I faw the peasant stooping to his plough
And whistling time away; I met a form,
Fair as a fabled nymph; Nature had spread
Her toilette, health her handmaid dealt the bloom,

Simplicity attir'd her, by the copfe

Skirting the horn-beam row, where violets bud
And the first primrose opens to the spring,
With her fond lover arm in arm the walk'd,
Not with the stealthy step and harlot leer
Of guilty affignation, nor unnerv'd
By midnight feast or revel, but in prime
Of youth and health and beauty's genuine glow:
I mark'd the conscious look of honest truth,
That greets the paffenger with eye direct,
Nor fears nor meditates surprize; my heart
Yearn'd at the fight and as they pass'd I cried-
"Why was it not my fortune to have faid
"Go, and be happy?"-On a rising slope
Full to the fouth the stately mansion stands,
Where dwells the master of this rich domain;
Plain and of chafte proportion the device,
Not libell'd and bedawb'd with tawdry frize
Or lac'd pilafter, patcht with refuse scraps,
Like that fraternal pile on Thames's bank,
Which draws it's title not it's taste from Greece.
Happy! if there in rural peace he dwells,
Untortur'd by ambition, and enjoys
An eye for nature and a heart for man.

N°. XCVI.

U

N° XCVI.

Οὐκ ἔσαμαι πλετῶιν ἔτ ̓ ἔυχομαι, ἀλλὰ μοι εἴη
Ζῆν ἀπὸ τῶν ὀλίγων μηδὲν ἔχοντι κακόν.

(Theognis.)

" I ask not wealth; let me enjoy
“An humble lot without annoy!"

PON my arrival at the house I was shewn into a small room in the base-story, which the owner of this fine place usually occupied and in which he now received me: here I had been but a very few minutes before he proposed to shew me the house, and for that purpose conducted me up stairs to the grand apartment, and from thence made the entire tour, without excepting any one of the bedchambers, offices or even closets in the house: I cannot say my friend Attalus consulted times and feafons in chusing so early a moment after my arrival for parading me about in this manner; fome of the apartments were certainly very splendid; a great deal of rich furniture and many fine pictures folicited my notice; but the fatigue of so ill-timed a perambulation disabled me from expreffing expreffing that degree of admiration, which seemed to be expected on this occafion, and which on any other I should have been forward to bestow: I was forry for this, because I believe he enjoyed little other pleasure in the poffeffion of his house, befides this of shewing it; but it happened to my hoft, as it does too frequently to the owners of fine places, that he mifled the tri-. bute of flattery by too great eagernefs in exacting it.

It appeared to me that Attalus was no longer the gay lively man he was formerly; there was a gloom upon his countenance and an inquietude in his manner, which seemed to lay him under a conftraint that he could not naturally get rid of: Time hung heavy on our hands till the hour of dinner, and it was not without regret I perceived he had arranged his family meals upon the fashionable system of London hours, and at the diftance of two hundred miles from the capital had by choice adopted those very habits, which nothing but the general custom of late affemblies and long fittings in Parliament can excufe upon the plea of neceffity: It was now the midft of fummer, which made the absurdity of fuch a difpofition of our time more glaring, for whilft the best hours of the afternoon were devoted to the table, all exercise and enjoyment out of doors

were either to be given up, or taken only in the meridian heat of the day. I discovered a further bad confequence of these habits upon society and good-fellowship, for such of the neighbouring gentry, who had not copied his example, were deterred from making him any visits, not prefuming to disturb him at unsuitable hours, and yet not able, without a total disarrangement of their own comforts, to make their time conform to his. Attalus himself, I must acknowledge, both saw and confeffed the bad system he was upon, he found himself grown unpopular amongst his country neighbours on this very score, and was piqued by their neglect of him : "It was a villainous custom," he observed, " and destructive " both of health and pleasure; but all people of " fashion dined at five, and what could he do? " He must live as other great families lived; if in" deed he was a mere private gentleman, he might " do as he liked best." If it be so, thought I, this man's great fortune is an incumbrance to him; if it robs him of health and pleasure, what does it give him, nay what can it give him, in compensation for the loss of fuch blessings? If fashion takes away from Attalus the liberty of doing what he best likes, and is best for him,' I must have been mistaken in supposing independance was the result of affluence; I suspect there

1

are

are not all the advantages in his conditon which I fuppofed there were-I will examine this more narrowly.

The next morning, after a late breakfast, the consequence I had foreseen ensued, for we were advanced into the hottest hours of the day, when Attalus, being impatient to shew me the beauties of his park and grounds, gave orders for the equipages and horfes to be made ready, and we were to fet out upon the survey in a burning fun. When the train was in waiting at the door, we fallied forth, but here a difcuffion began, in which so many things required a new arrangement, that a long stop was put to our march, whilft the fcrutinizing eye of Attalus was employed in a minute examination of every thing appertaining to the cavalry and carriages, the horfes were wrong harneffed, they were to be changed from the off-fide to the near-fide, faddles were to be altered, and both groom and coachman were heartily recommended to repeated damnation for their stupidity and inattention-" Never any " man was fo plagued with rafcally fervants as I "am," cried Attalus; "they are the curse and "vexation of my life; I wish I could live with" out them; no man can be happy, who has to " do with them." - Is it fo? (faid I within myself) then I have the advantage over you in that refpect