ty, when their attention goes no further than the mere words, and the rules of construction necessary to be attended to in putting them in order. If we do not suppose ourselves in the authour's place, and figure to ourselves the scene in which he acted, we can profit no more in conversing with the most eminent, than with the most trifling characters. St. Augustine wished to have seen Rome in all its glory, and to have conversed with the most eminent men of that Republick, which, from small beginnings, rose to be the wonder, the terrour, and the mistress of the world. But though his wish had been granted, he could not have kuown more than we may yet learn from those, who had that advarge, and who were undoubtedly more able to describe it to us than we could be to observe it ourselves, even though we had that opportunity, which the Saint wished for in vain. The want of attention to the history of the times, and the want of knowledge of the cha, racter, rank, situation, and connexions of the persons spoken of occasions obscurity of conception, and hinders our entertainment and improvement. A competent knowledge of ancient geography and History is, therefore, necessary to our right understanding of the classick authours, which, without this, must prove as unprofitable to the student as fairy tales, or the lives of men, who never lived. Aids the first warblings of the tuneful tongue, First treads the mead, by modest daisies pied, His new fledged pinion, next he trembling tries, Gains, by degrees, possession of the skies. And Heav'nward urging his unwearied flight, Is lost to vulgar view amid the blaze of light, Happy could I ascend on equal wing, And soaring high, with equal vigour sing. Then Doon should roll more rapidly his floods, Ayr, more majestick wander through his woods, Beloved streams; where'er my footsteps trious family, she ennobled her rank by her virtues. Although she was above the common stature, her person was well formed, and her whole mien majestick. Her hair, which covered a finely turned neck, with its graceful ringlets, was a luxuriant auburn. Her azure eyes expressively displayed the emotions of her soul, and dimples eternally played around her mouth, for it is always arrayed in smiles. Her father had left her at too early a period for her to feel his loss. But the care of a fond relative had formed her mind in the principles of virtue. And such was the happy facility of her disposition, that when the mirthful strings of the lyre warbled the notes of festivity, she twined through the mazes of the dance; and when weariness had fatigued her, she enlivened the silence of the midnight hour by the vivacity of her conversation. The young were insensibly allured by the soft harmony of her voice, and the aged did not disdain to listen to her words, and approve her wisdom. Possessed of a copious flow of wit, it was so attempered by the sweet forbearance of good nature, that though all laughed at the dart, yet no one felt the wound. She was accurately acquainted with the history of her own. country, and also of the other parts of Greece, which had produced historians to record their transactions. Her companions were amused and improved by the justness of her remarks, upon our most popular poets, and their happiest inspirations seemed to acquire new attractions from the melody of her recitations. Her taste in literature was at once accurate and delicate. It had never been refined by the subtlety of artificial rules, but was the result of her own observation and good sense. But although she was thus superiour to the greater portion of her sex, she was not ostentatious of her acquisitions. She kindly threw a vail over them, when she saw that they would oppress the inferiority of her companions: an‹ by that constant flow of good nature. which pervaded her own bosom, she diffused cheerfulness, and irresistibly attracted the love and admiration of all who had a heart to feel. By the idle and the curious, who were thrown in the shade by the brightness of those rays, which her merit beamed around her, she was accused of vanity, but hers was a vanity which they had never felt, which they could never feel! Her vanity taught her to seek the love, and aspire to the praise of all who knew her. It was the fertile source of all her excellence: it was a desire to please, and emulation to excel. Venus, when she girded her with the zone of attraction, had breathed over her face the purple light of youth ;* in her eyes little Loves transported the enraptured gaze of admiration, and her lips were the sweet roses of Persuasion.† I will not say she was very susceptible of the softer emotions of love. Her better prudence regulated and restrained her feelings. Her discrimination was quick: her selection judicious; and she never violated any professions which her affection prompted, and her judgment sanctioned; but Virgil somewhere says, lumen juvente purpureum : a brilliant expression which I take to be merely figurative, and not as meant to describe the precise colour of the object to which the epithet is applied. So in Horace we have rosea cervix, purpureis ales coloribus; and Pindar speaks of the violet curls of a female of distinguished beauty. In this instance, I believe he does not speak me. taphorically. The violet colour was considered as ornamental in his time, and the ladies, who, I presume, were not less sedulous to please then, than they are in the present day, employed particular tingents to imbue their hair with this desirable colour. I write this note from memory, and I may be wrong. The ancients, in order to convey an idea of a mouth perfectly lovely, represented it by the lips of Persuasion: and I envy not his feelings, who cannot, at once, feel the force elegance and gallantry of the Grecian Muse. of this metaphor, so characteristick of the Meleager cails his mistress the sweet Rose of Persuasion. Persuasion's lips and Cyprian charms are young, And the fresh beauty of the vernal flowers. A those who merited it, experienced a friendship, not capricious, nor cool, but warm, and sincere, uniform and lasting. Her imagination, fertile and inquisitive, was ever on the wing. The legends of love, and the romantick fictions of our poets ever found in her an attentive listner. She delighted in the wild song, which erstwhile had cheered the savage in his pathless wanderings, or greeted him at eventime, after the labours of the chace, before Polity, sedate, and sage, had tamed the excursive fancy, and quenched the fondness for a rambling life. Her heart was alive to the softest touches of harmony, and she had a tear for the tale of wo, when it stole upon her willing ear. Such was Myrylla; even now I see her, lovely, meek, and amiable, such as I first knew her. In her manners, free, without familiarity; dignified, but not haughty in her conversation, easy, without levity, and sensible, without pedantry... Need I add, that beauty so attractive, loveliness so seducing, accomplishments so ornamental, excited my admiration, and soon won my warmest love. I was in the spring of life. The vernal glow of Hope was mine, and Fancy, elate, and gay, gilded the prospect, which a disposition naturally sanguine had delighted to contemplate. My patrimony was small, but it was sufficiently ample for one whose ambition was not to be diverted from its pursuits by slight obstacles, whose desircs were restrained by content, and whose industry could be stimulated to every exertion, when animated by the smiles of her who should bestow its reward. I did not affect to conceal the ardent wishes of my soul. My hopes and fears were expressed in an ode in the Dorick measure. my first attempt to soar into the regions of poetry, since I had received the lessons of Anacreon; and if the grandeur of the subject be remembered, the youthful Muse certainly winged a daring flight. It was TO MYRILLA. Myrilla, by the gods above, That doth my heart control. Queen of the stars is Venus named, Teach me, ye gods, some happy art Then take, oh take my proffered love- When I had finished, I sighed at observing how inadequately I had expressed the fervour of my feelings. So far was I from blushing at my passion, that I gloried in the indulgence of it. I was pleased to find that I had a heart susceptible of the finest emotion of which our nature is capable; and I was proud of the selection that it had made. Myrilla, so accomplished and beautiful, would have reRected honour on the homage of any man; and in proportion to the purity of his affection, would be the increase of his virtue, and the refinement of his manners. Such is the power of Love. His plastick hand moulds the most rugged and softens the ferocious. He banishes every vitious propensity, by offering a reward to sincerity, which can only be attained by habits of virtue, temperance, and urbanity. But the fear that Myrilla wo uld not deem me worthy of the high ho the fullness of the earth," bearing witness to the beneficence of Him, who exacts not "vain oblations" but from nations and individuals asks the sacrifice of the heart, whose "sweet incense" rises on seraphick wings. When we had surmounted the hardships, antici dangers had been magnified, and habi nour to which I aspired, plunged me into the gloom of despondence. Quitting the society of convivial men, whose wit had now lost all its attractions, I became a solitary wanderer in the white valley of Pedion, and roved on the banks of the Cephisus, and the Eridan. Amid these sylvan scenes, Ipated in this day's ride, we found its resigned myself to those delicious reveries of melancholy which none but the melancholy can enjoy. Every object furnished me a simile. When I beheld the waves gently pursuing each other, and at length commingling, and rolling on in a larger torrent, "ah!" I exclaimed, thus should the souls of Myrilla and Critias be united, and softly glide down the stream of life." The branches of the vine, interweaving their foliage to protect the flowers of the plain from the fervid beams of the sun, seemed to indicate that happy union which adds confidence to each, and shelters them in all the persecutions of misfortune. I have perused with wonder, but not with implicit faith, European sarcasms, on the "savage American character.' I have heard of "execrable" accommodations at our inns, of fair ladies fainting on the stony approach to the Blueridge, and of "master spirits," appaled by the barbarous freedom of a republick; in truth, my dear S-, if you listen to the experience of others, timidity would shrink from the mountaneous heights, rocky declivities, and still greater ruggedness of manners, exhibited by tourists in our western hemisphere, we thought it safest to trust the evidence of our own senses, tual exercise enabled us to endure fatigue. The glowing exuberance of nature, and the happy influence of husbandry announced our return to the fertile precincts of Lancaster county. It is impossible to open your eyes, in this part of Pennsylvania, without observ ing the enlivened aspect of industry. Labour, here, assumes the hardy features of independence, the master of the soil directs its tillage, and in "seed time and harvest" shares the rustick toil. At night we gladly resumed our matrasses at the inn, and allotted the Sabbath to rest at Lancaster. As the ancient and youthful were flocking to morning worship, it was curious to see the old-fashioned German costume, contrasted with modern light drapery. It would seem that the new-school Philosophy had small success with those, who in defiance of imported transparences, arrayed themselves in " dest apparel," and according to the "tradition of their fathers," made publick acknowledgment of Christian Faith. It is not my friend, in a bigotted observance of forms, that the vital spark of Divinity is manifested, but accord with the "inward and spiritual the "outward and visible" sign should grace;" on the same principle, personal habiliments would be arranged with feminine delicacy and simplicity. Lavater's text, makes dress a table of contents; what would he say to the disDigression is a traveller's privilege, mantled figures in the present day? we carelessly proved it so. After receiving information where to turn to the right and left; and when to pursue a direct road to Ephrata, lady like, we took the angles when we should have followed the strait line, and in lieu mo and through a country rich in blessings of private friendship, with quinces and we marked the "dew of heaven and cream, we met our dessert at Reams fast a gentleman of the Law, politely seat us several numbers of this li erary Journal, which with a poetical letter from a married lady in Philadephia, combined to brighten the hours, till we recommenced our journey, twenty miles of which was dreary and wet, in a north east direction. We bent our course towards Allentown, here the scene was beautifully varied, the village is pleasantly situated, a branch of the Lehigh passes along its borders and is so perfectly transparent that be burnished with the rays of an unclouded Sun. And o'er the world of waters, blue and wides town. Our evil genius led us to a public house, four miles beyond the settlement of religious Germans, wnither we were directed to wait the arrival of P, whom business detained two hours in the rear of our party; when we met, he rallied us on the want of discernment, in exchanging the sweets anticipated at Kingmaker's, for the unripe fruits at a democratick tavern. By this mistake, we avoided meridian heat, and in the afternoon proceeded at our leisure to Reading. Fording the Schuylkill, reimpres-neath its fair surface, every pebble was sed on our minds those scenes with which we were familiarised, by local attachment and youthful prediliction. A swift current seemed impatiently winding away to our native city; sighs were wafted on the evening gale, mixed with a tender orison. I can not tell why this place is admired. The inhabitants expatiated on its pleasant situation, civility forbade us to say it was dull and uninteresting; we amus ed ourselves with watching the county court of Swallows, which we concluded was now in session: the number and various sized birds that crowded to the court house and made their entrance at the chimney top, led us to suppose an important cause was pending; we listened attentively to this novel judicatory, as we associated ideas of legal wisdom and oratorial graces with the learned profession, but the moment their point of elevation was obtained, zeal and fluttering agitation subsided into profound silence; whether the court decision was a sine-cure and slothful ease its consequence, or if Morpheus had pronounced a verdict, which sealed their eyes and voices, to us was immaterial. With the dawn we heard them twittering at the window, amusing themselves, when we were not disposed for a serenade; the feathered tribe are the most interesting part of animated nature. In The Port Folio, I met with a little history of "Marine birds," highly gratifying to my curiosity and taste; it was a translation from the French. I have sought in vain, for further information from the same elegant source. After break The river takes a serpentine course which brings you to a second ford, «nd by a verdant ascent, you enter Bethlehem. Its local position is so advan tageous that every spot wears the luxuriance of a garden, and abounds with simple yet striking imagery. It was the anniversary of the Moravian establishment, and observed as a religious festival. The Nuns in snow-white garments, were sitting on sylvan seats, the grass their carpet, and the sky their canopy. Neither Monk nor Frier was visible, though without the aid of magick, Fancy metamorphosed this monastick ground into a thousand grotesque forms; and invested the demure recluse, with the mantle grey, and the cowl. We travelled forty miles this day, and were anxious to relieve our harrassed spirits, by a calm night's rest at the inn. The next day came a mirthful being in whom the American traveller will recognize "Father Thomas," his cheerfulness and indiscriminate civility, seemed the result of kindness of heart; but what should make him such a perfect philanthropist, that he can thus embrace all ages and sexes with equal warmth? He was our guide to the Convent, at the door of which, we were received by one of the superiours of the house; Father Thomas introduced her as sis ter Mary, she called herself Miss Gill. Neither the look demure nor the |