ALMACHILDE.

Alm. Why was I chose for this? to be the victim

Was there no other--of thy cursed lust?

Was there no ranker soldier to fill up

Thy pause of woman's pleasures?

Ros.

I should seem

To find one rank in thee, about the camp
Well taught to brawl it with his fellow-knaves,
With such a foul impetuosity

Of words and empty thunder dost thou chide.-
Thy limbs are well indeed; and all about thee
Looks as if made to be the secret hero

Of a pale woman's watchings--but for me--
Think'st thou thine amorous qualities and shapes
Did bring thee to the high bed of a queen?
I'll tell thee what it was! I thought thee apt-

Thy tall ambition reaching to the stars

Ripe for dominion-marked thee, as a man

Fit to perform my vengeance on a king.

Thou art mine! Thy hands are mine-freed by my act From chains-look to thy side-the very sword,

That hangs beside thee-mine!

And cannot speak my wonder-yet I hear

Thy voice; and--such the strange authority
Thou hast usurped upon my all of man-

I listen, knowing not if to a god

I listen, or a fiend, in human shape,

With all the power and daring of a god.

Ros. Lo! thou shalt hear-then tell me if I am Human or fiend-a -a passage of my life.

Am I a woman, from my father's skull

The skull of mine own father-to have swallowed

A draught of blood- for such it was to me!

Each wine-drop seemed his blood-I have not spoken
Before in passion-let him think it passed.

But I have treasured up that thought, and will
Treasure it yet within my woman's heart;
Till the black blood, I do not say of whom,
Shall answer, gout by gout, for every drop
Of wine that I did quaff; and by the host
Of heaven, I drained, in that delicious hope,
His goblet to the dregs,―art fond of death?
If so, back to thy cave,-would'st be a king?

Alm. A king! Oh, I have dreamed of such a word

A king!

Ros. A king! Take a queen's hand upon it!

If that thou dare, I'll set thee on the way.

Enter that chamber! then, unto the hilt,

Plunge in his bosom, who is lying there,
This dagger, thrice, and every time to death,
And on the last, the last, but say to him
Rosmunda sent thee.

Resolved, pale hearted slave, to see thy head

Bleach with thy dastard body in the wind

To see thee strung, strewed o'er with sweets i'the air,
Till the foul swarms of Italy's warm flies
Half eat thee-then, I'll set thee to a tree,
Starving to whiten in Maremma's blasts!
I'll-yet a moment ere I call the guard--
Awake the king, and bid him look on thee,
The violator of his queen! Oh now

You shake! But go, since you're so far in love
With honorable death! Refuse a crown,

Alb. Methinks I hear strange noises, that at times
Like whispered murmurs from Rosmunda's chamber
Reach hither! I would seek the cause of this;

But knowing that some nervous sprite hath fixed
Upon my mind, I will not break her rest,

Nor vex, with sleepless images of ill,

My senses, that do chide this phantasy! (Enter Alm.)
Alm. He lies in an ill posture! Shall I steal

Upon his rest, and send him unprepared-

He dealt not so with me-to his account?

I'll wake him; yet that's worse than dangerous,

And failing-thus 'twere best!-Oh worst, worst, worst! To stain a soldier's sword! If I do wake him,

It is no murder, and without his guards,

Is man to man, and honest sword to sword.

'Tis thus to win-I will not steal-his crown!

Alb. This is no dream, (starting up) who's there?
Alm.

Stand forth and see!

VOL. IV.

Win it, and wear it! Hast thou prayed? thou know'st

Ros. 'Tis true, thou hast not heard me speak or rage
Of vengeance-never hath been heard, nor shall
Be uttered, sound of vengeance from my lips,
Unless to say, "'tis done!" Away with thee;
Speed, of thy men, the fleetest and the best,
To call thy Ravennese.

Ros. And if the deed should not be done,
Exarch, thou must achieve it; and the boy,
"Twere not amiss to deal as quick with him.

(Enter Alboinus fighting with Almachilde.)
Alb. Wounded, but not to death! Rosmunda--
Ros.

My valorous youth!

Alb.

Ha!

My wife! (falling leans on her.)

Ros. (Tearing open his robes.) His breast is bare,

Strike Almachilde-'tis my father's shade,

Old Alboinus, strikes thee! (Almachilde stabs him.)

A CHAPTER ON DUNNING.

"Be done, or I'm undone"

"I have a suit to thee."—

"At whose suit, pray?”—

"Dungeons for such as thou."—

MAXIMS FOR THE WISE.

THE true nature of man is said to be art; by which is meant, invention, ingenuity, the capacity of designing, creating, devising, &c. It is by this faculty that he establishes his superiority over the brute creation, and emulates the Deity himself. People who talk about the simplicity of nature, therefore, and all that sort of thing, talk nonsense. To refine, to multiply his agents along with his necessities, is the province of his intellect; and hence it is that he is enterprising, and hence it is that his arts grow, in progress of time, into sciences. Arts are of various kinds, according to his wants or appetite-some are useful, some are fine, some polite, and some partake of all these characteristics, and are partly useful, partly polite, and partly fine. There are yet other arts known to man, not less common, not less proper, than any of these; yet, strange to say, they remain unclassified. The art of crediting may be called a liberal art— the art of getting credit, establishes high pretensions on the part of him who gets and we may call it a timely art for two reasons; it admirably adapts itself to a fine appetite among the young, which otherwise might run to waste, and then, borrowing a pun rather the worse for wear, because it is said to go on tick. But the most ingenious art of all, is certainly that of dunning. This art we may with much propriety style the debt-urgent art, improperly written detergent in the dictionary, as it most effectually cleans us out.

Dunning, now, as every body knows, is a clamorous and most impertinent importuning for one's money; and a professed dun is decidedly an odious and highly detestable personage. There's no denying this; and, with this knowledge, it is something wonderful that such an animal should be tolerated in society. He certainly interferes greatly with its enjoyments-breaks up its plans, abridges its indulgences, and, in a thousand ways, contrives to spoil sports, in which, with a just sense of propriety, the scoundrel is not often permitted to partake.

But once allow his existence, and he whose "withers are unwrung" by his obtrusions, may yet derive some small amusement in beholding his practices upon others. There is no little mirth, be satisfied, to be gathered from a close survey of dunner and dunnee at the moment of the dread collision; and if we can only contrive to shake off the involuntary terrors which the very presence of the former person necessarily occasions, we shall do well to study the contest of wits, which the opposing parties carry