who have lived affectionate parents to their children and friends to their brothers, and some there are who have acted the opposite part toward each other. Whichsoever of these you shall observe to have been most advantageous, you will do well in giving it the preference in your choice. But perhaps this is sufficient as to these matters. When I am dead, children, do not enshrine my body in gold nor in silver, nor anything else, but lay it in the earth as soon as possible; for what can be more happy than to mix with the earth, which gives birth and nourishment to all things excellent and good? And as I have always hitherto borne an affection to men, so it is now most pleasing to me to incorporate with that which is beneficial to men. Now," said he, "it seems to me that my soul is beginning to leave me, in the same manner as, it is probable, it begins its departure with others. If, therefore, any of you are desirous of touching my right hand or willing to see my face while it has life, come near to me; for when I shall have covered it, I request of you, children, that neither yourselves nor any others would look on my body. Summon all the Persians and their allies before my tomb to rejoice for me that I shall be then out of danger of suffering any evil, whether I shall be with the gods or shall be reduced to nothing. As many as come, do you dismiss with all those favors that are thought proper for a happy man. And remember this as my last and dying words. If you do kindnesses to your do kindnesses to your friends, you will be able to injure your enemies. Farewell, dear children, and tell this to your mother as from me. And all you, my friends, both such of you as are here present, and the rest who are absent, farewell!" Having said this and taken every one by the right hand, he covered himself, and thus expired. Translation of MAURICE ASHLY COOPER. THE JUDGE AND THE CULPRIT. WILLIAM NORWYNNE having no child to create affection to his home, his study was the only relief from that domestic encumbrance called his wife; and though, by unremitting application there, joined to the influence of the potent relations of the woman he hated, he at length arrived at the summit of his ambitious desires, still they poorly repaid him for the sacrifice he had made in early life of every tender disposition. tender disposition. Striding through a list of rapid advancements in the profession of the law, at the age of thirty-eight he found himself raised to a preferment such as rarely falls to the share of a man of his short experience: he found himself invested with a judge's robe, and, gratified by the exalted office, curbed more than ever that aversion which her want of charms or sympathy had produced against the partner of his honors. While William had thus been daily rising in Fortune's favor, poor Agnes Primrose had been daily sinking deeper and deeper under Fortune's frowns, till at last she became a midnight wanderer through the streets of London, soliciting or rudely demanding money of the passing stranger. Sometimes, hunted by the watch, she affrighted fled from street to street, from portico to portico, and once, unknowing in her fear which way she hurried, she found her trembling knees had sunk, and her wearied head was reclined against the stately pillars that guarded William's door. At the sudden recollection where she she reluctantly accepted the proposal to mix was a swell of passion composed of horror, with a band of practised sharpers and robof anger, of despair and love, gave rean- bers, and became an accomplice in negotiatimated strength to her failing limbs, and, ing bills forged on a country banker. But, regardless of her pursuer's steps, she ran to though ingenious in arguments to excuse the the centre of the street, and, looking up to deed before its commission, in the act she the windows of the mansion, cried, "Ah! had ever the dread of some incontrovertible there he sleeps in quiet, in peace, in ease! statement on the other side of the question. He does not even dream of me! He does Intimidated by this apprehension, she was not care how the cold pierces me or how the the veriest bungler in her vile profession; people persecute me! He does not thank and on the alarm of being detected, while me for all the lavish love I have borne him every one of her confederates escaped and aband his child! His heart is so hard he does sconded, she alone was seized, was arrested for not even recollect that it was he who brought issuing notes they had fabricated and comme to ruin!" mitted to the provincial jail, about fifty miles from London, where the crime had been perpetrated, to take her trial for life or death. Had these miseries been alone the punishment of Agnes-had her crimes and sufferings ended in distress like this-her story had not perhaps been selected for a public recital; for it had been no other than the customary history of thousands of her sex. But Agnes had a destiny yet more fatal. Unhappily, she was endowed with a mind so sensibly alive to every joy and every sorrow, to every mark of kindness, every token of severity, so liable to excess in passion, that, once perverted, there was no degree of error from which it would revolt. Taught by the conversation of the dissolute poor with whom she now associated, or by her own observation on the worldly reward of elevated villany, she began to suspect "that dishonesty was only held a sin to secure the property of the rich, and that to take from those who did not want by the art of stealing was less guilt than to take from those who did want by the power of the law. By false yet seducing opinions such as these, her reason estranged from every moral and religious tie, her necessities urgent, The day at length is come on which Agnes shall have a sight of her beloved William. She who has watched for hours near his door to procure a glimpse of him going out or returning home, who has walked miles to see his chariot pass,-she now will behold him and he will see her by command of the laws of their country. Those laws, which will deal with rigor toward her, are in this one instance still indulgent. The time of the assizes at the county-town in which she is imprisoned is arrived; the prisoners are demanded at the shire-hall; the jail-doors are opened; they go in sad procession. The trumpet sounds: it speaks the arrival of the judge, and that judge is William. The day previous to her trial Agnes had read in the printed calendar of the prisoners his name as the learned justice before whom she was to appear. For a moment. she forgot her perilous state in the excess of joy which the still unconquerable love she bore him permitted her to taste even on the brink of the grave. After-reflection made her check those worldly transports as unfit for the present solemn occasion. But, alas! to her earth and William were so closely united that till she forsook the one she could never cease to think without the contending passions of hope, of fear, of joy, of love, of shame and of despair on the other. Now fear took the place of her first immoderate joy. She feared that although much changed in person since he had seen her, and her real name now added to many an alias, yet she feared that some well-known glance of the eye, turn of the action or accent of speech might recall her to his remembrance; and at that idea shame overcame all her other sensations, for still she retained pride, in respect to his opinion, to wish him not to know Agnes was that wretch she felt she was. Once a ray of hope beamed on her— that if he knew her, if he recognized her, he might possibly befriend her cause; and life bestowed through William's friendship seemed a precious object. But, again, that rigorous honor she had often heard him boast, that firmness to his word of which she had fatal experience, taught her to know he would not for any improper compassion, any unmanly weakness, forfeit his oath of impartial justice. In meditations such as these she passed the sleepless night. When, in the morning, she was brought to the bar and her guilty hand held up before the righteous judgment-seat of William, imagination could not form two figures or two situations more incompatible with the existence of former familiarity than the judge and the culprit; and yet these very persons had passed together the most blissful mo ments that either ever tasted. Those hours of tender dalliance were now present to her mind; his thoughts were more nobly employed in his high office, nor could the haggard face, hollow eye, desponding countenance and meagre person of the poor prisoner once call to his memory, though her name was uttered among a list of others which she had assumed, his former youthful, lovely Agnes! She heard herself arraigned with trembling limbs and downcast looks, and many witnesses had appeared against her before she ventured to lift her eyes up to her awful judge. She then gave one fearful glance, and discovered Williamunpitying but beloved William in every feature. It was a face she had been used to look on with delight, and a kind of absent smile of gladness now beamed on her poor wan visage. When every witness on the part of the prosecutor had been examined, the judge addressed himself to her: "What defence have you to make?" It was William spoke to Agnes. The sound was sweet, the voice was mild-was soft, compassionate, encouraging. It almost charmed her to a love of life. Not such a voice as when William last addressed herwhen he left her undone, vowing never to see or speak to her more. She could have hung upon the present words for ever. She did not call to mind that this gentleness was the effect of practice, the art of his occupation, which at times is but a copy by the unfeeling from his benevolent brethren of the bench. In the present judge tenderness was not designed for the consolation of the culprit, but for the approbation of the auditors. There were no spectators, Agnes, by your side when last he parted from you: if there had, the awful William had been awed to marks of pity. Stunned with the enchantment of that well-known tongue directed to her, she stood like one just petrified; all vital power seemed suspended. Again he put the question, and with these additional sentences, tenderly and emphatically delivered: and rose to pronounce her sentence, she started The piercing shriek which accompanied these words prevented their being heard by part of the audience, and those who heard them thought little of their mean "Recollect yourself. Have you no wit- ing, more than that they expressed her nesses-no proof in your behalf?" fear of dying. "Have you no one to speak to your nessed, William sat down to dinner with character ?" The prisoner answered, "No." A second gush of tears followed this reply, for she called to mind by whom her character had first been blasted. an appetite, let not the reader conceive that the most distant suspicion had struck his mind of his ever having seen, much less familiarly known, the poor offender whom he had just condemned. Still, this forgetfulness did not proceed from the want of memory for Agnes. In every peevish or heavy hour passed with his wife he was sure to think of her; yet it was self-love rather than love of her that gave rise to these thoughts: he felt the lack of female sym He summed up the evidence, and every time he was compelled to press hard upon the proof against her she shrunk and seemed to stagger with the deadly blow, writhed under the weight of his minute justice more than from the prospect of a shame-pathy and tenderness to soften the fatigue ful death. of studious labor, to soothe a sullen, a morose The jury consulted for a few minutes. disposition, he felt he wanted comfort for himThe verdict was, "Guilty!" She heard it with composure; but when William placed the fatal velvet on his head self, but never once considered what were the wants of Agnes. Yet the poor, the widow and the orphan frequently shared William's ostentatious bounty. He was the president of many excellent charities, gave largely, and sometimes instituted benevolent societies for the unhappy; for he delighted to load the poor with obligations and the rich with praise. There are persons like him who love to do every good but that which their immediate duty requires. There are servants who will serve every one more cheerfully than their masters; there are men who will distribute money liberally to all except their creditors; and there are wives who will love all mankind better than their husbands. Duty" is a familiar word which has little effect upon an ordinary mind; and, as ordinary minds make a vast majority, we have acts of generosity, valor, self-denial and bounty where smaller pains would constitute greater virtues. Had William followed the common dictates of charity, had he adopted private piety instead of public munificence, had he cast an eye at home before he sought abroad for objects of compassion, Agnes had been preserved from an ignominious death, and he had been preserved from remorse, the tortures of which he for the first time proved on reading a printed sheet of paper accidentally thrown in his way a few days after he had left the town in which he had condemned her to die. THE LAST DYING WORDS OF AGNES PRIMROSE. "March the 12th, 179-. "Agnes Primrose was born of honest parents, in the village of Anfield, in the county of" [William started at the name of the village and county], "but, being led astray by the arts and flattery of seducing men, she took to bad company, which instilled into her young heart all their evil ways, and at length brought her to this untimely end. So she hopes her death will be a warning to all young persons of her own sex. The said Agnes freely forgives all persons who have done her injury or given her sorrow, from the young man who first won her heart to the jury who found her guilty and the judge who condemned her to death. "And she acknowledges the justice of her sentence, not only in respect of the crime for which she suffers, but in regard to many other heinous sins of which she has been guilty, more especially that of once attempting to commit a murder upon her own helpless child, for which guilt she now considers the vengeance of God has overtaken her, to which she is patiently resigned, and departs in peace and charity with all the world, praying the Lord to have mercy on her parting soul." POSTSCRIPT TO THE CONFESSION. "So great was this unhappy woman's terror of death and the awful judgment that was to follow that when sentence was pronounced upon her she fell into a swoon, from that into convulsions, from which she never entirely recovered, but was delirious to the time of her execution, except that short interval in which she made her confession to the clergyman who attended her. She has left one child, a youth about sixteen, who has never forsaken his mother during all the time of her imprisonment, but waited on her with true filial duty; and no sooner was her fatal sentence passed than he began to droop, and now lies dangerously ill near the prison from which she is released by death. During the loss of her senses the said Agnes |