of Mr. Huskisson. I ask him if the human mind can experience a more dreadful sensation than to see its own jobs refused and the jobs of another religion perpetually succeeding. I ask him his opinion of a jobless faith, of a creed which dooms a man through life to a lean and plunderless integrity. He knows that human nature cannot and will not bear it; and if we were to paint a political Tartarus, it would be an endless series of snug expectations and cruel disappointments. Letters to my brother Abraham by Peter Plymley. Letter ix. Yes! you will find people ready enough to do the good Samaritan without the oil and the two pence. W. W., p. 329. If you choose to represent the various parts in life by holes upon a table, of different shapes,—some circular, some triangular, some square, some oblong,-and the persons acting these parts by bits of wood of similar shapes, we shall generally find that the triangular person has got into the square hole, the oblong into the triangular, and a square person has squeezed himself into a round hole. Ib. It requires a surgical operation to get a joke well into a Scotch understanding. Their only idea of wit, or rather that inferior variety of this electric talent which prevails in the North, and which under the name of WUT, is so infinitely distressing to people of good taste, is laughing immoderately at stated intervals. Memoir. 213. Sir Walter Scott, 1771-1832. (Handbk., prs. 221, 501, 539.) Melrose Abbey. If thou would'st view fair Melrose aright, Go visit it by the pale moonlight; For the gay beams of lightsome day When the broken arches are black in night, And each shafted oriel glimmers white; When buttress and buttress, alternately, When silver edges the imagery, And the scrolls that teach thee to live and die; And the owlet to hoot o'er the dead man's grave, Lay of the Last Minstrel, canto ii. Love of Country. Breathes there a man with soul so dead, This is my own, my native land! From wandering on a foreign strand? To the vile dust, from whence he sprung, Love rules the court, the camp, the grove, For love is heaven and heaven is love. The harper smiled, well pleased; for ne'er A simple race! they waste their toil Ib.. canto vi. Ib., canto iii. To., canto iv. The Battle of Flodden and Death of Marmion. [Marmion returning from his Scottish mission reaches Flodden, having the Lady Clara, the victim of his avarice and treachery, in his power. He leaves her on the hill within sight of the armies, under the charge of his squires, Blount and Fitz-Eustace.] Blount and Fitz-Eustace rested still From the sharp ridges of the hill, Told England, from his mountain-throne Scarce could they hear or see their foes, Until at weapon-point they close. They close in clouds of smoke and dust, Of sudden and portentous birth, As if men fought upon the earth, Long looked the anxious squires; their eye Could in the darkness nought descry. . . ... • Bent-The Scottish army set fire to their camp, to descend the bill under cover of the smoke. [The two squires, maddened by the sight of the fall of their leader's banner, rush into the battle, and return some time after with the wounded Marmio 1.] With that, straight up the hill there rode Two horsemen, drenched with gore, A wounded knight they bore. His hand still strained the broken brand: Said-By St. George, he's gone! 'Unnurtur'd Blount!-thy brawling cease: When, doffed his casque, he felt free air, 'Where's Harry Blount? Fitz-Eustace, where? Redeem my pennon, charge again! That shout shall ne'er be heard again! Let Stanley charge with spur of fire,- Full upon Scotland's central host, Must I bid twice ?-hence, varlets! fly! Clare drew her from the sight away, Till pain wrung forth a lowly moan, Page, squire, or groom, one cup to bring O Woman! in our hours of ease, By the light quiv'ring aspen made; Scarce were the piteous accents said, To the nigh streamlet ran: Forgot were hatred, wrongs, and fears; She stooped her by the runnel's side, But in abhorrence backward drew; For, oozing from the mountain wide, Where raged the war, a dark red tide Was curdling in the streamlet blue. Where shall she turn ?-behold her mark A little fountain-cell, Where water, clear as diamond-spark, In a stone basin fell. Above, some half-worn letters say, Drink. weary. pilgrim . drink. and . pray. For the kind. soul. of. Sybil. Greg. Who. built. this. cross. and. well.' She filled the helm, and back she hied, And with surprise and joy espied |