and ten poring over figures which lay bare essential secrets
relative to the average duration of life, to the evolutions of
heavenly bodies, or to the payment of the national debt in
cash ready money. Reading with him has become such a
habit, that he can do nothing else. His life is described
by Hamlet,-"Words, words, words,"-yet words he never
had with any one, so quiet has been his career. He hath
drawn everything into his head, and nothing was ever
drawn out of it. His head has bowed so long over the
table, that it seems to be of the same substance.
book, and the table, and himself are as one; and so well
he knows what is before and about him, that he could
almost see to read in the dark. He goes on quite as
regularly from section to section, and turns over the leaves
as mechanically, when he is asleep as awake; and should
his cap catch fire at his lamp as he dozes, it would never
set his brain in a flame. Happy peruser! quiescent, com-
fortable old reader! May thy mental spectacles hold on
to the last, thy finis be gradual, and a good book still pillow
thy head, when, in the fulness of time, thou passest from
sheets-into boards!
"A good book," saith Milton, "is the precious lifeblood of a master-spirit, embalmed and treasured up on purpose to a life beyond life." Therefore is a good book likely to grow old. But this, the last of our set of Readers, cares not so much for the goodness as for the age. He is essentially the lover of old books-a reader, truly, but
SONNET: ON BEHOLDING AN INFANT PLUCK A ROSE.
Sweet child! whose retrospective gentleness
Floats dimly back where laughing May arose,
'Tis thine, indeed, to beautify our woes,
And renovate, with whispers numberless,
Moist-eyed Devotion's young and green caress.
Alas! thy starry zest he only spies,
Who, softly soaring where the Fond One flies,
Hath learned pale Memory's coral caves to dress,
And strew the conch-shells over Sorrow's cheek-
Oh! mantle not thy morning. Many a day
When Lustre pines in Truth's transcendent well,
The Monitor shall wake, and thou wilt say-
"Ah me! that Time's Elysian clouds are weak,
And canker-worms should ring vain Rapture's knell."