CHAPTER VI.

THE HAPPINESS OF A COUNTRY FIRESIDE.

As we carried on the former dispute with some degree of warmth, in order to accommodate matters, it was universally agreed that we should have a part of the venison for supper, and the girls undertook the task with alacrity. "I am sorry," cried I," that we have no neighbor or stranger to take a part in this good cheer: feasts of this kind acquire a double relish from hospitality."-" Bless me," cried my wife, "here comes our good friend, Mr. Burchell, that saved our Sophia, and that ran you down fairly in the argument."--"Confute me in argument, child!" cried I. "You mistake there, my dear; I believe there are but few that can do that: I never dispute your abilities at making a goose-pie, and I beg you'll leave argument to me." As I spoke, poor Mr. Burchell entered the house, and was welcomed by the family, who shook him. heartily by the hand, while little Dick officiously reached him a chair.

I was pleased with the poor man's friendship for two reasons because I knew that he wanted mine, and I knew him to be friendly as far as he was able. He was known in our neighborhood by the character of the poor Gentleman that would do no good when he was young, though he was not yet thirty. He would at intervals talk with great good sense; but in general he was fondest of the company of children, whom he used to call harmless little men. He was famous, I found, for singing them ballads and telling them stories; and seldom went out without something in his pockets for them— a piece of gingerbread or an halfpenny whistle. He generally came for a few days into our neighborhood once a year, and lived upon the neighbors' hospitality. He sat down to supper among us, and my wife was not sparing of her gooseberry wine. The tale went round; he sung us old songs, and gave

the children the story of the Buck of Beverland, with the history of Patient Grissel, the adventures of Catskin, and then Fair Rosamond's Bower. Our cock, which always crew at eleven, now told us it was time for repose; but an unforeseen difficulty started about lodging the stranger-all our beds were already taken up, and it was too late to send him to the next alehouse. In this dilemma, little Dick offered him his part of the bed if his brother Moses would let him lie with him; "and I," cried Bill, "will give Mr. Burchell my part if my sisters will take me to theirs."--"Well done, my good children," cried I, "hospitality is one of the first Christian duties. The beast retires to its shelter and the bird flies to its nest, but helpless man can only find refuge from his fellow-creature. The greatest stranger in this world was He that came to save it. He never had an house, as if willing to see what hospitality was left remaining amongst us. Deborah, my dear," cried I to my wife, "give those boys a lump of sugar each, and let Dick's be the largest, because he spoke first."

In the morning early I called out my whole family to help at saving an after-growth of hay; and our guest offering his assistance, he was accepted among the number. Our labors went on lightly: we turned the swath to the wind. I went foremost, and the rest followed in due succession. I could not avoid, however, observing the assiduity of Mr. Burchell in assisting my daughter Sophia in her part of the task. When he had finished his own, he would join in hers, and enter into a close conversation; but I had too good an opinion of Sophia's understanding, and was too well convinced of her ambition, to be under any uneasiness from a man of broken. fortune. When we were finished for the day, Mr. Burchell was invited as on the night before; but he refused, as he was to lie that night at a neighbor's, to whose child he was carrying a whistle. When gone, our conversation at supper turned upon our late unfortunate guest. "What a strong instance," said I, "is that poor man of the miseries attending a youth of levity and extravagance. He by no means wants sense, which only serves to aggravate his former folly. Poor forlorn creat

ure, where are now the revellers, the flatterers, that he could once inspire and cominand? Gone, perhaps, to attend the bagnio pander, grown rich by his extravagance. They once praised him, and now they applaud the pander; their former raptures at his wit are now converted into sarcasms at his folly. He is poor, and perhaps deserves poverty, for he has neither the ambition to be independent nor the skill to be useful." Prompted perhaps by some secret reasons, I delivered this observation with too much acrimony, which my Sophia gently reproved. "Whatsoever his former conduct. may have been, papa, his circumstances should exempt him from censure now. His present indigence is a sufficient punishment for former folly; and I have heard my papa himself say that we should never strike our unnecessary blow at a victim over whom Providence holds the scourge of its resentment."-"You are right, Sophy," cried my son Moses, "and one of the ancients finely represents so malicious a conduct by the attempts of a rustic to flay Marsyas, whose skin, the fable tells us, had been wholly stripped off by another. Besides, I don't know if this poor man's situation be so bad as my father would represent it. We are not to judge of the feelings of others by what we might feel in their place. However dark the habitation of the mole to our eyes, yet the animal itself finds the apartment sufficiently lightsome. And, to confess a truth, this man's mind seems fitted to his station, for I never heard any one more sprightly than he was to-day when he conversed with you." This was said without the least design; however, it excited a blush, which she strove to cover by an affected laugh, assuring him that she scarce took any notice of what he said to her, but that she believed he might once have been a very fine gentleman. The readiness with which she undertook to vindicate herself, and her blushing, were symptoms I did not internally approve; but I repressed my suspicions.

As we expected our landlord the next day, my wife went to make the venison pasty. Moses sat reading, while I taught the little ones: my daughters seemed equally busy with the rest, and I observed them for a good while cooking something

over the fire. I at first supposed they were assisting their mother, but little Dick informed me in a whisper that they were making a wash for the face. Washes of all kinds I had a natural antipathy to, for I knew that instead of mending the complexion, they spoiled it. I therefore approached my chair by sly degrees to the fire, and, grasping the poker as if it wanted mending, seemingly by accident, overturned the whole composition, and it was too late to begin another.

CHAPTER VII.

A TOWN WIT DESCRIBED. THE DULLEST FELLOWS MAY LEARN TO BE COMICAL FOR A NIGHT OR TWO.

WHEN the morning arrived on which we were to entertain. our young landlord, it may be easily supposed what provisions were exhausted to make an appearance. It may also be conjectured that my wife and daughters expanded their gayest plumage upon this occasion. Mr. Thornhill came with a couple of friends, his chaplain and feeder. The servants, who were numerous, he politely ordered to the next alehouse: but my wife, in the triumph of her heart, insisted on entertaining them all; for which, by-the-bye, our family was pinched for three weeks after. As Mr. Burchell had hinted to us the day before that he was making some proposals of marriage to Miss Wilmot, my son George's former mistress, this a good deal damped the heartiness of his reception. But accident in some measure relieved our embarrassment; for one of the company happening to mention her name, Mr. Thornhill observed, with an oath, that he never knew anything more absurd than calling such a fright a beauty: "For strike me ugly," continued he, "if I should not find as much pleasure in choosing my mistress by the information of a lamp under the clock at St. Dunstan's!" At this he laughed, and so did we: the jests of the rich are ever successful. Olivia, too, could not avoid whispering, loud enough to be heard, that he had an infinite fund of humor.

After dinner I began with my usual toast-the Church; for this I was thanked by the chaplain, as he said the Church was the only mistress of his affections. Come, tell us honestly, Frank," said the Squire, with his usual archness, "suppose the Church, your present mistress, dressed in lawn sleeves, on one hand, and Miss Sophia, with no lawn about her, on the other, which would you be for?"-" For both, to be sure," cried the chaplain. "Right, Frank," cried the Squire, "for, may this glass suffocate me, but a fine girl is worth all the priestcraft in the creation. For what are tithes and tricks but an imposition?-all a confounded imposture, and I can prove it.”—“I wish you would," cried my son Moses, " and I think,” continued he, "that I should be able to answer you."-" Very well, sir," cried the Squire, who immediately smoked him, and winking on the rest of the company to prepare us for the sport, "if you are for a cool argument upon that subject, I am ready to accept the challenge. And, first, whether are you for managing it analogically or dialogically?"—"I am for managing it rationally," cried Moses, quite happy at being permitted to dispute.-" Good again," cried the Squire, "and, firstly, of the first, I hope you'll not deny that whatever is, is. If you don't grant me that, I can go no further."-"Why," returned Moses, I think I may grant that, and make the best of it.""I hope, too," returned the other, "you'll grant that a part is less than the whole."-"I grant that, too," cried Moses; "it is but just and reasonable."-"I hope," cried the Squire, "you will not deny that the two angles of a triangle are equal to two right ones."-"Nothing can be plainer," returned t'other, and looked round with his usual importance."Very well," cried the Squire, speaking very quick, “the premises being thus settled, I proceed to observe that the concatenation of self-existence, proceeding in a reciprocal duplicate ratio, naturally produces a problematical dialogism, which in some measure proves that the essence of spirituality may be referred to the second predicable."-" Hold, hold!” cried the other, "I deny that. Do you think I can thus tamely submit to such heterodox doctrines?"-"What," replied the Squire, as if in a passion, "not submit! Answer me one