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APHORISMS.

PROVIDENCE is an exercise of reason; experience an act of sense; by how much reason excels sense, by so much providence exceeds experience. Providence prevents that danger which experience repents: providence is the rational daughter of wisdom; experience the empirical mistress of fools.QUARLES.

He that suffers by imposture, has too often his virtue more impaired than his fortune.-DR. JOHN

SON.

The seat of Law is the bosom of God, her voice the harmony of the world; all things in heaven and earth do her homage; the very least as feeling her care, the greatest as not exempted from her power; both angels and men, and creatures of what condition soever, though each in different sort and manner, yet all with uniform consent admiring her as the mother of their peace and joy.-HOOKER. Ceremony keeps up all things; it is like a penny I glass to a rich spirit, or some excellent water; without it, the water were spilt, the spirit lost.-SELDEN'S TABLE-TALK.

He that studies books alone, will know how things ought to be; and he that studies men will know how things are.-COLTON'S LACON.

There is such a sin as oppression, which consists not in that gross violation of justice which is cognizable by law, and against which the wisdom of all civilized nations has provided, but in taking such an advantage of the weakness and necessities of the poor, as converts them into mere instruments of a superior power, the victims of selfish emolument, with no other consideration than how far their physical exertions may be rendered subservient to the gratification of an unfeeling rapacity. -ROBERT HALL.

TO THE EDITOR OF THE TOURIST.

DR. JOHNSON has some remarks on the value of first impressions, before the mind becomes, either by custom or association, so prejudiced

myself; and our first impulse was, to threaten to shoot the driver if he did not desist. I am not ashamed to say, that, after drawing off to such a distance that our small shot could not seriously injure the vagabond, we peppered his legs pretty handsomely. That we should have adopted so summary a mode of punishment, had we lived twice as long in the world, I will not say; but my conscience has never reproached me for the steps which we took to show our disapprobation of the diabolical act.

"I havo too often witnessed the application of the lash to old and young, male and female, and have too frequently heard their cries and lamentations, ever to forget it; nor shall I ever cease to hold in utter detestation and abhorrence this infernal system."--See Rough Sketches, Life of an old Soldier, by Lieut.-Colonel Leach. pp. 19, 21. Surely, after reading this, no Briton valuing justly his rights can vote for any candidate who upholds the continuance of such a system any longer-but must insist on immediate abolition.

Your early insertion will oblige

S.

A FRIEND TO CIVIL AND RELIGIOUS LIBERTY THROUGHOUT THE WORLD.

EPITAPH ON BRADSHAW.

THE following Epitaph on John Bradshaw was engraven on a cannon, placed over his grave, by an American.

Stranger!

Ere thou pass, contemplate this cannon;
Nor regardless to be told,

that near its base lies deposited the dust of
JOHN BRADSHAW:

Who, nobly superior to selfish regards, despising alike the pageantry of courtly splendour, the blast of calumny,

and the terror of regal vengeance,

sometimes you are very positive; you talk of your skill in church history, and of your understanding Latin and English: I think I understand something of them too, as well as you, but, in short, must tell you that, if you do not understand your duty better, I shall teach it you." Upon this Mr. Wallop sat down. On Baxter endeavouring to address the court, Jeffries stopped him. "Richard! Richard! dost thou think we will hear thee poison the court? Richard, thou art an old fellow, an old knave, and thou hast written books enoughto load a cart. Every one is as full of sedition, I might say treason, as an egg is full of meat. Hadst thou been whipped out of thy writing tradeforty years ago it had been happy. Thou pretendest to be a preacher of the gospel of peace, and thou hast one foot in the grave. It is time for thee to begin to think what account thou intendest to give; but leave thee to thyself, and I see thou wilt go on as thou hast begun; but, by the grace of God, I'll look after thee! I know thou hast a mighty party, and I see a great many of the brotherhood in corners, waiting to see what will become of their mighty don, and a doctor of the party (looking at Dr. Bates) at your elbow; but, |ail. by the grace of Almighty God, I will crush you

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When the chief justice had finished his summing up, Baxter said, Does your lordship think that any jury will pretend to pass a verdict upon me upon such a trial?"-"I'll warrant you, Mr. Baxter," replied Jeffries; "don't you trouble yourself about that." The jury immediately found a verdict of guilty.-Roscoe's British Lawyers.

TXPEDITIOUS TRAVELLING.

(From the Newcastle Courant, dated 1712.) Edinbro', Berwick, Newcastle, Durham, and London Stage Coach begins on Monday, the 13th October, 1712; all that desire to pass from Edinbro' to London, or any place on that road, let them repair to Mr. John Ballies, at the Coach every other Saturday; or to the Black Swan, in and Horses, at the head of Canon-gate, Edinbro', Holborn, every other Monday. At both of which places they may be received in the stage coach,

as to prevent its deciding clearly between right presided in the illustrious band of heroes & patriots, which performs the whole journey in thirteen days

and wrong. I shall, therefore, make no apology for giving you an account of the first impressions of a young soldier on the horrible effects of slavery. On being about to leave Antigua he thus writes:

"Before I bid adieu to the spot where so many of my earliest and much-valued military friends and companions were taken to their long homes, I must say a word or two on the idea which I formed of the system of slavery. I am well aware that different persons look at this question in different points of view; but I am willing nevertheless to believe, that the numbers in England who view it with the same degree of indignation, horror, and disgust, which I ever have done, preponderate beyond all comparison; and that the time is not far distant, when the voices of those will be silenced. who are not ashamed to declare that an unfortunate negro, writhing under the lash of the merciless slave-driver, for laying aside his spade for a few minutes in the heat of a tropical sun, or for some offence equally trivial, is infinitely better off, decidedly more happy, and in a more enviable situation, than the labouring peasant in the mother country. Facts are stubborn things; and, although many years have rolled over my head since I left the West Indies, I have not yet forgotten what the system of slavery was in 1803, 1804, and 1805. The first exhibition of the kind which met my eye, a few days after landing in Antigua, was a huge slave-driver flogging, most unmercifully, an old decrepit female negro, who appeared bowed down with misery and hard labour. I know not what her offence was, but she was one of a gang, as they are termed, of negroes, of different sexes and ages, working with spades under a mid-day tropical sun. A brother officer, who was with me on a shooting excursion, felt as astonished and indignant at this unnatural and inhuman proceeding as

who fairly and openly adjudged CHARLES STUART,

tyrant of England,

to a public and exemplary death; thereby presenting to the amazed world, and transmitting down through applauding ages, the most glorious example of unshaken virtue, love of freedom, and impartial justice.

ever exhibited on the blood-stained theatre
of human action.
Oh! Reader!

pass not on till thou hast blessed his memory; and never-never forget

THAT REBELLION TO TYRANTS
IS OBEDIENCE TO GOD.

JUDGE JEFFRIES' TREATMENT OF RICHARD BAXTER.

THE hatred with which Jeffries regarded the Presbyterian party found a free vent on the trial of the celebrated Richard Baxter, for publishing what was termed a seditious libel. The language which, during this trial, Jeffries applied both to the counsel and to the defendant, was more gross, vulgar, and indecent, than had ever before been heard in a court of justice. Interrupting Mr. Wallop, the counsel for Mr. Baxter, he said, "Mr. Wallop, I observe you are in all these dirty causes; and were it not for you gentlemen of the long robe, who should have more wit and honesty than to support and hold up these factious knaves by the chin, we should not be at the pass we are at."" My lord," said Mr. Wallop, I humbly conceive that the passages accused are natural deductions from the text."-"You humbly conceive!" cried Jeffries, "and I humbly conceive. Swear him-swear him!" Soon afterwards he added, "Sometimes you humbly conceive, and

without any stoppages (if God permit), having eighty able horses to perform the whole journey; each passenger paying four pounds ten shillings, allowing each passenger 20lbs. luggage; all above, 6. per lb. The coach sets off at six o'clock in the morning.-Performed by Henry Harrison, Richard Croft, Nicholas Speight, Robert Garbe.

VALEDICTORY STANZAS.
'Farewell!-the word is on my tongue,
The feeling in my heart,

With all those thoughts of sorrow, wrung
Which come when we depart
From those with whom the winter's day
Grew even shorter still,

While something yet remained to say-
Some promise to fulfil.

Farewell!--some eyes will mark the word,
Which love and grief combine-
Some hearts will memories record,
Delightful still to mine;

And mine. in musing upon this,

Will still more fondly beat,
While fancy raised pourtrays the bliss
'Twill be again to meet.
Farewell-farewell! I name no name,
But kindred thoughts will roam
To those who kindred feelings claim,
In many a happy home;
The parting word-the parting glance-
The tear which lately flowed,
Remembered yet will tell, perchance,
On whom my rhyme's bestowed.

Printed by J. HADDON and Co.; and Published by J. CRISP, at No. 27, Ivy Lane, Paternoster Row, where all Advertisements and Communi-cations for the Editor are to be addressed.

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THE Journal de Physique contains an | posed of lava, cinders, and ashes, this interesting narrative of some travellers, who had the hardihood to descend the crater of Vesuvius, and examine its burning focus. Though the relation of their adventure is not charged with many facts, it is upon the whole interesting.

The party was composed of several persons, assisted by the usual Neapolitan guides, called Lázaroni. They availed themselves of their carriages to the base of the mountain, where they arrived about midnight, when they proceeded to ascend its sides, mounted on mules, pursuing the usual track, one by one. Amid the thick darkness, the numerous guides, bearing lighted torches, gave to the whole cortége an air that would have been sufficiently solemn and mysterious, but for the gaiety and mirth which the buoyant spirits of the company otherwise remarkably contrasted with it. At about midway, the ascent becomes so steep and difficult that travellers are obliged to alight, and make the rest of the journey on foot. All this upper half of the mountain being com

portion of the adventure is a work of real toil and fatigue. Accordingly, when they gained the edge of the volcano, at about half past two in the morning, they found themselves overwhelmed with perspiration and perfectly exhausted; insuperable difficulties seemed now to present themselves to all attempts to make any nearer approach to the awful mysteries of the mountain, than the edge of the immense crater: the inside abyss, extending by computation, somewhat more than 5700 feet in circumference, has a perpendicular depth of about 200 more, forming a crater or cup, in the centre of which lie strewed, masses of recently glowing scoria, and heated ashes, all diversely variegated, from among which the ignited vapours find a passage upwards through numberless rents and little orifices. While the travellers were deliberating on the means of descending further, some stones that came rolling down from the higher edge of the crater, occasioning a general agitation of the masses over which they

passed, one of the party, Adjutant Dampierre, feeling at the same time the earth shake under him, was led to exchange his ground.

He had scarce called to a companion, named Wicar, to follow him, when the entire portion of this part of the crater sunk down and disappeared. Soon after still greater masses underwent the same change, the whole of the small eminences, thereabout, crumbling down successively; so that, in the course of half an hour, what had been the summit of the volcano, was precipitated with an awful noise into the bottom of the crater.

Dejected by difficulties, that seemed an effectual barrier to their accomplishing the object of their journey, they had proceeded to satisfy their curiosity by making the circuit of the crater, when fortunately they discovered a long declivity, or rather a portion of the shelving sides of the crater, much less precipitous than the other parts: though deep, it was seemingly smooth, and conducted immediately to the focus, or burning issue of

the volcano. Without waiting to examine whether there were any other difficulties, such as rents and precipices, which interposed between their curiosity and the innermost mysteries of the mountain, the ambassador's secretary, M. Debeer, taking a Lazaroni with him, set out first to traverse the passage; they had reached half of the descent, gliding down in a torrent of ashes, which their feet displaced as they moved on, when they found themselves at the edge of a precipice, about twelve feet deep, down the face of which it was necessary to descend to reach a lower declivity. The Lazaroni here stood aghast, and refused to proceed. A speedy recourse, however, to the sign of the cross, and invocations to the Madonna and St. Anthony of Padua, giving him fresh courage, he threw himself, with the secretary, to the bottom of the precipice. Another cliff of less height interposed, but it was overcome with more ease and less reluctance. At length, amid torrents of rushing lava, ashes, and stones, that incessantly broke away from the declivity, they arrived at the bottom of the crater. Here, with outstretched arms and shouts of joy, that were answered by their more timid companions with satisfaction and enthusiasm, they cheered on the others to fol

low them.

M. Houdonart, an engineer, was the next adventurer after M. Dobeer. He encountered the same difficulties and dangers. Mr. Wickers, another of the party, hesitated when he came to the cliffs, but seeing that no assistance could be rendered him, he grew impatient and rushed down, amid similar floods of ashes, stones, and volcanic scoria, as his predecessors. Adjutant Dampiere. M. Bagnins, Physician to the Army, Messrs. Tassinct, and Andres, two French travellers, and M. Moulin, Inspector of Ports, next followed; these all arrived at the crater, after overcoming the same difficulties, and incurring the same dangers as the

others.

cessary that persons should succeed each
other at long intervals, for fear of burying
under a torrent of volcanic matter those
that followed them. Every tread dis-
places a mass of ashes through a circuit
of thirty feet of the acclivity.

On arriving at the two precipices, it
was necessary to adopt the expedient of
mounting on the shoulders of a man sta-
tioned at the bottom, to give necessary
aid, while another standing at the top of
the cliff, by means of a stick, was to help
the person to scramble upward; he was to
rest the feet, however, no where but with
caution and gentleness. In this way the
summit of Vesuvius was again reached,
and each of the adventurers, without ac-
cident, but in a state of exhaustion and
fatigue, and covered with ashes and
smoke. The six of the party who had
not essayed this descent into the volcano,
received their wearied friends with joy,
supplying them with refreshments that
were very needful to them.

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The church in Falmouth, to which Mr. Holmes refers, was raised by the exertions of the Rev. James Mann, of Berwick-upon-Tweed, who was called to his rest on the 13th of Feb. 1830. The church then made a request that I would take the pastoral charge, to which I acceded, and continued with them till the chapel was destroyed on the 7th of Feb. 1832.

The whole of the collections and subscriptions raised from slave members, and free, 4s. 2d. currency, or 2s. 6d. sterling, from each were voluntary donations, and amounted to individual per annum. The smallest coin in Jamaica is a fivepence, and this was contributed by each person, on an average, ten times during the year.

The whole sum thus collected was appropriated towards paying for the chapel in Falmouth, which was destroyed by the magistrates, and other breakers of the public peace. I never received a single fraction of what was contributed, being supported entirely by the Baptist Missionary Society.

When my house was illegally entered and searched by William Seyer and Mr. Kitchen of Falmouth, and my papers stolen, they took, among other articles, the Church AccountThis excursion was made with no view Book, in which every sum received was enmore important, says the Journal de Phy-tered, together with the manner of its approsique, than to try the possibility of reach-priation. This book was examined by the ing the centre of the crater, and to show officers and the colonel of the Trelawney regithe practicability of the philosopher, the ment, and I dare the bitterest enemy I have naturalist, and chemist, exploring at their to produce the least shadow of proof that the leisure this great furnace of nature. The negroes contributed in any way, or for any variety of matters that form the consti-purpose, more than I have stated, or that I ever appropriated any portion of the proceeds tuent elements of it afford an ample field of the church to my personal advantage. for chemical research; from which, perhaps, might be elicited discoveries portant in art or science.

My church accounts were audited every im-quarter of the year by four of my brother missionaries, and a copy transmitted to the Parent Society in London, where any respectable person may see them, and satisfy himself respecting the truth of the statement I have made. The fact is, that instead of gaining any emolument, a portion of what little I possessed was lent on one of the chapels which has been destroyed, and is therefore lost.

VINDICATION OF THE BAPTIST

MISSIONARIES.

I am not at all surprised at such men as Mr. Holmes imagining, that the love of money actuated me, in my endeavours to instruct the negroes. His sordid soul was never inspired by a higher motive; and were his character as well known in Scotland as it is in Jamaica,

to his assertions.

WE cheerfully insert the following letter from our respected correspondent, Mr. Knibb. It will serve at once to vindicate the Jamaica Missionaries, and to exhibit in its true character of meanness and falsehood the opposition which the same degree of credence would be given they have had to encounter. These excellent men need not fear the verdict of porters of the flogging of females, are still enAs the advocates of slavery, and the supthe British public. They have the con-deavouring to cast the blame of the late disfidence and the sympathy of the nation. turbances in Jamaica on the Baptist MissionLet them proceed in their work of mercy, aries, let them come forward like men; I and their best wishes will soon be rechallenge them to prove the assertions they make. I will meet them, on this subject, at any time and place; and a discerning public shall judge upon whom the blame should rest.

The bottom of the crater, of which no correct conclusions can be formed, when examined from above, is a vast field of rugged inequalities, made up of piles of porous lava, sometimes hard and firm, and sometimes extremely yielding and in-alized. secure; particularly just when the travellers reached the focus. The most interesting sight, however, of the whole, was the number of small orifices or vents very properly denominated spiracles, which, both at the bottom of the crater and on the interior face of the mountain, suffer the ignited vapours to escape.

Their observations being finished, it was a business of some thought to get back again-the descent is far less laborious than the ascent. It is not easy to climb eminences, where the supports for the feet are moving with every step; besides, ascending but by one at a time, it is ne

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TO THE EDITOR OF THE TOURIST.

Dundee, Oct. 30, 1832. SIR,-Having noticed in several of the Cornwall Chronicle, published in Montego newspapers, a paragraph, copied from the Bay, Jamaica, by a Mr. Holmes, in which the assertion is made, that, during my missionary career, I collected the sum of twelve thousand pounds, you will oblige me, by permitting me, through your columns, to repel the foul slander. Mr. Holmes has stated a deliberate falsehood; and I dare him, and every editor who has copied the paragraph, with apparent pleasure, to prove the charges they have promulgated.

The only punishment I wish may be allotted to Mr. Holmes is this, that when he has reaped the Baptist Missionaries, he may be compelled a full harvest, by traducing the characters of tune to the instruction of the deeply injured to devote the sum at which he affixes my forand oppressed sons and daughters of Africa.

I remain,

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VENETIAN JUSTICE.

A MOST affecting instance of the odious inflexibility of Venetian courts, appears in the case of Foscari, son to the Doge of that name. This young man had, by some imprudences, given offence to the senate, and was, by their orders, confined at Treviso, when Almor Donato, one of the Council of Ten, was assassinated on the 5th of November, 1750, as he entered his own house.

A reward, in ready money, with pardon for this, or any other crime, and a pension of two hundred ducats, revertible to children, was promised to any person who would discover the planner, or perpetrator, of this crime; no such discovery was made. One of young Foscari's footmen, named Olivier, had been observed loitering near Donato's house on the evening of the murder; he fled from Venice next morning. These, with other circumstances of less importance, created a strong suspicion that Foscari had engaged this man to commit the murder.

Olivier was taken, brought to Venice, put to the torture, and confessed nothing: yet the Council of Ten being prepossessed with an opinion of their guilt, and imagining that the master would have less resolution, used him in the same cruel manner. The unhappy young man, in the midst of his agony, continued to assert that he knew nothing of the assassination. This convinced the court of his firmness, but not of his innocence; yet there was no legal proof of his guilt-they could not sentence him to death. He was condemned to pass the rest of his life in banishment, at Canéa, in the island of Candia.

This unfortunate youth bore his exile with more impatience than he had done the rack; he often wrote to his relations and friends, praying them to intercede in his behalf, that the term of his banishment might be abridged, and that he might be permitted to return to his family before he died. All his applications were fruitless; those to whom he addressed himself had never interfered in his favour, for fear of giving offence to the obdurate Council, or had interfered in vain.

After languishing five years in exile, having lost all hope of return, through the interposition of his own family, or countrymen, in a fit of despair he addressed the Duke of Milan, putting him in mind of the services which the Doge, his father, had rendered him, and begging that he would use his powerful influence with the State of Venice, that his sentence might be recalled. He entrusted his letter to a merchant, going from Canéa to Venice, who promised to take the first opportunity of sending it from thence to the Duke; instead of which, this wretch, as soon as he arrived at Venice, delivered it to the chiefs of the Council

of Ten.

This conduct of the young Foscari appeared criminal in the eyes of those judges; for, by the laws of the republic, all its subjects are expressly forbid claiming the protection of foreign princes, in any thing which relates to the government of Venice.

Foscari was, therefore, ordered to be brought from Candia, and shut up in the State-prison. There the chiefs of the Council of Ten ordered him once more to be put to the torture, to draw from him the motives which determined him to apply to the Duke of Milan. Such an exertion of law is, indeed, the most flagrant injustice.

The miserable youth declared to the Council, that he had written the letter in the full persuasion that the merchant, whose character

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he knew, would betray him, and deliver it to them; the consequence of which, he foresaw, would be, his being ordered back a prisoner to Venice, the only means he had in his power of seeing his parents and friends; a pleasure for which he had languished with insurmountable desire for some time, and which he was willing to purchase at the expense of any danger or pain.

The judges, little affected with this generous instance of filial piety, ordained that the unhappy young man should be carried back to Candia, and there be imprisoned for a year, and remain banished to that island for life; with this condition, that if he should make any more applications to foreign powers, his imprisonment should be perpetual. At the same time they gave permission, that the Doge, and his lady, might visit their unfortunate son.

The Doge was, at this time, very old; he had been in possession of the office above thirty years. Those wretched parents had an interview with their son in one of the apartments of the palace; they embraced him with all the tenderness which his misfortunes and his filial affection deserved. The father exhorted him to bear his hard fate with firmness: the son protested, in the most moving terms, that this was not in his power; that however others could support the dismal loneliness of a prison, he could not; that his heart was formed for friendship, and the reciprocal endearments of social life, without which his soul sunk into dejection worse than death, from which alone he should look for relief, if he should again be confined to the horrors of a prison; and, melting into tears, he sunk at his father's feet, imploring him to take compassion on a son who had ever loved him with the most dutiful affection, and who was perfectly innocent of the crime of which he was accused; he conjured him by every bond of nature and religion, by the bowels of a father, and the mercy of a Redeemer, to use his influence with the Council to mitigate their sentence, that he might be saved from the most cruel of all deaths-that of expiring under the slow tortures of a broken heart, in a horrible banishment from every creature he loved. "My son," replied the Doge, "submit to the laws of your country, and do not ask of me what it is not in my power to obtain."

Having made this effort, he retired to another apartment; and, unable any longer to support the acuteness of his feelings, he sunk into a state of insensibility, in which condition he remained till some time after his son had sailed on his return to Candia.

Nobody has presumed to describe the anguish of the wretched mother; those who are endowed with the most exquisite sensibility, and who have experienced distresses in some degree similar, will have the justest idea of what it was. The accumulated misery of those unhappy parents touched the hearts of some of the most powerful senators, who applied with so much energy for a complete pardon for young Foscari, that they were on the point of obtaining it, when a vessel arrived from Candia, with tidings that the miserable youth had expired in prison a short time after his return.

Some years after this, Nicholas Erizzo, a noble Venetian, being on his death-bed, confessed that, bearing a violent resentment against the senator Donato, he had committed the assassination for which the unhappy family of Foscari had suffered so much.

At this time the sufferings of the Doge were at an end; he had existed only a few months after the death of his son His life had been

prolonged till he beheld his son persecuted to death for an infamous crime, but not till he should see this foul stain washed from his family, and the innocence of his beloved son made manifest to the world.

The ways of heaven never appeared more dark and intricate than in the incidents and catastrophe of this mournful story. To reconcile the permission of such events to our ideas of infinite power and goodness, however difficult, is a natural attempt in the human mind, and has exercised the ingenuity of philosophers in all ages; while, in the eyes of Christians, these seeming perplexities afford an additional proof, that there will be a future state in which the ways of God to man will be fully justified.— Moore's Travels in Italy.

A CHANCELLOR'S PUN. AFTER Lord Bacon had been heavily fined by parliament, and reduced to extreme poverty, he wrote to James I. in the following terms:"Help me, dear sovereign lord and master! and pity me so far, that I, who have so long borne a bag, be not forced in my old age to carry a wallet."

ROME.

[From the Metropolitin.]

Ir e'er you've seen an artist sketching,
The purlieus of this ancient city,

I need not tell you how much stretching,
There is of truth, to make things pretty ;-
How trees are brought, perforce, together,

Where never tree was known to grow;
And founts condemned to trickle, whether
There's water for said founts, or no;-
How even the wonder of the Thane,

In stretching, all its wonder loses,
As woods will come to Dunsinane,
Or any where the sketcher chooses.
For instance, if an artist see,-
As at romantic Tivoli,—

A waterfall and ancient shrine,

Beautiful both, but not so plac'd,
As that his pencil can combine
Their features in one whole with taste,-
What does he do? Why, without scruple,
He whips the temple up,--
--as supple
As were those angels, who (no doubt)
Carried the Virgin's house about,-
And lands it plump upon the brink

Of the cascade, or wheresoever
It suits his plaguy taste to think

'Twill look most picturesque and clever. In short there's no end to the treacheries, Of man, or maid, who once a sketcher is. The livelier, too, their fancies are,

The more they falsify each spot;
As any dolt can give what's there,

But men of genius give what's not.
Then come your travellers, false as they,—
All Piranesis, in their way;

Eking out bits of truth with fallacies,
And turning pig-sties into palaces.
But, worst of all, that wordy tribe,
Who sit down-hang them!-to describe;
Who, if they can but make things fine,

Have consciences, by no means tender,
In sinking all that will not shine,
All vulgar facts, that spoil their splendour ;-
As Irish country squires, they say,

Whene'er the Viceroy travels nigh,
Compound with beggars, on the way,
To be lock'd up, till he goes by;
And so send back his Lordship marvelling,
That Ireland should be deem'd so starveling.

THOMAS MOOre.

MIRACULOUS ESCAPE.

THE following account is taken from an American paper, to which it was communicated by the captain of a Guinea ship :"The bosom of the ocean was exceedingly tranquil; and the heat, which was intolerable, had made us so languid, that almost a general wish overcame us, on the approach of the evening, to bathe in the waters of Congo. However, myself and Johnson were deterred from it by the fear of sharks, many of which we had observed in the progress of our voyage, and those enormously large. At length, Campbell alone, who had been making too free with the liquor-case, was obstinately bent on going overboard; and although we used every means in our power to dissuade him, he dashed into the watery element, and had swam some distance from the vessel, when we on deck discovered an alligator making towards him from behind a rock that stood at a short distance from the shore. His escape I now considered impossible; and I asked Johnson how we should act. He, like myself, affirmed the impossibility of saving him, and instantly seized upon a loaded carbine to shoot the poor fellow before he fell into the jaws of the monster. I did not, however, consent to this, but waited with horror the tragedy we anticipated. Yet, willing to do all in our power, I ordered the

boat to be hoisted, and we fired two shots at
the approaching alligator, but without effect.
The report of the piece, and the noise of the
blacks from the sloop, soon made Campbell
acquainted with his danger; and he saw the
creature making for him; and, with all the
strength and skill he was master off, made to
the shore. And now the moment arrived, in
which a scene was exhibited, beyond the power
of my humble pen to describe. On approach-
ing within a short distance of some canes and
shrubs which covered the bank, while closely
pursued by the alligator, a fierce and ferocious
tiger sprang towards him, and that just at the
same instant that the jaws of the first enemy
were opened to devour him. At this moment,
Campbell was preserved. The tiger, eager for
his prey, by overleaping him, encountered the
gripe of the amphibious monster. The water
was covered with the blood of the tiger, whose
efforts to tear the scaly covering of the alliga-
tor were unavailing; while the latter had also
the advantage of keeping the tiger under
water, by which the victory was soon obtained,
for the tiger's death was now effected: they
both sunk to the bottom, and we saw no more
of the alligator. Campbell was soon recovered
and conveyed on board; and, the moment he
leaped on the deck, he fell on his knees, and
returned thanks to God for protecting him.”

COMMISSION EXCHANGED.

is related, that, towards the conclusion of IN the papers of Richard, Earl of Cork, it Queen Mary's reign, a commission was signed for the persecution of the Irish Protestants: and, to give greater weight to this important affair, Dr. Coke was nominated one of the commissioners. The doctor, on his way to Dublin, halted at Chester, where he was waited upon by the mayor, to whom, in the course of conversation, he imparted the object of his mission, and exhibited the leathern box that contained his credentials. The landlady of the inn where the interview took place, being a Protestant, and having overheard the conversation, seized an opportunity, while the doctor was attending the mayor to the bottom of the stairs, to exchange the commission for a dirty pack of cards, on the top of which she facetiously turned up the knave of clubs. The doctor, not suspecting the trick which had been played him, secured his box, and pursued his way. Arriving at Dublin, on the 7th of October, 1558, he lost no time in presenting himself to Lord Fitzwalter and the privy council; to whom, after an explanatory speech, he presented his credentials in the box, which, to the astonishment of all present, contained only a pack of cards! The doctor, greatly chagrined, returned instantly to London, to have his commission renewed: but while waiting a second time on the coast for a favourable wind, the news reached him of the queen's death.-Lord Fitzwalter afterwards related the circumstance to Queen Elizabeth; which so much pleased her, that she afterwards allowed the good Protestant woman an annuity of forty pounds per

[graphic]

aunum.

TAVISTOCK ABBEY.

THESE are the ruins of a monastery, coeval with the very ancient town of Tavistock, in Devonshire, in which they stand. This antiquity, however, only appertains to the endowment, as the edifice was destroyed by the Danes, though it subsequently arose from its ruins with considerable enlargement. It was founded by Ordgar, Earl of Devonshire, in 961, in consequence of an admonition to that effect, which he is stated by tradition to have received in a dream. It was completed by his son in 981, richly endowed, and consecrated to St. Mary the Virgin, and St. Rumon (a gentleman of whom we can give no account), in 997. The abbey church was dedicated in 1318, by Bishop Stapleton; and in 1539, the monastery was surrendered to the king, by John Peryn, the last abbot, when its

revenues

were found to amount to £902: 5:7-no inconsiderable sum in those days. This establishment is remarkable, as having contained, at a very early

THE HEDGEHOG AND THE SNAKE.

HAVING occasion to suspect that hedgehogs, occasionally, at least, preyed upon snakes, Professor Buckland procured a common snake (Coluber natrix), and also a hedgehog, which had lived in an undomesticated state, some time in the botanic garden' at Oxford, where it was not likely to have seen snakes, and put the animals into a box together. The hedgehog was rolled up at the first meeting; but the snake was in continual motion, creeping round the box as if in order to make its escape. Whether or not it recognized its enemy was not apparent; it did not dart from the hedgehog, but kept creeping gently round the box; the hedgehog remained rolled up, and did not appear to notice the snake. The professor then laid the hedgehog on the body of the snake, with that part of the ball where the head and tail meet downwards, touching it. The snake proceeded to crawl; the hedgehog started, opened slightly, and, seeing what was under it, gave itself up again. It soon opened a second time, the snake a hard bite, and instantly rolled repeated the bite, then closed as if for defence; opened carefully a third time, and then inflicted a third bite, by which the back of the snake was broken. This done, the hedgehog stood by the snake's side, and passed the whole body of the snake successively through its intervals of half an inch or more, by which jaws, cracking it, and breaking the bones at operation the snake was rendered entirely motionless. The hedgehog then placed itself at the tip of the snake's tail, and began to eat upwards, as one would eat a radish, without intermission, but slowly, till half of the snake was devoured, when the hedgehog ceased from mere repletion. During the following night the anterior half of the snake was also com

period, a school for Saxon literature, and
an ancient printing press, soon after the
introduction of printing into England.
In Exeter College, Oxford, there are pre-
served copies of certain books which
were printed here, in the year 1525, by
Dan Thomas Rychard, one of the monks
of the abbey. Its possessions, with the
borough and town, were granted at the
time of the dissolution to John, Lord Rus-
sell, ancestor of the present noble pro-
prietor, the Duke of Bedford. The un-
fortunate Lord William Russell was re-
turned to the House of Commons from
this borough, as also the celebrated John
Pym, in the reign of Charles I. There
are still, as partly appears from the above
engraving, sufficient remains of this ve-
nerable fabric, to indicate its former ex-
tent and beauty; though now much
mutilated and applied to various uses.
Within the parish there are also remains
of old Morwell House, formerly the hunt-
ing seat of the holy Nimrods of Tavistock.pletely eaten up.

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