entertain you with their agreeable conversation, and what has been your choice? Why, to sit on the terrace, satisfying yourself with the fine prospect, and passing your eye over the beauties of the gardens below, without taking one step to descend and walk about in them. On the contrary, you call for tea and the chessboard; and lo! you are occupied in your seat till nine o'clock, and that besides two hours' play after dinner; and then, instead of walking home, which would have bestirred you a little, you step into your carriage. How absurd to suppose that all this carelessness can be accompanied by health. Franklin. I am convinced now of the justice of Poor Richard's remark, that "our debts and our sins are always greater than we think for." Gout. So it is. You philosophers are sages in your maxims and fools in your conduct. Franklin. But do you charge among my crimes that I return in a carriage from Mr. Brillon's? Gout. Certainly; for, having been seated all the while, you cannot plead the fatigue of the day, and cannot want, therefore, the relief of a carriage. Franklin. What, then, would you have me do with my carriage? Gout. Burn it, if you choose; you would at least get heat out of it once in this way; or, if you dislike that proposal, here's another for you; observe the poor peasants who work in the vineyards and grounds; you may find every day, among these deserving creatures, four or five old men and women, bent and perhaps crippled by weight of years and too long and too great labor. After a most fatiguing day, these people have to trudge a mile or two to their smoky huts. Order your coachman to set them down. This is an act that will be good for your soul, and at the same time, if you return on foot, that will be good for your body. Franklin. Ah! how tiresome you are! Gout. Well, then, to my office; it should not be forgotten that I am your physician. There. Franklin. Oh-h-h! what a cruel physician. Gout. How ungrateful you are to say so! Is it not I who, in the character of your physician, have saved you from the palsy, dropsy, and apoplexy? one or other of which would have done for you long ago but for me. Franklin. I submit, and thank you for the past, but entreat the discontinuance of your visits. For Heaven's sake leave me, and I promise never more to play at chess, but to take exercise daily and live temperately. Gout. I know you too well. You promise fair; but after a few months of good health you will return to your old habits; your fine promises will be forgotten like the forms of the last year's clouds. Let us then finish the account, and I will go. But I leave you with an assurance of visiting you again; for my object is your good, and you are sensible now that I am your real friend. - BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. SONG OF THE CHATTAHOOCHEE OUT of the hills of Habersham, I hurry amain to reach the plain, All down the hills of Habersham, The ferns and the fondling grass said, "Stay," The dewberry dipped for to work delay, Here in the hills of Habersham, Here in the valleys of Hall." High o'er the hills of Habersham, The hickory told me manifold Fair tales of shade; the poplar tall Wrought me her shadowy self to hold; The chestnut, the oak, the walnut, the pine, And oft in the hills of Habersham, The white quartz stone and the smooth brook stone And many a luminous jewel lone Crystals clear or a-cloud with mist, Made lures with the lights of streaming stone But oh, not the hills of Habersham, And oh, not the valleys of Hall Downward, to toil and be mixed with the main; And the lordly main from beyond the plain Calls through the valleys of Hall. - SIDNEY LANIER. ALMOST the last words which Sir Walter Scott spoke to Lockhart, his biographer, were, "Be a good man, my dear!" and with the last flicker of breath on his dying lips, he sighed a farewell to his family, and passed away blessing them. Two men, famous, admired, beloved, have just left us, the Goldsmith and the Gibbon of our time. One was the first ambassador whom the New World of Letters sent to the Old. He was born almost with the republic. He |