4

are flying in the next crowd; till, if he met them there, he would find the component parts of each precifely the fame. He would hear the fame ftated phrafes interrupted, not answered, by the fame ftated, replies, the unfinished fentence "driven

adverfe to the winds," by preffing mul, titudes; the fame warm regret mutually exchanged by two friends (who had; been exprefsly denied to each other all the winter) that they had not met before; the fame foft and finiling forrow at being torn away from each other now; the fame, avowed anxiety to renew the meeting, with perhaps the fame fecret refolution to avoid it. He would hear defcribed with the fame pathetic earneftnefs the difficulties of getting into this house, and the dangers of getting out of the laft! the perilous retreat of former nights, effected amidst the fhock of chariots, and, the clang of contending coachmen! a retreat in deed effected with a fkill and peril little inferior to that of the ten thousand, and

detailed

detailed with far jufter triumph: for that which happened only once in a life to the Grecian hero, occurs to these British heroines every night. There is one point of refemblance, indeed, between them in which the comparison fails; for the commander,' with a mauvaise honte at which a true female veteran would blush, is remarkable for never naming himself. 90 vi

With

myfterious reverence" I for bear to defcant on thofe ferious and interefting rites, for the more auguft and folemn celebration of which Fafhion nightly convenes these splendid myriads to her more fumptuous temples. Rites! which, when engaged in with due devotion, abforb the whole foul, and call every paflion into exercife, except indeed thofe of love, and peace, and kindness, and gentleness. Inspiring rites! which ftimulate fear, roufe hope, kindle zeal, quicken dulnefs, fharpen difcernment, exercise memory, inflame cu

4

riofity!

riofity! Rites! in fhort, in the due performance of which all the energies and attentions, all the powers and abilities, all the abstraction and exertion, all the diligence and devotedness, hall the facrifice of time, all the contempt of cafe, all the neglect of fleep, all the oblivion of care, all the risks of fortune (half of which, if directed to their true. objects, would change the very face of the world): all these are concentrated to one point; a point in which the wife and the weak, the learned and the ignorant, the fair and the frightful, the fprightly and the dull, the rich and the poor, the patrician and plebeian, meet in one common and uniform equality; an equality as religioufly refpected in these folemnities, in which all diftinctions are levelled at a blow, and of which the very spirit is therefore democratical, as it is combated in all other inftances,

Behold

Behold four Kings in majefty rever'd,

With hoary whiskers and a forked beard ;

And four fair Queens, whofe hands sustain a flow'r,a The expreffive emblem of their fofter pow'r;

Four Knaves in garbs fuccinct, a trufty band,

Caps on n their ha

heads, and halberts in their hand;

And party-colour'd troops, a fhining train, forth to combat on the velvet plain *.

Drawn to

On public amufements. : ansbiog

Ir is not propofed to enter the long contefted field of controverfy as to the individual amufements which may be confidered as fafe and lawful for those women of the higher clafs who make a strict profeffion of Chriftianity. The judgment they will be likely to form for themselves on the fubject, and the plan they will confequently adopt, will depend much on the clearness or obfcurity of their religious views, and on the greater or lefs progrefs they have made in their Chriftian course. It is in their choice of amusements that you are able, in fome measure, to get acquainted with the real difpofitions of mankind. In their bufinefs, in the leading employments of life, their path is in a good degree chalked