His  father  was  not  rich,  and  sent  his  son  to  the  Temple  to
study  laws  which  he  was  only  fitted  to  break.  The  young
Adonis  had  sense  enough  to  see  that  destiny  did  not  beckon
him  to  fame  in  the  gloom  of  a  musty  law  court,  and  removed
a  little  farther  up  to  the  Thames,  and  the  more  fashionable
region  of  Scotland  Yard.  Here,  where  now  Z.  300  repairs  to
report  his  investigations  to  a  Commissioner,  the  young  dandies
of  Charles  II.'s  day  strutted  in  gay  doublets,  swore  hasty
oaths  of  choice  invention,  smoked  the  true  Tobago  from  huge
pipe-bowls,  and  ogled  the  fair  but  not  too  bashful  dames
who  passed  to  and  fro  in  their  chariots.  The  court  took  its
name  from  the  royalties  of  Scotland,  who,  when  they  visited
the  South,  were  there  lodged  as  being  conveniently  near  to
Whitehall  Palace.  It  is  odd  enough  that  the  three  architects,
Inigo  Jones,  Vanbrugh,  and  Wren,  all  lived  in  this  yard.
It  was  not  to  be  supposed  that  a  man  who  could  so  well  ap-
preciate a  handsome  face  and  well-cut  doublet  as  Charles  II.
should  long  overlook  his  neighbour,  Mr.  Kobert  Fielding,  and
in  due  course  the  Beau,  wfco  had  no  other  diploma,  found
himself  in  the  honourable  position  of  a  justice  of  the  peace.
