Orasmin was scarcely feated fecure among the branches, when he heard the dreaded monfters come prowling about the trunk below; and his fickly imagination felt all the horrors of the fate he escaped. Fatigue however exerted her privileges over his fenfes, and funk him in flumber, in the midst of his fear. But his flumbers were unpleasant and difturbed; the clofed fense rejected not the intrusion of felfreproach, and the bleffings he had neglected tormented his nocturnal hours. He awoke in the morning, difpirited and unrefreshed, and looked anxious abroad for a fpring that might cool his ardent thirft.

A fpring was discovered near at hand; nor far off was the wished-for hofpitable roof, which Orasmin again tormented himself with reflecting he might have gained, had he not wafted the precious hours in the fore part of the preceding day in useless repining, and dilatory langour.

With perturbed mind he defcended from his feat, and having flaked his thirft at the neighbouring fpring, advanced toward the hofpitable dome; and demanded fuch refreshment as he wished. Then, informed by his hoft where the castle of Aladin was to be found, he once more renewed his courfe, and hoped for the reward of his toils.

The day was about half spent, when, looking up toward the eaft, he again difcovered two branching roads, and began to call to mind the warning of the genius, that he fhould prefer the more cheerful path. But his reflections were interrupted by an aged dervife, whom he overtook as he advanced toward the spot.

Bending with years and forrows feemed the hoary fire, like the vine that hath loft its prop; his feps were

fupported by a fordid staff, and neg lected was his wretched garb; his eyes pored on the earth, as though forlorn of hope, and his fighs were as the groans of death.

'Father,' faid Orafinin, why droopeft thou thus forlorn, convulfing thy bofom with these painful throes? Can affliction thus purfue the filver wisdom of age, or fearch out the pious votary of folitude and peace, in the obscurity of his lonely retreat? Say, mournest thou the woes of these thy feeble days, or the errors and neglects of thy youth?'

Young man,' answered the dervise, thou art inexperienced, and unwife, or that queftion had not iffued from thy lips.

What is man, that he should rejoice in the vigour of his ftrength, or exult in the wifdom of his fading years? Are not pain and difappointment his portion here? Are not his joys like the tranfient bloffoms of a fummer's day, that bloom but to fade, and allure but to be mourned and forgotten? What is his wisdom, but a purblind guide, that enables him to choose, yet cannot teach him where the choice fhould be made? An untoward friend, that is filent when it should assist, and reproaches what is wrong when it is too late to retrieve? Happier the brute of inftinct, who is impelled, and who obeys, than the boafted fage, whofe eyes and hopeful profpects are before, but whose wisdom and reflection can but look behind.

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Say, what then, is hope-but delufion and vanity? or poffeffionbut difappointment and difguft?

The face of inanimate nature but reminds us of our untoward fate, where fruits only ripen to be plucked and deftroyed! and verdure but revives with the refreshing fhower, to expire again before the parching fun!'

Orafmin was charmed by the dreary wifdom of the fage. He called to mind all the disappointments that were paffed; and applied the reflections of his defponding tutor to the adventures of the preceding day. He reprobated

the

the delufive wisdom that had been given him from above, which paffion oft had clouded, or appetite effaced, and which his tardy will had rather employed to reproach what was paffed, than to investigate or guide with refpect to what might be yet to come. Heedlefs of the way he was purfuing, he yielded his whole attention to his new inftructor, and walked with filent reverence by his fide. Listening to admonitions on the vanity of hope, and reiterated reflections on the raylefs mifery of man, he hailed the gloomy maxims as facred revelations from above, or as truths which the unerring fickle of time had reaped in the toilfome field of experience.

Fertile is the theme; and fmooth was the feducing tongue of the fage; fo that time paffed unheeded by the youthful traveller, and the fixth day of his journey being nearly confumed, he beheld himself arrived at the termination of the path, where nothing

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was prefented before him but inac ceffible mountains, and the gloom of impenetrable woods.

Orafmin started from his reverie, and enquired for the castle of Aladin. Of Aladin, or his caftle,' replied the dervise, I am uninformed; nor can I direct you on the fruitless way. But this I can tell you, if in the vanity of youthful blood, you are engaged in the fond pursuits of business or of pleasure, you have mistaken both your road and your guide.'

The traveller now difcovered his error. He found that by attending to the gloomy fage, he had neglected the inftructions of the warning genius, and chofen the improper road. Curfing, not his folly, but his malignant fate, he trod back with angry speed his erroneous fteps, and arrived at midnight, weary and depreffed, at the place where the roads divide. [To be concluded in our next.]

SIR,

Do not pretend, by tranfmitting to you the following paper, to lay claim to the merit of making profound discoveries in antiquities; on the contrary, it will, I doubt not, occur to your remembrance that the substance of what is here contained is to be found in Warton's Hiftory of English Poetry. But the customs are fo curious in their nature, and fo foreign to the manners of the prefent century, that I doubt not they may tend to the amusement of some of the readers of your inftructive miscellany; efpecially as they tend to fhew how far the fpirit of enthufiafm, and the moft extravagant refinements of gallantry, mixed themfelves with the ferocious spirit of the wild, but fplendid, era of romantic chivalry.

The Court of Love. This was a fociety formed by thofe high-priefs of gallantry, the early

corded which took place in France, in the year 1206; when application was made to the queen, to reverfe a fentence deemed unjuft by the party, and which had been pronounced in the Love Pleas of one of thefe courts, in which the countess of Champagne prefided. It was deemed, however, that decrees of this nature admitted of no appeal; and her majesty declared, that the did not choofe to interpofe in a matter of fuch confequence, nor to fcrutinize the decrees of a court whofe power was abfolute, and whofe decifions were final; adding God forbid that I should prefume to contradict the fentence of the countess of Champagne.' So far may the manners, and even prejudices, of an age, fometimes have a tendency to correct the haughtiness even of defpotic power! The Fraternity of the Penitents of Love.

This inftitution was established in Languedoc, not long after thofe we have juft mentioned; and indeed, as it originated from the fame principle, we are not to be furprised at finding it fprout forth, in the fame state of general fociety. The fuperftition and enthusiasm which marked the religion of the age, had communicated their peculiarities to the military fpirit, and even to the amorous paffion of the times; and indeed, in no one cafe was it ever carried to a greater pitch of extravagance, than by the prefent fraternity; which was fupported by a kind of contention between its male and female members, who fhould beft fuitain the honour of amorous fanaticism.

who ftrove to immortalize their gal lant virtues, that Love works the moft wonderful and extraordinary changes.'

In winter, their love, ftill deaf to the ignoble voice of comfort and convenience, again perverted the dictates of the feafons. They then clothed themselves in the lightest and thinneft ftuffs that could be procured. It was a crime to wear fur on a day of the moft piercing cold; or to appear with a hood, clcak, gloves, or muff.

The flame of love kept them fufficiently warm!

Fires all the winter were utterly banished from their houses; and they dreffed their apartments with evergreens; and in the moft intense frofts, their beds were covered only with a piece of canvas.

tired, they paffed the greater part of Thus accommodated, and thus atthe day abroad; wandering about from caftle to caftle, wherever they were fummoned by the inviolable duties of love and gallantry; fo that many of thefe devotees, during fo defperate a pilgrimage, perished by the inclemency of the weather; and received the crown of martyrdom to their profeffion.

Is it not trange that the ingenuity of man fhould be fo frequently and fo fuccefsfully exerted to curtail life and to deftroy its comforts? While, at the fame time, he has never been afhamed, in any age or country, to complain of the shortness of existence, and the paucity of its enjoyinents! The fevere precepts of mistaken religion, it feems, are fometimes infufficient for our torment, and we are obliged to pervert the fources even of the deareft delights and relaxations, to fill up the idle catalogue of voluntary fufferings. In matters of love, however, at least, we are at length grown wifer; and the love-ftricken maidens and amorous youths of the prefent day, prefer less fevere ways of proving their attachment; and (notwithstanding all the noise which is fometimes made about antiquity, and I

The Floral Games.

These were inftituted in France in the year 1324, and filled the French poetry with allegorical images drawn from floral and botanical objects: fuch as the flower of daify,' &c. of Froiffart.

They were founded by Clementina Ifaure, countefs of Toulouse, and annually celebrated in the month of May.

This lady published an edict, which affembled all the poets of France, to difplay their talents under the infpiring fhade of artificial arbours, dreffed with flowers; and he who produced the best poem, was rewarded with violet of gold. There were alfo inferior prizes of flowers made in filver.

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In the mean time, the conquerors were crowned with natural chaplets of their own respective flowers: each one, it feems, choofing his titulary flower, which acted as his guardian or infpiring faint in the facred regions of Parnaffus.

During the ceremony, degrees were alfo conferred. He who had won a prize three times, was created Docteur en gaye Science; for fo the poetry of the Provençal Troubadours was denominated. The inftrument of

creation was in verse.

This inflitution, however fantastic, foon became common through the whole kingdom of France: and these romantic rewards, diftributed with the mot impartial attention to merit, at leaft infufed a ufeful emulation, and in fome measure revived the languishing genius of French poetry.

Those who are defirous of perufing the particulars of a variety of inftituthe third volume of Warton's English tions fimilar to thefe, may refer to Poetry; notes of which, in particular,

furnish abundant materials for illuftrating the customs and character of the middle ages. I am, fir, yours,

A GLEANER.