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could only hang over it, in rapturous silence: it was pale as the clearest, whitest, ivory: not a tinge of colour blended with its whiteness, except the soft blue veins which shone through the brow, where they had once meandered: the curls of her rich chestnut hair were not concealed, but lay clustering round her face. The hair looked as if she were alive; it was so soft and glossy; something like the living brightness of her eyes glistened through the long veiling lashes of the closed eyelids. On her beautiful and delicately formed lips such a smile still lingered! I could have gazed for ever, I forgot every thing; but some one drew me away gently. I turned at last, to answer the soft voice that spoke to me. I was not the least angry, for my heart was softened; and I beheld the only countenance, which I should not have refused to look upon, just as I had been gazing on Rosine's. It was that of a venerable female, and it mildly commanded me to obey. Meekness, majesty, and affection, mingled in the look she gave me while she exclaimed, "She is not here, but risen, and gone, we may hope, into Paradise! Stand no longer as if you thought she were present, as if you were not gazing at her lifeless body, but think of her as one happier than us: recall her not by one

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selfish wish she requires no longer our prayers." This could be no one but Lady Falkland, Rosine's dearest English friend: she took my hand and led me again to the coffin. "With this body," she said, "beautiful, perfect as it appears, corruption is already at work; it will be soon shapeless and loathsome: this is not Rosine."-I thought for some time: tears at length relieved me. While I was sitting, shortly after, in a corner of the room, a little girl entered softly, holding up her frock, which was filled with small branches of myrtle; she went up to the coffin, and decked it with them. Taking a rose (which is now so rare) from her bosom, she kissed it, and was about to place it on the body; when its leaves fell away and strewed the floor. "Oh grandmamma," (said the child mournfully, while her eyes filled with tears,)

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my only rose is lost; there are no more: but it is just like her; it looked as fresh and beautiful, and it dies, just as she did, when I could not expect it."

A MERCHANT'S SON.

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"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

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