[Illustration: CUPID AND DEATH.]
Cupid, one sultry summer's noon, tired with play, and faint with heat,
went into a cool grotto to repose himself, which happened to be the cave
of Death. He threw himself carelessly down on the floor, and his quiver
turning topsy-turvy, all the arrows fell out, and mingled with those of
Death, which lay scattered up and down the place. When he awoke, he
gathered them up as well as he could; but they were so intermingled
that, though he knew the certain number, he could not rightly
distinguish them; from which it happened that he took up some of the
arrows which belonged to Death, and left several of his own in the room
of them. This is the cause that we, now and then, see the hearts of the
old and decrepit transfixed with the bolts of Love; and with equal grief
and surprise behold the youthful blooming part of our species smitten
with the darts of Death.