ith terrours, and drowned in
tears; then shall thy towns sound with lamentations, as thy shores with
the roarings of the waves." These are the words literally rendered, but
how are they verified! The lake is dry, the stone is turned up, but
there is no appearance of this dismal scene. Is not all, at home,
satisfaction and tranquillity? all, abroad, submission and compliance?
Is it the interest, or inclination, of any prince, or state, to draw a
sword against us? and are we not, nevertheless, secured by a numerous
standing army, and a king who is, himself, an army? Have our troops any
other employment than to march to a review? Have our fleets encountered
any thing but winds and worms? To me the present state of the nation
seems so far from any resemblance to the noise and agitation of a
tempestuous sea, that it may be much more properly compared to the dead
stillness of the waves before a storm.

"Nam foecunda rubri
Serpent per prata colubri,
Gramina vastantes,
Flores fructusque vorantes,
Omnia foedantes,
Vitiantes, et spoliantes;
Quanquam haud pugnaces,
Ibunt per cuncta minaces,
Fures absque timore,
Et pingues absque labore."

"Then through thy fields shall scarlet reptiles stray,
And rapine and pollution mark their way;
Their hungry swarms the peaceful vale shall fright,
Still fierce to threaten, still afraid to fight;
The teeming year's whole product shall devour,
Insatiate pluck the fruit, and crop the flow'r;
Shall glutton on the industrious peasants' spoil,
Rob without fear, and fatten without toil."

He seems, in these verses, to descend to a particular account of this
dreadful calamity; but his description is capable of very different
senses, with almost equal probability:

"Red serpents," says he, (_rubri colubri_ are the Latin words, which the
poetical translator has rendered _scarlet reptiles_, using a general
term for a particular, in my opinion, too licentiously,) "Red serpents
shall wander o'er her meadows, and pillage, and pollute," &c. The
particular mention of the colour of this destructive viper may be some
guide to us in this labyrinth, through which, I must acknowledge, I
cannot yet have any certain path. I confess, that, when a few days after
my perusal of this passage, I heard of the multitude of lady-birds seen
in Kent, I began to imagine that these were the fatal insects, by which
the island was to be laid waste, and, therefore, looked over all
acco