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means think of taking it. No, my dearest child!' said Alphonso, 1 would on no account reveal my birth. Heaven knows I am innocent of the crime I am charged with, but the event of it is yet uncertain. I would not for the world have it known that the son of Orlando, the heir of the crown of Sardinia, was ever sus▾ pected of having committed a theft. No, Almira; I would go to my trial, obscure and unknown as I am. If I should, by the villainy of Antonio, be found guilty, my family will suffer no disgrace from my unhappy fate. If I should be pronounced innocent, as Heaven knows I am, with honour I shall then be able to discover myself to my father and my country.'

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The horror with which this sentence, so peremptorily delivered, and no less cruel than unexpected, struck Alphonso, may be better conceived than expressed.-' Is it possible,' cried Alphonso, that Antonio can be so unjust as to condemn any one unheard?'

He is satisfied,' answered the officer, with the evidence laid before him; and has commanded me, his officer of justice, to signify to you his will and pleasure; that his judgment shall not only be final and conclusive, but that you be immediately transported, agreeable to the sentence given against you.

'Heavens!' exclaimed Almira, ‘is my father then to be dragged from me?'

'He is,' returned the officer, unless, indeed, you will undertake to be his advocate, and seek his pardon from Antonio, who is of a mild and merciful disposition, and easily to be won over by your entreaty to forgive your father."

To forgive me!' cried Alphonso. 'Tell him, tell Antonio, that I spurn the idea, and would rather die than live by his favour.

Say you so replied the officer,

trial. The guard belonging to the galleys is near at hand, waiting my orders to convey you to the place of your destination; and unless you will permit your fair daughter to accompany me hack to Antonio, I shall instantly call on them to execute the sentence of the law.'

WHILE Alphonso and Rinaldo were preparing to ward off the blow intended by Antonio, every instru-Your pride will soon be put to the ment the latter could employ was industriously used to carry into execution his diabolical design, and hurl destruction on Alphonso's head. Accordingly an officer, attended by a party of soldiers, who were ordered to wait at a small distance, came to Alphonso's hut; and demanding an immediate interview, informed him, in a solemn tone of voice, that Antonio had been made acquainted with the circumstance of the very ring he had been robbed of being found concealed in his hut, and, considering that alone as a sufficient proof of his being the robber, had thought fit to order him to serve for life as a galley-slave.

Hold, monster!' cried Alphonso. I value my child's virtue before every thing the world contains, and would gladly meet the worst of deaths in preserving it.'

Say you so?' replied the officer; and immediately he called the guard to do their duty."

The ruffians no sooner began to bind the unhappy Alphonso than

Almira rent the air with her piercing cries, and entreated the officer to forbear executing the sentence: adding, that rather than her father, whom she esteemed more than life, should be carried into slavery, she would suffer every thing; and even yield herself up to the passion of Antonio, how ever she might abhor and detest him. The officer, perceiving in what manner her fears worked on her, informed Alphonso that, observing Almira likely to act in a way that would please Antonio, he should for the present stop the hands of the guards, and leave him to consider whether he would prefer the situa tion of a galley-slave to Almira's being the mistress of Antonio, whose power and wealth commanded the respect of every one throughout Sardinia.

. 'How is this?' cried Alphonso, as soon as the officer had left them. Is it possible that you would consent to be Antonio's, and prefer a life of shame and infamy to my being wretched and a slave? The very thought, my dear child, drives me almost to distraction. Sooner than Antonio should possess you this hand of mine should put an end to the existence of us both. What are chains and fetters to a mind that

is

pure and unsullied?'

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Indeed, my dear father,' answered Almira, you wrong me much. I never could harbour so vile a thought as that of giving my hand to Antonio. The very idea were at once monstrous and preposterous. Believe me, my dear father, if I affected to reconcile the thought of giving up myself to Antonio, it was only for the purpose of gaining time, in order that Rinaldo might have an opportunity of bringing an appeal before the king. But sooner than my father should go into sla very, I will even consent to accompany Antonio's officer back to his

lord and master; and you and Rinaldo shall both of you approveof the resolution I have formed.'

Rinaldo was struck with amazement, and immediately demanded of Almira what she meant, and how she could reconcile her declaration in favour of Antonio with the solemn assurances she had so repeatedly given him of her love.

Almira replied, that during her interview with Antonio Rinaldo might have it in his power to seek the king; and that, if it could not be done in time, she hoped to be able to persuade Antonio to drop all farther persecution, release Alphonso, and clear up his honour; or, if that should fail, her last expedient should be to give herself up to Antonio, upon condition of his becoming her father's friend and advocate, instead of being his enemy and persecutor, and when, buoyed up by her promises, he should order Alphonso to be declared innocent, and in consequence expect a sacrifice of her honour, as a return she would, at the very moment of expectation, stab the monster to the heart, and think her life well given if it should but tend to rescue the best of fathers from a situation too horrid to be thought of, without piercing her with the severest pangs of misery and distress.

Alphonso and Rinaldo were equally charmed at the heroic behaviour of Almira, but thought it by no means prudent that she should venture herself in the hands of Antonio, who would stop at nothing to effect her ruin: nor could Rinaldo suffer her to think a moment of so rash an expedient; adding, that it would be infinitely better for him to fly immediately to the king, and lay before him Alphonso's unhappy case. Alphonso and Almira equally approved of Rinaldo's proposal, but could not bear the thought of his leaving them at the mercy of An

tonio, whose creatures would, perhaps, before his return, be enabled to accomplish the purpose he had in view.

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A thousand projects were thought ef, but nothing held advisable to be pursued so distracted were each of them to determine the courses that should be taken as most likely to tend to their general good.

(To be continued.).

SOLITARY WALKS

sparkling train of golden constella tions; and such is thy condescending goodness, thou dispensest thy beams over the wide creation, lighting the sea-beat mariner to the wished for part, and the benighted traveller: to his journey's end; and, as the post sings through every distant age hast held a lamp to wisdom.”

What an awful stillness pervaded the dreary scene! How different from the bustle and activity of the :living world The plotting head and palpitating heart were both at rest! The schemist no longer lamented his baffled projects, nor was the man of feeling a martyr to his acute sensabrations, proceeding from a too refined sensibility. The infant no more desired to drain the breast of its milky beverage; and talkative age had finished its long, long tale.

IN A COUNTRY CHURCH-YARD. -,

BY JOHN WEBB.

WALK II.

•Hush'd' was the pausing deep-ton'd funeral

knell,

Twelve times the clapper stroke the pausing bell;

The rooks and daws, dark tenants of the tow'r,

Caught the alarm, and croak'd the midnight,

hour:

Complacent sleep! kind Nature's loveliest' law!

Had stretch'd the peasant on his bed of

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While absorpt in meditation, me. thought I heard the tread of an unwelcome foot, that was trespassing upon my solitude; but it proved only the echo of mine own footsteps.

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Like Nelson, made Britannia's thunders roll
From northern Thule to the southern pole.

What countless numbers crowd this hallow'd
spot,

Their useful lives, their humble names, forgot!

Assist me, recollection, to review

The various characters of those I knew.

In yon short grave is my Clarissa laid,
A tender flower, that blossom'd but to fade;
Too delicate a texture to sustain
The fierce assaults of agonising pain.
Thrice bappy infant! thou shalt weep no

more;

Thou'rt landed on a pleasurable shore;
Escap'd each threat'ning wave and beating

storm,

And wear'st' in heaven a cherub's glittering

form.

Millions, when day's bright lamp shall cease to burn,

Will wish, like thee, they'd found an early

Then king's, divested of their regal state,
Would give their years of fame for thy short
date:

Heroes would with their boasted laurels part,
To gain, blest, babe! thine innocence of

heart.

Then impious Voltaire, the proud wit of

France,

Will view with envious eye, thy happy ignorance.'

Author's Manuscript Poem. Near the walls of the sacred fane are laid the remains of eccentric Ambrose, a singular character, who dwelt secluded from society, and spent his time in mathematical researches, and in endeavouring to find out the longitude, hoping to gain the reward which the legislature offered for the discovery. Though fond of solving the problems of Euclid, he was by profession a son of Esculapius, and possessed much medical knowledge, and oft imparted ease to the tortured frames of those who personally applied to him; but neither promises nor rewards could prevail with him to quit his cottage to visit any of his patients. Were I to record his eccentricities they would provoke risibility, which the seriousness of my subject for bids. Therefore shall only observe

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While others joy in dull seclusion find,
Mine be the pleasures of a social mind;
Mine, the soft bliss that waits the nuptial
tie,

I And mine the charms of sweet society;
Mine be the philanthropic wish, t'embrace,
In one warm ample fold, the human race."
Manuscript Poem.

Behind the church, where rest in obscurity the parish dead, old Wil liam, a tippling mechanic, reposes, who travelled the country an itinerant carpenter, contracting debts, which he never discharged; but, though folly was a prominent fea ture in his character,

He wisely shunn'd the incumbrance * of a wife.'

A short time before his death, being at an ale-house, he said, 'tis a saying that Church-goers will swear, Presbyterians will lie, Methodists will cant, and Quakers will cheat; and I believe I can do a little of them all.'

He was, however, a favourite with the youthful tribe, and by making their bats and wickets contributed to their pleasure, by furnishing them with the means to procure

it.

For he was one in all their idle spert,
And, like a monarch, rul'd their little court.
The pliant bow he form'd, the fiying ball;
The bat, the wicket, were his labours all.

Being about to retire from the so-
lemn spot,
the reflections occasioned
by a review of the last character

The fair reader, perhaps, will be ready to call me, and may deem an apology needful, for my deeming any of her sex an incum brance. I grant, and by pleasing experience I affirm, that a wife is a very desirable actress in-the domestic scene, and well calculated to add charms to the happy fire-side. But a poor itinerant pedestrian always finds to his

cost, that a female companion is the most cumbrous part of his baggage.

gave rise to the following apostrophe.

Gracious Heaven! may I be enabled, by thy assistance, to act an useful honourable part on earth, that, when my body moulders in the darksome tomb, my memory may bloom in the remembrance of my friends and relatives.—

'Only the actions of the just Smell sweet, and blossom in the dust.' Haverhill.

ANECDOTE OF MICHAEL ANGELO,

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(From Duppa's Life and Literary Works of Michael Angelo Buonarotti.”)

WHEN Michael Angelo pursued his profession in his father's house he produced a statue of a sleeping Cupid that advanced his reputation; and as, at this period, the discoveries of antiquity, which made a new æra in art and literature, were found sometimes to betray the judgment into too great an enthusiasm for those remains, it was suggested to him by a friend of his, one Pier Francesco, that if it could be supposed an antique it would not fail to be equally admired. He adopted the thought, and stained the marble so as to give it the desired appearance; and his friend sent it to Rome, consigned to a proper person to carry on the deception; who after burying it in his vineyard dug it up, and then reported the discovery. The deception completely succeeded, and the statue was bought by cardinal St. Giorgio, for two hundred ducats; of which sum, however, Michael Angelo only received thirty.

The cardinal had not been long in the possession of his new purchase before he was given to understand that he was deceived; and that, instead of its being an antique, it was the work of a modern artist in

Florence. He felt indignant at the imposition, and immediately sent a gentleman of his household to Florence, on purpose to learn the truth. No sooner was Michael Angelo discovered to be the sculptor, than the most flattering cominendation was bestowed upon his merit; and he was strongly recommended to visit Rome, as the proper theatre for the exercise of his great talents. As an additional inducement, he was promised to be introduced into the cardinal's service, and given to expect that he would recover the whole sum for which his statue had been sold. Michael Angelo felt these advantages, and without further hesitation returned with the gentleman to Rome. The person who sold the statue was arrested, and obliged to refund the money; but Michael Angelo was not benefited, nor was the cardinal afterward sufficiently complaisant to reward him with encouragement who had been the means of mortifying his pride.

A CHINESE ANECDOTE.

THERE was a certain intendant of a province in China, who, out of regard to a particular friend of his, made him chief justice of the city in which he resided. It happened that the intendant, on a sudden, became inaccessible; and, under pretext of indisposition, would neither do business nor be seen. The chief justice was extremely concerned at this behaviour: he came often to his house, but was denied admittance: at last, however, it was granted him; and, when he entered, he found the intendant in a very melancholy posture. He entreated his friend not to conceal from him the cause of his trouble of mind.

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