1829.]

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"Do you know there are boys borne on every ship's establishment?—Yes.

"Supposing that a number of those boys were instructed in the rudiments of seamanship, in climbing up the rigging of a vessel, C and in making ropes, and in carpenters' work; do not you think that the boys are of that age and of that description, that they could be usefully employed on board King's ships?-I have no doubt that it would be very useful, if arrangements could be made to take those boys off as the Marine Society do; but they are now very guarded about the morals of the boys they take, because they have such a choice, and they will not take our thieving boys; in the time of war we got off a great many, but now they will not take the bad boys.

民

"Do you think there is such a deep taint of depravity in their characters, that if they were submitted to a discipline of a couple of years, and were completely separated from their associates previously to their being sent on board a ship, that there is any reason whatever why they should not be made very useful seamen ?-Quite so; I think that more than three-fourths of those boys might be saved by some arrangement of that sort, where they might be placed, so that they could be made some time or other useful members of society; I have often thought of the parental law of Paris, a most excellent law, which allows parents to send their children, through a magistrate, into a prison, to go through a certain discipline, that goes on from about three to six months, according to the views of the parents; but the other suggestion is much better, of establishing something upon the principle of the Marine Society to take off those boys, so that they may be brought up to the sea service; I do think that would be a great relief to the cities of London and West

minster.

"And you think they would be usefully employed in the sea service?-Yes: the boys that go from the Marine Society are very useful boys, and we have generally a good character of them afterwards; they make very good sailors."

The second thing proposed for consideration is the result of education. W. H. Bodkin, esq. thinks that buys who have had moral instruction are those who come the least before criminal courts. (p. 68.)

Mr. Alderman Wood speaks thus:

"I wish to make an observation with reference to a statement which was made by a magistrate a few days ago; that, in his opinion, the circumstance of boys congregating together in the national schools tended to GENT. MAG. August, 1829.

one of those public schools, of which the late Mr. Whitbread was the founder, where 7000 children have been educated, and I can state that there has been no instance of

any one of them being brought up for trial, either in Middlesex or in the city of London. I have inquired most minutely in every possible way, and that is the result of my inquiries; and I think that the employment of six hours a day, which they have in that school, is a very material check to crime."

Mr. Sergeant Scriven thinks that there is not sufficient discipline supported in charity schools, as to indecorous conduct out of them. (p. 135.)

William Davis, esq. says,

"Have you turned your mind very much to juvenile offenders?—I have, since there has been so much outcry, or complaint I should say, about juvenile offences. I have made particular investigation into the history of all the schools I have had to do with, which are very extensive, the result enables me to say, with the greatest confidence, that there is scarcely a lad brought up in our schools who has ever been brought before a court of justice, that I can with safety say; but my attention has been particularly drawn, with a view to keeping them to school as long as possible, from 12 to 14 years of age, by which time we hope they get their minds tolerably well settled in good principles."

The Rev. Robert Black decidedly expresses a favourable opinion of the subsequent conduct of boys educated at the national sehools. (p. 112.)

John Rawlinson, esq. finds, that several boys educated at the national schools have been brought before him, but never a boy educated at the old charity schools. (p. 57.)

Here we shall observe that boys and girls were boarded by charity schools, because it was found that intercourse with the parents at home destroyed the effects of the education.

Mr. Dyer thinks that over-education, through increase of variety and desire of luxuries, has produced many crimes in shopmen, apprentices, and that class (p. 170), and that the majority of offenders could read and write. (p. 171.)

We shall now, in conclusion, give a short abstract or index of other matters touched upon in this momentous Report.

Marine store-shops (for receiving stolen goods),-easy access to pawnbrokers,-tally-shops, or shops for sell

1829.]

REVIEW.

The New Forest. By the Author of Brambletye House. 3 vols. Colburn.

IN this attempt Mr. Smith has trodden new ground, or more properly speaking, he has broken from the trammels of imitation, and has placed his pretensions to originality in a work of fiction fairly at issue. On this point we will merely observe, that we have a strong recollection of having read in our boyhood a novel entitled "Hermsprong, or Man he is Not," the hero of which, an Americaa by birth, and a republican by education, may have suggested the leading character in the fiction before us. The great defects of the present work appear to be a want of lively and continued interest; occasional scenes of true pathos, of genuine nature, written with beauty and power, might be easily pointed out, but they do not redeem the heaviness of the whole. If Mr. Smith will excuse a bad pun, we would say that his New Forest contains too many bores, and though he has introduced a lion, probably for the sake of variety, yet we feel strongly disposed to knock the geologist on the head with his own mallet, to prostrate the scientific mouthed landlord, and horsewhip his waiter "of the pig coloured hair." As for the bores female, assailing them with more gentle violence, we will content ourselves with avoiding all contact with the exaggerated display of gyneocracy in the varied exhibitions of domestic government, with which the volumes too literally abound. The character painted after that of Sir Giles Overreach, though powerfully drawn, is in the same strain of unnatural and overwrought excitement. The hero of the piece, too, a compound of grammarian, philosopher, philanthropist, and athlete, will scarcely be a favourite.Mr. S. refers his peculiarities to the circumstances of his birth and education; but these, though they may account for his oddities, will hardly bring him within the pale of our sympathies.

But we proceed to the more agreeable employment of praise. It is in the scenes connected with a borderer of the New Forest; in the abode of the "Captain," concealing the predatory habits of the smuggler under the ostensible character of a farmer, -that the talents of Mr. Smith are best exhibited. Here is all life, animation, interest, and excitement; here every

147

thing is in perfect harmony, true to nature, and in good keeping. The daring courage of the men are beautifully contrasted with feminine gentleness, modesty, and truth; the reckless adventure, the peril, the escape, all these, though as it were only incidental to the main story, yet appear to us to be far the most interesting portions of the work. Among those whom a reckless course of dissipation and vice had driven to find a shelter and an occupation in the home of a smuggler, was a youth who is thus graphically described:

"Reclining upon a chair, and holding a book in his hand, though with an air of abstraction that showed he was not reading

but, oh! how unlike those we have been

it, there was another individual in the room, describing, and how much exalted by the contrast they presented. It was a tall young man, whose syinmetry of form was perceptible even through the homely habiliments in which he had invested it, evidently for the purpose of disguise; while his fine countenance, in which sorrow and perhaps vice had made manifest inroads, without having been able to eclipse its pale beauty, could be compared to nothing but that of a fallen angel. His redundant glossy brown air was thrown wildly, and yet not inelegantly, about his head; his fair hands, so dissimilar from those of his comrades, were adorned with rings; and in spite of the negligence and coarseness of his dress, which was adapted to the degrading occupation he followed, his suavity of manner, his polished language, his courteous demeanour, imparted to him a certain air of gentility and distinction, of which the effect was rather heightened by the deep melancholy in which he was generally plunged. Gentleman George was his common name, although some of his rude companions, jealous of the favour shown him by the Captain, bestowed upon him the less complimentary appellation of George the Swell. His generosity, indeed, and a courage so reckless as almost to deserve the name of desperation, had early endeared him to the Captain; whose attachment had been strengthened by his conduct in a sharp affray with some of the Preventive Servicemen; wherein he had received a wound in his anxiety to screen and bring off his leader. In intrepidity and nobleness of feeling, the

two men resembled each other; in all other respects they were totally dissimilar."

We have nothing to add to the observations that preceded this extract. Although "The New Forest" might have done something for a novice, it will hardly add to the reputation of Mr. Smith.

148

NICHOLS's Autographs.-Parts 9 to 11. OUR attention having been much occupied by this valuable and elegant work, we have, in ruminating upon it, attempted to discover traces, if any, between_handwriting and character. In the Preface the subjeet has been most impartially and ably discussed; but, we should add, without the rashness of decision. Nevertheless, there may be both indications of temperament and character, especially of the former, in mere signatures of names. A mau full of imagination and quick conception is far more likely to write a hasty scrawl, than a reflecting slow man of machine regularity. The proud man will more probably write a stately stiff legible hand than the humble man, who may be satisfied with thinking neatness becoming. In the present day the gentleman does not choose to write like a school-boy or a clerk, but adopts, as far as he is able, an easy legibility; and a similar opinion prevailed in the days of Shakspeare, for Hamlet says it was deemed a baseness to write fair, as statists did; a feeling which is certainly declaratory of a consideration of station, both in the writ ing of the gentleman and the statist. It has been said of farmers, that it takes them a whole day to write a bill of three items; and persons who are in the habits of manual labour or exercise, even as gentlemen, cannot have a flexibility of finger, which avoids stiffness, or, from the nature of their avocations or pastimes, a pleasure in writing. Gentlemen, therefore, who even admitted the inevitable necessity of writing, might have deemed it sufficient, if they were proud, to have acquired a set stately hand, a formal thing, halfprinting; and have made their letters by a process similar to writing Greek. When the letters of a word were detached from each other, that certainly was the case. No indications of cha racter can be drawn from such handwriting. It is possible too, that many persons never wrote ten letters in a year, and merely got up an engrossing hand for occasional business purposes, without any studiousness of penmanship. It is certain that the genuine writing of Shakspeare is pure engrossing, and of the same character as the common charter-writing of two centuries before him; and as Chaucer's Absalom used to write charters of quittance, very possibly a similar parish

[Aug.

clerk was Shakspeare's Schoolmaster. Be that as it may, Shakspeare's testamentary autograph is nothing but charter-gothic. (See No. 11, B.) We mean his genuine hand, taken from the signature of his will: for we cannot admit the Gothic-Italian " William Shakspeare his booke," in the same plate, to be free from suspicion. In the S (capital) the (small), and other letters, variations occur; but we do not speak with confidence, because we know that it was usual for the same persons at that period to write two different hands; and it is presumptive that they did apply the engrossing autograph to law deeds and business writings, and the Italian one to familiar letters and memorandums. In the Italian hand, however, of the æra, the capital S is very rarely if ever of the Gothic form (as may be seen even in the plate quoted), but only a swanneck serpentine demi-spiral, and in the presumed Shakspeare the S capital and the hand p small are sheer Gothic. We have not gone further, because in searching all the plates of this work, we have not found a solitary instance of the capital Gothic or black-letter in running or familiar hand; and it is upon this circumstance we have founded our suspicion, which we willingly leave open to confutation, because we are sure that an exception, if any be found, will be exceedingly rare. Shakspeare wrote much we apprehend that he either used two different hands, or employed an amanuensis; for he hardly engrossed all his plays. his thoughts flowed fast is evident from his writings, and his testamentary Gothic "by me," would take up twice as many seconds in writing, as the same syllables would in runninghand. The familiar affectionate term, used by Ben Jonson, or some of his contemporaries, "Willy Shakspeare," shows that he was a lively, pleasant, good-tempered fellow; but could any of his own running-hand manuscripts be discovered, we sadly fear that they would turn out illegible scrawls, because his ideas travelled with the celerity of light, and it is improbable that he would have allowed himself the time which the neatness of the running-hand of the day shows to have been consumed, even in this familiar

As

That

Leland (see No. 9, B.) did not write. his works in black letter.