You are ill, and you must be well. If I did not see the antidote as well as the bane, your letter would give me the most serious alarm. That conscious unworthiness, those choked avenues of love, that comparison of the damnable present indicative with the blessed præterpluperfect of the subjunctive, am with might have been, are all symptomatic of melan

cholia, black bile, or, which is the same thing, blue devils. Why, one would suppose, that you had made it your sole employment to be constantly cracking all the commandments in regular succession one after the other, and that you knew so little of the nature of love as to suppose it essentially repellant, instead of attractive. Come, come, let me be your physician; - I know your case, and I engage for your cure. I will write my prescription, and, as a friend, I will attend to the making of it up, and assist in administering it myself. You will not have to make mouths at it:- you have no objection to syrup of squills; it is not a bit more nauseous:

Dulce ridentem Lalagen amato
Dulce loquentem

Adde

Vocum et nervorum cantus

Sumenda extemplo, et per vitam adducta.

horæ xxiv.

quant. suf.

pro re nata.

Sir Francis Darrell.

Nonsense, Darrell!

L.V.

Love not your

disease! Well then, let it be your medicine. But as I am the M. D. called in,

I must claim my prerogative of complete confidence and implicit obedience. None of your raising the cup to your lip, and putting it away like a wayward child, or I must have you held, and the whole dose poured down your throat at once.

Before I resume mon serieux, in replying to yours from London, let me scribble a dozen French lines, which, I think, give a very fair, as well as pleasant account of love:

Il est aimable quand il pleure,
Il est aimable quand il rit;
On le rappelle quand il fuit,
On l'adore quand il demeure.
C'est le plus aimable boudeur
Qui soit de Londres à Cythère;
C'est le plus aimable imposteur
Qui soit né pour tromper la terre;
Il fait vingt sermens aujourd'hui,
Et demain il les désavoue:
On sait qu'il blesse quand il joue,
Et l'on veut jouer avec lui.

Now, my friend, try if you, cannot trace him under one or all of these characteristics in that region of your frame which he is known to claim as his abode; and, unless you like him better weeping than laughing, make the place gay, and give

him a cheerful welcome. Stay he will, you may be assured, and I advise you not to put him out of sorts with glouting and blue devils for his companions in your heart.

Your letter, my dear Darrell, is the most serious one I ever received from you. I do not feel myself at all disposed to laugh at you, but I hope still to laugh with you, and often. I approve of your studies, and I heartily wish you success, but I fear your nerves and the scrupulosity of your imagination. You have not only to conquer the serpent, and the astronomy and chronology, the zodiac of Jacob's children, and the dishonourable practices of Moses himself by divine command; but when you have gained the victory, you will be for asking yourself whether it is your head or your heart that has gained it; and your doubt will turn the day against you- Now, with such a cynosure before me, methinks I should beat you all to nothing in sailing through the ocean I was so commanded to explore.

It is not my intention to preach