PAUL AND VIRGINIA. 11'] 



jefbs, which we habitually behold, we are unabls 

 to perceive with what rapidity our life paffes away; 

 they, as well as onrfelves, grow old, with an im- 

 perceptible decay : but thofe, which we fuddenly 

 fee again, after feveral years abfence, admonifli us 

 of the fwiftnefs with which the ftream of our days 

 flows on. Paul was as much furprized, and as for- 

 rowful, at the fight of this large papaya, loaded 

 with fruit, as a traveller is, who, on his return to 

 his native country, after a long abfence, finds thofe 

 who were his contemporaries to be no more, and 

 fees their children, whom he had left at the breaft, 

 themfelves become fathers of families. Sometimes 

 he was going to cut it down, as it made him too 

 fenfible of the length of time which had elapfed 

 fince Firginias departure; at other times, confider- 

 ing it as a monument of her beneficence, he kifled 

 it's trunk, and addrefled to it thefe words, didated 

 by love and regret : " Oh, tree, whofe pofterity' 

 ** ftill exifts in our woods, I view thee with more 

 *' concern and veneration, than the triumphal 

 " arches of the Romans ! May Nature, which is 

 ** daily deftroying the monuments of the ambition 

 *' of Kings, multiply, in thefe forefts, thofe of the 

 " beneficence of a young and unfortunate girl." 



It was at the foot of this papaya-tree, that I was 

 certain of feeing Patily whenever he came to my 



habitation. 



