And when unable to forsake the Town,

In the blind Courts he sate desponding down-
Always alone; then feebly would he crawl

The Church-way Walk, and lean upon the Wall:
Too ill for this, he laid beside the Door,
Compell'd to hear the reasoning of the Poor;
He look'd so pale, so weak, the pitying Crowd
Their firm belief of his Repentance vow'd ;
They saw him then so ghastly and so thin,
That they exclaim'd, "Is this the work of Sin ?"

"Yes," in his better moments, he replied, "Of sinful Avarice and the Spirit's Pride ;— "While yet untempted, I was safe and well; "Temptation came; I reason'd, and I fell : "To be Man's Guide and Glory I design'd, "A rare Example for our sinful kind ; ❝ But now my Weakness and my Guilt I see, "And am a Warning-Man, be warn'd by me !"

1

He said, and saw no more the human Face;
To a lone Loft he went, his dying-place,
And, as the Vicar of his state enquir'd,
Turn'd to the wall and silently expir'd!

LETTER XX.

THE POOR OF THE BOROUGH.

ELLEN ORFORD.

Patience and sorrow strove

Who should express her goodliest.

Shakspeare. Lear.

No charms she now can boast,'-'tis true,

But other charmers wither too;

And she is old,'-the fact I know,

And old will other heroines grow:
But not like them has she been laid,
In ruin'd castle, sore dismay'd;
Where naughty man and ghostly spright

Fill'd her pure mind with awe and dread,
Stalk'd round the room, put out the light,

And shook the curtains round her bed.

No cruel uncle kept her land,

No tyrant father forc'd her hand;
She had no vixen virgin-aunt,
Without whose aid she could not eat,
And yet who poison'd all her meat,
With gibe and sneer and taunt.
Yet of the heroine she'd a share,
She sav'd a lover from despair,
And granted all his wish, in spite

Of what she knew and felt was right;

But heroine then no more,

She own'd the fault, and wept and pray'd,

And humbly took the parish aid,

And dwelt among the poor.

* JQ *

ELLEN ORFORD.

The Widow's Cottage.-Blind Ellen one.-Hers not the Sorrows or Adventures of Heroines.-What these are, first described.— Deserted Wives; rash Lovers; courageous Damsels: in desolated Mansions; in grievous Perplexity.-These Evils, however severe, of short Duration.-Ellen's Story.-Her Employment in Childhood.-First Love; first Adventure; its miserable termination.-An ideot Daughter.-An Husband.-Care in Business without Success.-The Men's Despondency, and its Effect.— Their Children: how disposed of.-One particularly unfortunate. -Fate of the Daughter.-Ellen keeps a School and is happy.Becomes blind: loses her School.-Her Consolations.

LETTER XX.

THE POOR OF THE BOROUGH.

ELLEN ORFORD.

OBSERVE yon Tenement, apart and small,
Where the wet Pebbles shine upon the Wall;
Where the low Benches lean beside the Door,
And the red Paling bounds the Space before;
Where Thrift and Lavender, and Lad's-love* bloom,-
That humble Dwelling is the Widow's Home:
There live a Pair, for various Fortunes known,
But the blind Ellen will relate her own';-
Yet ere we hear the Story she can tell,
On prouder Sorrows let us briefly dwell.

I've often marvel'd, when by night, by day,
I've mark'd the Manners moving in my way,
And heard the Language and beheld the Lives
Of Lass and Lover, Goddesses and Wives,
That Books, which promise much of Life to give,
Should show so little how we truly live.

* The lad's or boy's love of some counties is the plant Southernwood, the Artimisia Abrotanum of Botanists.