all parts to solemnize this feast.
Samson, with these immixed, inevitably
Pulled down the same destruction on himself;
The vulgar only 'scaped who stood without.

NOTE.--The person supposed to be speaking is a Hebrew who chanced to be
present at Gaza when the, incidents related took place. After the
catastrophe he rushes to Manoah, the father of Samson, to whom and his
assembled friends he relates what he saw. (Cf. Bible, Judges xvi, 23.)

LXXXVI. AN EVENING ADVENTURE. (315)

Not long since, a gentleman was traveling in one of the counties of
Virginia, and about the close of the day stopped at a public house to
obtain refreshment and spend the night. He had been there but a short
time, before an old man alighted from his gig, with the apparent intention
of becoming his fellow guest at the same house.

As the old man drove up, he observed that both the shafts of his gig were
broken, and that they were held together by withes, formed from the bark
of a hickory sapling. Our traveler observed further that he was plainly
clad, that his knee buckles were loosened, and that something like
negligence pervaded his dress. Conceiving him to be one of the honest
yeomanry of our land, the courtesies of strangers passed between them, and
they entered the tavern. It was about the same time, that an addition of
three or four young gentlemen was made to their number; most, if not all
of them, of the legal profession.

As soon as they became conveniently accommodated, the conversation was
turned, by one of the latter, upon the eloquent harangue which had that
day been displayed at the bar. It was replied by the other that he had
witnessed, the same day, a degree of eloquence no doubt equal, but it was
from the pulpit. Something like a sarcastic rejoinder was made as to the
eloquence of the pulpit, and a warm and able altercation ensued, in which
the merits of the Christian religion became the subject of discussion.
From six o'clock until eleven, the young champions wielded the sword of
argument, adducing with ingenuity and ability everything that could be
said pro and con.

During this protracted period, the old gentleman listened with the
meekness and modesty of a child, as if he were adding new information to
the stores of his own mind; or perhaps he was observing, with a
philosophic eye, the faculties of the youthful mind, and how new energies
are evolved by repeated action; or perhaps, with patriotic emotion, he was
refl