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temples and statues in good repair, though he either forgot their names or mistook their situations; and though he rather disliked dogs, he permitted an old black spaniel to be his constant companion, because it seemed to be the only thing to which she shewed any attachment. Yet bitter remembrance would sometimes extort from him, in the company of very particular friends, the confeffion, " that the poor woman " had very odd ways, but people who " are always ill are apt to be whimsical."

It was the general opinion of the country, that the good baronet would never more engage in a matrimonial connexion, and this seemed to be the more extraordinary, as it was known he ardently wished to transmit his fortune and honours to a lineal descendant of his own name. Whether influenced by delicacy arifing from past happiness, or corroded by the recollection of past forrows, it is certain he never appeared perfectly at ease when love or marriage was the topic of conversation; and though remarkable for uniform civility, the words, " fine feeling," and "acute sensibility," when used in their general import, always drew from him an emphatical " Non" fenfe!"

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CHAP. VII.

-She was fair beyond your brightest bloom,
(This Envy owns, since now her bloom is fled,)
Fair as the forms that, wove in Fancy's loom,
Float in light vision round the poet's head.

Whene'er with soft serenity she smil'd,
Or caught the orient blush of quick surprize,
How sweetly mutable, how brightly wild.
The liquid luftre darted from her eyes!

Each look, each motion, wak'd a new-born grace,
That o'er her form its tranfient glory cast:
Some lovely wonder soon ufurp'd the place,
Chas'd by a charm still lovelier than the last.

MASON.

My readers, whom I introduced in the beginning of my second Chapter to the marriage of Geraldine Powerscourt with the earl of Monteith, will perhaps complain of the intervening circumstances which retard my account of the events immediately subsequent to those aufpicious nuptials. They will probably blame me for beginning in the middle, and then going back to the first part; but I have not even yet quite unravelled the clue which led to that event, and must entreat their patience a little longer. Nothing is so imposing upon the generality of the world as an air of superior information and self-confidence; I shall therefore, instead of acknowledging myself to have been in an error, proceed to state, that this apparent inconsistency is the effect of design, and sanctioned by authority.

I can plead the example of many ingenious authors, who folely owe their reputation to a skilful generalship in the arrangement of their plans. Some have chosen to make a second volume take precedence of the first; others have objected to the formality of a beginning; and a third set have disdained the pe. dantry

VOL. I,

F

dantry of a conclusion. Several of the wits of the last age wrote pages on their own pre-existent state; and many writers of our times have penned volumes, which, if they have any meaning, tend to prove that it would have been better had they not existed at all. Some suppose the road to fame lies through the labyrinth of inexplicable paradoxes; while others, who publish one book to disprove what they have written in another, seem to think that, in order to advance, it is necessary to move backward, like a crab. In vain does Criticism attempt to restrain these excursive flights: the modern Pegasus is too restive to endure the rein, and too volatile to attend to the lash; and most writers have fucceeded, who have attempted to found their reputation on the broad bafis of fingularity; for what greater proof of originality and spirit

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