before the greedy visiting was closed, and the longprivileged house left empty-swept as by a plague. -Yet no rapacious plague

Had been among them; all was gentle death,
One after one, with intervals of peace.

A happy consummation! an accord

Sweet, perfect, to be wished for! save that here
Was something which to mortal sense might sound
Like harshness,—that the old grey-headed Sire,
The oldest, he was taken last; survived

When the meek Partner of his

age,

his Son,

His Daughter, and that late and high-prized gift,
His little smiling Grandchild, were no more.

How would he face the remnant of his life? the neighbours said. What would become of him? But Heaven was gracious; yet a little while, and this Survivor, with his "inward hoard of unsunned griefs, too many and too keen,"

Was overcome by unexpected sleep

In one blest moment. . . . And so,
Their lenient term of separation past,
That family (whose graves you there behold)
By yet a higher privilege once more

Were gathered to each other.

An ingathering that realises to the full Burns's prayer (not at all in the spirit or style of Holy Willie's) for a household he counted dear to him:

When soon or late they reach that coast,

O'er life's rough ocean driven,

May they rejoice, no wand'rer lost,

A family in Heaven!

POLONIUS ON POLEMICS.

THE parting advice of Polonius to his son Laertes, when dismissing him for France, is as full of matter as an egg is of meat. In every item of the catalogue of counsels,—and the items are not few,—is manifested the shrewd spirit of the experienced statesman (or perhaps rather statecraftsman), and of the seasoned and sagacious man of the world. They who, upon the stage, turn this fussy and prolix old Minister into a mere drivelling, puzzleheaded, anile buffoon, show a most pitiful ambition to set on some quantity of barren spectators to laugh. Foremost, maybe, in familiarity as well as significance, among these monitory items, is that which, bids the young man

-Beware

Of entrance to a quarrel: but, being in,
Bear it that the opposer may beware of thee.

Do all you can to avoid à conflict: concede a great deal rather than have to fight: parley, and procrastinate, and be at once strenuous in your endeavours, and ingenious in your persevering devices, to keep the peace. But if all is of no avail; if

conflict is unavoidable; if fight your adversary will, and fight therefore you must; then go in with a will. Deal your hardest-hitting strokes upon him fast and freely; no thought of parley or halfmeasures then. Smash him, if you can, and as soon as you can. Forget all compromise, scout all conciliation, and only remember your swashing

blow.

Hamlet himself, later in the play, is not far from the same meaning, when he says that

Rightly to be great,

Is, not to stir without great argument;

though his after-clause diverges from the Polonian drift: "but greatly to find quarrel in a straw, when honour's at the stake." More pat to the purpose is a passage between Sampson and Gregory, Capulet's serving-men, when they enter armed with swords and bucklers :

Sampson. I strike quickly, being moved.

Gregory. But thou art not quickly moved to strike.

And to the like sense might be strained a passage between Antony and Eros, of entirely diverse import in itself:

Ant. Lo thee.

Eros. My sword is drawn.

Ant. Then let it do at once

The thing why thou hast drawn it.

More legitimate in its application is King Richard's utterance, when Richmond is reported prosperous and on the march :

VOL. I.

12

Come,-I have learn'd, that fearful commenting
Is leaden servitor to dull delay;

Delay leads impotent and snail-paced beggary:
Then fiery expedition be my wing.

The Shakspearean Ulysses, again, in his panegyric on the youngest son of Priam, not yet mature, yet matchless; firm of word; speaking in deeds, and deedless in his tongue, has this line,-which indeed comprises in itself the Polonian system entire :

Not soon provoked, nor, being provoked, soon calm'd.

In this respect suggesting a degree of affinity to Othello, as one "not easily jealous, but, being wrought, perplexed in the extreme.” As again, and only once more, an illustrative parallel might be found in the contrast between Macbeth's "I'll not fight with thee," to Macduff, followed so instantly when the fight is inevitable, by the vehement defiance, “Lay on, Macduff!" and the imprecation of perdition on him of the two that shall first cry, Hold, enough!

Among the proverbs of Solomon, which the men of Hezekiah, King of Judah, copied out, occurs the warning, "Go not forth hastily to strive, lest thou know not what to do in the end thereof." The counsel in Sallust has passed into a proverb,-at any rate has found its way into Latin collections,-which bids you, before you begin, take advice; but having maturely considered, use despatch. Priusquam incipias consulto, et ubi consulueris maturè, facto

opus est. A saying is on record of Paulus Æmilius to his son Scipio, that a good general never gives battle but when he is led to it, either by the last necessity, or by a very favourable occasion. And Paulus Æmilius might have stood, more fairly than some, for Thomson's representative man of patriotism militant:

Backward to mingle in detested war,
But foremost when engaged.

Montaigne moralises on the necessity of deliberation before we engage in affairs, especially quarrels : a little thing, says he, will involve you in one," but being once embarked, all cords draw; greater considerations are then required, harder and weightier." We should go to work, he continues, contrary to the reed, which at its first spring produces a long and straight shoot, but afterwards, as if tired and out of breath, runs into thick and frequent joints and knots, as so many pauses, which show that it no longer has its first vigour and consistency. " "Twere better to begin fair and calmly, and to keep a man's breath and vigour for the height and stress of the business." Montaigne finds some who rashly and furiously rush into the lists, but are dull in the race itself. He who enters lightly into a quarrel, is 'subject to run as lightly out of it. The same difficulty that keeps me," declares the Sieur Michel, "from entering into it, would incite me, when once hot and engaged in it, to maintain it with spirit and resolve." And he quotes approvingly the saw of