Characters.-SWIPES, a brewer; CURRIE, a saddler; FRANK MILLINGTON, and 'SQUIRE DRAWL.

Swipes. A sober occasion, this, brother Currie. Who would have thought the old lady was so near her end?

Currie. Ah! we must all die, brother Swipes; and those who live the longest, outlive the most.

Swipes. True, true; but since we must die and leave our earthly possessions, it is well that the law takes such good care of us. Had the old lady her senses when she departed?

Cur. Perfectly, perfectly. 'Squire Drawl told me she read every word of the will aloud, and never signed her name better. Swipes. Had you any hint from the 'Squire, what disposition she made of her property?

Cur. Not a whisper; the 'Squire is as close as an underground tomb: but one of the witnesses hinted to me, that she had cut off her graceless nephew, Frank, without a shilling. Swipes. Has she, good soul, has she? You know I come in, then, in right of my wife.

Cur. And I in my own right; and this is no doubt the reason why we have been called to hear the reading of the will. 'Squire Drawl knows how things should be done, though he is as air-tight as one of your beer-barrels. But here comes the young reprobate. He must be present, as a matter of course, you know. [Enter FRANK MILLINGTON.] Your servant, young gentleman. So your benefactress has left you,

at last.

Swipes. It is a painful thing to part with old and good friends, Mr. Millington.

Frank. It is so, sir; but I could bear her loss I not so often been ungrateful for her kindness. only friend, and I knew not her value.

better, had

She was my

Cur. It is too late to repent, Master Millington. You will now have a chance to earn your own bread.

Swipes. Ay, ay, by the sweat of your brow, as better people are obliged to. You would make a fine brewer's boy, if you were not too old.

Cur.

Ay, or a saddler's lackey, if held with a tight rein.

Frank. Gentlemen, your remarks imply that my aunt has treated me as I deserved. I am above your insults, and only hope you will bear your fortune as modestly, as I shall mine submissively. I shall retire. [Going: he meets 'SQUIRE DRAWL.]

'Squire. Stop, stop, young man.

We must have your presence. Good morning, gentlemen; you are early on the ground.

Cur. I hope the 'Squire is well to-day.

'Squire. Pretty comfortable, for an invalid.

Swipes. I trust the damp air has not affected your lungs again.

'Squire. No, I believe not. But since the heirs at law are all convened, I shall now proceed to open the last will and testament of your deceased relative, according to law.

Swipes. [While the 'Squire is breaking the seal.] It is a trying thing, to leave all one's possessions, 'Squire, in this

manner.

Cur. It really makes me feel melancholy, when I look around and see every thing but the venerable owner of these goods. Well did the preacher say, "all is vanity."

'Squire. Please to be seated, gentlemen. [He puts on his spectacles, and begins to read slowly.] *Imprimis; whereas my nephew, Francis Millington, by his disobedience and ungrateful conduct, has shown himself unworthy of my bounty, and incapable of managing my large estate, I do hereby give and bequeath all my houses, farms, stocks, bonds, moneys, and property, both personal and real, to my dear cousins, Samuel Swipes, of Malt-Street, brewer, and Christopher Currie, of Fly-Court, saddler." [The 'Squire takes off his spectacles, to wipe them.]

Swipes. Generous creature! Kind soul! I always loved her. Cur. She was good, she was kind;-and, brother Swipes, when we divide, I think I'll take the mansion-house.

Swipes. Not so fast, if you please, Mr. Currie. My wife has long had her eye upon that, and must have it.

Did I not

Cur. There will be two words to that bargain, Mr. Swipes. And, besides, I ought to have the first choice lend her a new chaise, every time she wished to ride? who knows what influence

And

Swipes. Am I not named first in her will? and did I not furnish her with my best small beer, for more than six months? and who knows

Frank. Gentlemen, I must leave you. [Going.]

'Squire. [Putting on his spectacles very deliberately.] Pray, gentlemen, keep your seats, I have not done yet. Let me see; where was I? Ay, "All my property, both personal and real, to my dear cousins, Samuel Swipes, of Malt-Street, brewer,"

Swipes. Yes!

'Squire. "And Christopher Currie, of Fly-Court, saddler," Cur. Yes!

Squire. "To have and to hold, IN TRUST, for the sole and exclusive benefit of my nephew, Francis Millington, until he shall have attained the age of twenty-one years, by which time, I hope he will have so far *reformed his evil habits, as that he may safely be intrusted with the large fortune which I hereby +bequeath to him."

Swipes. What is all this? You don't mean that we are humbugged? In trust! How does that appear? Where is it?

'Squire. There; in two words of as good old English as I ever penned.

Cur. Pretty well too, Mr. 'Squire, if we must be sent for, to be made a laughing stock of. She shall pay for every ride she has had out of my chaise, I promise you.

Swipes. And for every drop of my beer. Fine times, if two sober, hard-working citizens are to be brought here, to be made the sport of a graceless +profligate. But we will manage his property for him, Mr. Currie; we will make him feel that trustees are not to be trifled with.

Cur. That we will.

'Squire. Not so fast, gentlemen; for the tinstrument is dated three years ago; and the young gentleman must be already of age, and able to take care of himself. Is it not so, Francis?

Frank. It is, your worship.

'Squire. Then, gentlemen, having attended to the breaking of the seal, according to law, you are released from any further trouble about the business.

1. MAN, the noblest work of God in this lower world, walks abroad through its +labyrinths of grandeur and beauty, amid countless manifestations of creative power and providential wisdom. He acknowledges, in all that he beholds, the might that called them into being; the skill which perfected the harmony of the parts, and the benevolence which *consecrated all to the glory of God and the welfare of his fellow creatures. He stands entranced on the peak of +Ætna, or +Teneriffe, or +Montserrat, and looks down upon the far distant ocean, silent to his ear, and tranquil to his eye, amid the rushing of tempestuous winds, and the fierce conflict of stormy billows. He sits enraptured on the mountain summit, and beholds, as far as the eye can reach, a forest robe, flowing in all the varieties of graceful undulations, over declivity after declivity, as though the fabulous river of the skies were pouring its azure waves over all the landscape.

2. He hangs over the precipice, and gazes with awful delight on the savage glen, rent open as it were, by the earthquake, and black with lightning-shattered rocks; its only music the echoing thunder, the scream of the lonely eagle, and the tumultuous waters of the mountain torrent. He reclines, in pensive mood, on the hill-top, and sees around and beneath him, all the luxuriant beauties of field and meadow, of olive yard and vineyard, of wandering stream and grove-encircled lake.

3. He descends to the plain, and amid waving harvests, verdant avenues, and luxuriant orchards, sees between garden and grass-plat, the farm-house, embosomed in copse-wood or "tall ancestral trees." He walks through the valley, fenced in by barrier cliffs, to contemplate, with mild enthusiasm, its scenes of pastoral beauty; the cottage and its blossomed arbor, the shepherd and his flock, the clumps of oaks or the solitary willow. He enters the caverns buried far beneath the surface, and is struck with amazement at the grandeur and magnificence of a subterranean palace, hewn out as it were, by the power of the Genii, and decorated by the taste of Armida, or of the Queen of the Fairies.

4. Such is the natural world; and such, for the most part.

has it ever been, since men began to subdue the wilderness, to scatter the ornaments of civilization amid the rural scenery of nature, and to plant the lily on the margin of the deep, the village on the hillside, and martial battlements in the +defiles of the mountains. Such has been the natural world, whether beheld by the eye of savage or barbarian, of the civilized or the refined. Such has it been, for the most part, whether contemplated by the harpers of Greece, the bards of Northern Europe, or the voluptuous minstrels of the Troubadour age. Such it was, when its beauties, like scattered stars, beamed on the page of classic lore; and such, when its "sunshine of picture" poured a flood of meridian splendor on modern literature. Such is the natural world to the ancient and the modern, the pagan and the Christian.

5. Admirable as the natural world is for its sublimity and beauty, who would compare it, even for an instant, with the sublimity and beauty of the moral world? Is not the soul, with its glorious destiny and its capacities for eternal happiness, more awful and majestic than the boundless Pacific or the tinterminable Andes? Is not the mind, with its thoughts that wander through eternity, and its wealth of intellectual power, an object of more intense interest, than forest, or *cataract, or precipice? And the heart, so eloquent in the depth, purity, and pathos of its affections, can the richest scenery of hill and dale, can the melody of breeze, and brook, and bird, rival it in loveliness?

6. The same God is the author of the invisible and visible world. The moral grandeur and beauty of the world of man, are equally the production of his wisdom and goodness, with the fair, the sublime, the wonderful in the physical creation. What, indeed, are these, but the outward manifestations of his might, skill, and benevolence? What are they but a glorious volume, forever speaking to the eye and ear of man, in the language of sight and sound, the praises of its author? And what are those but images, faint and imperfect as they are, of his own incomprehensible attributes? What are they, the soul, the mind, the heart of an immortal being, but the temple of the holy Spirit; the dwelling place of him whom the Heaven of Heavens can not contain, who inhabiteth eternity? How then can we compare, even for a moment, the world of nature with the world of man?