ly posture; which to divert Marina told her, she looked exceeding well, and nothing could be more genteel than the deshabille in which she appeared; this a little brightened the chagrin on her visage, and made her something attentive to the pranks of a new monkey which her page had just introduced to divert his fair mistress; who, in the midst of the recreation, was seized with a fainting fit, sunk back in an easy chair, and after a few hours convulsive pangs gave up the ghost.

I have been so particular in this account, in hopes it will have a lasting influence on your conduct; and by being faithful to my living friend I may, if possible, attone for my insincerity to the dead. I have a thousand and a thousand times reproached myself for not letting Amanda plainly know her danger, leaving the event to Heaven. I am convinced it was my duty, in spite of all the false rules by which the friendship of this world is guided.

These two sisters had the misfortune, in their early years, to lose their mother, and were left to the conduct of a father who made it his pride to think and live freely; he looked on all religion as a State Policy, and put the Bible and Alcoran on a level. With these principles he perverted his daughters' minds; and, except observing the strictest forms of honour and reputation, they were go

of the age. Thus they saw their father live, and thus they saw him die, entirely negligent and thoughtless of any thing beyond the period of human life. Instead of prayers and pious meditations, one of his libertine companions read Dryden's translation of Lucretius to him in his last hours; while fearless and insensible he met death and all its succeeding horrors.

Amanda's death has made a deep impression on my thoughts; I have bid the modish world adieu, and am now retired to my brother's country-seat. You may call it the spleen, but I hope it is the ef fect of just reasoning, that I have never read any thing since I came hither but books of devotion. Mr Law's excellent treatise of Christian Perfection has been instructive to me; the character of Miranda has raised a noble emulation in my mind, though I despair of reaching that perfection.

If you make me a visit, you will not find me engaged in cards at one-and-thirty, nor telling riddles, or drawing Valentines, with my country neighbours; but musing by the side of a gentle cascade, or sitting in some flagrant bower, listening to the songs of heaven in Dr Watt's pious numbers:

"Hark! how beyond the narrow bounds

"Of Time and Space they run,

And speak in most majestic sounds
"The Godhead of the Son:

"How on the Father's breast he lay,

"The darling of his soul,
"Infinite years before the day

"Or heav'ns began to roll.

"And now they sink their lofty tone,

"And milder notes they play;

"And bring th' cternal Godhead down

"To dwell in humble clay."

If this long letter should give you the spleen, I hope it will be your advantage; nothing but that is the intention of,

YOUR letter, I hope, will be a restraint on the great levity of my temper. The account of Amanda's death will leave me without excuse, if I should carry my vanity so far as to act the last part of life with so little propriety. I cannot, without the warmest gratitude to heaven, reflect on the advantages of a different education and principles, which I hope will never be effaced from my soul.

But, my dear Emilia, I shall never be so good as you would have me, nor as I sincerely desire to be.

fore I bid adieu to the world, and rank myself in the number of departed spirits. I cannot on a sudden contract such intimacies with invisible beings as to abandon all my material acquaintance. I despair of following you and Miranda, who, if you were Roman Catholics, are in a fair way of being canonized, (as many a miserable sinner has been before you). Of whatever religion I am, it is certain I shall never be numbered in the same class with St Winifrid.

You love poetry, and it is a pleasure to me to oblige you with any thing writ on a subject so agreeable to your taste as these verses inscribed to Mrs M, a person of strict piety, though she does not turn recluse and live in a grotto, but converses freely with the polite world, and keeps an unblemished character in it. I will leave you now to your shady retreats and murmuring brooks.

On SOLITUDE.

Inscribed to Mrs M.

Ye groves, and flow'ry vales, in you we find
The first unblemish'd joys for man design'd;
Your charming scenes th' attentive mind supply
With pleasure in its nice variety:

Nature does here her virgin smiles afford,
And shows us Paradise again resor'd;
Our souls their former harmony acquire,
And vexing Care and conscious Guilt retire.
Propitious Solitude! thou kind retreat
From all the vain amusements of the great!

In thee alone, without disgust, we prove
The endless sweets of Innocence and Love..
Beauty and Wit may find a refuge here,
Unenvy'd ev'n Belinda might appear :

Each nymph would yield the uncontested prize,
And ev'ry swain pay homage to her eyes.
Flourish, ye gentle Shades, and rural Seats,
Let endless verdure deck your soft retreats;
Peace dwell upon your banks, ye silver Streams,
The Muses' chaste delights and constant themes!"
For ever you the Poet's breast inspire,
With sprightly joys, and wake the golden lyre.

Retir'd in fragrant bow'rs, the Hebrew King
For Pharoh's daughter touch'd the tuneful string;.
The fair Egyptian's charms his soul possess'd,
And fill'd with sacred ecstasics his breast;
Celestial numbers melted from his tongue,
In human figures truths divine were sung,
While Lebanon's high cedars lent an ear.
And Siloe rose above its banks to hear;
Hermon and Carmel kept the pleasing lay,
And Sharon's painted vale appear'd more gay.
What pow'r, enchanting Solitude, is thine!
That men for thee the dearest ties resign:
For thee the Monarch lays his crown aside,
And the young lover quits his weeping bride:
The Hero gives the chace of honour o'er,
And fame and glorious conquest tempt no more:
The softer sex, with fearless piety,

To woods and savage wilds have follow'd thee.
Fair Magdalen the flatt'ring World declin'd,
And to a narrow cave her charms confin'd.
In Herod's wanton court admir'd she shone,
And all the tempting paths of Vice had known;
To her's the beauties of the Hebrew race,