Young Jamie loved me well, and ask’d me for his bride; and would have had her, it is clear, though she does not explicitly say so, if there had not been a necessary moral motive counteracting what would have been otherwise the plain free will of both. ‘Young Jamie loved me well.’ She does not say that she loved young Jamie; and here is a striking illustration of that female decorum which forbids young ladies to speak as they think on any subject whatever: an admirable political institution, which has been found by experience to be most happily conducive to that ingenuousness of mind and simplicity of manner which constitute so striking a charm in the generality of the fair sex. But saving a crown, he had nothing else beside. Here is the quintessence of all that has been said and written on the subject of love and prudence, a decisive refutation of the stoical doctrine that poverty is no evil, a very clear and deep insight into the nature of the preventive or prudential check to population, and a particularly luminous view of the respective conduct of the two sexes on similar occasions. The poor love-stricken swain, it seems, is ready to sacrifice all for love. He comes with a crown in his pocket, and asks for his bride. The damsel is a better arithmetician. She is fully impressed with the truth of the old proverb about poverty coming in at the door, and immediately stops him short with ‘What can you settle on me, Master Jamie?’ or, as Captain Bobadil would express it, ‘How much money ha’ you about you, Master Matthew?’ Poor Jamie looks very foolish—fumbles in his pocket—produces his crown-piece—and answers like Master Matthew with a remarkable elongation of visage, ‘’Faith, I ha’n’t past a five shillings or so.’ ‘Then,’ says the young lady, in the words of another very admirable ballad—where you will observe it is also the damsel who asks the question: Will the love that you’re so rich in, Make a fire in the kitchen? [Illustration: _Anthelia._] On which the poor lover shakes his head, and the lady gives him leave of absence. Hereupon Jamie falls into a train of reflections. _Mr. O’Scarum._ Never mind his reflections. _Mr. Derrydown._ The result of which is, that he goes to seek his fortune at sea; intending, with the most perfect and disinterested affection, to give all he can get to his mistress, who seems much pleased with the idea of having it. But when he comes back, as you will see in the sequel, he finds his mistress married to a rich old man. The detail of the circumstances abounds with vast and luminous views of human nature and society, and striking illustrations of the truth of things. _Mr. Feathernest._ I do not yet see that the illustration throws any light on the definition, or that we are at all advanced in the answer to the question concerning Chevy Chase and Paradise Lost.