devour kouskous, a fattening diet, as our modern agriculturists blow out the hides of prize cattle with oil-cakes.

On the contrary, in England, France, and many other countries, the men admire what is termed an elegant figure, and is the very reverse of the en bon point. A lusty lady is set down (right or wrong) for a landlord's, a butcher's, or a tallow-chandler's wife. But exceptions are to be found even in them, of which our Squire is a proof. No man envied him his lumping pennyworth; but all men, condemning the insult offered to his less bulky but more beautiful wife, exclaimed:

"Is Virtue then

Given to make us wretched? Ah, sad portion!
Fatal to all that have thee! Shunn'd on earth,
Depress'd, and shewn but in severest trials,
Condemn'd to solitude, then shining most
When black obscurity surrounds: poor, poor,
But ever beautiful!"

CHAPTER IV.

YOUTHFUL FOLLY NEVER ARRIVES AT MANHOOD, BUT SINKS INTO SECOND DOTAGE: THIS WAS THE SQUIRE'S CASE. THE MALIGNITY AND DARK INTRIGUES OF GREAT FOLKS, AND THE ONLY MEANS OF COUNTERACTING THEM.

THE glow of warm blood, the vigour of youth, and the strong powers of imagination represent the morning of life, like the morning of day, when every thing is fresh and cheerful, and invites to enjoyment and pleasure. Love, pastime, and even business, are pursued with delight. Every thing appears charming, as in the season of spring, inspires us with rapture, and beckons us to bliss. But as all sublunary transports have but a transitory existence, a full meal is sure to blunt the edge which a slight taste gives to our appetites. Therefore those who seek no higher enjoyment than from the passions, will be sure to experience satiety in

their indulgence, as nature has doomed us to weariness in all the unrestrained gratifications of our senses. Whilst the passions are in full force, we can no more expect perfect command of them, than of a young colt never before backed. If, with time, the colt becomes a serviceable steady horse, he is the more valuable for that fire which it still retains; but if it continues restive beyond the middle age, it may be given over as vicious. Those only continue happy, who take the precaution of laying in an early stock of those things which contribute to permanent satisfaction; these are pleasures of a less violent nature, but of a much longer duration. This store must consist of virtue, knowledge, and temperance, the needful components of felicity.

Youth, therefore, to be happy, must acquire some of the attainments of age, which can be only drawn by reason from the experience of grey heirs. It is in the dispensing of its knowledge that age appears venerable, and, indeed, it has very little other business in the world; if it has not qualified itself for the task, it loses all its dignity; for a head grown hoary in folly is

a woeful object of pity, and almost of deri

sion.

Our passions in youth are very powerful seducers they hurry us into hasty enjoyments which often terminate in long and fruitless repentance. Against these threatening evils, which have their foundations in early life, there is no other kind of defence, than in the experience of older heads, which those are the most happy who soonest acquire and pay attention to.

The long practised in life have found the futility of all raptures, and know that there are none worth purchasing at the price of great hazards. The lover's dreams of ecstacies, and the prodigal's of high delights, are alike delusions practised by passion on reason; for in rational enjoyments, only, duration is to be found. We grow speedily sick of what we only admire; but are often lastingly gratified with what we reasonably approve.

Youth, therefore, to be happy, must acquire some of the qualities of age; and age, to be comfortable, must retain some of those of youth. The strong passions and affections of both are

alike deceitful; as, in one stage, we have not attained to the vigour of sound judgment; and in the other, we have passed it, and got into the state of second dotage, without the benefit of those restraints that were our security in our first childhood.

It appeared as if our Squire was got into this state of second dotage by his present conduct. If he had really been drawn in to marry Mrs. Fitzwaddle, he had been guilty of a most egregious piece either of duplicity or folly, as he must have been very well aware that the marriage was contrary to the established law, and must have been very silly to imagine that the tenants would have acquiesced in it. Although Joan may be as good as my lady in the dark, yet every Joan was not a lady for them in the open face of day. If, after having married Mrs. Fitzwaddle, he gave his hand to another lady, he was guilty of a very great crime, for which he had no excuse to allege but that of having forfeited his word of honour to the tenants when they paid off his former incumbrances by running into a second labyrinth of them. If, as appeared to be the case from