Its louder yet-thou dreadfu' storm, thumbed over the pages of Cronstedt and Linné; and many a weary winter night had I turned over the elaborate pages of the renowned Dr. Adam Smith. It was now my time to turn these studies to some account, "Dread was the night-and dread's the by adding farther to my own stock, or by Strong the cauld chilling arm o' death O toil! ye smooth the care-worn bed Is safter than a crown. O hear ye, frae yon turf-clad ha, The morning hymn sae fine! Hear ye the father's orison, Sae humble, sae divine! In joy and peace he welcom'd night; The blazing ingle o' the morn Bad a' be pray'r and praise. Blyth shines the face, strong beats the heart, Warm'd wi' a soul like thine : Thy life, thy hope, my hoary carl! Thy life, thy hope, be mine," After some ludicrous adventures our travellers arrive safe and sound at the Saracen's Head,where they stop to break fast. Having got this extraordinary affair off my hands, and also got the waiter's news, in order to give Shadrach half an hour more to furbish up his buckskin breeches to his satisfaction by the kitchen fire, I thought it would not be amiss to take a small stroll through the town, in the proper stile and spirit of a tourificator. Though I had been in the same town almost every week of my life, and had been again and again in almost every hole and pore in it; yet in a scientific point of view I found I knew nothing at all about it. “Partly for my amusement, and partly with a view to qualify myself for this mighty expedition, I had in the Re Rustica-way travelled down from Old Varro and Columella, to Young and Anderson; I had bestowing knowledge and information where it seemed to be lacking among others. "Accordingly I sallied forth, staff in hand and wherever the sound of the hammer, or the treddles, or even the whistling of a taylor was to be heard, thither I bent my steps. The blacksmith, necessarily situated near the Saracen's Head, first attracted my attention; and I entered the smithy with a countenance formed, as well as I could, both to conciliate respect, and to inspire con fidence. The blacksmith, resting his elbow upon the lever of the bellows, exchanged a pinch with me. He satisfied me as to the angle a hobnail ought to be pointed to; and he was loud and long on the general abuse and cruelty of fitting the horse's foot to the shoe with vile heels, &c. instead of fitting the shoe to the foot. And, as to the farrierbusiness,' added he, as a shoer of horses, I am obliged, from old custom, and in spite of my teeth, to be a practitioner; but it would be a blessed tenderness to all horses, ill or well, for they are both subject to the farrier, either to prevent, or remove diseases ; -that both farrier and groom should have a mark put upon them at the market-cross." In recompence for this, and a great deal more, I gave him a chemical dissertation upon iron, and the easiest and cheapest modes of exciting heat; and I shewed him how his forge, which was like something hastily and temporarily reared up in the corner of a waste house, might be Rumfordized to the greatest possible advantage. ་ Passing on, my weaver had just thrown Paine's Age of Reason into the little basket at his elbow, which held his pins; and thumping away at his loom, was silently un saying all that his pious father and mother had taught him. On talking to him about the beautiful and immense labours of the loom, he gravely uttered, that while the minds of men were hampered with creeds and confessions, and while civil liberty, pressed to death by aristocratical statutes and edicts, existed only in name, we can look for nothing,' said he, but grovelling imperfection in the operations either of the soul or of the body of man.' This last word he pronounced with prodigious emphasis. My hour of politics and polemics not being yet come, I endeavoured to divert the attention of the weaver to his warp and wocf, by remarking, that though the loom had existed since the days of Tubal-Cain-the weaver looked at Tom Paine, and then at me-Dedalus, I mean, said I, and had, no doubt, in so many thousand years, undergone divers alterations and improvements, yet much remained to be done, and much might be expected in this age of ingenuity and I did not despair of living to see the day when the shuttle would be the only fixed part in the loom, and all the other machinery whirled round it by water or by steam. The weaver never hesitated at the possibility or impossibility of my scheme; but it immediately occurred to him, that if the thing actually took place, the whole race of weavers would be starved, nay extirpated; whereupon he laid his shuttle softly upon the web, mended a broken thread, imposed silence upon his heels, and commenced a most vehement philippic against his brethren of mankind, whose ingenuity, he said, was only exercised in abominable contrivances to degrade, and to lessen the numbers of mankind, thereby rendering them the more manageable: and in the heat of his indignation he swore most furiously, that all the wars of modern times were carried on for this very purpose, The loom thus got out of sight again, and so far too, that I concluded it impossible to bring her again into action; and as I have a mortal aversion to anger, and all profane swearing, I quietly wished my weaver, with all his souls, a good morning. "I directly crossed over the street to where I saw a tailor on his shop-board, enlivened by the morning sun, and seemingly at peace with all the world, chanting an old Scots his work seemingly going on all song, the better for it: to be sure I had little to expect here from my merry taylor, for the purpose of a tourificator, and as little to give, where a pair of scissars, a thimble, and a needle, constituted the principal apparatus of the artist. I was therefore a good deal at a loss how to proceed; but a good song being always a good thing, and also transferable to Meldrum-hall; and as I also stood in no little need of something to adjust my nervous system after the weaver's analysis of modern politics; so with as little ceremony as possible, I leaned myself on the shop-board, and begged the taylor not to be interrupted in his song, which, beside being very beautiful, I said, was quite new. The lad, not at all disconcerted, took his pinch of snuff, and set his arm vigorously a-going again, saying it was a new thing he had somehow picked up, written, he understood, by a gentleman in the neighbourhood; and, added he, all people did nothing but talk good of that lady before she left this country; a curse upon that England, it takes away all our best folks.' Little did my taylor know he was making his best eulogium on one of my best friends, and who, if she mixed more with the world, with her incomparable talents and elegance, would carry the world before her; but that seems not much to be bragged of, and I dare say she has chosen the better part. While was apostrophising thus, the taylor was going on- As you seem to like the song, sir, I will begin it again. My bow, and I my thanks, and a new threaded needle, set him a going. "L. M. S.'s Farewell to the Highlands." "Ye mountains sae grey, which hide the blue heav'ns; Ye hills green wi' birk, and spangled wi' dew; Ye rivers which mix your wild voice wi' the morning; O must I, sweet highlands! must I bid you adieu ! And then, in thy forest's sae braid-mantling bosom, Sweet cottage, where pleasure and happiness dwell? Must I, wet wi 'tears, my bonny Kinrara! O must I for ever can I bid thee farewell! "Farewell then, dear highlands-O farewell, Ye sons of the hills, a long, long adieu! Kinrara ; How long your Comala O will ye remember, Far parted I'll sigh on Kinrara and you. Bleat on, then, ye lammies; and proud in your forests Be thy steps, thou gay roe, and thine, bound, ing deer! Sweet Spey, on thy banks, and thy far-gathering waters, May happiness shine, and be mine the last tear. "Here a most inviting opportunity offers, were I to adhere to the footsteps of my brethren of the staff, to thrust in a disquisition concerning the Scottish music, and to follow it up with ample eulogium; but reserving this till a season when I have more ma terials about me, and when I have not a musical taylor at my elbow, I shall only observe what surely has, or ought to have been observed long before I was born, that every singer, public as well as private, ought to be bodily employed during their performance. I am certain my little taylor would not have sung half so well had he been sitting prim and erect in his chair, with all his needles sticking idle in his sleeve; and what is it but this which makes the lass's melody at her wheel, and the young lady's with her netting by the parlour fire so pleasing." The knight of the thimble tipt him another ditty, and no one knows how long this pastoral contest might have lasted---for Mr. Meldrum was tuning his pipe to the taylor, if an unlucky accident had not spoiled all their singing. Snip's brother was a great chemister, and could talk of nothing but the Priestlands and the Lavoshys, of oxheads, and carbunns, and fluggistone; he was at this very time trying some unlucky experiment, and it so happened, that with the inflammability of his gas, and the combustibility of his apparatus, he had set fire to his laboratory: the fire ex tending to the taylor's shop, &c. &c. Mr. Meldrum, however, made his escape, and in his hurry mistook his road to the Saracen's Head. Now this incident certainly does not speak much in favour of his active benevolence. Nero, we are told, amused himself with fiddling while Rome was burning: Mr. Meldrum, instead of working at the bucket, took to his heels till he found a resting place which commanded a lonely and romantic view; and while the taylor's shop-board was in flames amused himself, it being the summer season, with the recitation of a descriptive Ode to Winter! However, we are not disposed to quarrel with him; a hundred brawny arms could be found to pump the fire-engine, and in sorrow be it spoken, few are the singers who strike the lyre with the same spirit, delicacy, and feeling of Malachi Meldrum, esquire. Our tourificator's range is not a very extensive one: his musical meditations are interrupted by the appearance of a gentleman of the old school, Mr. Shuttlethrow the weaver, with whom he holds much sapient conversation on divers subjects of policy and commerce. To this delay succeeds another by an unexpected meeting with one of the most bewitching little madcaps in the world, Miss Watson, who draws him away with her to dinner, so that we really arrive at the end of one of the two volumes before Mr. Meldrum has discharged his first morning's breakfast bill at the Saracen's Head! Evils seldom come alone, as the saying is Malachi will never get back to the inn. First the weaver stops him and talks politics, then that fascinating gipsey, Miss Watson, sings songs to him, and by and by comes the parson, who is also a bit of a poet, and discusses literary subjects. The parson indeed is a heterodox sort of a gentleman---not in his religion but his literary creed: who, of all writers in the world, should he fall foul of but of Virgil? That Virgil was a flatterer is very true, poets very commonly are so---now, do not let Mr. Meldrum have the slightest suspicion that we make any personal allusion, that we mean to remind him of his own well-merited eulogies on the reigning monarch, and on his prime minister, Henry Addington, esquire. Virgil too was a notorious imitator. But did not he improve upon his originals? Is not the Georgics, without exception, the most correct and polished poem in existence, and may we not pre sume that the Eneid would have come down to us in a more finished form had the author lived to correct his manuscript? The parson, too, has a mind to revive the old controversy on the authenticity. of Ossian's poems; or more properly, perhaps, he has arbitrated between the parties, and settled the business by splitting the difference. His statement of the case is probably a very just one, that Macpherson collected a great number of original fragments, "and, aided by a man of ability, superior it was believed to his own, he arranged into an epic what was possible, and it is to their honour that our feebleness appears to denounce the patch-work. Those poems which had little connection with Fingal, or Temora, or where Fingal and Temora could be carried on without them, were published in their insulated state; but I would not aver, says the parson, that the soldering hand had not been upon them too." We are not much disposed to agree with him in opinion, that "an hundred years hence, people may talk about the thing, but they will care little whether James Macpherson, esquire, or Ossian, the son of Fingal, was the bard." People a hundred years hence will, probably, be as anxious as we are to trace the progress of poetry, to mark the periods of its splendor and obscurity, and connect them, as illustrative of the human mind, with the state of society in those particular periods. In this view of the question it was of importance to fix the date of Ossian's poems; Mr. Mac. pherson has thrown darkness over a subject which it was in his power to have enlightened. Well, well, we must leave Virgil, and Ossian, and Fingal, and Macpherson, and return to our friend Malachi, or we shall be guilty of what, of all things in the world, is most unpardonble, a breach of good manners. Mr. Meldrum, and the little party who had increased around him, at length reaches the hospitable house of Mr. Watson: after dinner the bottle circulates with sufficient celerity till it is suspended by Captain Hamilton's narrative of the story of Jessy Hawthorn. The character of the Captain's grandfather is admirably drawn, and as to Jesse, let him who can read the tale without emotior, without feeling all his best affection's excited, depart into the wilderness. Before the evening began to close Mr. Malachi was warned by a confounded twinge in the toe, that he was going to have a fit of the gout, and this put him in mind that he was too far away from Dorothy and the arm chair. So he wisely determined to return to Meldrum Hall, During my hours of respite, in this same paroxysm," says he, "I put my memorabilia together in such a man. ner as if they had immediately occurred, lamenting and grieving bitterly all the while, that my tourifications, from which I had promised myself so much renown, as well as entertainment, should have terminated in less than a day, and not more than a dozen of miles from my fireside." From the specimens we have given, our readers will be able to calculate upon the quantum and degree of amusement they will find in these little volumes. We have been so much gratified with Mr. Meldrum's remarks on men and manners, with his characters and obser vations, and have been so much delight. ed with the poetical effusions which flow from him so freely, that he has our hearty good wishes for a speedy recovery from his gout, and we trust that he will extend his peregrinations to some different quarter. Mr. Meldrum is a good-natured sort of a gentleman, and therefore he will not be offended with us if we advise him in future to pay a little more attention to grammatical accuracy. In our last extract of is twice used for for: would and should are perpetually changing places, and in the poetry, singular and plural are not always confined to their proper limits. ART. VIII. The Wanderer; or a Collection of original Tales and Essays, founded upon Facts; illustrating the Virtues and Vices of the present Age. In which are introduced the oriental Travels of a learned Mahometan of the last Century. In erspersed with ori ginal Poetry. By CHARLES FOTHERGILL, Esq. 12mo. 2 vols. about 300 pages each. THE incidents of some of these tales are amusing enough, but they are told in such florid high-flown language, as to border upon the ridiculous. The travels of Abdallah show a considerable acquaintance with the manners, customs, and superstitions of the east. In a very pompous, self-sufficient introduction, the author reprobates the idle trash which is now so widely circulated under the va◄ rious titles of romances, novels, adventures, &c. as injurious to the cause of virtue. After this affectation of chastity, we were at once surprised and disgusted to meet with some very licentious de scriptions and lascivious scenes. ART. IX. The Pic-Nic. COLONEL Greville, the projector of a foolish plan for rendering the follies and dissipations of the higher class more notorious, was the projector also of this 2 vols. 12mo. foolish paper. It has since changed its name for the Cabinet; but these literary upholsterers, joiners, or cabinet-makers, are miniserable workmen. ART. X. Cowper illustrated by a Series of Views in or near the Park of Weston-Underwood, Bucks, accompanied with copious Descriptions and a brief Sketch of the Author's Life. 8vo. pp. 51, and 13 plates. A Due tribute of respect to a poet most deservedly popular, though not so popular for his merits as his opinions. The prints would have been appropri ART. XI. Observations upon Duelling. THIS Irish barrister writes the very worst English that we have ever seen, ately inserted in his poems, and the descriptions might have been advantageous ly curtailed into notes. By an Irish Barrister. 8vo. pp. 30. and he reasons as ridiculously as he writes. ART. XII. Verulamiana; or Opinions on Men, Manners, Literature, Politics, and Theology. By FRANCIS BACON, Baron of Verulam, &c. To which is prefixed a Life of the Author by the Editor. 12mo. pp. 320. THIS is merely a selection from the works of Lord Bacon, introduced by a brief biographic sketch. We noticed a similar compilation in the preceding vo lume of our Review (page 702), and have no other observations to make on the present. ART. XIII. Beauties of Dr. John Moore, selected from the moral, philosophical, and miscellaneous Works of that esteemed Author, &c. By the Rev. F. PREVOST and F. BLAGDON, Esq. 8vo. pp. 482. SCRAPS from Dr. Moore's works, thrown together without arrangement. The preface announces a series of such beauties. It would be well if the laws ART. XIV. Addisoniana: THE editor of this publication asserts that more than a thousand volumes have been looked over to supply the materials. They must have been looked over very carelessly if only 343 articles could be collected from them, many of which are mere extracts from the Spectator, and the other works of Addison, and others to protect literary property were extended to abridgments, and such mutilations as these. 12mo. 2 vols. pp. 502. only repetitions of the same worthless information which is elsewhere in the same volume given under a different title. The original matter consists of a few letters of no great value between Addison and Mr. Wortley, with facsimiles of Addison's writing. ART. XV. The Polyanthea; or a Collection of interesting Fragments, in Prose and Verse: consisting of original Anecdotes, Biographical Sketches, Dialogues, Letters, Characters, &c. &c. 2 vols. 8vo. pp. 808. AN excellent book for the sofa or the drawing room window-seat: he must have a very fastidious appetite, who does not relish some or other of the various dishes set before him by this industrious editor. By the Rev. F. PREVOST 8vo. pp. about 500. ART. XVI. Flowers of Literature, for 1801 and 1802. ART. XVII. A Narrative of the Loss of his Majesty's Packet, the Lady Hobart, on an Island of Ice in the Atlantic Ocean, 28th of June 1803. With a particular Account of the providential Escape of the Crew in two open Boats. By WILLIAM DORSET FELLOWES, Esq. Commander. Dedicated, by Permission, to the Right Hon. the Postmaster General. 8vo. pp. 46. SUCH a narrative as this is no sub-ject for literary criticism: let those who can weep over the imaginary sorrows of the hero of a novel close their volume and turn to the real distresses here exhibited. The following critique is more to the purpose than any we can write : "We have perused this report with a mixed sentiment of sympathy and admira tion. We are satisfied, that in the loss of the packet and of the public correspondence, no blame is imputable to Captain Fellowes, to his officers, or to his seamen. In their exertion after the ship had struck on the floating mass of ice, and in their subsequent conduct, they appear to have shewn all the talents and virtues which can distinguish the naval character. "Let a proper letter be written in our names to the friends and family of the very worthy French officer who perished. And we shall be solicitous to learn the entire re covery of the other passengers, who met such dangers and sufferings with the most exemplary fortitude. Mr. Freeling will return the narrative to Captain Fellowes, with our permission to him to communicate it to his friends; or, if he shall think proper, to give it to the public. It cannot fail to impress on the minds of all who may read it, the benefit of religion, and of calamity; and also an awful sense of the the consolation of prayer under the pressure interposition and mercies of Providence, in a case of extreme peril and distress. To seamen it will more especially shew that discipline, order, generosity of mind, good temper, mutual benevolence, and patient exertion, are, under the favour of Heaven, the best safeguards in all their difficulties. "With respect to Captain Fellowes, we feel highly gratified in having it in our power so immediately to give to him a promotion, which we have reason to believe will be particularly acceptable. (Signed) Aug. 16, 1803. "AUCKLAND. The French officer here alluded to was Mr. Charles Rossé, who had just been wreck: in a moment of delirium he taken prisoner of war before the fatal sprang overboard and perished. This attention to his friends and family does honour to the British character. |