w no dawn. The same
event, in truth, broke up our little Congress that broke up the great
one. But that was to meet again: our deliberations have never been
resumed.

[Footnote 35: There are few things more contemptible than the
conversation of mere _men of the town_. It is made up of the
technicalities and cant of all professions, without the spirit or
knowledge of any. It is flashy and vapid, or is like the rinsings of
different liquors at a night-cellar instead of a bottle of fine old
port. It is without body or clearness, and a heap of affectation. In
fact, I am very much of the opinion of that old Scotch gentleman who
owned that "he preferred the dullest book he had ever read to the most
brilliant conversation it had ever fallen to his lot to hear!"]

_Hazlitt._

ON A SUN-DIAL

_Horas non numero nisi serenas_--is the motto of a sun-dial near
Venice. There is a softness and a harmony in the words and in the
thought unparalleled. Of all conceits it is surely the most classical.
"I count only the hours that are serene." What a bland and
care-dispelling feeling! How the shadows seem to fade on the
dial-plate as the sky lours, and time presents only a blank unless as
its progress is marked by what is joyous, and all that is not happy
sinks into oblivion! What a fine lesson is conveyed to the mind--to
take no note of time but by its benefits, to watch only for the smiles
and neglect the frowns of fate, to compose our lives of bright and
gentle moments, turning always to the sunny side of things, and
letting the rest slip from our imaginations, unheeded or forgotten!
How different from the common art of self-tormenting! For myself, as I
rode along the Brenta, while the sun shone hot upon its sluggish,
slimy waves, my sensations were far from comfortable; but the reading
this inscription on the side of a glaring wall in an instant restored
me to myself; and still, whenever I think of or repeat it, it has the
power of wafting me into the region of pure and blissful abstraction.
I cannot help fancying it to be a legend of Popish superstition. Some
monk of the dark ages must have invented and bequeathed it to us, who,
loitering in trim gardens and watching the silent march of time, as
his fruits ripened in the sun or his flowers scented the balmy air,
felt a mild languor pervade his senses, and having little to do or to
care for, determined (in imitation of his sun-dial) to efface that
little from his though