INTRODUCTION.

Servetur ad imum Qualis ab incepto processerit, & sibi constet. From his first entrance to the closing scene. Let him one equal character maintain.

Hor.

FRANCIS.

AS they must be of an odd complexion who go to a Tragedy to laugh, so are they no less who take up this paper with a view to meet an entertaining novel or a merry tale. The calamities inflicted on our fellow creatures for their crimes by way of punishment to themselves, and example to deter others from offending, seem to be a very untoward subject for mirth and laughter; nor should readers expect to find it here; and yet this subject should not be supposed void of all rational entertainment, or profitable improvement. An aweful solemn pleasure attends the passage thro' the deep imbowered grove or the gloomy grotto; though it be of a different cast from that afforded by the enamelled smiling meads, the variegated lawns and so rests, and the fruitful vine-yards and corn fields, which seem to laugh and sing, when the sun-shine brightens them into hope and joy.

Every scene of nature no less than every dispensation of Providence have their various beauties and peculiar uses; though the attentive reader be here led through the valley of the shadow of death, yet need he fear no evil; the rod inflicted on others may be turned into a staff and a stay to save, or recover his steps, and comfort him because he is saved.

It is perhaps better now and then to go to the house of mourning or to take up a serious book or paper than for ever to be in the house of mirth; for by the sadness of the countenance on proper occasions, the heart may be made better; while the laughter of fools is like the crackling of thorns vanishing quick into smoke and ashes.

Let this be admitted as an humble apology for not falling into the levity, and giving way to the vein of fiction and romance which adorns and enriches the writings of some of our contemporary fellow-labourers in such subjects as these.

The great use which it is my ambition to make of these unhappy occasions, is to warn and rescue as many as may be from incurring the like sad catastrophe, ever inculcating this incontrovertible maxim of the moral poet, so well established by experience, and history sacred and profane;

Raro antecedentem scelestum Deseruit pede pna claudo.

Yet with sure steps, tho' lame and slow, Vengeance o'crtakes the trembling villian's speed.

which observation as it was made long before Horace's time may be thus expressed in the language of a sacred poet.

Evil shall hunt the wicked person to overthrow him, PSAL. cxl. ver. II.