Yet glad she came that night to prove, A witness undescried, How much the object of her love Was lov'd by all beside. Darkness the skies had mantled o'er Darkness O Queen! ne'er call'd before On borrow'd wheels away she flies, Resolv'd to be unknown, And gratify no curious eyes That night, except her own. Arriv'd, a night like noon she sees, As all by instinct, like the bees, Had known their sov❜reign come. Pleas'd she beheld aloft pourtray'd Emblems of health, and heav'nly aid, Unlike the ænigmatic line, So difficult to spell! Which shook Belshazzar at his wine, The night his city fell. Yet let the glories of a night Like that, once seen, suffice! Heav'n grant us no such future sight, LETTER LXXIII, To SAMUEL ROSE, Esqr. The Lodge, June 5, 1789. MY DEAR FRIEND, I am going to give you a deal of trouble, but London folks must be content to be troubled by country folks; for in London only can our strange necessities be supplied. You must buy for me, if you please, a cuckow clock; and now I will tell you where they are sold, which, Londoner as you are, it is possible you may not know. They are sold, I am informed, at more houses than one, in that narrow part of Holborn which leads into broad St. Giles.' It seems they are well-going clocks, and cheap, which are the two best recommendations of any clock, They are made in Germany, and such numbers of them are annually imported, that they are become even a considerable article of commerce, I return you many thanks for Boswell's tour. I read it to Mrs. Unwin after supper, and we find it amusing. There is much trash in it, as there must always be in every narrative that relates indiscriminately all that passed. But now and then the Doctor speaks like an oracle, and that makes amends for all. Sir John was a coxcomb, and Boswell is not less a coxcomb, though of another kind. I fancy Johnson made coxcombs of all his friends, and they in return made him a coxcomb; for with reverence be it spoken, such he certainly was, and flattered as he was he was sure to be so. Thanks for your invitation to London, but unless London can come to me, I fear we shall never meet. I was sure that you would love my friend when you should once be well acquainted with him ; and equally sure that he would take kindly to you. Now for Homer. W. C. LETTER LXXIV. To the Revd. WALTER BAGOT. MY DEAR FRIEND, Weston, June 16, 1789. You will naturally suppose that the Letter in which you announced your marriage occasioned me some concern, though in my an swer I had the wisdom to conceal it. The account you gave me of the object of your choice was such as left me at liberty to form conjectures not very comfortable to myself, if my friendship for you were indeed sincere. I have since, however, been sufficiently consoled. Your Brother Chester has informed me that you have married not only one of the most. agreeable, but one of the most accomplished women in the kingdom. It is an old maxim, that it is better to exceed expectation than to disappoint it, and with this maxim in your view it was, no doubt, that you dwelt only on circumstances of disadvantage, and would not treat me with a recital of others which abundantly overweigh them. I now congratulate not you only, but myself, and truly rejoice that my friend has chosen for his fellow-traveller, through the re |