the world!-that the catching a little fifh in another quarter of the globe, or a conteft for a little dominion, in a land of favages, fhould arm nation against nation,-make them fufpend all the graces of courtefy,-and involve fuch legions of wretches in the complicated miseries of war!

THE

THE OLD SERVANT.

THE reflected light from the white cliffs of FRANCE, on which my eyes were fixed, made them appear to prefs forward on my fight; and while my imagination was taking a frifk from the STREIGHTS OF DOVER, to the MEDITERRANEAN, and dropping a figh, over political neceffity-I found I had thrown the reins of my horfe on his neck, who had taken the advantage of my inattention, to pick up a little clover that grew by the way-fide.

-Nay,-if it be thy will, old companion, fays I, e'en take the other bite; the farmer will be never the poorer for the mouthful thou fhalt carry away;-did he know thy good quali

C 3

qualities, he would let thee eat thy

fill.

-I will not interrupt thy pleafurable moments,fo prithee feed on.Long have I wished an occafion to record thy deferts, thou faithful. old. fervant! It now prefents itself,and thou fhalt have a page in my book, though it provoke the fneer of the critic. It is thy due, for thou haft given me health.-Full many a year haft thou journeyed with me, through the uneven ways of the world! -We have tugged up many a fteep hill, and borne the buffet of the tempest together!-I have had the labours of thy youth, and thy age hath a claim on me, which, while I have fixpence in my pocket, I dare not refufe.

-Thou shalt not, when thy strength

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is

is exhausted, be configned to poverty and toil!-or, as thou paffeft by my door, lashed on by fome unfeeling owner, look at me with the fevere eye of reproach!

-Had THAT HAND, which fafhioned us both, endued thy fpecies with the faculty of fpeech, in what bitterness of heart would they complain of the ingratitude of ours!

-In the wide extent of the animal reign, there fcarce exifts an object from which man may not borrow fome useful hint;-thou, my trusty friend, haft offered me no inconfiderable one-thou never aimedst to appear what thou waft not;-a. steady walk, or a cheerful trot, was all thou attemptedst-nay, perhaps it was as much as thy mafter himself afpired to; -and when remembrance shall be

weighing thy merits, the fcale fhall: turn in thy favor, when I reflect, that thou scornedft to defert the path of nature for the perilous one of affectation!

-Is it not owing to this error, that fo many nags, whom Providence had deftined for the plough, or the shaft, are daily provoking a horse-laugh in: the world, by awkwardly ftriving to. imitate the graces of the turf, or the caprioles of the manage?.

THE