-Ile tinds the lacerated lamb of anothers flock. This moment I beheld him leaning with his head against his crook, with pitious indination looking down upon it. Publishid as the Art directa Jolenson in St Pauls Church Yard May 1801. The Shepherd. 4 BOOK VII. DESCRIPTIVE PIECES. CHAP. I. SENSIBILITY. DEAR Senfibility! fource inexhausted of all that's Eternal Fountain of and this is thy divi precious in our joys, or coftly in our forrows! thou chainest thy martyr down upon his bed of ftraw, and it is thou who lifteft him up to Heaven. our feelings! It is here I trace thee, nity which firs within me not, that in fome fad and fickening moments, my foul fhrinks back upon herself, and startles at deftruction'-mère pomp of words!—but that I feel fome generous joys and generous cares beyond myself-all comes from thee, great, great Senforium of the world! which vibrates, if a hair of our head but falls upon the ground, in the remoteft defert of thy creation. Touched with thee, Eugenius draws my curtain when I languish; hears my tale of fymptoms, and blames the weather for the diforder of his nerves. Thou giveft a portion of it fometimes to the rougheft peafant who traverfes the bleakeftmountains.-He finds the lacerated lamb of another's flock. This moment I beheld him leaning with his head against his crook, with piteous inclination looking down upon it. L 5 Oh! Oh! had I come one moment fooner!-it bleeds to death -his gentle heart bleeds with it. PEACE to thee, generous fwain! I fee thou walkeft off with anguifh-but thy joys fhall balance it; for happy is thy cottage, and happy is the fharer of it, and happy are the lambs which sport about STERNE. you. 1 CHAP. II. LIBERTY AND SLAVERY. DISGUISE thyfelf as thou wilt, ftill, SLAVERY! ftill thou art a bitter draught; and though thoufands in all ages have been made to drink of thee, thou art no less bitter on that account. It is thou, LIBERTY, thrice fweet and gracious goddess, whom all in public or in private worfhip, whofe taste is grateful, and ever will be fo, till nature herfelf fhall change-no tint of words can fpot thy fnowy mantle, or chymic power turn thy fceptre into ironwith thee to smile upon him as he eats his cruft, the swain is happier than his monarch, from whofe court thou art exiled. Gracious Heaven! grant me but health, thou great Beftower of it, and give me but this fair goddess as my companion; and fhower down thy mitres, if it feems good unto thy divine providence, upon thofe heads which are aching for them. PURSUING thefe ideas, I fat down close by my table, and leaning my head upon my hand, I began to figure to myfelf the miferies of confinement. I was in a right frame for it, and fo I gave full fcope to my imagination. I WAS going to begin with the millions of my fellowcreatures born to no inheritance but flavery; but finding, however affecting the picture was, that I could not bring it nearer me, and that the multitude of fad groups in it did but diftract me I TOOK a fingle captive, and having first fhut him up in in his dungeon, I then looked through the twilight of his grated door to take his picture. I BEHELD his body half wafted away with long expectation and confinement, and felt what kind of fickness of the heart it was which arifes from hope deferred. Upon looking nearer, I saw him pale and feverish: in thirty years the weftern breeze had not once fanned his blood-he had feen no fun, no moon, in all that time. -nor had the voice of friend or kinsman breathed through his lattice. His children—— BUT here my heart began to bleed-and I was forced to go on with another part of the portrait. He was fitting upon the ground upon a little straw, in the furtheft corner of his dungeon, which was alternately his chair and bed: a little calendar of fmall fticks were laid at the head, notched all over with the difmal days and nights. he had paffed there he had one of these little sticks in hist hand, and with a ruffy nail he was etching another day of mifery to add to the heap. As I darkened the little light he had, he lifted up a hopeless eye towards the door, then caft it down-fhook his head, and went on with his work of affliction. I heard his chains upon his legs as he turned his body to lay his little stick upon the bundle-He gave a deep figh-I saw the iron enter into his foul-1 burst into tears I could not fustain the picture of confinement which my fancy had drawn. STERNE. CHAP. III. Obadiah Mr Y young mafter in London is dead, faid ➡HERE is fad news, Trim, cried Sufannah, wiping her eyes as Trim ftepped into the kitchen,-mafter Bobby is dead. I LAMENT for him from my heart and my foul, faid Trim, L6 Trim, fetching a fighpoor creature!-poor boy !-paor gentleman! He was alive laft Whitfuntide, faid the coachman.Whitfuntide alas! cried Trim, extending his right arm, and falling inftantly into the fame attitude in which he read the fermon, what is Whitfuntide, Jonathan, (for that was the coachman's name) or Shrovetide, or any tide or time paft, to this? Are we not here now, continued the corporal, ftriking the end of his stick perpendicularly upon the floor, fo as to give an idea of health and ftability) and are we not (dropping his hat upon the ground) gone! in a moment!-It was infinitely triking! Sufannah burst into a flood of tears-We are not stocks and ftones--- Jonathan, Obadiah, the cook-maid, all melted fcullion herself, who was fcouringcal fish The foolish fat kettle upon her knees, was roofed with it.-The whole kitchen crowded about the corporal. "Are we not here now-and gone in a moment ?”. There was nothing in the fentence-it was one of your felf-evident truths we have the advantage of hearing every day; and if Trim had not trufted more to his hat than his head, he had made nothing at all of italok ge ,་་ “Are we not here now, continued the corporal, and are we not" (dropping his hat plump upon the ground-and paufing before he pronounced the word)" gone! in a moment?" The defcent of the hat was as if a heavy lump of clay had been kneaded into the crown of it -Nothing could have expreffed the fentiment of mortality, of which it was the type and forerunner, like it; his hand feemed to vanish from under it, it fell dead, the corporal's-eye fixed upon it, as upon a corpfe,--and Sufannah burst into a flood of tears. STERNE. JAL L'our praifes why thould Lords engrofs? Pleas'd |