My gentler rest is on a thought; Conscious of doing what I ought." Andrew Marvell.. "Stern Law-giver! yet thou dost wear The Godhead's most benignant grace, Nor know we any thing so fair As is the smile upon thy face: Flow'rs laugh before thee on their beds, And fragrance in thy footing treads.” Wordsworth's Ode to Duty. A MERCHANT'S SON. THERE are times when the mind indulges itself in a sort of security of happiness; when it allows itself to anticipate a thousand little delights, without one accompanying fear of the future. This particular feeling, from its very nature, can only last a very short time: it is a weakness of mind in any one; it is wrong in the Christian, for it is one of those intervals when he neglects to watch and pray; when he is, from trusting to the world, often bitterly disappointed by the world-it was when indulging in the full luxury of this feeling, that Duncan Forbes returned home; two young men, with whom he was slightly acquainted, had accompanied him from the place where he had last stopped: they were to sleep at Glasgow on their way to England. "Don't you envy me," said Duncan; 66 you are both going to a strange inn; while I shall be welcomed by a dear family, who love me more than I deserve, I do believe. Some of them will run out to meet me, I suppose, and I shall be thought so much of, and so anticipated in all my wishes, that if I am my real humble self again, for some time, I only know I shall wonder."The young companions separated. “Well,” exclaimed Duncan, "they can't know I am come, yet James spoke to me as he opened the gate; no one rushes out however. Where can Florella and Jeanie be? and that idle little Marion?How does every one do?" said he, laughing, as he entered the house. He flew into the room and kissed them all: "You see I am quite well, my dear mother; and I have so much to tell you. Highland air and hard study agree so well with me; I've found time to see every thing, to ramble about, not with guides, but quite by myself, often in the most unfrequented spots. I have been half wild, Florella, when I allowed my mind to relax in the delights of poetry in such poetical scenery. I expected to find wonderful beauties in the Highlands; and I, who have eyes for every depth of mist, who distinguish the thinnest blue which softens the distant landscape, equally with the deepest melting veil to say. which hangs on the mountain's summit, I have been positively in raptures. You need not be surprised that I allow no time for your answers, for I shall never get to the end of all that I have One recollection wakes a thousand others. I suppose you would like to see my sketches, though, and my fanciful rhymes." Duncan untied the writing case which was always his constant companion. "There, mother, is a Highland cottage, just the cottage which I admire, for you to look at: its small fields appeared like an island among the dark heath, or rather like an Oasis in the Arabian deserts: not that I think the wild heaths deserts; to me they outshine all rich scenery: hills of every shape rising around, with heather bells in full bloom as far as the eye can gaze, little silvery lakes gleaming in the hollows, are much finer than soft green fields. Then, in winter, such scenery is just as beautiful; it depends not on summer warmth, or spring verdure; and the very clouds which winter darkens it with, add sublimity and grandeur.-Those birch trees are not half elegant enough. That rivulet! I could not paint that rivulet, with the beds of emerald grass and sparkling sand it flows over, with half its coy windings, its silent dimpling depths, and babbling shallows. That blue |