For the Rural Magazine.
The fogs of England have been at all times the complaint of foreigners. Gondomar the Spanish ambassador, when some one who was going to Spain waited on him to ask whether he had any commands, replied, "Only my compliments to the Sun, whom I have not seen since I came to England." Caracoli, the Neapolitan minister there, a man of a good deal of conversational wit, used to say that the only ripe fruit he had seen in England, were roasted apples; and in a conversation with George II., he took the liberty of preferring the Moon of Naples to the Sun of England.
JOHN HOWARD.
I have been frequently asked, says this great man, what precautions I use to preserve myself from infections in the prisons and hospitals I visit. I here answer, next to the free goodness and mercy of the Author of my being, temperance and cleanliness are my preservatives. Trusting in Divine Providence, and believing myself in the way of my duty, I visit the most noxious cells, and while thus employed, "I fear no evil."
FRANKLIN.
He that raises a large family, says Franklin, does indeed, while he lives to observe them, stand, as Watts says, a broader mark for sorrow; but then he stands a broader mark for pleasure too. When we launch our little fleet of barks into the ocean, bound to different ports, we hope for each, a prosperous voyage; but contrary winds, hidden shoals, storms and enemies, come in for a share in the disposition of events; and though these occasion a mixture of disappointment, yet considering the risk where we can make no insurance, we should think ourselves happy if some return with success.
BURNS THE POET.
About the age of thirteen, Burns was sent during a part of the summer to the parish school in Dalrymple, in order to improve his hand writing.—In the following year he had an opportunity of passing several weeks with his old friend Murdoch, with whose assistance he began to study French with intense ardour and assiduity. His proficiency in that language, though it was wonderful, considering his opportunities, was necessarily slight; yet it was in shewing this accomplishment alone that Burns' weakness ever took the shape of vanity. One of his friends, who carried him into the company of a French lady, remarked with surprise that he attempted to converse with her in her own tongue. Their French, however, was soon found to be almost mutually unintelligible. As far as Burns could make himself understood, he unfortunately offended the foreign lady.—He meant to tell her that she was a charming person and delightful in conversation; but expressed himself so as to appear to her to mean, that she was fond of speaking; to which the Gallic dame indignantly replied, that it was quite as common for poets to be impertinent, as for women to be loquacious.
ORTHOGRAPHY.
The following curious instances of spelling are from Bassompierre's account of his mission to the court of Charles I. in 1626.