New-York, Sept. 21, 1796.
A RURAL PICTURE.
On a spacious lawn, bounded on every side by a profusion of the most odoriferous flowering shrubs, a joyous band of villagers were assembled; the young men dressed in green; youth, health, and pleasure in their air, led up their artless charmers, in straw hats adorned with the spoils of Flora, to the rustic sound of the tabor and pipe. Round the lawn, at equal intervals, were raised temporary arbours of branches of trees, in which refreshments were prepared for the dancers; and between the arbours, seats of moss for their parents, shaded from the sun by green awnings, on poles, round which were twined wreaths of flowers, breathing the sweets of the spring. The surprise, the gaiety of the scene, the flow of general joy, the sight of so many happy people, the countenances of the enraptured parents, who seem to live anew again, the sprightly season of youth in their children, with the benevolent looks of the noble bestowers of the feast, filled my eyes with tears, and my swelling heart with a sensation of pure, yet lively transport, to which the joys of the courtly belles are mean.
GLEANINGS.
When a man is disposed to reveal a secret, and expects that it shall be kept, he should first enquire whether he can keep it himself. This is good advice, perhaps a little in the Irish way.
All the wisdom in the world will do little while a man wants presence of mind. He cannot fence well that is not on his guard. Archimedes lost his life by being too busy to give an answer.
Notwithstanding the difference of estate and quality among men, there is such a general mixture of good and evil, that in the main, happiness is pretty equally distributed in the world. The rich are as often unhappy as the poor, as repletion is more dangerous than appetite.
It is wonderful how fond we are of repeating a scrap of Latin, in preference to the same sentiment in our own language equally well expressed. Both the sense and words of Omnia vincit amor (love conquers all) are worthy only of a school-boy, and yet how often repeated with an affectation of wisdom!