the Press. I lay you under no other injunctions. The unkind behaviour of our acquaintance, though it is possible that, in some instances, it may not much affect our happiness, nor engage many of our thoughts, will sometimes obtrude itself upon us with a degree of importunity not easily resisted; and then, perhaps, though almost insensible of it before, we feel more than the occasion will justify. In such a moment it was, that I conceived this poem, and gave loose to a degree of resentment, which perhaps I ought not to have indulged, but which in a cooler hour I cannot altogether condemn. My former intimacy with the two characters was such, that I could not but feel myself provoked by the neglect with which they both treated me on a late occasion. So much by way of preface.

you

as

You ought not to have supposed, that if you had visited us last summer, the pleasure of the interview would have been all your own. By such an imagination you wrong both yourself and us. Do you suppose we do not love a? You cannot suspect your Mother of coldness; and to me, assure yourself I have no friend in the world with whom I communicate without the least reserve, yourself excepted. Také heart then; and when you find a favorable opportunity to come, assure yourself of such a welcome from us both, as you have a right to look for. But I have observed in your two last letters, somewhat of a dejection and melancholy, that I am afraid you do not sufficiently strive against. I suspect you of being too Sedentary. You cannot Walk Why you cannot is best known to yourself. I am sure your legs are long enough, and your person does not overload them. But I beseech you Ride, and ride often. I think I have heard you say you cannot even do that without an Object. Is not Health an object? Is not a new prospect, which in most countries is gained at the end of every mile, an object? Assure yourself, that Easy-chairs are no friends to Cheerfulness, and that a long winter, spent by the Fire-side, is a prelude to an Unhealthy spring. Everything I see in the fields, is to me an object; and I can look at the same Rivulet or at a handsome Tree, every day of my life, with new pleasure. This indeed, is partly the effect of a Natural taste for Rural beauty, and partly the effect of Habit; for I never, in all my life, have let slip the opportunity of breathing Fresh-air, and conversing with Nature, when I could fairly catch it. I earnestly recommend a cultivation of the same Taste to you, suspecting that you have neglected it, and suffer for doing sơ.

HENRY Vth's Address to his Soldiers,

at the Siege of Harfleur.

Alarums, Enter King HENRY, EXETER, BEDFORD, GLOSTER, and Soldiers, with scaling Ladders.

Once more unto the breach (a), dear friends! once more;
Or close the wall up with our English dead.

In Peace, there's nothing so becomes a man
As modest stillness and humility:

But when the blast of War blows in our ears,
Then, imitate the action of the Tiger;
Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood,
Disguise fair nature with hard-favored rage:
Then lend the eye a terrible aspect;

Let it pry through the portage of the head,
Like the brass cannon; let the brow o'erwhelm it,
As fearfully, as doth a galled rock

O'erbang and jutty (b) his confounded base,
Swilled with the wild and wasteful ocean.

Now set the teeth, and stretch the nostril wide;
Hold hard the breath, and bend up every spirit
To his full height. On on, you Noblest English!
Whose blood is fetched from Fathers of War proof;
Fathers! that like so many Alexanders,

Have, in these parts, from morn till even fought, And sheathed their swords for lack of argument.

Dishonor not your Mothers; now attest

That those, whom you called Fathers, did beget you.
Be copy now to men of grosser blood,

And teach them how to war!

-And you, good Yeomen! (c) Whose limbs were made in England, show us here

The méttle of your pasture; let us swear

That you are worth your breeding! which I doubt not;
For there is none of you so mean and base,
That hath not noble lustre in your eyes.
I see you stand like Greyhounds in the slips,
Straining upon the start: the game's afoot;
Follow your spirit; and, upon this Charge,

Cry God for Harry! England! and Saint George!

LECTURE X.

On the Pronunciation of the English Language,

concluded.

Lord CHATHAM.

The Secretary stood alone. Modern degeneracy had not reached him. Original and unaccommodating, the features of his character had the hardihood of antiquity. His august mind overawed Majesty itself. No state chicanery, no narrow system of vicious politics, no idle contest for ministerial victories, sunk him to the vulgar level of the Great; but, overbearing, persuasive, and impracticable, his object was England, his ambition was Fame. Without dividing, he destroyed party; without corrupting, he made a venal age unanimous. France sunk beneath him. With one hand he smote the House of Bourbon, and wielded in the other the Democracy of England. The sight of his mind was Infinite; and his schemes were to affect, not merely England, not the present age only, but Europe and posterity. Wonderful were the means by which these schemes were accomplished; always seasonable, always adéquate— the suggestions of an understanding animated by ardor, and enlightened by prophecy.

The ordinary feelings which make life amiable and indolent were unknown to Him. No domestic difficulties, no domestic weakness reached Him: but, aloof from the sordid occurrences of life, and unsullied by its intercourse, he came occasionally into our system, to counsel and to decide.

A character so exalted, so strenuous, so various, so authoritative, astonished a corrupt age, and the Treasury trembled at the name of Pitt, through all her classes of venality. Corruption imagined, indeed, that she had found defects in this Statesman, and talked much of the inconsistency of his glory, and much of the ruin of his victories, but the History of his Country and the Calamities of the Enemy, answered and refuted her.

Nor were his Political abilities his only talents. His Eloquence was an era in the Senate, peculiar and spontaneous, familiarly expressing gigantic sentiments and instinctive wisdom; not like the torrent of Demosthenes, or the splendid conflagration of Tully; it resembled sometimes the thunder, and sometimes the music of the spheres. He did not conduct the understanding through the painful subtilty of argumentation; nor was he for ever on the rack of exertion; but rather lightened upon the subject, and reached the point by the flashings of the mind-which, like those of his eye, were felt, but could not be followed. Upon the whole, there was in this man something that could create, subvert, or reform; an understanding, a spirit, and an eloquence, to summon mankind to society, to break the bonds of slavery assunder, and to rule the wildness of free minds with unbounded authority; something that could establish or overwhelm Empire, and strike a blow in the world that should resound through the Universe.

ROBERTSON,

The Actor.

The Player's province they but vainly try
Who want these powers-Deportment, Voice, and Eye.
The Critic's sight 'tis only grace can please;

No figure charms us if it has not ease.
There are, who think the stature all in all;
Nor like the hero, if he is not tall.
The feeling sense all other want supplies;
I rate no Actor's merit from his size:
Superior height requires superior grace;
And what's a giant with a vacant face?

3

Theatric monarchs, in their tragic gait,
Affect to mark the solemn pace of state;
One foot put forward, in position strong,
The other, like its vassal, dragged along:
So grave each motion, so exact and slow,
Like wooden monarchs at a puppet-show.
The mein delights us that has native grace,
But affectation ill supplies its place.

Unskilful Actors, like your mimic apes,
Will writhe their bodies in a thousand shapes -

However foreign from the Poet's art,
No tragic Hero but admires a Start:
What though unfeeling of the nervous line,
Who but allows his attitude is fine?

While a whole minute equipoised he stands,
Till Praise dismiss him with her echoing hands!
Resolved, though nature hate the tedious pause,
By perseverence to extort applause:

When Romeo, sorrowing at his Juliet's doom,
With eager madness bursts the canvas tomb,
The sudden whirl, stretched leg, and lifted staff,
Which please the Vulgar, make the Critic laugh.
To paint the Passion's force, and mark it well,
The proper Action nature's self will tell:
No pleasing power Distortions e'er express,
And nicer judgement always lothes excess,
Of all the evils which the Stage molest
I hate your Fool who overacts his jest;
Who murders what the poet finely writ,
And, like a bungler, haggles all his Wit -
With shrug, and grin, and gesture out of place,
And writes a foolish comment, with his face.

The Word and Action should conjointly suit, But Acting words is labor too minute. Grimace will ever lead the Judgement wrong; While sober Humor marks the impression strong. Her proper traits the fixed attention hit, And bring me closer to the poet's wit; With her, delighted, o'er each scene I go, Well-pleased and not ashamed of being so. But let the generous Actor still forbear To copy features with a Mimic's care': 'Tis a poor skill, which every fool can reach, A vile stage-custom, honored in the breach: Worse as more close -the disengenuous art But shows the wanton looseness of the heart. When I behold a wretch, of talents mean, Drag private foibles on the public scene, Forsaking nature's fair and open road

To mark some whim, some strange, peculiar mode;
Fired with disgust, I lothe his servile plan,
Despise the mimic, and abhor the Man!
Go to the Lame, to Hospitals repair,
And hunt for humor in distortions there!
Fill up the measure of the moteley whim

With shrug, wink, snuffle, and convulsive limb;