roof as high as we could reach, yet a goat would have pierced the top with his horns; such was its height. Branches of ozier formed the walls, and a small chequer of rose-trees closed the entrance to our dwelling. How delicious were all the hours we passed in this lovely retreat!

CLIMENA. Did I not too plant, before our house, a little garden; and did we not surround it with a hedge of bulrushes? so high it was, that a sheep would have brows'd it in a moment.

DAMON. Can the favour of the gods rest upon the house where no children are? You found a little mutilated image of the god of love, and, like a fond mother, you were prodigal of your care and A nut-shell was its bed, and you lulled your songs, while it reposed on the leaves of

caresses.

it with

roses.

CLIMENA. Yes, DAMON, and that god will recompence the ingenuous cares of our infancy.

DAMON. I one day made a little cage of rushes. I put a grasshopper into it, and then presented it to thee. You would have taken it from the cage to play with; but as you held it, in struggling to escape, it left one of its slender legs between your fingers. Fluttering with pain, the grasshopper remained fixed on the stalk of a flower. Ah, look! you said, how the poor insect trembles! Thou art tortured, and I am the cause of thy misery. Your eyes were bathed in tears, and I rejoiced to see thee so tender and sympathising.

Ꮓ

CLIMENA. Thy goodness, DAMON, appeared to me far more affecting, on the day my brother took two young linnets from their nest. Give me, you said, those little birds; but he would not part with them. I will give thee this crook for them: look with what art I have adorned it; see how this brown bark, and these green twigs, twine round the shining wand. The offer was accepted. When you had got the tender birds, you put them in your little basket, and climbing the tree, placed them gently in their nest. Then tears of joy ran down my cheeks; I should have loved thee from that moment, had I never loved thee before.

DAMON. Thus sweetly pass'd the hours away, when, in our infant sports, I was thy husband, and thou my wife.

CLIMENA. And those hours shall I ever remember with delight.

DAMON. How happy will be each moment of our lives, if, with the next new moon, as thy mother hath promis'd, HYMEN shall unite our loves, and realize our infant pastimes!

CLIMENA. If the propitious gods shall deign to bless our lot, never, my companion-no, never were lovers more happy than we.

Stothard del

THE AUTUMNAL MORNING

London Published May 6, 1797, by T Heptinstall Fleet Street.

Blackbord Je

THE AUTUMNAL MORNING.

ALREADY had the sun's rays gilded the summit of the mountains, and proclaimed the approach of the fairest of autumnal days, when MILON placed himself at his window. The sun then shone through the branches of the vine, whose verdure, mix'd with purple and aurora, form'd over the window a shady arbour, that lightly waved to the morning's gentle gale. The sky was serene; a sea of vapours cover'd the valley. The highest hills, crown'd with smoking cottages, and, with the party-colour'd garb of autumn, rose like islands, by the power of the sun's rays, out of the bosom of that sea. The trees, loaded with ripening fruits, presented to the eye a striking mixture of a thousand shades of gold and purple, with some remains of verdure. MILON, in sweet ecstasy, suffer'd his sight to wander through the vast extent. Sometimes he heard far off, sometimes more near, the joyous bleating of the sheep, the flutes of the shepherds, and the warblings of the birds, that by turns pursued each other on the floating gales, or died away in the vapours of the valley. Plunged in a profound contemplation, for a long time he stood motionless; then, fired with a sudden transport of divine enthusiasm, he seized his lyre, that hung against the wall, and thus he sung: