fifty-five, enters upon a course of life quite alien from his former habits. He then proceeds, in the style of an advocate arguing on one side of a question, to enumerate all possible suppositions as to defects in the character of the object of an old man’s choice as a partner for the remainder of his life. She may be peevish and morose—She may be intemperate, immodest, idle and sluttish—If she is a maiden and young, it will be found on trial that the levity of youth will not harmonize with the gravity of advanced years—If she be a widow, there is great hazard lest she should entertain vivid recollections of the pleasures which she enjoyed in her connexion with her former spouse—recollections which will by no means operate to the advantage of her present husband. As to the entering into an union with an aged woman, this would be of course the feeble propping and sustaining the feeble—it would be a proceeding productive of nothing but a doubling of infirmity and discomfort. For a literary man to enter into a connexion which must trespass upon that time which should be devoted to the cultivation of his mind were folly indeed—to all which considerations must be added this most important one, that if a man who marries late in life becomes the father of children, he cannot expect to live to see the completion of that education which he hopes may imbue his offspring with that useful knowledge and with those virtuous dispositions which are requisite to secure their success in the world. At his death, then, he will be oppressed by the painful reflection, that he must leave the objects of his fond solicitude to the discretion of guardians, who have been found in so many instances to be careless or unfaithful in the discharge of their important trust. “I am aware,” says Niccolo at the termination of his speech, “that in some cases circumstances may be different from what I have represented them as likely to be. You, Poggio, for instance, are fortunate if what you tell us of your matrimonial experience is true—but yet I always have been, and still am, of opinion, that safe counsels are to be preferred to hazardous ones.”