I think we are too ready with complaint In this fair world of God’s. Had we no hope Indeed beyond the zenith and the slope Of yon grey blank of sky, we might grow faint To muse upon eternity’s constraint Round our aspirant souls; but since the scope Must widen early, is it well to droop, For a few days consumed in loss and taint? O pusillanimous heart, be comforted And like a cheerful traveler, take the road, Singing beside the hedge. What if the bread Be bitter in thine inn and thou unshod To meet the flints? At least it may be said, “Because thy way is _short_, I thank thee, God.” TALES FROM SHAKSPERE. By CHARLES LAMB. ALL’S WELL THAT ENDS WELL. Bertram, Count of Rossilion, had newly come to his title and estate, by the death of his father. The King of France loved the father of Bertram, and when he heard of his death, he sent for his son to come immediately to his royal court in Paris; intending, for the friendship he bore the late count, to grace young Bertram with his especial favor and protection. Bertram was living with his mother, the widowed countess, when Lafeu, an old lord of the French court, came to conduct Bertram to the king. The King of France was an absolute monarch, and the invitation to court was in the form of a royal mandate, or positive command, which no subject, of what high dignity soever, might disobey; therefore though the countess, in parting with this dear son, seemed a second time to bury her husband, whose loss she had so lately mourned, yet she dared not keep him a single day, but gave instant orders for his departure. Lafeu, who came to fetch him, tried to comfort the countess for the loss of her late lord, and her son’s sudden absence: and he said, in a courtier’s flattering manner, that the king was so kind a prince, she would find in his majesty a husband, and that he would be a father to her son: meaning only that the good king would befriend the fortunes of Bertram. Lafeu told the countess that the king had fallen into a sad malady, which was pronounced by his physicians to be incurable. The lady expressed great sorrow on hearing this account of the king’s ill health, and said, she wished the father of Helena (a young gentlewoman who was present in attendance upon her), were living, for that she doubted not he could have cured his majesty of his disease. And she told Lafeu something of the history of Helena, saying she was the only daughter of the famous physician Gerard de Narbon, and that he had recommended his daughter to her care when he was dying, so that since his death she had taken Helena under her protection; then the countess praised the virtuous disposition and excellent qualities of Helena, saying she inherited these virtues from her worthy father. While she was speaking, Helena wept in sad and mournful silence, which made the countess gently reprove her for too much grieving for her father’s death.