from whofe court thou art exiledGracious heaven! cried I, kneeling down upon the laft ftep but the laft ftep but one, in my afcent grant me but health, thou great Beflower of it; and give me but this fair goddess as my companion-and fhower down thy nitres, if it feems good unto thy divine providence, upon thofe heads which are aching for them.

THE

THE CAPTIVE.

PARIS.

HE bird in his cage purfued me into my room ; I fat down close to my table, and leaning my head upon

my hand, I begun to figure to myself the miseries of confinement. I was in a right frame for it, and fo I gave full fcope to my imagination.

of

I was going to begin with the millions

my, fellow creatures born to no inheritance but flavery; but finding, however affecting the picture was, that I could not bring it near me, and that the multitude of fad groups in it did but diftract me..

-I took a fingle captive, and having first fhut him up in his dungeon, I then look'd through the twilight of his grated door to take his picture.

I beheld his body half wafted away with long expectation and confinement, and felt what kind of fickness of the heart it was which arifes from hope deferr'd. Upon looking nearer I faw him pale and feverish in thirty years the western breeze had not once fann'd his blood he had feen no fun, no moon in all that time-nor had the voice of friend or kinfman breathed through his lattice his children

:

But here my heart began to bleed and I was forced to go on with another part of the portrait.

He

He was fitting upon the ground upon a little ftraw, in the furtheft corner of his dungeon, which was alternately his chair and bed: a little calendar of finall flicks were laid at the head notch'd all over with the difinal days and nights he had pafs'd there he had one of thefe little flicks in his hand, and with a rufty nail he was etching another day of mifery to add to the heap. As I darkened the little light he had, he lifted up a hopeless eye towards the door, then caft it down-fhook his head, and went on with his work of affliction. I heard his chains upon his legs, as he turn'd his body to lay his little flick upon the bundle-He gave a deep figh-I faw the iron enter into his foul-I burst into tears I could not fuftain the picture of confinement which my fancy had drawn -I flarted up from my chair, and calling La Fleur, I bid him befpeak me

a remife, and have it ready at the door of the hôtel by nine in the morning.

I'll go directly, faid I, myself to Monfieur le Duc de Choifeul,

La Fleur would have put me to bed; but not willing he should fee any thing upon my cheek which would coft the honeft fellow a heart ache-I told him I would go to bed by myfelf-and bid him go to the fame.