusement and occupation of the tenderest and most engaging kind. Thus I soon became necessary to his comfort and his happiness; and, though he would often talk still, of having me placed in some situation where I could be properly instructed in arts and sciences, and learned lore, it became evident to every one who saw us together that he would never part with me so long as he could keep me with him. To make up for the want of other knowledge, however, he himself began, from my very earliest years, to teach me everything that might render me successful in that way of life which he himself had so ardently embraced. My hands, almost in infancy, were accustomed to the sword, the dag, and the petronel; and I remember, ere I was six years old, being permitted, as a high favour, to apply the match to the touchhole of a culverin that commanded a road by which the Roundheads were advancing.

Many, too, were the dangers through which I passed in safety. Often in times of surprise and confusion have I sat upon the peak of my father's saddle, while he cut his way through the enemy; and often have I stood as a mere child amidst the charging squadrons and the bristling pikes of a general field of battle. Strife and bloodshed became so familiar to my mind, that I could hardly conceive another state of things; and when any occasional pause took place in the dreadful struggle that then desolated our native land, I used to wonder at the space of time such idleness was suffered to continue, and to long for the moment of activity and exertion. It was with joy and satisfaction that my father beheld this disposition in his son, and he strove by every means in his power to promote its growth, and to direct the efforts that it prompted. He taught me to be quick and decisive, as well as bold and fearless: he bade me always think, in the first place, what was best to be done, and how it might best be executed; and then to perform what my reason had suggested without either fear or hesitation. Always keeping his view fixed upon the ultimate advantage of the cause he had espoused, he zealously instructed me to remark and remember every part of the country through which we passed in our wandering life, and the person of every one who was brought into temporary connexion with us in the changing fortunes of those adventurous times.

Besides teaching me to ride and to shoot, and to perform all other military exercises, he did not fail to give me what little education, of a milder kind, circumstances permitted, during the short lapses of tranquillity which occasionally intervened. He was himself, however, obliged to be my preceptor; for he was not only prevented from engaging any other person in that capacity, by our continual changes from place to place, but he was also rendered unable to do so by his pecuniary circumstances, which had by this time been reduced to the lowest ebb. Our own property had been sequestrated: the King had no money to bestow; and, although Captain Hall sometimes enjoyed a moment of temporary prosperity, after squeezing some rich parliamentarian, or capturing some inimical town, his whole property more usually consisted in his horse, his sword, and his son. I acquired, it is true, in a desultory manner, some knowledge of history, geography, and arithmetic; but this, together with a smattering of Latin, and the capability of writing and reading, was all that I could boast of by the time I was ten years old.

Our moments of quiet, indeed, were always of very short duration; and, during all my early remembrances, I scarcely can recollect having passed six weeks without seeing blood flow in civil strife.

It must not be thought, however, that our state was melancholy or painful. To those who thought as little of human life as the persons did by whom I was generally surrounded, this kind of existence was gay and happy enough. When they saw a comrade sent to his long home, or a friend fall dead by their side, a minute's mourning, and a vow to revenge him, was all that the sight excited; and many a cheerful bowl, and a gay jest, would circulate in the evening amongst the Cavaliers who had lost, in the morning, the dearest acquaintances and oldest companions.

Habit is a wonderful thing; and it would be difficult to make other people comprehend how little emotion bloodshed or massacre produces in the minds of men accustomed to be daily spectators of such scenes. It is not at all surprising then, that a boy--born, as it were, and brought up in the midst of them--should feel their awful nature less than others, and should enter with more pleasure into the adventurous excitement which they certainly afford. Such, at all events, was the case with myself; and although I have learned, from after events, to believe that my heart was neither naturally hard nor cruel, yet it is scarcely possible to describe the joy and enthusiasm I experienced on the approach of strife or battle, the triumph that I felt at the overthrow or death of any remarkable foe, or the careless disregard with which I viewed the slaughter of my countrymen, and the fall even of those I personally knew. This military zeal was known and remarked by all my father's comrades; and the amusement and gratification which they derived from my early passion for that course of life, to which they had given themselves up at a more mature age, caused me to be a general favourite with every old soldier in the ranks of the royalists; so that each one vied with the other in exciting me more and more upon the very track which I was already too eager to pursue. Amongst the Cavaliers I was generally known by the name of "Little Ball-o'-Fire;" and I soon learned to be proud of that appellation, and vexed when I was addressed by any other. In times of prosperity I was loaded with presents and caresses; and in moments of defeat and danger there was still some one to think of and protect Little Ball-o'-Fire, the soldier's son. Nor were these good deeds entirely without requital on my part; for, shrewd, active, and fearless, I was often enabled to assist the defeated or pursued Cavalier, to mislead the Parliamentarian by false information, or to gain intelligence of the enemy's movements, and to guide my friends either to security or victory.

Amongst all the comrades and connexions of my father, Goring, afterwards Lord Norwich, was the foremost in his affections; and with him also I was an infinite favourite, although there were several others to whom I was personally more attached. I remember, however, many instances of great favour received from him; and, as difficulties multiplied round the royal cause, and as dangers threatened more and more imminently the head of our sovereign, it was to the exertions and friendship of Lord Goring that we were, more than once, indebted for our existence. With him we served in many a campaign in Kent and Sussex: with him have I aided my father to empty many a flagon when the fight was over; and with him have we lain in concealment for weeks together, when our paths were surrounded by enemies against whom our force was too weak to contend.

At length, when I was little more than ten years old, and a momentary gleam of success brightened the cause of the Cavaliers, my father and Lord Goring unfortunately separated; and with a small but well-appointed troop we hastened across the country with the intention of joining the royal army, which was then marching towards Cornwall. At Bolton-le-Moors, however, while we were