ANTIQUARIAN RESEARCHES. 167

if the laugh is raised, it is at the expense of viceor folly; or if the bells are gingled, it is for thepurpose of obtaining attention to some moral in-struction.

Examples of this kind might be multiplied farbeyond the limits of this brief notice, which wasonly intended to bring into view those capabili-ties (as Brown would call them) which the studyof virtu is calculated to exhibit.

It is true, conjecture and fancy will mix them-selves up with the solid materials, or in some in-stances become substitutes for the true meaning,but then they are often so ingenious and inven-tive, that the resemblance is readily admitted, asin the case of the Scotch novels, where history andfiction unite so imperceptibly as not easily to bediscovered, and what may be lost by the absenceof the one is gained by the skill and the amuse-ment found in the other.

Our design goes simply to show that the Anti-quary may be surprised by Death in the midst of