NOR was he lefs

dence and wisdom.

celebrated for his pruTwo of his proverbs

are yet remembered and repeated among the Laplanders. To exprefs the vigilance of the fupreme Being, he was wont to fay, Odin's Belt is always buckled. To fhew that the moft profperous condition of life is often hazardous, his leffon was, When you flide on the fmootheft Ice, beware of pits beneath. He confoled his countrymen, when they were once preparing to leave the frozen defarts of Lapland, and refolved to feck some warmer climate, by telling them, that the eastern nations, notwithstanding their boafted fertility, paffed every night amidst the horrors. of anxious apprehenfion, and were inexpreffibly affrighted, and almost stunned, every morning, with the noise of the fun while he was rifing.

His temperance and feverity of manners were his chief praise. In his early years he never tafted wine; nor would he drink out of a painted cup. He conftantly slept in his armour, with his fpear in his hand; nor would he ufe a battle-ax whofe handle was inlaid with brafs. He did not, however, perfevere

persevere in this contempt of luxury; nor did he close his days with honour.

ONE evening, after hunting the Gulos, or wild-dog, being bewildered in a folitary foreft, and having paffed the fatigues of the day without any interval of refreshment, he difcovered a large ftore of honey in the hollow of a pine. This was a dainty which he had never tasted before, and being at once faint and hungry, he fed greedily upon it. From this unusual and delicious repaft he received fo much fatisfaction, that, at his return home, he commanded honey to be ferved up at his table every day. His palate, by degrees, became refined and vitiated; he began to lofe his native relifh for fimple fare, and contracted a habit of indulging himself in delicacies; he ordered the delightful gardens of his caftle to be thrown open, in which the moft luscious fruits had been fuffered to ripen and decay, unobferved and untouched, for many revolving autumns, and gratified his appetite with luxurious defferts. At length he found it expedient to introduce wine, as an agreeable improvement, or a necessary ingredient, to his new way of living; and having

M 3

having once tafted it he was tempted, by little and little, to give a loose to the exceffes of intoxication. His general fimplicity of life was changed; he perfumed his apartments by burning the wood of the moft aromatick fir, and commanded his helmet to be ornamented with beautiful rows of the teeth of the reindeer. Indolence and effeminacy stole upon him by pleafing and imperceptible gradations, relaxed the finews of his refolution, and extinguished his thirst of military glory.

WHILE Hacho was thus immerfed in pleasure and in repose, it was reported to him, one morning, that the preceding night, a difaftrous omen had been difcovered, and that bats and hideous birds had drank up the oil which nourished the perpetual lamp in the temple of Odin. About the fame time, a meffenger arrived to tell him, that the king of Norway had invaded his kingdom with a formidable army. Hacho, terrified as he was with the omen of the night, and enervated with indulgence, rouzed himself from his voluptuous lethargy, and recollecting fome faint and few fparks of veteran valour, marched forward to meet him. Both armies

joined battle in the foreft where Hacho had been loft after hunting; and it fo happened, that the king of Norway challenged him to fingle combat, near the place where he had tafted the honey. The Lapland Chief, languid and long difufed to arms, was foon overpowered; he fell to the ground; and before his infulting adversary ftruck his head from his body, uttered this exclamation, which the Laplanders ftill ufe as an early leffon to their children: "The vicious man "fhould date his deftruction from the firft "temptation. How juftly do I fall a facrifice "to floth and luxury, in the place where I "first yielded to thofe allurements which fe"duced me to deviate from temperance and "innocence! The honey which I tafted in "this foreft, and not the hand of the king of "Norway, conquers Hacho."

No 97. Saturday, February 23.

T may, I think, be juftly obferved, that

IT

few books difappoint their readers more than the Narrations of Travellers. One part of mankind is naturally curious to learn the fentiments, manners, and condition of the reft; and every mind that has leisure or power to extend its views, muft be defirous of knowing in what proportion Providence has distributed the bleffings of Nature or the advantages of Art, among the feveral nations of the earth.

THIS general defire eafily procures readers to every book from which it can expect gratification. The adventurer upon unknown coafts, and the defcriber of diftant regio ns, is always welcomed as a man who has laboured for the pleasure of others, and who is able to enlarge our knowledge and rectify our opinions; but when the vo

lume