shepherds of the country, "fellows of the baser sort," in all probability Midianitish democrats, influenced by the wonted churlishness; impudence, boorishness, and ferocity of the republican character, came and drove these unoffending females away. Perceiving this harshness, and, in a spirit of gallantry, resenting it, Moses, with the courtesy of a cavalier, quitted his seat and his meditations, civilly helped the insulted maidens, and relieved them from the labour of watering their flocks. This is a pleasing instance of primeval politeness, and demonstrates that even in the simplest stages of society, the man of feeling, taste, and judgment, will always support the rights of woman.

The sex have a paramount claim to our protection, tenderness, and courtesy. Years cannot cause my dim eyes to survey the fair carelessly, or with indifference. My heart still palpitates at their approach, and, in despite of the discipline of philosophy, my nerves vibrate, like the keys of a harpsicord, from the lightest touch of a charmer. Once in the absurd misapprehension of youth, I thought the character of a woman-hater worth imitating, and even attempted to hurl a feeble lance at the daugh

ters of Eve. But time has taught me the impolicy and baseness of such a warfare. I have not only made a truce, but concluded a firm and lasting peace with the ladies. I pride myself that they still admit an old bachelor to their toilets, and that they will not refuse a dropped fan, though presented to them by a gray-headed gallant. If I hear the pleasing rustle of silk against my study stairs, I make shift to hide my spectacles, and at the expense of my gouty limbs, cheerfully resign my obsolete arm chair to the occupancy of the fair sex. I am a very Moses to resent any ill treatment they may receive; and did modern ladies watch and water sheep, like the seven shepherdesses of Midian, I am sure I should "right merrily" fill the bucket.

The gallantry of the attentive Moses was not unrequited. It procured him an invitation to the house of the priest, whose daughters had been thus protected by the shield of civility. The fruits of good breeding were the gratitude of a venerable divine, and the hand of Zipporah his daughter.

Thus it may be learned by every young man, for a pleasant passage through life, that

eager

attention to women honours both the giver and the receiver. Nothing is to be gained by rudeness to the sex. By complaisance to them much may be acquired. He who is universally decried by women, is rarely very popular in male society. Nature intended the two sexes should live in amity. Let the good understanding continue. If we treat our female friends with courtesy, and with tenderness, if we listen to their voice with attention, bow at their approach, and sigh at their departure, we shall be liberally remunerated. Selfishness alone will dictate such politeness. Woman, naturally frank, generous and sensitive, will hasten to discharge the obligation. On him, who is thus watchful to please her, she will smile with radiance, she will smooth his pillow, she will, like Hotspur's consort, "sing the song that pleases him," and "bind his aching head with flowers."

THE MAN OF UNDERSTANDING.

"When thou seest a man of understanding, get thee betimes unto him, and let thy feet wear the steps of his door!"-Ecc. vi. 36.

YES, in a world of weak ones, it is our duty, it will be our pleasure, and, ye selfish generation, it will be for our interest too, to yield favours to the wise, and bread to men of understanding. Our patronage will be but rarely exercised, and few will be the loaves for these wise men to devour, for I looked, and lo! they are a solitary and scanty band, unobtrusive, like the hermit of the mountains.

But, though the "man of understanding" is rarely to be seen, and, though it would profit us much under the sun, to gather the honey of his lips, such is our perverseness, our folly, or our fate, that, untrodden by our " feet," we suffer the moss to gather on the "steps of his door."

My study window overlooks the house of an eminent physician: he understands accurately the nice movements of the human machine; he is a botanist, skilled in the properties of plants, the cedar of Libanus, and the "hyssop on the wall;" he has meditated on the system of nature, and he has tried many of the processes of art. I see him turning over the volumes which contain the secrets of medicine, and I hear him describe skilfully, the various modes to blunt, or to extract, the arrows of disease. But, alas! my careless countrymen, "all this availeth him nothing." The blind, the maim, and the halt of our villages, refuse bread to this "man of understanding," and measure their wheat, in brimming bushels, to the quack, who cannot distinguish between a fever and the gout, who applies his nippers to a wart, and thinks he extracts a cancer, who poisons you with antimony, curdles your blood with calomel, drenches you with enfeebling teas, and, as a wit once expressed it, prescribes draughts so neutral, they declare neither for the patient nor the malady. If the royal preacher, in whose writings I find my text, had seen whole villages, clamorous, at the midnight hour, for a fetid quack, and