WH

N⚫ CXXII.

HEN I had parted from the old gentleman, I found Mrs. Abrahams defirous to return home, being fomewhat indisposed by the heat of the theatre, fo that I loft no time in getting her and Conftantia into the coach: In our way homewards I reported the conversation I had held with Mr. Goodifon; the different effects it had upon my hearers were fuch as might be expected from their feveral characters; the gentle spirit of Conftantia found relief in tears; her grateful heart difcharged itself in praises and thanksgivings to Providence: Mrs. Abrahams forgot her head-ach, felicitated herself in having prevailed upon Mrs. Goodifon to confent to her daughter's going to the play, declared she had a prefentiment that something fortunate would come to pass, thought the title of the comedy was a lucky omen, congratulated Constantia over and over, and begged to be indulged in the pleasure of telling these most joyful tidings to her good man at home: Ned put in his claim for a share in the prophecy no less than Mrs. Abrahams; he had a kind of a fomething in his thoughts,

thoughts, when Goodison fat at his elbow, that did not quite amount to a discovery, and yet it was very like it; he had a sort of an impulse to give him a gird or two upon the character of Sterling, and he was very fure that what he threw out upon the occasion made him squeak, and that the discovery would never have come about, if it had not been for him; he even advanced fome learned remarks upon the good effects of ftage-plays in giving touches to the conscience, though I do not pretend to say he had Jeremy Collier in his thoughts at the time; in short, what between the Hebrew and the Chriftian there was little or nothing left for my share in the work, fo that I contented myself with cautioning Conftantia how fhe broke it to her. mother, and recommended to Mrs. Abrahams to confine her difcourfe to her husband, and leave Conftantia to undertake for Mrs. Goodi fon.

When we arrived at our journey's end we found the honeft Jew alone, and furprised him before he expected us: Mrs. Goodifon was gone to bed a little indifpofed, Conftantia haftened up to her without entering the parlour; Mrs. Abrahams let loofe the clapper of joy and rang in the good news with fo full a peal and fo many changes, that there was no more to be

done on my part but to correct a few trips in the performance of the nature of pleonasms, which were calculated to improve the tale in every particular but the truth of it. When she had fairly acquitted herself of the history, fhe began to recollect her head-ach, and then left us very thoroughly disposed to have a fellow-feeling in the fame complaint.

After a few natural reflections upon the event, foberly debated and patiently delivered, I believe we were all of one mind in wifhing for a new subject, and a filence took place fufficiently preparatory for it's introduction; when Abrahams, putting on a grave and ferious look, in a more folemn tone of voice, than I had ever heard him affume, delivered himself as follows:

There is fomething, Gentlemen, preffes on my mind, which feems a duty on my conscience to impart to you: I cannot reconcile myself to play the counterfeit in your company, and therefore if you will have patience to listen to a few particulars of a life, fo unimportant as mine, I will not intrude long upon your attention, and at worst it may serve to fill up a few spare minutes before we are called to our meal.

I need not repeat what was faid on our parts; we drew our chairs round the fire; Abrahams gave a figh, hemmed twice or thrice, as if the

words

words in rifing to his throat had choaked him, and thus began:

I was born in Spain, the only son of a younger brother of an antient and noble houfe, which like many others of the fame origin and perfuafion had long been in the indispensable practice of conforming to the established reiigion, whilft fecretly and under the most guarded concealment every member of it without exception hath adhered to those opinions, which have been the faith of our tribe from the earliest ages.

This I truft will account to you for my declining to expofe my real name, and justify the discretion of my affuming the fictitious one, by which I am now known to you.

Till I had reached my twentieth year I knew myself for nothing but a Christian, if that may be called Christianity, which monkish superftition and idolatry have fo adulterated and diftorted from the moral purity of it's fcriptural guides, as to keep no traces even of rationality in it's form and practice.

This period of life is the ufual season for the parents of an adult to reveal to him the awful fecret of their concealed religion: The circumftances, under which this tremendous difcovery is confided to the youth, are fo contrived as to

imprint

imprint upon his heart the ftrongeft feal of fecrecy, and at the fame time prefent to his choice the alternative of parricide or conformity: With me there was no hesitation; none could be; for the yoke of Rome had galled my conscience till it festered, and I seized emancipation with the avidity of a ransomed flave, who efcapes out of the hands of infidels.

Upon our great and folemn day of the Paffover I was initiated into Judaism; my father conducted me to the interior chamber of a fuite of apartments, locking every door, through which we passed, with great precaution, and not uttering a fyllable by the way; in this secure retreat he purpofed to celebrate that antient rite, which our nation holds fo facred: He was at that time in an alarming decline; the agitating task he had been engaged in overpowered his fpirits; whilft he was yet fpeaking to me, and my eyes were fixed upon his face, the hand of death fmote him; I faw his eye-lids quiver; I heard him draw his laft expiring figh, and falling dead upon my neck as I was kneeling at his feet, he brought me backwards to the floor, where I laid panting under his lifeless corpse, fcarce more alive than he was.

The noife of his fall and the horrid fhrieks I began to utter, for I had no prefence of mind in VOL. IV.

T

that