to give him a jostle on the breast, without seeming to intend any such thing. Be sure likewise to have your boots well shod with iron, or wear shod slippers above them, that you may be enabled to make as much noise as possible; for if you walk lightly at present, you will pass for any thing but a young gentleman; you must imitate old Harden, by all means, in your manner of walking. His hose war brac'd wi' cheens o' airn, His twa-hand sword hang round his neck, Though this costume in general is only applicable to officers, yet any young gentleman may contrive to make enough of noise. You had better strike the pavement with redoubled ordinary force at every step, than be taken for a low, paltry fellow. No person will take you for a horse, but those that are blind; and it is of no importance what they may think. "I beg your pardon," said the other, "I thought ye was a horse, I'm a blind man." But if you wish to appear quite in the ton, I cannot recommend any thing better, than leaning upon the rails at the door of Poole's Hotel; and in the evening, in order that all these devout exercises may be the more deeply implanted in your mind, it will be necessary to terminate them in the tavern, where, if you can contrive to keep it up until "that hour of night's black arch the key stane," when the Sabbath is fairly past, you may give a loose to all those refined moral delights, so well becoming a rational creature, and a candidate for a blessed immortality. Let the young men of lower degree, only take care to spend as much money as they can spare on that day; and rather sit up all the night than keep any of it. Though they should half starve themselves during the week, and work very hard besides, what is that, compared to the delights of spending a few hours in the pleasures of dissipation, or as they term it, high-life? Let them take care likewise, when over their cups, to talk of all their vicious courses and experiments, in the grossest language they can conceive; for there is nothing tends more to the discouragement of vice, than the exposing of it, in its most luxuriant deformity. Let them not fail likewise to confirm every assertion by a most terrible and fine sounding oath, regardless whether the company doubts of the assertion or believes it. None can ever suppose that a man is taking his Maker's name in vain, when he is hereby confirming the important truths, that such a girl is pretty, or that such a man was monstrous drunk at such a time. I should now address the various ranks of females in this city, but the ladies are already so well versed in all the rules of religious discoveries; so gentle, and so. lttle apt to do either good or evil; and withall so naturally desirous to adorn their fine forms, which is the one thing needful and necessary with them; that it can hardly be expected they will ever keep the Sabbath better than they do at present. The secondary and lower orders of the fair sex, have indeed much need of some direction; for many of them are so absurd as to suppose, that there is really a state of rewards and punishments awaiting them, and to make occasionally, some little provision for that state! people of so little refinement in their taste and opinions are past all hope. If I were to publish their rules, they would never see them; and besides, I am checked by the remembrance of an old proverb, "Too much of one thing is good for nothing." MOOR-BURN Α SIMILE I. When sober evening's veil of russet hue, Eling's on the earth's lone face, its deep'ning shade ;: That all one fairy scene of sweet enchantment seems II. Till waking reason checks the new delight In that gay scene, which fancy deems so fair, She hears amid the soft illumin'd night, 'The shrieks of woe and comfortless despair; The feather'd tribes astonish'd mount in air, While blazing ruin sweeps their mountains grey! And wing to deeper wilds their am'rous way, Where yet the waving heath escapes man's ruthless sway III. Such is ambition's course, at first it charms, Its blood stain'd fields where desolation bears, And deeds that yet shall shrink,---before the Almighty's bar. BORDER SONG. "Lock the door Lariston, lion of Liddisdale ; Lock the door Lariston, Lowther comes on; The Armstrongs are flying, The widows are crying; The Castleton's burning and Oliver's gone. Lock the door Lariston,--high on the weather-gleam, Yeoman and carbinier, Bilman and halberdier; Fierce is the forray, and far is the cry. Bewcastle brandishes high his broad scymeter ; Wandale and Windermere ; Lock the door Lariston, hold them at bay. Why dost thou smile noble Elliot of Lariston; Beware of thy danger; Thy foes are relentless, determin'd, and nigh.” "Little know'st thou of the hearts I have hidden here; Little know'st thou of our moss-troopers' might; Linhope and Sorby true, Sundhope and Milburn too; Gentle in manner, but lions in fight! I have Mangerton, Ogilvie, Raeburn, and Netherbie, Come all Northumberland, Teesdale and Cumberland, Here at the Breaken-tower end shall the fray. Scowl'd the broad sun o'er the links of green Liddesdale, Many a bold martial eye, Never more oped on his orbit of gold. Shrill was the bugle's note ! dreadful the warrior's shout, Helmit and hawberk then, Braved the claymore in vain, Buckler, and armlet in shivers were shorn. See how they wane the proud files of the Windermere !* Hear the wide welkin rend, While the Scot's shouts ascend; Elliot of Lariston, Elliot for ay! EDINBURGH-Printed at the Star Office, (price 4d. a single Number, 4s. 6d. per quarter, delivers able in town, and 5s. when sent to the country), by A. AIKMAN, for the PROPRIETORS; where Subscriptions, and Communications, (post paid), will be received. 1811. The Spy. SATURDAY, APRIL 6. Purus et insons, -Si et vivo carus amicis, Causa fuit pater his.--HOR. TO THE SPY. I AM a plain country gentleman, who, after an absence of nearly thirty years, have been induced to visit this gay city: I took up my residence with an old friend, on whose breakfast table I found your paper the morning after my arri val. To tell you the truth, he did not give it a very high character; and the Ladies, especially the young ones of the family, looked very shy, and, pouting with their pretty lips, declared it was extremely faulty in style, wanted polish exceedingly, and had some descriptions of courtships that were quite unnatural, and very offensive to a delicate mind,-with a great deal of stuff about vulgar people, and expressed in broad Scotch that no body could read. A judicious old Lady, putting on her spectacles, and taking up the paper, read a passage in that dialect of a very simple and pathetic nature." It is true I am an old fashioned woman my dear," said she to the young Lady who had spoken, "but I confess it does my heart good to hear my native tongue introduced with taste and delicacy, either in writing or in conversation. Just a little sprinkling, for in these refined days, I am afraid we shall forget it altogether. It is not necessary that Scotch No. 32. should be vulgar, and our own glorious bard has proved it is most favourable both to the humorous and to the pathetic." "But dear aunt," replied Miss Sophia, "who cares to hear about cottagers, and shepherds, and all those ple, my good girl, are to me the most sort of people."-" Those sort of peointeresting to hear about,— "Their homely joys and destiny obscure," because I have no opportunity of observing them myself, and the compari son of these artless traits of native cha racter with the graces and refinements of polished life, are to me, who am an old woman, a delightful subject of meditation. It is like wandering in an extensive meadow blooming with wild flowers, after having been confined to a cultivated garden, where the productions are more luxriant, their fragrance more rich, their colours more vivid and animating, but not to me at least so sweet and beautiful. All are originally the work of nature, and perhaps the less they depart from her sacred laws, the more perfect will they appear. In large cities, and in the circles of fashionable life, we do not see human nature, but a set of artificial beings; of moving puppets, elegantly decorated indeed, and graceful in attitude; so far they are attractive, but all seemingly influenced by the same springs, pursuing the same course, and totally defi |