"across the opening. I had no time to give way "to the horrors which rufhed into my mind at

this mournful fight; my adverfary's fword was "drawn, and any more delay would have looked "like fear. I drew mine alfo; determined, how

ever, to act only on the defenfive, and, if pof

fible, to difarm my enemy. This I was able to "effect without much difficulty, as fencing had "been one of the favourite exercifes of my 66 youth.

"Near the fpot where we fought, there was a grove of trees, among which the wind was making a mournful noife, while the leaves were

whirling in eddies about us. My adverfary's "weapon lay on the ground, and I knew that, "under our prefent circumftances, my superior skill "might not avail me if he recovered it. I felt,

however, fo overpowered by my fituation, that I "ftood still while he ftooped to take up his fword. "At that moment I thought I heard a thick pant"ing among the trees my mind misgave me,

and my hand lost its vigour. In the mean time my adverfary preffed on, and paffed his weapon through my fword-arm. Immediately a violent

❝ fhriek

«fhriek iffued from the fpot where the panting

was heard; and fuddenly the form of her on "whofe account my blood was flowing food be"fore us. The dear unhappy lady ftaggered into my arms, and could only pronounce my unfortu She was inftantly conveyed home,

(

6C nate name.

and, as I afterwards learned, breathed her laft in a "few days after this wretched interview. The " phyfician, by whom I had been attended, had been "fent for; and the furgeon, obferving my wound "to bleed faft, conveyed me to my lodgings. No"thing can be more vain than to attempt a de"fcription of fuch feelings as were mine, long after "this melancholy event. The wound in my arm *C was prefently cured; but what can ever cure "the wounds of my heart, but the phyfician that cures all, the grave? This, Sir, is the great "misfortune of my life:

what I have fuffered

«fince, I count for nothing in comparison. It is "this which has bent down my pride and my am“bition, and laid to fleep all the fervors of my "mind. It is this which has made me the man "of melancholy which you fee before you; which "has, as it were, ftripped my foul of its regalia, Q 6 " and

" and taken from me the command of my powers "and capacities.

"Notwithstanding, however, the debility of my "mind, in the midst of these misfortunes, I was "called forth into a scene very different from those "in which I had hitherto acted, and which de"manded fuch exertions as I had been well able to

bring to it about two years before this event.

My friend the physician, who had always acted "towards me with a kindness and generofity that "could only have been inspired by that best of

women, of whofe charities he had been the agent, "brought me the news, one morning, of his ha❝ving procured me a commiffion in one of the

regiments that were then going to serve in Ger

many. I have before obferved to you, that the

impreffions of my childhood have never been "eradicated. I felt a faint revival of the old en"thufiafm, not enough to have carried me out of

my country, had my country been any longer "agreeable to me; but enough to influence a man "fo far gone in defpair, as hardly to have a choice "between life and death, and yet so far under the "dominion of ancient habits, as to feel a kind of

"mecha

"mechanical love to the foldier's profeffion. Be"fore I fet out on this new career, I had just time "to take leave of my parents in the country, whom "I found ftill enamoured of the young stranger "whofe acquaintance they had just made when L "6 was laft at home."

N° 50.

SATURDAY, APRIL 20.

Tuque, o fanctiffime Conjux,

Felix morte tua, neque in hunc fervata dolorem. VIRGIL.

And thou, dear partner of his toil, repofe,

Bleft in thy death, nor fav❜d for weightier woes.

I MAY fafely affert, that no foldier ever began

"his fortunes, armed with greater intrepidity than "myself, though I confefs that this intrepidity was "borrowed rather from the desperation of my cir"cumstances than the ardour of my mind. The re"mains, however, of former impreffions were still "alive enough within me, to mount into fome de<c gree of enthusiasm, when furrounded by objects " of enterprise and courage, and all the spirit-stir"ring apparatus of a moving army. There is "fomething too, in a common participation of "danger, which by clofer drawing the knot of "amity, and awakening the focial and benevolent

"affections,

"affections, gives to the spirits a fort of fpring and "hilarity which the happieft occafions cannot "always inspire.

"I fhall not fatigue you with a history of the

campaigns in which I ferved, much less with a "general account of this deftructive war, in which "fo much of English blood was shed, and fo much "of English valour displayed. The history of "wars is but a dull theme, involving a number of "wearifome repetitions, and furnishing but one "mournful inference of a general kind. It teaches

r

us only to conclude, that man can cheerfully go "on to maffacre and to plunder, without regard "to the authority of reafon or religion, in the pur"fuit of a vain and criminal glory, derived from. "the multiplied deftruction of his fellow-crea"tures: yet, while we are compelled to acknow"ledge that war is in itself a proof of the corrup❝tion of our general nature, we may ftill confider "it as a theatre in which the moft generous qua"lities of our mind are exercifed, and in which "virtue meets with more fplendid and trying op"portunities of exertion, than in the comparatively calm and equable courfe of common life. This re

“mark,