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tended with an elegance, which, in some measure, disguised the deformity of vice.

Various reasons, which it is needless now to mention, at length constrained me to return home. As I approached my seat in the county of, I felt a tender satisfaction at the thought of revisiting those scenes where I had spent so many happy days in the early morn of life, and of seeing again the companions of my youthful sports, many of whom I knew had settled in the country, and lived on their estates in my neighbourhood. My arrival was no sooner known than they flocked to welcome me home. The friends of my father, and their sons, my old companions, were equally sincere and warm in their compliments; but, though I was pleased with their attachment, I could not help being disgusted with the blunt plainness of their manners. Their conversation usually turned on subjects in which I could not possibly be interested. The old got into keen political debate, or dissertations on farming; and the young talked over their last foxchase, or recited the particulars of their last debauch. If I attempted to give the conversation a different turn, they remained silent, and were altogether incapable to talk of those subjects on which I had been accustomed to think and to speak. I mentioned the Gabrielli, or the Mignotti, they were as much at a loss as I was when they joined in praising the notes of Juno or of Jowler; if the proportions of the Venus de Medicis were talked of, one would perhaps ask, what a dead beauty was good for? another would swear, that in his mind, Polly- -was a better-made girl than any heathen goddess, dead or alive.

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By degrees my neighbours gave me up altogether. They complained that I was a strange fellow, who hated company, and had no notion of

life. I confess I was rather pleased with their neglect, and, in my own mind, preferred solitude to such society; but solitude at length became irksome, and I longed again to mingle in society. With that view I went to the races at Edinburgh, where I was told I should meet with all the polite people of this country. The night I arrived, I accompanied to the assembly a female relation, almost the only acquaintance I had in town. If you, Mr. MIRROR, be a frequenter of public plaees, I need not tell you how much I was struck on entering the room. Dark, dirty, mean, offensive to every sense, it seemed to resemble a large barn, rather than a room allotted for the reception of polite company. I had no sooner entered, than I was hurried along by the crowd to the farther end of the hall, where the first thing that caught my eye was an old lady, who, it seems, presided for the night, and was at that instant employed in distributing tickets, to ascertain the order in which the ladies were to dance. was surrounded by a cluster of persons of both sexes, all of whom spoke at the same time, and some of them, as I thought, with a voice and gesture rather rough and vehement.

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This important part of the ceremonial being at length adjusted, the dancing began. My conductress asked me, if I did not think the ladies, in general, handsome? I told her (and that without any compliment) that I thought them more than commonly beautiful; but methinks,' added I, the gentlemen are not, either in dress or appearance, such as I should have expected.'- Oh,' replied she, have a little patience, the men of fashion are not yet come in; this being the first day of the races, they are dining with the stewards.' I had not time to make any observation on the propriety of allowing ladies to go unattended to a public place,

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to wait four hours there in expectation of the gentlemen with whom they were to dance; for, at that instant, a loud noise at the lower end of the hall attracted my notice. There they come,' said she and I soon perceived a number of young gentlemen staggering up the room, all of them flustered, some of them perfectly intoxicated. Their behaviour (I forbear to mention the particulars) was such as might be expected.

In a few days I was quite satisfied with the amusements of Edinburgh, and with pleasure, retired once more to my solitude at There, however,

I again fell a sacrifice to ennui: I could contrive no way to fill up my time. After passing two or three tedious years, I resolved to make one effort more, and set out for London, in hopes of meeting those friends with whom I had lived so happily abroad, and in whose society I now expected to receive pleasure without alloy.

Upon inquiry, I found that almost all my friends were in town, and next morning sallied forth to wait upon them. But nowhere could I gain admittance. It did not occur to me that those doors, which, at Rome or Naples, flew open at my approach, could, at London, be shut against me. I therefore concluded I had called at an improper time, and that the hours of London (with which I was but little acquainted) differed from those we had been accustomed to abroad.

In that belief, I went to the opera in the evening. I had not been there long before Lord happened to come into the very box where I was. With Lord I had lived in habits of the most intimate friendship, and, in a less public place, I should have embraced him with open arms. Judge then of my astonishment, when he received my compliments with the coldness of the most perfect in

difference. It is needless to run through the mortifying detail. From all my friends I met with much the same reception. One talked of the business of parliament, another of his engagements at the Sçavoir Vivre, or the Coterie. The Duke of

who then filled one of the great offices of state, alone seemed to retain his former sentiments. One day he took me into his closet, and, after some general conversation, solicited my interest in the county of, for Mr. I told him that my engagements to the other candidate were such, that I could not possibly comply with his request. He seemed perfectly satisfied, and we parted on the best of terms; but from that day forth, his Grace never happened to be at home when I did myself the honour of calling on him.

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Chagrined and mortified, I returned to Scotland. When I had got within a hundred miles of my own house, I observed, from the road, a gentleman's seat, the beauty and elegance of which struck me so much, that I stopped the carriage, and asked the post-boy to whom it belonged! To Mr. Manly,' said he. What, Charles Manly?' Before I could receive an answer, my friend appeared in a field at a little distance. Manly and I had been educated at the same school, at the same university, and had set out together to make the tour of Europe. But after we had been some time in France he was called home, by accounts that his father lay dangerously ill. From that time a variety of accidents had prevented our meeting. We now met as if we had parted but yesterday; with the same freedom, the same warmth, the same glow of friendship, heightened, if possible, by our long separation.

During my stay at his house, I told him all my distresses, all my disappointments. When I had done, To be plain with you, my friend,' said he,

I cannot help thinking that most of your disappointments must be imputed to yourself. Your long residence abroad, and your attachment to foreign manners, has led you to judge rather hastily of your countrymen. Had you been less rash, you might have discovered virtues in your neighbours that would, in some measure, have made up for the want of that high polish and refinement which they cannot be expected to possess. From what you saw at Edinburgh in the hurry of a race week, and from the behaviour of a set of men, who think that fashionable distinction consists in indulgence in low pleasures and gross amusements, you have drawn conclusions equally unfavourable and unjust. I know from experience, that nowhere are to be found men of more agreeable conversation, or women more amiable and respectable. Your late disappointment, in the reception you met with from your foreign friends, proceeds from a mistake not uncommon, from confounding that companionship, so apt to produce a temporary union among young men, when engaged in the same pleasures and amusements, with real friendship, which seldom or never has been found to subsist between men differing much in rank and condition, and whose views and objects in life do not in some measure coincide.'

I am now, Mr. MIRROR, fully convinced of the truth of Manly's observations; and am every day more and more satisfied, that it is a misfortune for a private gentleman, who means to pass his days in his native country, to become attached to foreign manners and foreign customs, in so considerable a degree, as a long residence abroad, in the earlier period of life, seldom fails to produce. I am, &c.

M.

ALONZO.

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