And yet repines at destiny,
  Appears ungrateful in the case,
  And merits not the good he has. 
  Then let us welcome the New Guest
  With lusty brimmers of the best;
  Mirth always should Good Fortune meet,
  And renders e’en Disaster sweet: 
  And though the Princess turn her back,
  Let us but line ourselves with sack,
  We better shall by far hold out,
  Till the next Year she face about.

How say you, reader—­do not these verses smack of the rough magnanimity of the old English vein?  Do they not fortify like a cordial; enlarging the heart, and productive of sweet blood, and generous spirits, in the concoction?  Where be those puling fears of death, just now expressed or affected?—­Passed like a cloud—­absorbed in the purging sunlight of clear poetry—­clean washed away by a wave of genuine Helicon, your only Spa for these hypochondries—­And now another cup of the generous! and a merry New Year, and many of them, to you all, my masters!

MRS. BATTLE’S OPINIONS ON WHIST

“A clear fire, a clean hearth, and the rigour of the game.”  This was the celebrated wish of old Sarah Battle (now with God) who, next to her devotions, loved a good game at whist.  She was none of your lukewarm gamesters, your half and half players, who have no objection to take a hand, if you want one to make up a rubber; who affirm that they have no pleasure in winning; that they like to win one game, and lose another; that they can while away an hour very agreeably at a card-table, but are indifferent whether they play or no; and will desire an adversary, who has slipt a wrong card, to take it up and play another.  These insufferable triflers are the curse of a table.  One of these flies will spoil a whole pot.  Of such it may be said, that they do not play at cards, but only play at playing at them.

Sarah Battle was none of that breed.  She detested them, as I do, from her heart and soul; and would not, save upon a striking emergency, willingly seat herself at the same table with them.  She loved a thorough-paced partner, a determined enemy.  She took, and gave, no concessions.  She hated favours.  She never made a revoke, nor ever passed it over in her adversary without exacting the utmost forfeiture.  She fought a good fight:  cut and thrust.  She held not her good sword (her cards) “like a dancer.”  She sate bolt upright; and neither showed you her cards, nor desired to see yours.  All people have their blind side—­their superstitions; and I have heard her declare, under the rose, that Hearts was her favourite suit.