PAUL AND VIRGINIA. 1 75 



elevate themfelves, and colle6t the clouds around 

 their peaks. 



It was to thefe plains, accordingly, that I con- 

 duced Paul. I kept him continually in adion, 

 walking with him, in fun-fhine, and in rain, by 

 day and by night, leading him into the woods, and 

 over the frefh ploughed ground, and the fields, in 

 order to amufe his mind by the fatigue of his 

 body ; and to deceive his reflecflions by ignorance 

 of the place where we were, and of the road which 

 we had left. But the mind of a lover finds, every 

 where, traces of the beloved objeft. The night 

 and the day, the calm of folitude and the noife 

 of habitation, nay, time itfelf, which erafes fo 

 many recollerions, brought no relief to his mind. 

 Like the needle, touched by the magnet, which is 

 to no purpofe agitated, for as foon as it recovers 

 a flate of reft, it points to the Pole which attradls 

 it : fo when I alked Pan!, as we wandered about, 

 in William's-Plain, " Whither fnall we go now ?" 

 he turned toward the North, and faid : " Thefe 

 *' are our mountains, let us return thither." 



I clearly perceived, that all the methods, by 

 which 1 had endeavoured to divert his mind, were 

 ineffecflual, and that the only refource now left, 

 was to attack the paffion in itfelf, by employing, 

 to this purpofe, the whole flrength of my feeble 



reafon. 



