Though I had not ftrength to refift when under the fame roof with you, ever fince we parted, the recollection that it was his roof has made me miferable. Whimsical, that he should bid you prefs me, when I at first refused his folicitation.-Is H. guilty of a breach of hospitality?

I must not queftion-I must not think, I muft not write.-But, we will meet as we fixed.

Does Robin Gray fufpect?-Sufpect! And is H. a fubject for fufpicion ?

LETTER

To the Same.

XIII.

Huntingdon, 16 Feb. 1776.

EVERY time I see you I discover some new charm, fome new accomplishment. Before Heaven, there was not a tittle of flattery in what I told you yesterday. Nothing can be flattery which I fay of you, for C 3.

no

no invention, no poetry, no any thing can come up to what I think of

you.

One of our Kings faid of the citizens of his good city of London, that when he confidered their riches, he was in admiration at their understandings-when he confidered their understandings, he was in admiration at their riches. Juft fo do I with regard to your perfon and your mind, but for a different reafon.-Nature was in one of her extravagant moods when she put you together. She might have made two captivating women out of you-by my soul, half a dozen! Your turn for music, and excellence in it, would be a fufficient stock of charms for the moft difagreeable woman to fet up with in life. Mufic has charms to do things moft incredible, mufic

Now fhall I, with the good-humoured, digreflive pen of our favourite Montaigne in his entertaining Effays, begin with love, and end with a treatise upon the Gamut.

Yet to talk of music, is to talk of you. M. and mufic are the fame. What is music without

without you? And harmony has turned your mind, your person, your every look, and word, and action.

Obferve-when I write to you I never pretend to write fenfe. I have no head; you have made me all heart, from top to bottom. Senfe-why, I am out of my fenfes, and have been these fix weeks. Were it poffible my fcrawls to you could ever be read by any one but you, I should be called a madman. I certainly am either curft or bleft (I know not which) with pasfions wild as the torrent's roar. Notwithstanding I take this fimile from water, the element out of which I am formed, is fire. Swift had water in his brain: I have a burning coal of fire: your hand can light it up to rapture, rage, or madness. Men, real men, have never been wild enough for my admiration: it has wandered into the ideal world of fancy. Othello (but he fhould have put himself to death in his wife's fight, not his wife), Zanga, are my herces. Milk-and-water paffions are like fenti

mental comedy. Give me (you fee, how, like your friend Montaigne, I ftrip myself of my skin, and fhew you all my veins. and arteries even the playing of my heart)

give me, I fay, tragedy, affecting tragedy, in the world, as well as in the theatre. I would maffacre all mankind fooner than lofe you.

This is mere madness;

And thus, a while. the fit will work on him;

Anon, as patient as the female dove When that her golden couplets are dif clofed,

His filence will fit drooping.

Inconfiftent being! While I am ranting thus about tragedy, and blood, and murder -behold, I am as weak as a woman. My tears flow at but the idea of losing you. Yes, they don't drop only; they pour; I fob, like a child. Is this Othello, is this Zanga? We know not what we are, nor what we may become.

This

This I know, that I am and ever will be your's and only your's.

I send you Offian. You will fee what a favourite he is with me, by fome drawings, and pieces of (what your partiality will call) poetry, which accompany the bard' of other times. Should you quit this world before me, which fate forbid, often fhall I hear your fpirit (if I can be weak enough to furvive you) calling me from the low-failing cloud of night.-They abufe Macpherson for calling them tranflations. If he alone be the author of them, why does he not fay fo, and claim the prize of fame; I protest I would. They who do not refuse their admiration to the compofitions, ftill think themselves juftified to abuse Macpherson, for pretending not to be the author of what they still admire.. Is not this ftrange?

As we could not meet this morning (how long must our meetings depend on others, and not on ourfelves?) I was determined,