“Lyre! 0, Lyre ! my chosen trea sure, “ Solace of my bleeding heart ; “ Lyre! 0, Lyre ! my only pleasure, “Soft!--the blood of murder'd legions “ Summons vengeance from the skies ; $ Flaming towns,and ravag'd regions, “ All in awful judgment rise! -“O then, innocently brave, “ I will wrestle with the wave ; “ Lo! Commerce spreads the daring sail, “And yokes her naval chariots to the gale. “ Blow ye breezes !-gently blowing, “ We must ever, ever part : " 'Tis in vain thy poet siogs, “ Woos in vain thine heavenly strings, “ Waft me to that happy shore, “Where,from fountains ever flowing, “ Indian realms their treasures pour; "Do foul misdeeds of former times Wring with remorse thy guilty breast, And Ghosts of unforgiven crimes Murder thy rest? "Lash'd by the furies of the mind, From wrath and vengeance wouldst thou flee? Ah! think not, hope not, Fool! to find "By all the terrours of the tomb, *I charge thee LIVE !-repent and pray; In dust thine infamy deplore; -go thy way, "Art thou a MOURNER ?-Hast thou known The joy of innocent delights? And tranquil nights? "O LIVE!—and deeply cherish still Art thou a WANDERER ?-Hast thou seen O'erwhelming tempests drown thy bark? A shipwreck'd Sufferer hast thou been, Misfortune's mark? Though long of winds and waves the sport, Condemn'd in wretchedness to roam, LIVE!-thou shalt reach a sheltering port, A quiet home. To FRIENDSHIP didst thou trust And was thy friend a deadly foe, "LIVE!-and repine not o'er his loss, For Friendship's gold. "Now, Traveller in the vale of tears! "There IS a calm for those who weep, "The Soul, of origin divine, "The SUN is but a spark of fire, THE BOSTON REVIEW. DECEMBER, 1806. Librum tuum legi & quam diligentissime potui atinotavi, quæ commutanda, quæ eximenda, arbitrarer. Nam ego dicere vero assuevi. Neque ulli patientius reprehenduntur, quam qui maxime laudari merentur.-PLINY. ARTICLE 65. part of which he seems better pleased, than with Louisiana. In Travels in Louisiana and the Flore the title-page we are informed that idas in the year 1802, giving a the work is an account of travels correct picture of those countries. in 1802 ; yet in the first sentence Translated from the French, with of the first chapter the writer tells notes, &c. by John Davis. us he has dwelt two years and a half Aspice et extremis domitum cultoris in the colony. The Frenchman bus orbem, considers Louisiana and Westo Laosque domos Arabum, pictosque Florida as one colony, but he was Gelonos ; never a surveyor of boundaries, and VIRC. politicians must look elsewhere New-York, Riley & Co. 12mo. for the demarkation of our sovernp. 181. 1806. eignty. We learn only, that on the west we are bounded by · NewThe immense price, we have Mexico, and vast countries unexalready paid for a part of the plored.' The President of the country, described in this book, United States, in a message to and the value, attached to the rest Congress, says, that Spain would both by its owners and by our gov- confine our territory to a narrow ernment, renders every account of strip of land on the west bank of it interesting in a higher degree, the Mississippi ; but, as we have than other travels. The knowl- long since sent a company across edge of the author might have the continent, even to the Pacifick been acquired by a two-months' Ocean, it is presumable, that our residence at New-Orleans ; but government lays claim to all that there are few men of education tract, traversed by Capts. Lewis and leisure, who are desirous of and Clarke. Yet it seems matter a pilgrimage into that region, so of very little concern in this quare little known to its possessors, and ter, whether our rights extend fifty we must, therefore, acquiesce ma- or fifteen hundred leagues beyond ny years in the relations of men, the Mississippi. But the translawho enjoy few opportunities for tor, in one of his notes, attempts inquiry, and exhibit little minute to raise a doubt, where we had ness of investigation. The author thought ourselves most secure. was, as is conjectured by his translator, a planter of St. Domingo, " It is a matter of mirth, what driven by the blacks to seek a re- erroneous notions the world has fuge on the continent, with any relative to the cession of Louisiana Vol. III. No. 12. 4K to the United States. A thousand inference is manifest, that only the people imagine at this moment eighth part of this vast country car that New-Orleans belongs to us; be appropriated to the labours and whereas New-Orleans still belongs residence of man, the remainder to his Catholic Majesty the King being covered with lakes, forests, of Spain ; it is comprehended in and swamps, and dry and sandy the tract reserved by him.” deserts.' P. 4. P.165. In the second chapter we learn, But, however ignorant of the ex- - The Mississippi, which ditent of our domain, we are willing vides the colony, and whose real to learn its value, name, in the language of the abo rigides of the country, is Messa• If we take into consideration chipi, which signifies the Father of the whole extent of the tract, com- Waters, is one of the most considprehended in the boundaries that erable rivers in America.' P.7. have been just exhibited, the colo- Of the impediments to navigany, under that point of view, in- tion, the rapidity of the current, cludes an immense territory. But the variation of the channel, and appreciating things by their real the bar at the mouth, we have all value, and considering the country the information, we can desire. in another point of view, both with The 3d chapter is chiefly occuregard to the nature of its soil and pied by a minute description of the other local circumstances, without city and island of New-Orleans. including Upper Louisiana, which Was it ever thought, that, in the begins at the thirty-first degree of hands of Spaniards that city would latitude, and extends to the north have been a difficult conquest? The and the east, an immense territo- President of the United States talkry, wild and uncultivated, with a ed of the rashness of attacking a few partial exceptions, I am dis- place, whose walls were covered posed to believe that this part of with cannon. But the traveller the colony, composed of Lower contemptuously asks, Must I Louisiana and West Florida, situ- make mention of Fort St. Charles, ated at the thirtieth and thirty-first and its pretended ramparts? It degrees of north latitude, and at would provoke the risibility of an the sixty-eighth or sixty-ninth de- engineer.' gree of east longitude, from the meridian of Ferrol, where the • Such is New Orleans at the principal settlements of the colony present era. It deserves rather are established ; this immense the name of a great straggling tract, I insist, comprehending a town, than of a city ; though, even space of four thousand leagues, to merit that title, it would be reaffords only five hundred square quired to be longer. In fact, the leagues of land adapted to the pur- mind can, I thik, scarcely image poses of agriculture : of these too, to itself a more disagreeable place seventy-five are upon the banks of on the face of the whole globe ; the Mississippi, a hundred and it is disgusting in whatever point twenty-five in the interiour of the of view it be contemplated, both as country, and three hundred in the a whole, separately, and the wild, tract bounded by the Atacapas and brutish aspect of its suburbs. Yet the Apelousas ; from which the it is the only town in the whole a |