Cal. I am glad that my weak words Have struck but thus much show of fire from Brutus. SHAKSPEARE. 0030000 CHAP. XV. BELLARIUS, GUIDERIUS, AND ARVIRAGUS. Bel. A GOODLY day! not to keep house, with such. Whose roof's as low as ours: see! boys, this gate Instruct you how t'adore the heav'ns; and bows you To morning's holy office. Gates of monarchs Are arch'd so high, that giants may jet through, And keep their impious turbans on, without Good morrow to the sun. Hail thou fair heav'n! We house i' th' rck, yet use thee not so hardly As prouder livers do. Guid. Hail, Heav'n! Arv. Hail, Heav'n! Bel. Now for our mountain sport, up to yond hill, Your legs are young. I'll tread these flats. When you, above, perceive me like a crow, That it is place which lessens and sets off: Consider,. And you may then revolve what tales I told you, Such gain the cap of him, that makes them fine, Guid. Out of your proof you speak; we, poor, unfledg'd, That have a sharper known; well corresponding Arv. What should we speak of, When we are old as you? When we shall hear Bel. How you speak! Did you but know the city's usuries, And felt them knowingly; the art o' th' court, The fear's as bad as falling; the toil of war; J' th' name of fame and honour; which dies i' th' search, As record of fair act; nay, many time, Was not far off: then was I as a tree, Whose boughs did bend with fruit. But in one night, A storm, or robbery, call it what you will, Shook down my mellow hangings, nay, my leaves; And left me bare to weather. Guid. Uncertain favour! Bel. My fault being nothing, as I have told oft, Follow'd my banishment; and, these twenty years, The fore-end of my time-But, up to th' mountains! And we will fear no poison, which attends In place of greater state, I'll meet you in the valleys. SHAKSPEARE. BOOK VII. DESCRIPTIVE PIECES. CHAP. I. SENSIBILITY. DEAR Sensibility! source inexhausted of all that's precious in our joys, or costly in our sorrows! thou chainest thy martyr down upon his bed of straw, and it is thou who liftest him up to Heaven. Eternal Fountain of our feelings! It is here I trace thee, and this is thy di rinity which stirs within me: not, that in some sad and sickening moments, my soul shrinks back upon herself, and startles at destruction-mere pomp of words!—but that I feel some generous joys and generous cares beyond myself all comes from thee, great, great Sensorium of the world! which vibrates, if a hair of our head but falls upon the ground, in the remotest desert of thy creation. Touched with thee, Eugenius draws my curtain when I languish; hears. my tale of symptoms, and blames the weather for the disorder of his nerves. givest a portion of it sometimes to the roughest peasant who traverses the bleakest mountains. He finds the la cerated lamb of another's flock. This moment I beheld him leaning with his head against his crook, with pite Thou ous inclination looking down upon it-Oh! had I come one moment sooner!-it bleeds to death-his gentle heart bleeds with it. Peace to thee, generous swain! I see thou walkest off with anguish-but thy joys shall balance it; for happy is thy cottage, and happy is the sharer of it, and happy are the lambs which sport about you. STERNE. CHAP. II. LIBERTY AND SLAVERY. DISGUISE thyself as thou wilt, still, Slavery! still thou art a bitter draught; and though thousands in all ages have been made to drink of thee, thou art no less bitter on that account. It is thou, Liberty, thrice sweet and gracious goddess, whom all in public or in private worship, whose taste is grateful, and ever will be so, till nature herself shall change- -no tint of words can spot thy snowy mantle, or chymic power turn thy scep tre into iron with thee to smile upon him as he eats his crust, the swain is happier than his monarch, from whose court thou art exiled. Gracious Heaven! grant me but health, thou great Bestower of it, and give me but this fair goddess as my companion; and shower down thy mitres, if it seems good unto thy divine providence, upon those heads which are aching for them.- Pursuing these ideas, I sat down close by my table, and leaning my head upon my hand, I began to figure to myself the miseries of confinement. I was in a right frame for it, and so I gave full scope to my imagination. I was going to begin with the millions of my fellowcreatures born to no inheritance but slavery; but finding, |