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Lady Teaz. And I dared say you'd make a very good sort of a husband.

Sir Pet. And you prophesied right; and we shall now be the happiest couple

Lady Teaz. And never differ again?

Sir Pet. No, never!-though at the same time, indeed, my dear Lady Teazle, you must watch your temper very seriously; for in all our little quarrels, my dear, if you recollect, my love, you always began first.

Lady Teaz. I beg your pardon, my dear Sir Peter; indeed, you always gave the provocation.

Sir Pet. Now see, my angel! take care- contradicting isn't the way to keep friends.

Lady Teaz. Then don't you begin it, my love!

You don't per

Sir Pet. There, now! you-you are going on. ceive, my love, that you are just doing the very thing which you know always makes me angry.

Lady Teaz. Nay, you know if you will be angry without any reason, my dear

Sir Pet.

There! now you want to quarrel again.

Lady Teaz. No, I'm sure I don't; but, if you will be so peevish
Sir Pet, There now! who begins first?

Lady Teaz. Why, you, to be sure. I said nothing but there's no bearing your temper.

Sir Pet. No, no, madam; the fault's in your own temper.

Lady Teaz. Ay, you are just what my cousin Sophy said you would be.

Sir Pet. Your cousin Sophy is a forward, impertinent gypsy. Lady Teaz. You are a great bear, I'm sure. to abuse my relations. Sir Pet. Now may all the plagues of marriage be doubled on me, if ever I try to be friends with you any more!

Lady Teaz. So much the better.

Sir Pet. No, no, madam: 'tis evident you never cared a pin for me, and I was a madman to marry you- —a pert, rural coquette, that had refused half the honest squires in the neighborhood.

Lady Teaz. And I am sure I was a fool to marry you- - an old dangling bachelor, who was single at fifty, only because he never could meet with any one who would have him.

Sir Pet. Ay, ay, madam; but you were pleased enough to listen to me: you never had such an offer before.

Lady Teaz. No! didn't I refuse Sir Tivy Terrier, who everybody said would have been a better match? for his estate is just as good as yours, and he has broke his neck since we have been married.

Sir Pet. I have done with you, madam. You are an unfeeling, ungrateful - but there's an end of everything. I believe you capable of everything that is bad. Yes, madam, I now believe the reports relative to you and Charles, madam. Yes, madam, you and Charles are, not without grounds

Lady Teaz. Take care, Sir Peter! you had better not insinuate any such thing! I'll not be suspected without cause, I promise you.

Sir Pet. Very well, madam! very well! A separate maintenance as soon as you please. Yes, madam, or a divorce! I'll make an example of myself for the benefit of all old bachelors. Let us separate, madam.

Lady Teaz. Agreed! agreed! And now, my dear Sir Peter, we are of a mind once more; we may be the happiest couple, and never differ again, you know; ha! ha! ha! Well, you are going to be in a passion, I see, and I shall only interrupt you — so, bye, bye? [Exit.

Sir Pet. Plagues and tortures! can't I make her angry either! O, I am the most miserable fellow! But I'll not bear her presuming to keep her temper: no! she may break my heart, but she shan't keep her temper. [Exit.

CHAPTER XIX.

WALTER SCOTT.

1771-1832. (Manual, pp. 376-395.)

FROM "THE LAY OF THE LAST MINSTREL." 254. DESCRIPTION of Melrose Abbey.

If thou wouldst view fair Melrose aright,
Go visit it by the pale moonlight;
For the gay beams of lightsome day
Gild but to flout the ruins gray.

When the broken arches are black in night,
And each shafted oriel glimmers white;
When the cold light's uncertain shower
Streams on the ruined central tower;

When buttress and buttress, alternately,
Seem framed of ebon and ivory;

When silver edges the imagery,

And the scrolls that teach thee to live and die;

When distant Tweed is heard to rave,

And the owlet to hoot o'er the dead man's grave,

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Then go
but go alone the while
Then view St. David's ruined pile;
And, home returning, soothly swear,
Was never scene so sad and fair!

255. Love of Country.

Breathes there a man with soul so dead,
Who never to himself hath said,

This is my own, my native land?
Whose heart hath ne'er within him burned,
As home his footsteps he hath turned

From wandering on a foreign strand?
If such there breathe, go mark him well;
For him no minstrel raptures swell;
High though his titles, proud his name,
Boundless his wealth as wish can claim;

Despite those titles, power, and pelf,
The wretch, concentred all in self,
Living, shall forfeit fair renown,
And, doubly dying, shall go down
To the vile dust, from whence he sprung,
Unwept, unhonored, and unsung,

O Caledonia! stern and wild,
Meet nurse for a poetic child!

Land of brown heath and shaggy wood,
Land of the mountain and the flood,
Land of my sires! what mortal hand
Can e'er untie the filial band

That knits me to thy rugged strand?
Still as I view each well-known scene,
Think what is now, and what hath been,
Seems as to me, of all bereft,

Sole friends thy woods and streams were left;
And thus I love them better still,

Even in extremity of ill.

FROM "MARMION."

256. PITT AND Fox.

To mute and to material things
New life revolving summer brings :
The genial call dead nature.hears,
And in her glory reappears.
But, O! my country's wintry state
What second spring shall renovate?
What powerful call shall bid arise
The buried warlike and the wise!

The mind that thought for Britain's weal,
The hand that grasped the victor's steel?
The vernal sun new life bestows,

E'en on the meanest flower that blows;

But vainly, vainly may he shine,
Where glory weeps o'er Nelson's shrine,
And vainly pierce the solemn gloom

That shrouds, O Pitt, thy hallowed tomb!

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Hadst thou but lived, though stripped of power, A watchman on the lonely tower,

Thy thrilling trump had roused the land,

When fraud and danger were at hand;

By thee, as by the beacon-light,

Our pilots had kept course aright;

As some proud column, though alone,

Thy strength had propped the tottering throne. Now is the stately column broke,

The beacon-light is quenched in smoke,

The trumpet's silver sound is still,
The warder silent on the hill!

O! think how to his latest day,

When Death, just hovering, claimed his prey, With Palinure's unaltered mood,

Firm at his dangerous post he stood;

Each call for needful rest repelled,

With dying hand the rudder held,
Till, in his fall, with fateful sway,
The steerage of the helm gave way;
Then, while on Britain's thousand plains,
One unpolluted church remains,

Whose peaceful bells ne'er sent around
The bloody tocsin's maddening sound,
But still upon the hallowed day,
Convoke the swains to praise and pray;
While faith and civil peace are dear,
Grace this cold marble with a tear,

He who preserved them

Pitt, lies here!

Nor yet suppress the generous sigh, Because his rival slumbers nigh;

Nor be thy requiescat dumb,

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Lest it be said o'er Fox's tomb, -
For talents mourn, untimely lost,
When best employed and wanted most;
Mourn genius high and lore profound,
And wit that loved to play, not wound;
And all the reasoning powers divine,
To penetrate, resolve, combine;
And feelings keen and fancy's glow, -
They sleep with him who sleeps below;
And, if thou mourn'st they could not save
From error him who owns this grave,
Be every harsher thought suppressed,
And sacred be the last long rest.
Here, where the end of earthly things
Lays heroes, patriots, bards, and kings;
Where stiff the hand, and still the tongue,
Of those who fought, and spoke, and sung:
Here, where the fretted aisles prolong
The distant notes of holy song,

As if some angel spoke again,

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