at least the best, is to serve in terrorem to others, when occasion may happen to offer, that they may escape (so far as my admonitions can have any weight with them) my folly and my fate. When you feel yourself tempted to relax a little of the strictness of your present discipline, and to indulge in amusement incompatible with your future interests, think on your friend at Weston. Having said this, I shall next, with my whole heart invite you hither, and assure you that I look forward to approaching August with great pleasure; because it promises me your company. After a lit tle time (which we shall wish longer) spent with us, you will return invigorated to your studies, and pursue them with the more advantage. In the mean time you have lost little, in point of season, by being confined to London. Incessant rains, and meadows under water, have given to the summer the air of winter, and the country has been deprived of half its beauties. It is time to tell you that we are all well, and often make you our subject. This is the third meeting that my Cousin and we have had in this country; and a great instance of good fortune I ac count it in such a world as this, to have expected such a pleasure thrice without being once disappointed. Add to this wonder as soon as you can by making yourself of the party. LETTER LXXVIII. W. C. To SAMUEL ROSE, Esqr. MY DEAR FRIEND, Weston, August 8, 1789. Come when you will, or when you can, you cannot come at a wrong time, but we shall expect you on the day mentioned. If you have any book that you think will make pleasant evening reading, bring it with you. I now read Mrs. Piozzi's Travels to the ladies after supper, and shall probably have finished them before we shall have the pleasure of seeing you. It is the fashion, I understand, to condemn them. But we, who make books ourselves, are more merciful to book-makers. I would that every fastidious judge of authors, were himself, obliged to write; there goes more to the composition of a volume than many critics imagine, I have often wondered that the same poet who wrote the Dunciad, should have written these lines, The mercy I to others show, That mercy show to me. Alas! for Pope, if the mercy he showed to others, was the measure of the mercy he received! he was the less pardonable too, because experienced in all the difficulties of composition. I scratch this between dinner and tea; a time when I cannot write much without disordering my noddle, and bringing a flush into my face. You will excuse me therefore, if through respect for the two important considerations of health and beauty, I conclude myself. Ever yours, W. C. LETTER LXXIX. To SAMUEL ROSE, Esqr. MY DEAR FRIEND, Weston, Sept. 24, 1789. You left us exactly at the wrong time, Had you stayed till now, you would have had the pleasure of hearing even my Cousin say-" I am cold."-And the still greater pleasure of being warm yourself; for I have had a fire in the study ever since you went. It is the fault of our summers that they are hardly ever warm or cold enough. Were they warmer we should not want a fire, and were they colder we should have one. I have twice seen and conversed with Mr. J. he is witty, intelligent, and agreeable beyond the common measure of men who are so. But it is the constant effect of a spirit of party to make those hateful to each other, who are truly amiable in themselves. ་ Beau sends his love; he was melancholy the whole day after your departure. W. C. LETTER LXXX. To SAMUEL ROSE, Esqr. Weston, Oct. 4, 1789. MY DEAR FRIEND, The hamper is come, and come safe; and the contents I can affirm on my own knowledge, are excellent. It chanced that another hamper and a box came by the same conveyance, all which I unpacked and expounded in the hall; my Cousin sitting, mean time, on the stairs, spectatress of the business. We diverted ourselves with imagining the manner, in which Homer would have described the scene. Detailed in his circumstantial way, it would have furnished materials for a paragraph of considerable length in an Odyssey. The straw-stuff'd hamper with his ruthless steel Which bound the lid and lip secure. Forth came The rustling package first, bright straw of wheat, Or oats, or barley; next a bottle green Throat-full, clear spirits the contents, distill'd |