person have attained maturity; she is not aware of the nature of her own feelings; they are prematurely developed in their full force before she has strength to bear them; and love and grief together rend and shatter the frail texture of her existence, like the burning fluid poured into a crystal vase. She says very little, and what she does say seems rather intended to hide than to reveal the emotions of her heart; yet in those few words we are made as perfectly acquainted with her character, and with what is passing in her mind, as if she had thrown forth her soul with all the glowing eloquence of Juliet. Passion with Juliet seems innate, a part of her being, "as dwells the gathered lightning in the cloud;" and we never fancy her but with the dark splendid eyes and Titian-like complexion of the south. While in Ophelia we recognize as distinctly the pensive, fair-haired, blue-eyed daughter of the north, whose heart seems to vibrate to the passion she has inspired, more conscious of being loved than of loving; and yet, alas! loving in the silent depths of her young heart far more than she is loved. When her brother warns her against Hamlet's importunities-- For Hamlet, and the trifling of his favor, Hold it a fashion, and a toy of blood, A violet in the youth of primy nature, Forward not permanent, sweet not lasting, The perfume and the suppliance of a minute-- No more! she replies with a kind of half consciousness-- No more but so? LAERTES. Think it no more. He concludes his admonition with that most beautiful passage, in which the soundest sense, the most excellent advice, is conveyed in a strain of the most exquisite poetry. The chariest maid is prodigal enough, If she unmask her beauty to the moon: Virtue itself 'scapes not calumnious strokes. The canker galls the infants of the spring Too oft before their buttons be disclos'd: And in the morn and liquid dew of youth, Contagious blastments are most imminent. She answers with the same modesty, yet with a kind of involuntary avowal, that his fears are not altogether without cause:-- I shall the effect of this good lesson keep As watchman to my heart. But, good my brother, Do not, as some ungracious pastors do, Show me the steep and thorny way to heaven; Whilst, like the puff'd and reckless libertine, Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads, And recks not his own read.[40]