THE

TRAVELLER'S ORACLE.

"Travelling in Youth, is a part of Education."

Bacon's Essays.

TRAVELLING is attended with Pleasure and Profit; but these advantages cannot always be obtained without occasional Privations: The Author hopes to give the Reader some Instructions which will teach him how to increase the former and diminish the latter.

Persons who have not been in the habit of leaving Home, are apt to fancy, that Travelling is at best a perilous adventure, and attended by inevitable dangers :-Ignorance and Idleness make every thing terrible

we Will not, because we dare not,—we Dare not because we will not.

It is possible to be Drowned, to break one's Neck, to be Murdered, or to fall Sick abroad; but may not all these possibilities happen to us at Home?

A Soothsayer told Eschylus the Grecian Dramatist, that he would be killed by the fall of a House: the frightened Poet retired from the City into the Fields; but no sooner there, than an Eagle, who was carrying off a Tortoise for its Dinner, in passing over our Poet's bald-pate; was attracted by its appearance as the Sun shone thereon, and the learned have imagined, that the Bird mistook it for a fine large new-laid Egg, and taking a fancy thereto, thinking, perhaps, that it would make a nice Luncheon, and it would be convenient to lubricate the Red Lane, previous to Banqueting upon the Tortoise, in order to crack it, Mr. Eagle dropped

"Exit

his load upon Mr. Eschy's Noddle, upon which, as a Dramatist might say, Eschy."

"He that will not sail till all dangers are

over, must never put to sea.

A Sailor saying that his Grandfather, his Father, and his Uncle, all died at Sea, a Bystander observed, "Then if I were you, I would certainly never go to Sea." "Why?" said the Seaman; "where did all your Relations die?" 66 Why, in their beds." "Then," said Sam Spritsail, "for the same Reason, if I was You, I would certainly never go to Bed."

However, as the Sudden Death of a Traveller, if intestate, would occasion irremediable distress and disputes in his Family; -if he consult only his own Tranquillity, (and the preservation of Peace of Mind, is more preventive of the Disorders and even the decays of our Body, than the most

careful precautions against unfavourable Seasons, or unwholesome Diet!) he will certainly make his Will before he leaves Home.

From innumerable causes which are beyond human control, there is, in fact, no condition that is not subject to premature and sudden Death, even in the very vigour of Life, and under the vigilant exercise of every prudential measure.

"Heav'n from all Creatures hides the Book of Fate, All but the page prescribed, their present state."

"As the Lord liveth, and as thy Soul liveth, there is but one step between Thee and DEATH!"-nay, not so much; for the strength whereby the Step must be taken, may fail before it is finished; a little change of Weather-a small Cold-a disappointment in Diet, will derange your Health; and a Fall,—a Bruise,-a Tile from a House,-the