168

DEATH S DOINGS.

his treasured relics; and that, while recording thewonders of antiquity, a monumental record may bepreparing for himself. Not that it would have beenimpossible to introduce Death as a consequenceof antiquarian researches. He might inoculatehimself with the canker by licking a coin, or be poi-soned in tasting the liquors used in the preservingof certain bodies; he might die of chagrin, whenmissing the purchase of a unique or a non-de-descript. There are other instances in which, likeJonathan Oldbuck, the Antiquary's temper andeven frame might receive a shock, when told thathis antique of 400 years had by some awkwarddiscovery been deprived of an 0. But Antiquariesdo not die of chagrin,—whether there is any " causein nature," or in the study of virtu, that fortifiesthe heart and keeps the brain cool, in the disap-pointed views, the accidents, or mistakes that at-tend these pursuits, is not perhaps known or hasnot become an object of inquiry. True it is, thereare men of such phlegm, or of such philosophy, asto bear up against mortifications that would anni-hilate persons of more morbid sensibilities; nor arethere wanting instances in which the most fatal