PAUL AND VIRGINIA, 73 



** Thefe rocks are covered with verdure, the birds 

 ** warble when they fee thee : all is gay around thee, 

 " and thou alone art fad." Thus, with embraces, 

 did he endeavour to re-animate her; but flie, turn- 

 ing away her head, flew, trembling, to her mother. 

 The unhappy girl felt herfelf difcompofed by the 

 careffes of her brother. Paul was quite ignorant 

 of the caufe of caprices, fo new and fo ftrange. 



Misfortunes feldom come fingly. One of thofe 

 Summers which defolate, from time to time, the 

 lands fituated between the Tropics, happened to 

 extend it's ravages here alfo. It was toward the 

 end of December, when the Sun, in Capricorn, 

 fcorches, with his vertical fires, the whole Ifle of 

 France, for three weeks together : the fouth-eaft 

 wind, which reigns there alrnoft all the year round, 

 now blew no longer. Huge whirlwinds of duft 

 raifed themfelves from the highways, and hung 

 fufpended in the air. The earth was cleft afunder 

 in all parts, the grafs entirely burnt up ; ardent 

 exhalations iffued from the fides of the mountains, 

 and moil of the rivulets were dried up. No cloud 

 arofe out of the fea; during the day-time, only, 

 red vapours afcended above it's furface, and ap- 

 peared, at fun-fet, lilce the flames of a great con- 

 flagration. Even the night feafon diffufed no cool- 

 nefs over the burning atmofphere. The bloody 

 difk of the moon rofe, of an enormous fize, in the 



hazy 



