impatience to know, if there be a letter from Langwood, and

what he fays.

FRAM. Ifhall never be able to afford you the leaft information, upon that fubje&t, my lord.

LD. EUST. Surely, I do not understand you. You faid you had fecured the letters-Have you not read them?

FRAM.

You have a right, and none but you, to ask me fuch a question. My weak compliance with your firft propofal relative to these letters, warrants your thinking fo meanly of me. But know, my lord, that though my perfonal affection for you, joined to my unhappy circumstances, may have betrayed me to actions unworthy of myself, I never can forget, that there is a barrier fixed before the extreme of basenefs, which honour will not let me pass.

LD. EUST. You will give me leave to tell you, Mr. Frampton, that where I lead, I think you need not halt.

FRAM. You will pardon me, my lord; the consciousness of another man's errors, can never be a juftification for our own; and poor, indeed, must that wretch be, who can be fatisfied with the negative merit of not being the worst maa he knows.

LD. EUST. If this difcourfe were uttered in a conventicle, it might have its effect; by fetting the congregation to Пеер.

FRAM. It is rather meant to rouse, than lull your lord

hip.

LD. EUST.

No matter what it is meant for; give me

the letters, Mr. Frampton.

FRAM. Yet, excufe me. I could as foon think of arming a madman's hand, against my own life, as fuffer you to be guilty of a crime that will, for ever, wound your honour.

LD. EUST. I fhall not come to you, to heal the wound: your medicines are too rough and coarfe for me.

FRAM. The foft poifon of flattery, might, perhaps please you better.

LD. EUST. Your confcience may, probably, have as much need of palliatives, as mine, Mr. Frampton, as I am pretty well convinced, that your courfe of life, has not been more regular than my own.

of

FRAM. With true contrition, my lord, I confefs part your farcafm, to be juft. Pleasure was the object of my pursuit, and pleasure I obtained, at the expence, both of health, and fortune: but yet, my lord, I broke not in upon the peace of others; the laws of hospitality, I never violated; nor did I ever seek to injure, or feduce, the wife or daughter of my friend.

LD. EUST. I care not what you did; give me the letters. FRAM. I have no right to keep, and therefore shall furrender them, though with the utmoft reluctance; but, by our former friendship, I intreat you not to open them. Lb. EUST.

That you have forfeited.

FRAM. Since it is not in my power to prevent your committing an error, which you ought, for ever, to repent of, Iwill not be a witness of it. There are the letters.

LD. EUST. You may, perhaps, have caufe to repent your prefent conduct, Mr. Frampton, as much as I do our paft attachment.

FRAM. Rather than hold your friendship upon fuch terms, I refign it for ever. Farewel, my lord.

Re-enter FRAMPTON.

FRAM. Ill treated as I have been, my lord, I find it impoffible to leave you furrounded by difficulties.

LD. EUST. That fentiment fhould have operated fooner,

Mr.

Mr. Frampton. Recollection is feldom of use to our friends, though it may fometimes be ferviceable to ourselves.

FRAM. Take advantage of your own expreffion, my lord, and recollect yourself. Born and educated as I have been, a gentleman, how have you injured both yourfelf and me, by admitting and uniting in the fame confidence, your raf cally fervant!

LD. EUST. The exigency of my fituation is a fufficient excufe to myself, and ought to have been so to the man who called him felf my friend.

FRAM. Have a care, my lord, of uttering the leaft doubt upon that fubject; for could I think you once mean enough to fufpect the fincerity of my attachment to you, it must vanifh at that inftant.

LD. EUST. The proofs of your regard have been rather painful of late, Mr. Frampton.

FRAM. When I fee my friend upon the verge of a precipice, is that a time for compliment? Shall I not rudely rush forward, and drag him from it? Juft in that ftate you are at prefent, and I will ftrive to fave you. Virtue may languish in a noble heart, and fuffer her rival, vice, to ufurp her power; but bafenefs must not enter, or fhe flies for ever. The man who has forfeited his own efteem, thinks all the world has the fame confcioufnefs, and therefore is what he deferves to be, a wretch.

in

LD. EUST. Oh, Frampton! you have lodged a dagger heart.

my

FRAM. No, my dear Eustace, I have faved you from one, from your own reproaches, by preventing your being guilty of a meanness, which you could never have forgiven your felf.

LD. EUST. Can you forgive me, and be still

L 2

my friend?

FRAM.

FRAM. As firmly as I have ever been, my lord.-But let us, at present, haften to get rid of the mean bufinefs we are engaged in, and forward the letters we have no right to detain.

SCHOOL FOR RAKES.

CHA P.

IX.

DUKE. N

DUKE AND LOR D.

NOW, my co-mates, and brothers in exile,

Hath not old custom made this life more fweet Than that of painted pomp? are not these woods More free from peril, than the envious court? Here feel we but the penalty of Adam, The feafon's difference; as the icy phang, And churlish chiding of the winter's wind; Which, when it bites and blows upon my body, Even till I fhrink with cold, I fmile, and say, This is no flattery; thefe are counsellors, That feelingly perfuade me what I am. Sweet are the ufes of adversity,

Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous,

Wears yet a precious jewel in his head :

And this our life, exempt from public haunt,
Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks,
Sermons in ftones, and good in every thing.

Come, fhall we go, and kill us venison!

And yet it irks me, the poor dappled fools,
Being native burghers of this defart city,
Should, in their own confines, with forked heads
Have their round haunches gor❜d.

LORD. Indeed, my Lord,

The

The melancholy Jaques grieves at that;
And in that kind fwears you do more ufurp
Than doth your brother, that hath banish'd you.
To day my Lord of Amiens, and myself,
Did fteal behind him, as he lay along

Under an oak, whofe antique root peeps out
Upon the brook that brawls along this wood;
To the which place a poor fequeftered ftag,
That from the hunters' aim had ta'en a hurt,
Did come to languish; and, indeed, my Lord,
The wretched animal heav'd forth fuch groans
That their discharge did ftretch his leathern coat
Almost to bursting; and the big round tears
Cours'd one another down his innocent nofe
In piteous chafe; and thus the hairy fool,
Much marked of the melancholy Jaques,
Stood on th' extremeft verge of the swift brook,
Augmenting it with tears.

DUKE. But what faid Jaques ?
Did he not moralize this fpectacle ?

LORD. O yes, into a thousand fimiles,
First, for his weeping in the needless stream;
Poor Deer, quoth he, thou mak'st a testament
As worldlings do, giving thy fum of møre
To that which had too much. Then being alone,
Left an abandon'd of his velvet friends;
'Tis right, quoth he, thus mifery doth part
The flux of company. Anon a careless herd,
Full of the pafture, jumps along by him,

And never ftays to greet him: Ay, quoth Jaques,
Sweep on, you fat and greafy citizens,

"Tis just the fashion: wherefore do you look