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THE DIRECTOR.

No. 23. SATURDAY, JUNE 27, 1807.

To doubt

Is worse than to have lost and to despair,

Is but to antedate those miseries

That must fall on us.

DUKE OF MILAN.

HAVING received the two following communications from quarters very capable of affording many more, I submit them to the perusal of the reader, as the didactic part of the present number; to the first, I have taken the liberty of prefixing the above motto from MAS

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To the Editor of the Director.
Cypress Hall, June 13, 1807.

Sir,

I PERCEIVE that your Journal embraces miscellaneous matter, and is not exclusively confined to the details of the arts and sciences. Sometimes you love to sport with Beaus and Belles, and sometimes to steal behind the scenes, and give dramatic authors a whipping for their stupid or impudent productions.

It does not, however, appear to me, that you have yet travelled into the country, and taken notice of the oddities and singularities of the rustic character. In the present communication, it is my intention to transmit to you a short Journal which I made during my visit at the house of my old friend SIR TIMOTHY ZOUCHE. But, first of all, Sir, let me give you a sketch of Sir Timothy's cha

racter.

SIR TIMOTHY is of a very antient an

cestry; as may be observed from the Family Tree, drawn on vellum, and hanging up in an old oaken frame in the hall. I am not quite sure whether, among the curiosities of the black-room library, there be not an edition of the St. Albans Book on Heraldry, with MS. notes, by Sir William Dugdale; in which Sir Timothy's ancestors are mentioned in the most honourable manner. Suffice it to observe, that Sir Timothy justly boasts of a splendid race of great grandfathers and grandmothers, who have drawn swords and worked carpets for the benefit of their country.

He has two daughters and one son; the latter well married, and settled in Caernarvonshire; from whence he frequently writes long letters, and amuses the worthy Knight with his descriptions of Conway Castle, Snowdon and Plinlimmon mountains. The daughters are unmarried, and live with their father in tolerable harmony.

THE misfortune is, Sir Timothy ranks among those unhappy gentlemen who are continually worrying themselves about the triumphs of the French, and the manœuvres of Party at home. If the former happen to be defeated, he draws plans for confining a certain Gentleman within an iron cage; or, if he happen to conquer, he anticipates the subjugation of the world. When the surrender of Dantzic reached him, he expressed his surprise and chagrin that the Stocks had not fallen more than two per cent and when he was made acquainted with the news of our late disaster in Egypt, he uttered a deep groan, declaring that there was an end of British valour by land! Our ships, according to Sir Timothy's calculations, should be at all quarters of the world in all seasons; and though he acknowledges that the Atlantic is somewhat wider than Salisbury plain, he is quite astonished that every motion of the enemy's navy should not be seen and counteracted by

our own,

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