ays in the same disposition, as you are when you ask for
this secret, and you may take my word, you will never want it. An
inviolable fidelity, good humor, and complacency of temper outlive all
the charms of a fine face, and make the decays of it invisible."

We discoursed very long upon this head, which was equally agreeable to
us both; for, I must confess, as I tenderly love her, I take as much
pleasure in giving her instructions for her welfare, as she herself
does in receiving them. I proceeded, therefore, to inculcate these
sentiments by relating a very particular passage that happened within
my own knowledge.

There were several of us making merry at a friend's house in a country
village, when the sexton of the parish church entered the room in a
sort of surprize, and told us, "that as he was digging a grave in the
chancel, a little blow of his pickax opened a decayed coffin, in which
there were several written papers." Our curiosity was immediately
raised, so that we went to the place where the sexton had been at
work, and found a great concourse of people about the grave. Among the
rest there was an old woman, who told us the person buried there was a
lady whose name I do not think fit to mention, tho there is nothing in
the story but what tends very much to her honor. This lady lived
several years an exemplary pattern of conjugal love, and, dying soon
after her husband, who every way answered her character in virtue and
affection, made it her death-bed request, "that all the letters which
she had received from him, both before and after her marriage, should
be buried in the coffin with her." These, I found upon examination,
were the papers before us. Several of them had suffered so much by
time that I could only pick out a few words; as my soul! lilies!
roses! dearest angel! and the like. One of them, which was legible
throughout, ran thus:

_Madam_:--

If you would know the greatness of my love, consider that of your own
beauty. That blooming countenance, that snowy bosom, that graceful
person, return every moment to my imagination; the brightness of your
eyes hath hindered me from closing mine since I last saw you. You may
still add to your beauties by a smile. A frown will make me the most
wretched of men, as I am the most passionate of lovers.

It filled the whole company with a deep melancholy, to compare the
description of the letter with the person that occasioned it, who was
now reduced to a few c