THE BEE AND THE KISS.

The following is an extract from the Editor's Translation of Tasso's Amyntas, which is now ready to appear. It is Amyntas himself, who is speaking.

One day, Sylvia and Phillis

Were sitting underneath a shady beech,
I with them; when a little ingenious bee,
Gathering his honey in those flowery fields,
Lit on the cheeks of Phillis, cheeks as red
As the red rose; and bit, and bit again
With so much eagerness, that it appeared
The likeness did beguile him. Phillis, at this,

Impatient of the smart, sent up a cry;

“Hush! Hush!” said my sweet Sylvia, “ do not grieve;
I have a few words of enchantment, Phillis,

Will ease thee of this little suffering.

The sage Artesia told them me, and had
That little ivory horn of mine in payment,
Fretted with gold." So saying, she applied

To the hurt cheek, the lips of her divine

And most delicious mouth, and with sweet humming
Murmured some verses that I knew not of.

Oh admirable effect! a little while,

And all the pain was gone; either by virtue
Of those enchanted words, or as I thought,
By virtue of those lips of dew,

That heal whate'er they turn them to.
I, who till then had never had a wish
Beyond the sunny sweetness of her eyes,
Or her dear dulcet words, more dulcet far
Than the soft murmur of a hemming stream
Crooking its way among the pebble-stones,
Or summer airs that babble in the leaves,
Felt a new wish move in me to apply
This mouth of mine to hers; and so becoming
Crafty and plotting, (as unusual art
With me, but it was love's intelligence)

I did bethink me of a gentle stratagem

To work out my new wit. I made pretence,
As if the bee had bitten my under lip;

And fell to lamentations of such sort,

That the sweet medicine which I dared not ask
With word of mouth, I asked for with my looks.
The simple Sylvia then,

Compassioning my pain,

Offered to give her help

To that pretended wound;

And oh the real and the mortal wound,

Which pierced into my being,

When her lips came on mine.

Never did bee from flower

Suck sugar so divine,

As was the honey that I gathered then

From those twin roses fresh.

I could have bathed in them my burning kisses,

But fear and shame withheld

That too audacious fire,

And made them gently hang.

But while into my

bosom's core, the sweetness,

Mixed with a secret poison, did go down,
It pierced me so with pleasure, that still feigning
The pain of the bee's weapon, I contrived

That more than once the enchantment was repeated.
From that time forth, desire

And irrepressible pain grew so within me,
That not being able to contain it more,

I was compelled to speak; and so, one day,
While in a circle a whole set of us,

Shepherds and nymphs, sat playing at the game,
In which they tell in one another's ears
Their secret each," Sylvia," said I in her's,
"I burn for thee; and if thou help me not,
I feel I cannot live." As I said this,
She dropt her lovely looks, and out of them
There came a sudden and unusual flush,
Portending shame and anger: not an answer
Did she vouchsafe me, but by a dread silence,
Broken at last by threats more temible.

She parted then, and would not hear me more,
Nor see me. And now three times the naked reaper
Has clipped the spiky harvest, and as often
The winter shaken down from the fair woods
Their tresses green, since I have tried in vain
Every thing to appease her, except death.
Nothing remains indeed but that I die!

And I shall die with pleasure, being certain,
That it will either please her, or be pitied;
And I scarce know, which of the two to hope for.
Pity perhaps would more remunerate

My faith, more recompence my death; but still
I must not hope for aught that would disturb
The sweet and quiet shining of her eyes,
And trouble that fair bosom, built of bliss.

Printed and published by JOSEPH APPLEYARD, No. 19, Catherine-street, Strand. Price 2d. And sold also by A. GLIDDON, Importer of Snuffs, No. 31, Tavistockstreet, Covent-garden. Orders received at the above places, and by all Booksellers and Newsmen.

THE INDICATOR.

There he arriving round about doth flie,
And takes survey with busie curious eye:
Now this, now that, he tasteth tenderly.
SPENSER.

No. XXXVII.-WEDNESDAY, JUNE 21st, 1820.

A RAINY DAY.

THE day that we speak of is a complete one of it's kind, beginning with a dark wet morning and ending in a drenching night. When you come down stairs from your chamber, you find the breakfast-room looking dark, the rain-spout pouring away, and unless you live in a street of traffic, no sound out of doors but a clack of pattens and an occasional clang of milk-pails. (Do you see the rogue of a milkman? He is leaving them open to catch the rain.)

son.

We never see a person going to the window on such a morning, to take a melancholy look out at the washed houses and pavement, but we think of a re-animation which we once beheld of old Tate Wilkin But observe how sour things may run into pleasant tastes at last. We are by no means certain that the said mimetic antique, Tate Wilkinson, was not Patentee of the York Theatre, wore a melancholy hat tied the wrong way, and cast looks of unutterable dissatisfaction at a rainy morning, purely to let his worthy successor and surpasser in mimicry, Mr. Charles Mathews, hand down his aspect and counte nance for the benefit of posterity. We once fell into company with that ingenious person at a bachelor's house, where he woke us in the morning with the suspicious sound of a child crying in another room. It was having it's face washed; and had we been of a scandalizing turn, or envied our host for his hospitality, we should certainly have gone and said that there was a child in his house who inherited a sorrowful disposition from somebody, and who might be heard (for all the nurse's efforts of a morning) whining and blubbering in the intervals of the wash-towel ;-now bursting into open-mouthed complaint as it left him to dip in the water; and anon, as it came over his face again, screwing up it's snubbed features and eyes, and making half. stifled obstinate moan with his tight mouth. The mystery was explained at breakfast; and as it happened to be a rainy morning, we were entertained with the re-animation of that "living dead man" poor Tate aforesaid,-who had been a merry fellow too in his day. Imagine a tall thin withered desponding-looking old gentleman, enter ing his breakfast room with an old hat on tied under his chin the wrong way of the flap,-a beaver somewhat of the epicene order, so that you do not know whether it is his wife's or his own. He hobbles and shrinks up to the window, grunting gently with a sort of preparatory despair; and having cast up his eyes at the air, and seen the weathercock due east and the rain set in besides, drops the corners of his mouth and eyes into an expression of double despondency, not un

mixed (if we may speak unprofanely) with a sort of scornful resentment; and turns off with one solitary, brief, comprehensive, and groaning ejaculation of "Eh-Christ!" We never see any body go to the window of a rainy morning, but we think of this poor old barometer of a Patentee, whose face, we trust, will be handed down in successive fac-similes to posterity, for their edification as well as amusement; for Tate had cultivated much hypochondriacal knowledge in his time, and been a sad fellow in a merry sense before he took to it in it's melancholy one.

The preparation for a rainy day in town is certainly not the pleasantest thing in the world, especially for those who have neither health nor imagination to make their own sunshine. The comparative silence in the streets, which is made dull by our knowing the cause of it, the window-panes drenched and ever-streaming, like so many helpless cheeks, the darkened rooms, and at this season of the year, the having left off fires ;-all fall like a chill shade upon the spirits. But we know not how much pleasantry can be made out of unpleasantness, till we bestir ourselves. The exercise of our bodies will make us bear the weather better, even mentally; and the exercise of our minds will enable us to bear it with patient bodies in-doors, if we cannot go out. Above all, some people seem to think that they cannot have a fire made in a chill day, because it is summer-time,-a notion which, under the guise of being seasonable, is quite the reverse, and one against which we protest. A fire is a thing to warm us when we are cold; not to go out because the name of the month begins with J. Besides, the sound of it helps to dissipate that of the rain. It is justly called a companion. It looks glad in our faces; it talks to us; it is vivified at our touch; it vivifies in return; it puts life, and warmth, and comfort in the room. A good fellow is bound to see that he leaves this substitute for his company when he goes out, especially to a lady; whose solitary work-table in a chill room on such a day is a very melancholy refuge. We exhort her, if she can afford it, to take a book and a footstool, and plant herself before a good fire. We know of few baulks more complete, than co:ning down of a chill morning to breakfast, turning one's chair as usual to the fire-side, planting one's feet on the fender and one's eyes on a book, and suddenly discovering that there is no fire in the grate. A grate, that ought to have a fire in it, and gapes in one's face with none, is like a cold grinning empty rascal. :

There is something, we think, not disagreeable in issuing forth during a good honest summer rain, with a coat well buttoned up and an umbrella over our heads. The first flash open of the umbrella seems a defiance to the shower, and the sound of it afterwards, over our dry heads corroborates the triumph. If we are in this humour, it does not matter how drenching the day is. We despise the expensive effeminacy of a coach; have an agreeable malice of self-content at the sight of crowded gateways; and see nothing in the furious little rainspouts, but a lively emblem of critical oposition,-weak, low, washy, and dirty, gabbling away with a perfect impotence of splutter.

"

Speaking of malice, there are even some kinds of legs which afford us a lively pleasure in beholding them splashed.

LADY. Lord, you cruel man!

INDICATOR. Nay, I was not speaking of your's, Madam. How could I wish ill to any such very touching stockings? And yet, now I think of it, there are very gentle and sensitive legs, (I say nothing of beautiful ones, because all gentle ones are beautiful to me) which it is possible to behold in a very earthy plight;-at least the feet and ancles.

L. And pray, Sir, what are the very agreeable circumstances under which we are to be mudded?

INDIC. Fancy, Madam, a walk with some particular friend, between the showers, in a green lane; the sun shining, the hay sweet smelling, the glossy leaves sparkling like children's cheeks after tears. Suppose this lane not to be got into, but over a bank and a brook, and a good savage assortment of waggon-ruts. Yet the sunny green so takes you, and you are so resolved to oblige your friend with a walk, that you hazard a descent down the slippery bank, a jump over the brook, a leap (that will certainly be too short) over the ploughed mud. Do you think that a good thick-mudded shoe and a splashed instep would not have a merit in his barbarous eyes, beyond even the neat outline of the Spanish leather and the symbolical whiteness of the stocking? Ask him.

L. Go to your subject, do.~

INDIC. Well, I will. You may always know whether a person wishes you a pleasant or unpleasant adventure, by the pleasure or pain he has in your company. If he would be with you himself (and I should like to know the pleasant situation, or even the painful one, if a share of it can be made pleasant, in which we would not have a woman with us), you may rest assured that all the mischief he wishes you is very harmless. At the same time, if there are situations in which one could wish ill even to a lady's leg, there are legs and stockings which it is possible to fancy well-splashed upon a very different principle.

GENTLEMAN. Pray, Sir, whose may those be?

INDIC. Not yours, Sir, with that delicate flow of trowser, and that careless yet genteel stretch out of toe. There is an humanity in the air of it, a graceful but at the same time manly sympathy with the drapery beside it. I allude, Sir, to one of those portentous legs, which belong to an over-fed money-getter, or to a bulky methodist parson who has doating dinners got up for him by his hearers. You know the leg I mean. It is like unto the sign of the leg," only larger. Observe, I do not mean every kind of large leg. The same thing is not the same thing in every one, if you understand that pro found apophthegm. As a leg, indifferent in itself, may become very charming, if it belongs to a charming owner; so even when it is of the cast we speak of in a man, it becomes more or less unpleasant according to his nature and treatment of it. I am not carping at the leg of an ordinary jolly fellow, which good temper as well as good living helps to plump out, and which he is, after all, not proud of exhibiting; keeping it modestly in a boot or trowsers, and despising the starched ostentation of the other: but at a regular, dull, uninformed, hebetudinous, "gross, open, and palpable" leg, whose calf glares npon you like the ground-glass of a postchaise lamp. In the parson it is somewhat obscured by a black stocking. A white one is requisite to dis

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