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engage your mother to return to England with me: she and yourself are at length come, and I have had the inexpressible joy of seeing my girl every thing I wished her.

I have set down these particulars, relating to my family and self, for my Lydiat, in case, hereafter, she might have a curiosity, or a kinder motive, to know them.

As Mr. Sterne, in the foregoing narrative, hath brought down the account of himself until within a few months of his death, it remains only to mention that he. left York about the end of the year 1767, and came to London, in order to publish The Sentimental Journey, which he had written during the preceding summer at his favourite living of Coxwold. His health had been ́ for some time declining; but he continued to visit his friends, and retained his usual flow of spirits. In February, 1768, he began to perceive the approaches of death; and, with the concern of a good man, and the solicitude of an affectionate parent, devoted his attention to the future welfare of his daughter. His letters at this period reflect so much credit on his character, that it is to be lamented some others in the collection were permitted to see the light. After a short struggle with his disorder, his debilitated and worn-out frame: submitted to fate on the 18th day of March, 1768, at his lodgings in Bond-street. He was buried at the new burying-ground belonging to the parish of St. George, Hanover-square, on the 22nd of the same month, in the most private manner; and hath since been indebted to strangers for a monument very unworthy of his memory, on which the following lines are inscribed :

• Hence it appears that this account of our author's life and family was written about six months before his death,

+ His daughter.

"Near to this Place
Lies the Body of

The Reverend LAURENCE STERNE, A. M.
Died September 13th, 1768*,
Aged 53 Years.

Ah! molliter ossa quiescant.

If a sound head, warm heart, and breast humane,
Unsullied worth, and soul without a stain;

If mental pow'rs could ever justly claim
The well-won tribute of immortal fame,
Sterne was the Man, who, with gigantic stride,
Mow'd down luxuriant follies far and wide.
Yet what tho' keenest knowledge of mankind
Unseal'd to him the springs that move the mind,
What did it cost him?-Ridicul'd, ubus'd,
By fools insulted, and by prudes accus'd!-
In his, mild reader, view thy future fate;
Like him, despise what 'twere a sin to hate.

This monumental stone was erected by two brother masons; for, though he did not live to be a member of their society, yet as his all-incomparable performances evidently prove him to have acted by rule and square, they rejoice in this opportunity of perpetuating his high and irreproachable character to after-ages.

W. & S."

It is scarcely necessary to observe, that this date is erroneous.

A

SENTIMENTAL JOURNEY

THROUGH

FRANCE AND ITALY.

France.

THEY order, said I, this matter better in

-You have been in France? said my gentleman, turning quick upon me, with the most civil triumph in the world. Strange! quoth I, debating the matter with myself, that one-and-twenty miles sailing, for 'tis absolutely no further from Dover to Calais, should give a man these rights-I'll look into them: so giving up the argument, I went straight to my lodgings, put up half a dozen shirts, and a black pair of silk breeches the coat I have on, said I, looking at the sleeve, will do-took a place in the Dover stage; and the packet sailing at nine the next morning-by three I had got sat down to my dinner upon a fricasseed chicken, so incon

B

testably in France, that had I died that night of an indigestion, the whole world could not have suspended the effects of the droits d'aubaine *—my shirts, and black pair of silk breeches-portmanteau and all, must have gone to the king of Franceeven the little picture which I have so long worn, and so often told thee, Eliza, I would carry with me into my grave, would have been torn from my neck.-Ungenerous! to seize upon the wreck of an unwary passenger, whom your subjects had beckoned to their coast-by heaven! Sire, it is not well done; and much does it grieve me 'tis the monarch of a people so civilized and courteous, and so renowned for sentiment and fine feelings, that I have to reason with

But I have scarce set foot in your dominions—

CALAIS.

WHEN I had finished my dinner, and drank the king of France's health, to satisfy my mind that I bore him no spleen, but, on the contrary, high honour for the humanity of his temper-I rose up an inch taller for the accommodation.

• All the effects of strangers, (Swiss and Scotch excepted) dying in France, were seized by virtue of this law though the heir was upon the spot the profits of these contingencies being farmed, there was no redress.

-No-gaid I-the Bourbon is by no means a cruel race; they may be misled, like other people, but there is a mildness in their blood. As I acknowledged this, I felt a suffusion of a finer kind upon my cheek-more warm and friendly to man, than what Burgundy (at least of two livres a bottle, which was such as I had been drinking) could have produced.

-Just God! said I, kicking my portmanteau aside, what is there in this world's goods which should sharpen our spirits, and make so many kindhearted brethren of us fall out so cruelly as we do by the way?

When man is at peace with man, how much lighter than a feather is the heaviest of metals in his hand! He pulls out his purse, and, holding it airily and uncompressed, looks round him, as if he sought for an object to share it with

-In doing this, I felt every vessel in my frame dilate-the arteries beat all cheerily together, and every power which sustained life, performed it with so little friction, that 'twould have confounded the most physical precieuse in France: with all her materialism, she could scarce have called me a machine

I'm confident, said I to myself, I should have overset her creed.

The accession of that idea carried nature, at that time, as high as she could go-I was at peace with the world before, and this finished the treaty with myself————

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