we by any means intend him for the army. He will have leave to recruit, friends will recruit for him, and his education will proceed in the meantime. This is a fencible regiment, and will, I trust, be sent to graze before he is fit to kill or be killed.-About ten days since we made a great haystack, which brought you very fresh to memory, as treading on it last year, in the fulness of rural glee.-Now, before I tell my sad story, I must inform you that, while the rest of Scotland, and England's own self, were pinched with scarcity, we had last year, in this corner, the best crop ever remembered, and this year's is at least equal. Judge of our distress, when, after driving a cart all day, John was brought in bleeding and torn, in consequence of Paddy's being startled, and going off with the cart. He behaved like a

hero, and comforted his sisters; but you never saw a family so distressed. The muscles and sinews, I trust, are not materially injured. He will not, I hope, be

lame.

The spirit and manliness he has shewn in

this exigence have greatly endeared him

to us.

Give a little of your time to such another history. This employment of time will answer many good purposes. While it steals us a while from wearing cares and trivial occupations, it will perform a half miracle, it will recal the fleeting phantom, Youth; arrest the worst effects of time's silent progress. Yes, it will preserve the kindly propensities and tender confidence that are scattered fresh and sweet, like early dew in the delightful morning of life. Yet a while we may thus preserve the sunshine of the breast, and repel the unkindly frosts of cold suspicion and distrust, and the bleak sharp blasts of caprice and peevishness,

"That make lov'd life unlovely,"

and force the callous and the crafty to say at last,

"The yellow leaf,

And that which should accompany old age,

As honour, love, obedience, troops of friends,
I must not look to have."

*

*

*

I grasp

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I

grasp with avidity, the wish, the hope you express of our meeting once more.

It

were indeed a consummation devoutly to be wished, and I have seen too many strange things to despair of this. I think with you that I should love your husband; so much probity and tranquillity of temper would suit me, who detest art and finesse in all its shapes, and sicken at restless turbulent people, who are for ever in a bustle about they know not what. I do love a little constitutional philosophy.

Farewell, dear friend.

LETTER VIII.

TO MRS. MACINTOSH, GLASGOW.

Laggan, Feb: 20. 1796.

"WHY dost thou build the tower, son of Soon wilt thou depart

the winged days?*

with thy fathers. The blast from the desert shall rush through thy hall, and sound upon

* The subject of this letter was a celebrated and well known translator of ancient Scottish poetry.

thy

thy bossy shield," &c. &c. Do you recol-
lect, dear Madam, when I stopped with you
at the gate of B-e, I repeated those lines,
and observed what a suitable inscription they
might prove for the front of poor James's
new house. It would appear I was moved
by a prophetic impulse, when I predicted
that he never would see it finished. Friday
last, C. V. R. dined there. James had been
indisposed since the great storm, yet re-
ceived his guests with much kindness, seem-
ing, however, languid and dispirited. To-
wards evening he sunk much, and retired
early. Next morning he appeared, but did
not eat, and 'looked ill. R. begged he
would frank a cover for Charlotte; he did
so, and never more held a pen.
they left the house, he was taken extremely
ill, unable to move or receive nourishment,
though perfectly sensible. Before this at-
tack, finding some inward symptoms of his
approaching dissolution, he sent for a con-
sultation, the result of which arrived the day
after his confinement. He was perfectly
sensible and collected, yet refused to take
any thing prescribed to him to the last, and

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that

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that on this principle, that his time was come, and it did not avail. He felt the approaches of death, and hoped no relief from medicine, though his life was not such, as one should like to look back on at that awful period. Indeed whose is? It pleased the Almighty to render his last scene most affecting and exemplary. He died last Tuesday evening; and, from the minute he was confined till a very little before he expired, never ceased imploring the divine mercy in the most earnest and pathetic manner. People about him were overawed and melted by the fervour and bitterness of his penitence. He frequently and earnestly entreated the prayers of good serious people of the lower class who were admitted. was a very good natured man; and now that he had got all his schemes of interest and ambition fulfilled, he seemed to reflect and grow domestic, and shewed of late a great inclination to be an indulgent landlord, and very liberal to the poor; of which I could relate various instances, more tender and interesting than flashy or ostentatious. His heart and temper were originally good. His religious

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