unhappy; he discontinued his former assiduity, he was quite disgusted with small gains, and his customers began to forsake him. Every day he repeated the wish, and every night laid himself down in order to dream. Fortune, that was for a long time unkind, at last, however, seemed to smile upon his distresses, and indulged him Iwith the wished-for vision. He dreamed that under a certain part of the foundation of his mill, there was concealed a monstrous pan of gold and diamonds buried deep in the ground, and covered with a large flat stone. He rose up, thanked the stars that were at last pleased to take pity on his sufferings, and concealed his good luck from every person, as is usual in money dreams, in order to have the vision repeated the two succeeding nights, by which he should be certain of its veracity. His wishes in this also were answered; he still dreamed of the same pan of money, in the very same place.

refinement. Even allowing the works of their ancestors better written than theirs, yet those of the moderns acquire a real value, by being marked with the impression of the times. Antiquity has been in the possession of others; the present is our own: let us first therefore learn to know what belongs to ourselves, and then, if we have leisure, cast our reflections back to the reign of Shonou, who governed twenty thousand years before the creation of the moon.

The volumes of antiquity, like medals, may very well serve to amuse the curious; but the works of the moderns, like the current coin of a kingdom, are much better for immediate use: the former are often prized above their intrinsic value, and kept with care; the latter seldom pass for more than they are worth, and are often subject to the merciless hands of sweating critics and clipping compilers: the works of antiquity were ever praised, those of the moderns read: the treasures of our ancestors have our esteem, and we boast the passion, those of contemporary genius engage our heart, although we blush to own it. The visits we pay the former resemble those we pay the great, the ceremony is troublesome, and yet such as we would not choose to forego; our acquaintance with modern books is like sitting with a friend, our pride is not flattered in the interview, but it gives more internal satisfaction.

Now, therefore, it was past a doubt; so getting up early the third morning, he repairs alone, with a mattock in his hand, to the mill, and began to undermine that part of the wall which the vision directed. The first omen of success that he met was a broken mug; digging still deeper, he turns up a house tile, quite new and entire. At last, after much digging, he came to the broad flat stone, but then so large, that it was beyond one man's strength to remove it. "Here," cried he, in raptures to himself, "here In proportion as society refines, new books it is under this stone there is room for a very must ever become more necessary. Savage ruslarge pan of diamonds indeed! I must e'en go ticity is reclaimed by oral admonition alone; home to my wife, and tell her the whole affair, but the elegant excesses of refinement are best and get her to assist me in turning it up." corrected by the still voice of studious inquiry. Away therefore he goes, and acquaints his wife | In a polite age, almost every person becomes a with every circumstance of their good fortune. reader, and receives more instruction from the Her raptures on this occasion may be easily press than the pulpit. The preaching Bonze imagined; she flew round his neck, and em- may instruct the illiterate peasant; but nothing braced him in an agony of joy; but those trans- less than the insinuating address of a fine writer ports, however, did not delay their eagerness can win its way to a heart already relaxed in all to know the exact sum; returning, therefore, the effeminacy of refinement. Books are necesspeedily together to the place where Whang had sary to correct the vices of the polite; but those been digging, there they found-not indeed the vices are ever changing, and the antidote should expected treasure, but the mill, their only sup- be changed accordingly-should still be new. port, undermined and fallen.

NEW BOOKS.

There are numbers in this city who live by writing new books; and yet there are thousands of volumes in every large library unread and forgotten. This, upon my arrival, was one of those contradictions which I was unable to account for. "Is it possible," said I, "that there should be any demand for new books, before those already published are read? Can there be so many employed in producing a commodity with which the market is already over-stocked; and with goods also better than any of modern manufacture?"

What at first view appeared an inconsistence, is a proof at once of this people's wisdom and

Instead, therefore, of thinking the number of new publications here too great, I could wish it still greater, as they are the most useful instruments of reformation. Every country must be instructed either by writers or preachers; but as the number of readers increases, the number of hearers is proportionably diminished, the writer becomes more useful, and the preaching Bonze less necessary.

Instead, therefore, of complaining that writers are overpaid, when their works procure them a bare subsistence, I should imagine it the duty of a state, not only to encourage their numbers, but their industry. A Bonze is rewarded with immense riches for instructing only a few, even of the most ignorant of the people; and sure the poor scholar should not beg his bread, who is capable of instructing a million.

The only danger that attends a multiplicity of publications is, that some of them may be calculated to injure rather than benefit society. But where writers are numerous, they also serve as a check upon each other; and, perhaps, a literary inquisition is the most terrible punishment that can be conceived to a literary trans-sighted presumption, promised themselves imgressor.

wanderers and orphans, whose circumstances are the way to be young at sixty-five. Sure I am too humble to expect redress, and whose dis-well able to be as merry, though not so comical, tresses are too great even for pity. Their as he. Is it not in my power to have, though not wretchedness excites rather horror than pity. so much wit, at least as much vivacity? Age, Some are without the covering even of rags, and care, wisdom, reflection, begone-I give you to others emaciated with disease: the world has the winds. Let's have t'other bottle: here's to disclaimed them; society turns its back upon the memory of Shakespeare, Falstaff, and all the their distress, and has given them up to naked- merry men of Eastcheap. ness and hunger. These poor shivering females have once seen happier days, and been fluttered into beauty. They have been prostituted to the gay luxurious villain, and are now turned out to meet the severity of winter. Perhaps, now lying at the doors of their betrayers, they sue to wretches whose hearts are insensible, or debauchees who may curse, but will not relieve them.

Why was I born a man, and yet see the sufferings of wretches I cannot relieve? Poor houseless creatures! the world will give you reproaches, but will not give you relief. The slightest misfortunes of the great, the most imaginary uneasiness of the rich, are aggravated with all the power of eloquence, and held up to engage our attention and sympathetic sorrow. The poor weep unheeded, persecuted by every subordinate species of tyranny; and every law which gives others security, becomes an enemy to them.

Why was this heart of mine formed with so much sensibility? or why was not my fortune adapted to its impulse? Tenderness, without a capacity of relieving, only makes the man who feels it more wretched than the object which sues for assistance.

REFLECTIONS IN THE BOAR'S HEAD

TAVERN, EASTCHEAP.

The improvements we make in mental acquirements only render us each day more sensible of the defects of our constitution; with this in view, therefore, let us often recur to the amusements of youth, endeavour to forget age and wisdom, and as far as innocence goes, be as much a boy as the best of them.

Let idle declaimers mourn over the degeneracy of the age; but in my opinion every age is the same. This I am sure of, that man in every season is a poor fretful being, with no other means to escape the calamities of the times but by endeavouring to forget them; for, if he attempts to resist, he is certainly undone. If I feel poverty and pain, I am not so hardy as to quarrel with the executioner, even while under correction: I find myself no way disposed to make fine speeches, while I am making wry faces. In a word, let me drink when the fit is on, to make me insensible; and drink when it is over, for joy that I feel pain no longer.

The character of old Falstaff, even with all his faults, gives me more consolation than the most studied efforts of wisdom; I here behold an agreeable old fellow forgetting age, and showing

Such were the reflections that naturally arose while I sat at the Boar's Head Tavern, still kept at Eastcheap. Here by a pleasant fire, in the very room where old Sir John Falstaff cracked his jokes, in the very chair which was sometimes honoured by Prince Henry, and sometimes polluted by his immoral merry companions, I sat and ruminated on the follies of youth; wished to be young again, but was resolved to make the best of life while it lasted; and now and then compared past and present times together. I considered myself as the only living representative of the old knight, and transported my imagination back to the times when the Prince and he gave life to the revel, and made even debauchery not disgusting. The room also conspired to throw my reflections back into antiquity; the oak floor, the Gothic window, and the ponderous chimneypiece, had long withstood the tooth of time; the watchman had gone twelve; my companions had all stolen off; and none now remained with me but the landlord. From him I could have wished to know the history of a tavern that had such a long succession of customers; I could not help thinking that an account of this kind would be a pleasing contrast of the manners of different ages; but my landlord could give me no information. He continued to doze and sot, and tell a tedious story, as most other landlords usually do, and though he said nothing, yet was never silent; one good joke followed another good joke; and the best joke of all was generally begun towards the end of a bottle. I found at last, however, his wine and his conversation operate by degrees; he insensibly began to alter his appearance; his cravat seemed quilled into a ruff, and his breeches swelled out into a fardingale. I now fancied him changing sexes; and as my eyes began to close in slumber, I imagined my fat landlord actually converted into as fat a landlady. However, sleep made but few changes in my situation; the tavern, the apartment, and the table, continued as before; nothing suffered mutation but my host, who was fairly altered into a gentlewoman, whom I knew to be Dame Quickly, mistress of this tavern in the days of Sir John; and the liquor we were drinking, which seemed converted into sack and sugar.

"My dear Mrs Quickly," cried I (for I knew her perfectly well at the first sight), "I am heartily glad to see you. How have you left Falstaff, Pistol, and the rest of our friends below stairs? Brave and hearty, I hope?" "In good sooth," replied she, "he did deserve to live for

ever; but he maketh foul work on't where he hath flitted. Queen Proserpine and he have quarrelled for his attempting a rape upon her divinity; and were it not that she still had bowels of compassion, it more than seems probable he might have been now sprawling in Tartarus."

I now found that spirits still preserve the frailties of the flesh; and that, according to the laws of criticism and dreaming, ghosts have been known to be guilty of even more than platonic affection: wherefore, as I found her too much moved on such a topic to proceed, I was resolved to change the subject, and desiring she would pledge me in a bumper, observed with a sigh that our sack was nothing now to what it was in former days: "Ah, Mrs Quickly, those were merry times when you drew sack for Prince Henry: men were twice as strong, and twice as wise, and much braver, and ten thousand times more charitable than now. Those were the times! The battle of Agincourt was a victory indeed! Ever since that we have only been degenerating; and I have lived to see the day when drinking is no longer fashionable, when men wear clean shirts, and women show their necks and arms. All are degenerated, Mrs Quickly; and we shall probably, in another century, be frittered away into beaux or monkeys. Had you been on earth to see what I have seen, it would congeal all the blood in your body (your soul, I mean). Why, our very nobility now have the intolerable arrogance, in spite of what is every day remonstrated from the press; our very nobility, I say, have the assurance to frequent assemblies, and presume to be as merry as the vulgar. See, my very friends have scarcely manhood enough to sit to it till eleven; and I only am left to make a night on't. Prithee do me the favour to console me a little for their absence by the story of your own adventures, or the history of the tavern where we are now sitting: I fancy the narrative may have something singular." "Observe this apartment," interrupted my companion; "of neat device, and excellent workmanship. In this room I have lived, child, woman, and ghost, more than three hundred years: I am ordered by Pluto to keep an annual register of every transaction that passeth here; and I have whilom compiled three hundred tomes, which eftsoons may be submitted to thy regards." "None of your whiloms or eftsoons, Mrs Quickly, if you please," I replied; "I know you can talk every whit as well as I can; for, as you have lived here so long, it is but natural to suppose you should learn the conversation of the company. Believe me, dame, at best you have neither too much sense, nor too much language to spare; so give me both as well as you can: but first, my service to you; old women should water their clay a little now and then; and now to your story."

"The story of my own adventures," replied

the vision, "is but short and unsatisfactory; for, believe me, Mr Rigmarole, believe me, a woman with a butt of sack at her elbow is never longlived. Sir John's death afflicted me to such a degree, that I sincerely believe, to drown sorrow, I drank more liquor myself than I drew for my customers: my grief was sincere, and the sack was excellent. The prior of a neighbouring convent (for our priors then had as much power as a Middlesex justice now), he, I say, it was who gave me a licence for keeping a disorderly house, upon condition that I should never make hard bargains with the clergy, that he should have a bottle of sack every morning, and the liberty of confessing which of my girls he thought proper in private every night. I had continued for several years to pay this tribute; and he, it must be confessed, continued as rigorously to exact it. I grew old insensibly; my customers continued, however, to compliment my looks while I was by, but I could hear them say I was wearing, when my back was turned. The prior, however, still was constant, and so were half his convent; but one fatal morning he missed the usual beverage, for I had incautiously drunk over night the last bottle myself. What will you have on't? The very next day Doll Tearsheet and I were sent to the house of correction, and accused of keeping a low house. In short, we were so well purified there with stripes, mortification, and penance, that we were afterwards utterly unfit for worldly conversation; though sack would have killed me had I stuck to it, yet I soon died for want of a drop of something comfortable, and fairly left my body to the care of the beadle.

"Such is my own history; but that of the tavern, where I have ever since been stationed, affords a greater variety. In the history of this, which is one of the oldest in London, you may view the different manners, pleasures, and follies, of men at different periods. You will find mankind neither better nor worse now than formerly; the vices of an uncivilised people are generally more detestable, though not so frequent, as those in polite society. It is the same luxury, which formerly stuffed your alderman with plum-porridge, and now crams him with turtle. It is the same low ambition, that formerly induced a courtier to give up his religion to please his king, and now persuades him to give up his conscience to please his minister. It is the same vanity, that formerly stained our ladies' cheeks and necks with woad, and now paints them with carmine. Your ancient Briton formerly powdered his hair with red earth like brick-dust, in order to appear frightful: your modern Briton cuts his hair on the crown, and plasters it with hog's lard and flour; and this to make him look killing. It is the same vanity, the same folly, and the same vice, only appearing different, as viewed through the glass of fashion. In a word, all mankind are a

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