 of horror!
I thought reason would have appeased these doubts ere this; but every occasion I find calls them forth with unabated vigour. Surely this mental blindness must be the result of neglect. Had we but the will, the determination, it might be removed. Oh how reprehensible is my inconsistency!
The rapid decline of Mrs. Clifton grieves me deeply. Your brother too has frequently mentioned it with feelings

honourable to his heart. He is now more than ever sensible of her worth. He has been with me since I began to write this letter, and there is not the least appearance of remaining umbrage on his mind. It was indeed but of short duration, though too strong and sudden not to be apparent.
All kindness, peace, and felicity be with you.
A. W. ST. IVES.


COKE CLIFTON TO GUY FAIRFAX.
London, Dover Street.
I WILL curse no more, Fairfax. Or, if curse I do, it shall be at my own fatuity. I will not be the dilatory, languid, ranting, moralizing Hamlet of the drama; that has the vengeance of hell upon his lips and the charity of heaven

in his heart. I will use not speak daggers—
Fairfax, I am mad!—Raging!—The smothered and pent-up mania must have vent—What! Was not the page sufficiently black before?—I am amazed at my own infatuation! My very soul spurns at it!—But 'tis past—Deceitful, damned sex!—Idiot that I was, I began to fancy myself beloved!—I!—Blind, deaf, insensate driveler!—Torpid, blockish, brainless mammet!—Most sublime ass!—Oh for a bib and barley sugar, with the label Meacock pinned before and behind!—
Fairfax, I never can forgive my own absurd and despicable stupidity!—Marriage?—What, with a woman in whose eye the perfect impression and hated

form of a mean rival is depicted?—In colours glowing hot!—Who lives, revels, triumphs in her heart!—I marry such a woman?—I?—
I had rather be a toad,
And live upon the vapour of a dungeon,
Than keep a corner in the thing I love
For other's use.
I am too full of phrensy, Fairfax, to tell thee what I mean: but she has given me another proof, more damning even than all the former, of the gluttony with which her soul gorges. Her gloating eye devours him; ay, I being present. Nay, were I this moment in her arms, her arms would be clasping him, not me: with him she
