OR,

TO MARRY, OR NOT TO MARRY?

IN THREE VOLUMES.

Far less dismay'd, Anchises' wand'ring son
Was seen the straits of Sicily to shun:
When Palinurus, from the helm descry'd
The rocks of Scylla, on his eastern side;
While in the west, with hideous yawn disclos'd,
His onward path Charybdis' gulf oppos'd.

FALCONER.

Non hic Centauros, non Gorgonas, Harpyiasque
Invenies: hominem pagina nostra sapit.

VOL. II.

MARTIAL.

LONDON:

Printed by Strahan and Spottiswoode, Printers-Street;

FOR LONGMAN, HURST, REES, ORME, AND BROWN,

PATERNOSTER-ROW.

1819.

HOURS

OF

HESITATION.

CHAPTER I.

See the wretch who long has tost
On the thorny bed of pain,
At length regain his vigour lost,

And breathe and walk again!

The meanest herb — the air, the skies,

To him is opening Paradise!"

GRAY.

"Heaven first sent letters to some wretch's aid,

Some banish'd lover or some captive maid.”

I AM

should have charged me with neglect in not writing to you, and have begun to wonder whether you had not entirely lost so uncertain a correspondent.

"Instead of charging my silence to neglect, your lordship will have the kindness to assign for it its proper causeillness.

"Alas! my lord, I droop amidst the gaieties of this vast metropolis; incapable of observing in that extended sphere, which affords the finest range for the exertion of that faculty. I had promised myself some amusement, perhaps some yet undiscovered species of character, on which I might calculate and expatiate: but the realities of fruition and the splendid promises of anticipating fancy, are widely at variance. How often when the pleasures we are anxiously seeking, seem within our grasp, some trivial annoyance arises, like the nightly hag from the casket of the prosperous Abudah, to dash from our lips, the cup of enjoyment!

"The unavoidable evils of illness are, however, much alleviated by the train. of interesting ideas which are its invariable attendants, in the mind of the thinking man. Of all the estimates we