baptism. But as the baptism was according to the Greek ritual, by total immersion, Bertrandon seems to have a distant suspicion that this miracle may be resolved into the simple phenomenon of washing. He speaks well of the Turks, and represents them, to our surprise, as a very gay, laughing people. We thought Turkish gravity had been almost proverbial. The natives of the countries through which he passed pray (he says) for the conversion of Christians; and especially request that there may be never sent among them again such another terrible man as Godfrey of Boulogne. At Couhongue the caravan broke up; and here he quitted a Mameluke soldier, who had kept him company during the whole of the journey, and to whose courage and fidelity Europe, Philip le Bon, and Mr. Johnes of Hafod, are principally indebted for the preservation of the first esquire-carver.

I bade adieu,' he says to my Mameluke. This good man whose name was Mohammed, had done me innumerable services. He was very charitable, and never refused alms when asked in the name of God. It was through charity he had been so kind to me; and I must confess that, without his assistance, I could not have performed my journey without incurring the greatest danger; and that, had it not been for his kindness, I should often have been exposed to cold and hunger, and much embarrassed with my horse.

'On taking leave of him, I was desirous of showing my gratitude; but he would never accept of anything except a piece of our fine European cloth to cover his head, which seemed to please him much. He told me all the occasions that had come to his knowledge, on which, if it had not been for him, I should have run risks of being assassinated, and warned me to be very circumspect in my connections with the Saracens, for that there were among them some as wicked as the Franks. I write this to recal to my reader's memory,

that the person who, from his love to God, did me so many and essential kindnesses, was a man not of our faith.' p. 196, 197.

For the rest of the journey, he travelled with the family of the leader of the caravan, without any occurrence more remarkable than those we have already noticed; -arrived at Constantinople, and passed through Germany to the court of Philip le Bon. Here his narrative concludes, Nor does the carver vouchsafe to inform us of the changes which time had made in the appetite of that great prince,whether veal was now more pleasing to him than lamb, if his favourite morsels were still in request, -if animal succulence were as grateful to him as before the departure of the carver,—or if this semisanguineous partiality had given way to a taste for cinereous and torrefied meats. All these things the first esquire-carver might have said, none of them he does say, nor does Mr. Johnes of Hafod supply, by any antiquarian conjectures of his own, the distressing silence of the original. Saving such omissions, there is something pleasant in the narrative of this arch-divider of fowls. He is an honest, brave, liberal man; and tells his singular story with great brevity and plainness. We are obliged to Mr. Johnes for the amusement he has afforded us; and we hope he will persevere in his gentlemanlike, honourable, and useful occupations.

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LETTER ON THE CURATE'S SALARY BILL. * (E. REVIEW. 1808.)

A Letter to the Right Honourable Spencer Perceval, on a Subject connected with his Bill, now under Discussion in Parliament, for improving the Situation of Stipendiary, Curates. 8vo. Hatchard, London. 1808.

THE poverty of curates has long been a favourite theme with novelists, sentimental tourists, and elegiac poets. But, notwithstanding the known accuracy of this class of philosophers, we cannot help suspecting that there is a good deal of misconception in the popular estimate of the amount of the evil.

A very great proportion of all the curacies in England are filled with men to whom the emolument is a matter of subordinate importance. They are filled by young gentlemen who have recently left college, who of course are able to subsist as they had subsisted for seven years before, and who are glad to have an opportunity, on any terms, of acquiring a practical familiarity with the duties of their profession. They move away from them to higher situations as vacancies occur; and make way for a new race of ecclesitical apprentices. To those men, the smallness of the appointment is a grievance of no very great magnitude; nor is it fair with relation to them, to represent the ecclesiastical order as degraded by the

* Now we are all dead, it may be amusing to state that I was excited to this article by Sir William Scott, who brought me the book in his pocket; and begged I would attend to it, carefully concealing his name; my own opinions happened entirely to agree with his.

indigence to which some of its members are condemned. With regard, again, to those who take curacies merely as a means of subsistence, and with the prospect of remaining permanently in that situation, it is certain that by far the greater part of them are persons born in a very humble rank in society, and accustomed to no greater opulence than that of an ordinary curate. There are scarcely any of those persons who have taken a degree in an university, and not very many who have resided there at all. Now, the son of a small Welsh farmer, who works hard every day for less than 40l. a year, has no great reason to complain of degradation or disappointment, if he get from 50l. to 100l. for a moderate portion of labour one day in seven. The situation, accordingly, is looked upon by these people as extremely eligible; and there is a great competition for curacies, even as they are now provided. The amount of the evil, then, as to the curates themselves, cannot be considered as very enormous, when there are so few who either actually feel, or are entitled to feel, much discontent on the subject. The late regulations about residence, too, by diminishing the total number of curates, will obviously throw that office chiefly into the hands of the well educated and comparatively independent young men, who seek for the situation rather for practice than profit, and do not complain of the want of emolument.

Still we admit it to be an evil, that the resident clergyman of a parish should not be enabled to hold a respectable rank in society from the regular emoluments of his office. But it is an evil which does not exist exclusively among curates; and which, wherever it exists, we are afraid is irremediable, without the destruction of the Episcopal church, or the augment

ation of its patrimony. More than one half of the livings in England are under 80l. a year; and the whole income of the church, including that of the bishops, if thrown into a common fund, would not afford above 180l. for each living. Unless Mr. Perceval, therefore, will raise an additional million or two for the church, there must be poor curates, and poor rectors also; and unless he is to reduce the Episcopal hierarchy to the republican equality of our Presbyterian model, he must submit to very considerable inequalities in the distribution of this inadequate provision.

Instead of applying any of these remedies, however, instead of proposing to increase the income of the church or to raise a fund for its lowest servants by a general assessment upon those who are more opulent, instead of even trying indirectly to raise the pay of curates, by raising their qualifications in respect of regular education, Mr. Perceval has been able, after long and profound study, to find no better cure for the endemic poverty of curates, than to ordain all rectors of a certain income to pay them one fifth part of their emoluments, and to vest certain alarming powers in the Bishops for the purpose of controuling their appointment. Now, this scheme, it appears to us, has all the faults which it is possible for such a scheme to have. It is unjust and partial in its principle, it is evidently altogether and utterly inefficient for the correction of the evil in question, — and it introduces other evils infinitely greater than that which it vainly proposes to abolish.

To this project, however, for increasing the salary of curates, Mr. Perceval has been so long and so obstinately partial, that he returned to the charge in the last session of Parliament, for the third time;