there will be no appearance of evil in it, but harmony and joy will fhed unmixed felicities on them: they will live in no low degree of beatitude in the suburbs of heaven.

This was my cafe: wedlock to me became the greatest bleffing: a scene of the moft refined friendfhip, and a condition to which nothing can be added to complete the fum of human felicity. So I found the holy and fublime relation, and in the wilds of Westmoreland, enjoyed a happiness as great as human nature is capable of, on this planet. Senfible to all the ties of focial truth and honor, my partner and I lived in perfect felicity, on the products of our folitary farm. The amiable difpofitions of her mind, chearfulness, good nature, difcretion, and diligence, gave a perpetual dignity and luftre to the grace and loveliness of her perfon; and as I did all that love and fidelity could do, by practising every rule of caution, prudence, and juf tice, to prevent variance, foften cares, and preferve affection undiminished, the harmony of our ftate was unmixed and divine. Since the primitive inftitution of the relation, it never exifted in a more delightful manner. Devoted to each other's heart, we defired no other happiness in this world,

than

than to pafs life away together in the folitude we were in. We lived, hoped, and feared but for each other; and made it our daily ftudy to be what revealed religion prefcribes, and the concurrent voice of nature requires, in the facred tie. Do fo likewife, ye mortals, who intend to marry, and ye may, like us, be happy. As the instincts and paffions were wifely and kindly given us, to fubferve many purposes of our present ftate, let them have their proper, fubaltern fhare of action; but let reafon ever have the fovereignty, (the divine law of reafon and truth) and be, as it were, fail and wind to the veffel of life.

Our manner

of living at

Orton

Lodge.

§. 4. Two years, almoft, this fine fcene lafted, and during that period, the business and diverfions of our lone retreat appeared fo various and pleafing, that it was not poffible to think a hundred years fo spent, in the leaft degree dull and tedious. Exclufive of books and gardening, and the improvement of the farm, we had, during the fine season, a thousand charming amufements on the mountains, and in the glens and vallies of that fweet filent place. Whole days we would fpend in fishing, and dine in fome cool grot by the water-fide, or under an aged tree, on the margin of fome beauti

:

beautiful ftream.

We generally ufed the fly and rod; but, if in hafte, had recourse to one of the little water-falls, and, by fixing a net under one of them, would take a dozen or two of very large trouts, in a few minutes time.

By a little water-fall, I mean one of those that are formed by fome fmall river, which tumbles there in various places, from rock to rock, about four feet each fall, and makes a most beautiful view from top to bottom of a fall. There are many of these falling waters among the vast mountains of Westmoreland. I have feen them likewife in the Highlands of Scotland.

Glencrow

At Glencrow, half way bewater-falls. tween Dumbarton and Inverary, there are some very fine ones, and just by them one Campbell keeps a poor inn. There we were entertained with water and whifky, oat-cakes, milk, butter, and trouts he took by the net, at one of the little falls of a river that defcends a prodigious mountain near his lone house, and forms, like what we have at Orton-Lodge, a most beautiful scene. Several happy days I paffed at this place, with a dear creature, who is now a faint in heaven.

At

The great age and fize of

tench, in a fenny water

carp and

near Orton

Lodge.

At other times we had the diverfion of taking as much carp and tench as we pleased, in a large, ftanding, fenny water, that lies about two miles from the lodge, in a glen, and always found the fifh of this water of an enormous fize, three feet long, though the general length of fish of this fpecies is eleven inches in our ponds: this vaft bigness must be owing to the great age of these fish; I may fuppofe, at least, an hundred years; for it is certain, that in garden-ponds, which have, for experiment's fake, been left undisturbed for many years, the carp and tench have been found alive, and grown to a furprising bignefs.

The fate of carp and tench pond by agen tleman of my acquaintance.

put into a

A gentleman, my near relation, who lived to a very long age, put fome fish of thefe fpecies into a pond, the day that Colonel Ewer, at the head of feven other officers, prefented to the Commons that fatal.remonftrance, which in fact took off the head of Charles, that is, November 20, 1648; and in the year 1727, feyenty-nine years after, on his return to that feat, he found them all alive, and near two feet and a half in length. This demon

ftrates

ftrates that fish may live to a very great age. It likewife proves that they continue to grow till they are an hundred years old, and then they are the finest eating.

Another of our amufements, during the fummer's bright day, was the pointer and gun, for the black cock, the moor cock, and the cock of the wood, which are in great plenty on those vast hills. Charlotte was fond of this fport, and would walk with me for hours, to fee me knock down the game; till, late in the evening, we would wander over the fells, and then return to our clean, peaceful, little house, to fup as elegantly on our birds (1), as the great could do, and with a harmony and unmixed joy they are

for

Description of (1) The black cock is as large as our the black cock. game cocks, and flies very fwift and ftrong. The head and eyes are large, and round the eyes is a beautiful circle of red. The beak is ftrong, and black as the body; the legs robust and red. It is very high eating; more fo than any native in England except the fen-ortolan; but in one particular it exceeds the fen birds, for it has two taftes; it being brown and white meat: under a lay of brown is a lay of white meat; both delicious: the brown is higher than the black moor cock, and the white much richer than the pheasant.

The moor-cock.

The moor cock is likewife very rare, but is to be had fometimes in London, as the fportfmen meet with it now and then on the hilly heaths, not very far from town; particularly

on