gins to clarify, as we say. Well, child, what's the matter with

you? what's your distemper?

Char. Han, hi, hon, han.

Greg. What do you say?

Char. Han, hi, han, hon.
Greg. What, what, what?
Char. Han, hi, hon--

Greg. Han! hon! honin ha!I don't understand a word she says. Han bi! hon! what sort of language is this?

Sir J. Why, that's her distemper, sir; she's become dumb, and no one can assign the cause-and this distemper, sir, has kept back her marriage.

Greg. Kept back her marriage! why so?

Sir J. Because her lover refuses to have her till she 's cured.

Greg. O lud! was ever such a fool, that would not have his wife dumb!would to heaven my wife was dumb, I'd be far from desiring to cure her. Does this distemper, this, han, hi, hon, oppress her very much?

Sir J. Yes sir.

Greg. So much the better. Has she any great pains?
Sir
J. Very great.

Greg. That's just as I would have it. Give me your hand, child. Hum-ha-a very dumb pulse indeed.

Sir J. You have guessed her distemper.

وا

Greg. Ay sir, we great physicians know a distemper immetely I know some of the college would call this the Couor the Sinkee, or twenty other distempers; but I give you word, sir, your daughter is nothing more than dumb-so 1 have you be very easy, for there is nothing else the matter ch her- -if she were not dumb, she, would be as well as I am. Sir J. But I should be glad to know, doctor, from whence r dumbness proceeds?

Greg. Nothing so easily accounted for. Her dumbness proceeds from having lost her speech.

Sir J. But whence, if you please, proceeds her having lost her speech?

Greg. All our best authors will tell you, it is the impedi ment of the action of the tongue.

Sir J. But if you please, dear sir, your sentiment upon that impediment.

Greg. Hippocrates has upon that subject said very fine things; very fine things.

Sir J. I believe it, doctor.

Greg. Ah! he was a great man; he was indeed a very great man. Α man, who upon that subject was a man that--but to return to our reasoning: I hold that this impediment of the action of the tongue is caused by certain humors which our great physicians call-humors- -humors- -ah! you un

derstand Latin

Sir J. Not in the least.

Greg. What, not understand Latin?

Sir J. No indeed, doctor.

non.

Greg. Cabricius arci Thurum Cathalimus Singulariter Hæc musa, hic, hæc, hoc, Genitivo hujus, hunc, hanc, Musa, Bonus, bona, honum. Estne oratio Latinus? Etiam. Quia Substantivo & Adjectivum concordat in Generi, Numerum, & Casus, sic aiunt, prædicant, clamitant, & similibus. Sir J. Ah! why did I neglect my studies?

Har. What a prodigious man is this!

Greg. Besides, sir, certain spirits passing from the left side, which is the seat of the liver, to the right, which is the seat of the heart, we find the lungs, which we call in Latin, Whiskerus, having communication with the brain, which we name in Greek, Jackbootos, by means of a hollow vein, which we call in Hebrew, Periwiggus, meet in the road with the said spirits, which fill the ventricles of the Omotaplasmus, and because the said humors have-you comprehend me well, sir? and be cause the said humors have a certain malignity——listen seriously, I beg you.

Sir J. I do.

Greg. Have a certain malignity that is caused-be atten tive, if you please.

Sir J. I am.

Greg. That is caused, I say, by the acrimony of the humors engendered in the concavity of the diaphragm; thence it arrives, that these vapors, Propria quæ maribus tribuuntur, mascula, dicas. Ut sunt divorum.-This, sir, is the cause of

your daughter's being dumb.

Har, O that I had but his tongue.

Sir J. It is impossible to reason better, no doubt. But, dear sir, there is one thing.-I always thought till now, that the heart was on the left side, and the liver on the right.

Greg. Ay sir, so they were formerly, but we have changed all that. The college, at present, sir, proceeds upon an entire new method.

Sir J. I ask your pardon, sir.
Greg. Oh, sir! there's no harm-

know so much as we do.

-you 're not obliged to

Sir J. Very true; but, doctor, what would you have done with my daughter?

Greg. What would I have done with her? Why, my advice is, that you immediately put her into a bed warmed with a brass warming-pan; cause her to drink one quart of spring water, mixed with one pint of brandy, six Seville oranges, and three ounces of the best double-refined sugar.

Sir J. Why, this is punch, doctor.

Greg. Punch, sir! Ay, sir;--and what's better than punch to make people talk?-Never tell me of your juleps, your gruels, your-your-this, and that, and t' other, which are only arts to keep a patient in hand a long time. I love to do a business all at once.

Sir J. Doctor, I ask pardon, you shall be obeyed.

(Gives money. Greg. I'll return in the evening, and see what effect it has on her. But hold, there's another young lady here, that I must apply some little remedies to.

Maid. Who, me? I was never better in my life, I thank you, sir.

Greg. So much the worse, madam, so much the worse— 't is very dangerous to be very well-for when one is very well,

one has nothing else to do, but to take physic, and bleed

away.

Sir J. Oh strange! What, bleed when one has no distemper? Greg. It may be strange, perhaps, but 't is very wholesome Besides, madam, it is not your case, at present, to be very well; at least, you cannot possibly be well above three days longer; and it is always best to cure a distemper before you have it—or, as we say in Greek, distemprum bestum est curare ante habestum.-What I shall prescribe you at present, is to take every six hours one of these boluses.

Maid. Ha, ha, ha! Why, doctor, these look exactly like lumps of loaf sugar.

Greg. Take one of these boluses, I say, every six hours, washing it down with six spoonfulls of the best Holland's Geneva.

Sir J. Sure you are in jest, doctor!-This woman does not show any symptom of a distemper.

Greg. Sir Jasper, let me tell you, it were not amiss if you yourself took a little lenitive physic: I shall prepare something

for you.

Sir J. Ha, ha, ha! No, no, doctor, I have escaped both doctors and distempers hitherto, and I am resolved the distemper shall pay me the first visit.

Greg. Say you so, sir? Why then, if I can get no more patients here, I must even seek 'em elsewhere, and so humbly beggo te Domine Domitii veniam goundi foras.

Sir J. Well, this is a physician of vast capacity, but of exceeding odd humors.

THE CANT OF CRITICISM.-STERNE.

And how did Garrick speak the soliloquy last night? O, against all rule, my lord; most ungrammatically! Betwixt the substantive and adjective, (which should agree together, in number, case and gender,) he made a breach, thus,

(-) stopping as if the point wanted settling. And after the nominative case, (which, your lordship knows, should govern the verb,) he suspended his voice in the epilogue a dozen times, three seconds and three-fifths, by a stop-watch, my lord, each time

Admirable grammarian! But, in suspending his voice, was the sense suspended likewise? Did no expression of attitude or countenance fill up the chasm? Was the eye silent? Did you narrowly look?

I looked only at the stop-watch, my lord.

Excellent observer!

And what of this new book the whole

world makes such a rout about?

Oh! 'tis out of all plumb, my lord-quite an irregular thing!—not one of the angles at the four corners was a right angle. I had my rule and compasses, my lord, in my pocket. Excellent critic!

And, for the epic poem your lordship bid me look at-upon taking the length, breadth, height, and depth of it, and trying them at home upon an exact scale of Bossu's 'tis out, my lord, in every one of its dimensions.

Admirable connoisseur! And did you step in to take a look at the grand picture, in your way back?

'Tis a melancholy daub, my lord; not one principle of the pyramid in any one group! And what a price!—for there is nothing of the coloring of Titian-the expression of Rubensthe grace of Raphael-the purity of Dominichino-the corregiescity of Corregio-the learning of Poussin-the airs of Guido-the taste of the Garrichis—or the grand contour of Angelo.

Grant me patience! Of all the cants which are canted in this canting world, the cant of criticism is the most tormenting. I would go fifty miles on foot, to kiss the hand of that man whose generous heart will give up the reins of his imagination into his author's hands-be pleased, he knows not why and cares not wherefore.