they are in imminent danger of being lost, although the driver dismounts every few miles to see that they are safe. As this kind of attention, however, seemed better adapted to ascertain your loss than to secure your property, I bought a chain and padlock: one end of the chain my servant introduced into the stage: if he had a nibble, his attention was awakened; and a bite shewed that it was high time to stop. We broke two chains, but brought our luggage safely. The principal reason why the conveyance is so wretched, is, that few persons travel from the Southern to the Northern states by land, except in their own carriages; and as the road runs through the poorest part of America, even the opulent families generally prefer the packets. I should be glad, for the sake of the candour of those English travellers who so have misrepresented America, if their range of observation had been confined to the road on the sea-coast from New York to Georgia. Their inaccurate representations might then be accounted for, without impeaching either their motives or their good temper. From Petersburgh to the borders of North Carolina, the inns, the people, the face of the country, all seemed to degenerate; and from Petersburgh to Charleston we passed through only three small towns, and a few very small villages, although the distance is 400 miles. The log-huts were very thinly scattered; and the manners of the lower classes, both of the Black and White population, altered very sensibly for the worse. Their general demeanour became more rude and familiar, and their conversation more licentious and profane: their appearance, also, was dirty, ragged, and uncomfortable. The Virginian nightingales and mocking-birds have been our constant companions; and we were desired to look out for racoons and opossums, but did not see any. The number and variety of the squir I rels were almost incredible : heard of several instances of from 2000 to 3000 being killed in a day in some of the large squirrel-hunts. I once observed a beautiful one perfectly white. Although our route lay principally through the most barren tracts of Virginia and the Carolinas, I had the opportunity of seeing the clearing of land in almost every different stage. The process, I believe, is familiar to you, and I will not therefore describe it. Youcan have no idea, however, of the picture of desolation which is presented by a large tract of girdled trees, not only destitute of verdure, but entirely stripped of their bark; some black to the top, with fire which has been applied to them; some falling as you pass with a great crash; and others going by fragments to decay. The prodigious size of the pine trees thus deformed, and the absence of any thing to relieve the eye, which at that season could wander only over a leafless forest, added greatly to the effect. In passing through the pine barrens of the Carolinas, we saw may trees with little excavations in them, for the purpose of collecting the turpentine from them at particular seasons of the year. When the turpentine begins to flow, the owner of the woods divides them into little districts, which are confided to the charge of his slaves. A Negro has usually the care of from 3000 to 5000 trees. I was told that 3000 trees often produce about seventy-five barrels of turpentine annually; and that the excavations are emptied five or six times in the season, which lasts from about May to September. We also saw the tar-pits, where the tar is extracted from the dead wood of the pine trees in a particular state. In the night we frequently passed parties" camping out" in the woods, by large fires; and occasionally saw trees, accidentally set on fire by their embers, gradually consuming like a torch.-I forgot to say, in speaking of the clearing of land, that we had a striking in stance of the rapidity with which a settlement is occasionally effected. The mail stage stopped for breakfast one morning at a very comfortable log-house. The land was cleared for about the space of an acre, and, in addition to the house, there were two out-houses; a stable, in which were the four mail horses; and a granary. Thirteen days previously this was the middle of a wood, and not a tree was cut down! My companions were delighted with the frog concerts in the woods, and hailed them, as we do the cuckoo, as the harbinger of spring: I opened my window the first night, supposing these choristers were birds, and it was a night or two before I was undeceived. I have not thought them musical since I discovered my mistake. In the course of our route from Petersburgh we have crossed many rivers and creeks, frequently by ferries in the middle of the night. In South Carolina we have passed through several large swamps, where the monotony of the pine barrens was relieved by a variety of beautiful green shrubs, among which the magnolia was most conspicuous. As we approached the coast, I saw great abundance of the vegetable drapery which covers the trees like a fine cobweb, or hangs from them like streamers. Its botanical name, I believe, is tellandria usneaoides. It is frequently said to mark the limits within which the yellow fever confines its ravages, but this is incorrect, for it is found every where within the Tropics. We saw the first rice plantation at Georgetown, about sixty miles from Charleston, and began to be shocked with the vacant looks and ragged appearance of many of the slaves we met. But, abating the painful sensations excited by the appearance of slavery, our first approach to this city was calculated CHRIST. OBSERV. No. 249. ' to give us very favourable impressions, after our long monotonous ride through the pine barrens. On arriving at the ferry opposite Charleston, a little after sun-rise on a clear fresh morning, we crossed an extensive bay, from which we had a fine view of the open sea, and in which several ships were riding at anchor, loaded with rice and coffee, ready to sail for England with the first fair wind. Small boats of various kinds, sailing in every direction, gave animation to the scene; while the glittering spires increased our curiosity to see this metropolis of South Carolina, of which we had heard much. On entering the city, we seemed to be transported into a garden. Orange trees laden with ripe oranges, peach trees covered with blossoms, and flowering shrubs of a description which I had been accustomed to see only in hot-houses, gave me impressions similar to those which I suppose you experienced on visiting some of the cities on the Mediterranean. I had no sooner sat down to breakfast at the hotel, than I found one black slave at my elbow fanning away flies with at flapper, and three or four covering the table with a profusion of dishes. On sallying out after breakfast, I found the streets filled with welldressed and genteel-looking people, and carriages driving about in every direction. But I must reserve a description of Charleston and its inhabitants till I have be come better acquainted with them. (To be continued.) For the Christian Observer. CHARACTER AND WRITINGS OF THE LATE ELY BATES, FROM MR. PEARSON'S LIFE OF mr. HEY. THE author of "Christian Politics," Ely Bates, Esq., was a man endowed with a very superior capacity, a sublime genius, an original 4 E turn of thinking, and powers of monumental inscription were placed by his widow. acute and correct ratiocination. He had made considerable attainments in various departments of philosophy, the abstract sciences, and polite literature; his acquirements in civil and ecclesiastical history were extensive and accurate, and in biblical and theological learning he was probably surpassed by few of his contemporaries. Mr. Bates possessed a great and independent spirit; he was an ardent lover of rational liberty; of unblemished uprightness and integrity in his conduct; steady and sincere in his friendships; and, above all, he was adorned with a simple, modest, consistent and elevated piety. During many of the latter years of his life he resided at Blackheath, and lived in much privacy, though not absolute seclusion from society; dedicating his leisure to the improvement of his mind, to devotional exercises public and private, and to the conversation of his friends. His general deportment was grave and serious, and an air of abstraction would often hang about him; yet in discourse he was copious and animated; and, when raised to exertion by the grandeur and importance of his subject, he would display a rich, noble, and impressive eloquence, not very unlike the sublime simplicity of Homer. When Mr. Bates bad passed the middle period of life, he married a lady of suitable years, whose principles and pursuits, whose sentiments and dispositions were congenial with his own; and of whom, if she were not still living, much might be said in honour of her intellectual attainments, her enlarged charity, and her eminent piety. Mr. Bates had suffered from infirm health during many years; but his decline at the last was rather rapid. He died at Bath, January the 4th, 1812, aged sixty-eight years; and was buried in the Abbey Church there, where a plain memorial with a Mr. Bates published the first part of an intended work under the title of "A Chinese Fragment," in the year 1786; the second part, by far the more important, was withheld from the public in consequence of the severity and harshness with which the first part was treated in one of the Reviews. In the year 1804 he published the third edition of" Rural Philosophy," a work that has met with a favourable reception from the public, and which was in much estimation with our late excellent Queen Charlotte, consort of George the Third. His "Christian Politics" appeared in 1806; this was an enlarged and greatly improved edition of a tract published some years before, under the title of "A cursory View of Civil Government." The second and much improved edition of his "Observations on some important Points in Divinity," with the addition of a second preface, &c. appeared in 1811. Mr. Bates has made great use of the "Catholic Theology" of Richard Baxter in the composition of this work; he has likewise given large extracts from one of the writings of Bishop Stillingfleet, from Mr. Howe, &c.; and in the prefaces will be found some acute and probably original observations on the work of Edwards" on the Freedom of the Will," and on some effects of the reformation from Popery, Mr.Bates was deeply impressed with a sense of the mischiefs resulting from combining the doctrine of philosophical necessity with the Christian system; and he has indicated with much sense, moderation, and candour, the evil consequences which are to be apprehended from so rash and unwarrantable a measure. The able refutation of Hobbes, by Bishop Bramhall; the letters of Dr. Sam. Clarke to Leibnitz, Dodwell, &c.; the profound discussions of Anthony Arnauld and Malebranche; Bishop Butler's dissertation on Necessity, and the remarks on Calvinism which occur in the writings of the late Bishop Horsley, tend powerfully to rectify many of the mistakes, and to allay the heats that have been too frequently connected with inquiries into this subject. These great men really understood what they intended to confute, a qualification which has not always been apparent among the numerous writers that have intruded themselves into this controversy. Some divines, in undertaking a refutation of Calviuism, have not confined their animadversions to the peculiarities of the system of Mr. Calvin, but have extended their polemical discussions to the peculiarities of Christianity itself. This unwary mode of proceeding has defeated the good designs they may have formed in entering upon the controversy, and has given to their opponents the advantage of representing them, either as unqualified disputants, or as equally the antagonists of the doctrines of our own Reformers, and of the fatalism involved in the system of Geneva. The error of confounding principles which have nothing in common, and blending evangelical truth with stoical prejudices in one common censure, is not less reprehensible than lamentable, and contributes to strengthen and confirm the Calvinists in their adherence to the opinions of their teachers, and to afford a plausible ground of triumph to the avowed Antinomians. Tothe Editor of the Christian Observer. THE reprehensions in your work, and elsewhere, on the subject of Baptismal Balls and Balls in aid of National schools and other charitable and religious institutions, have not suppressed, even if they have checked, this incongruous practice. Perhaps the animadversions which have been levelled at it have been so seriously drawn up, that the offending parties did not feel inclined to stop their mirth to peruse them. I am induced, therefore, to send you a letter, composed in a vein of pleasantry, but containing under a light surface some solid arguments. It was written some time since, by a respectable minister on the Western side of the Atlantic, under the following circumstances. A ball having taken place in his parish, at a season of peculiar seriousness among the young people under his pastoral charge, many of them, from conscientious motives, had declined to attend, though expressly invited. Their absence was attributed, erroneously however, to the influence and interference of their pastor, who in consequence received the following anonymous note. Sir-Obey the voice of Holy Scripture. Take the following for your text, and contradict it. Shew in what consists the evil of that innocent amusement of dancing.-Eccles. iii. 4: "A time to weep, and a time to laugh: a time to mourn, and a time to dance." A true Christian, but no Hypocrite. The worthy minister immediately wrote the following reply, which, as the note was anonymous, and without address, remained in his own possession, till he lately communicated it to the American Christian Spectator; from which I am permitted to copy it, for the benefit of all cis-Atlantic amateurs of assize, baptismal, and charitable balls. I am, &c. A FRIEND TO REALLY INNO- My dear Sir [or Madam], Your request that I would preach from Eccles. iii. 4, I cannot comply with at present, since there are some Christian duties more important than dancing, which a part of my people seem disposed to neglect. Whenever I perceive, however, that the duty of dancing is too much neglected, I shall not fail to raise a warning voice against so dangerous an omission. In the mean time, there are certain difficulties in the text which you commend to my notice, the solution of which I should receive with gratitude from a "True Christian." My first difficulty respects the time for dancing; for, although the text declares that there is a time to dance, yet when that time is, it does not determine. Now this point I wish to ascertain exactly, before I preach upon the subject; for it would be as criminal, I conclude, to dance at the wrong time, as to neglect to dance at the right time. I have been able to satisfy myself, in some particulars, when it is not " a time to dance." We shall agree, I presume, that on the Sabbath-day, or at a funeral, or during the prevalence of a pestilence, or the rocking of an earthquake, or the roaring of a thunderstorm, it would be no time to dance. If we were condemned to die, and were waiting in prison the day of execution, this would be no time for dancing; and if our feet stood on a slippery place beside a precipice, we should not dare to dance. But suppose the very day to be ascertained; is the whole day, or only a part, to be devoted to this amusement? And if a part of the day only, then which part is "the time to dance?" From the notoriously pernicious effects of "night meetings," in all ages, both upon morals and health, no one will pre tend that the evening is the "time to dance;" and perhaps it may be immaterial which portion of the day-light is devoted to that innocent amusement. But allowing the time to be ascertained, there is still an obscurity in the text. Is it a command to dance, or only a permission? Or is it merely a declaration of the fact, that, as men are constituted, there is a time when all the events alluded to in the text do in the providence of God come to pass? If the text be a command, is it of universal obligation; and must "old men and maidens, young men and children," dance obedience? If a permission, does it imply a permission also to refrain from dancing, if any are disposed? Or, if the text be merely a declaration that there is a time when men do dance, as there is a time when they die, then I might as well be requested to take the first eight verses of the chapter, and shew in what consists the evil of those innocent practices of bating, and making war, and killing men, for which, it seems, there is "a time," as well as for dancing. There is still another difficulty in the text, which just now occurs to me. What kind of dancing does the text intend? for it is certainly a matter of no small consequence to a "true Christian," to dance in a scriptural manner, as well as at the scriptural time. Now, to avoid mistakes on a point of such importance, I have consulted every passage in the Bible which speaks of dancing; the most important of which permit me to submit to your inspection. Exod. xv. 20: " And Miriam the prophetess, the sister of Aaron, took a timbrel in her hand; and all the women went out after her, with timbrels and with dances." This was on account of the overthrow of the Egyptians in the Red Sea. Judges xi. 34: The daughter of of Jephthah "came out to meet him with timbrels and with dances." This also was on account of a victory over the enemies of Israel. Judges xxi. 21: The yearly feast in Shiloh, was a feast unto the Lord, in which the daughters of Shiloh went forth in dances. This was done as an act of religious worship. 2 Sam. vi. 14 and 20: "And David danced before the Lord with all his might." But the irreligious Michal" came out to meet David, and said, How glorious was the king of Israel to-day, who un |