6

Colony than its pecuniary circumstances justified; we are not masters of the circumstances sufficiently to say positively, that, had he not determined to incur that expenditure, a worse result might not have happened. But the charge against him is not merely that he involved his employers in a debt so far beyond his authority, and beyond even their means to pay-circumstances may be imagined in which an officer is justified in assuming such a responsibility-but that he did it without giving them any adequate warning of the extent to which he was prepared to go. He not only drew bills upon them for thousands upon thousands beyond his authority, without specifying the particular services for which they were drawn-this, in the confused state of affairs, it may have been impossible to do with exactnessbut he did not furnish them with the means of conjecturing, within any reasonable limits of approximation, what amount they were to be prepared for. It is true that he kept warning them in general terms that he was forced to incur enormous' expenses, the responsibility for which filled him with anxiety;' but what did an enormous' expenditure mean, when the authorized expenditure was L.12,000 a year? Was it twice as much, or three times, or four times as much? The only account (previous to that upon the receipt of which his Commissioners threw up their charge) on which any definite conjecture could be built as to the total amount for which they must in future be prepared, was that which accompanied the half-year's Report dated 26th November 1839, and which must have been received by them in February 1840. In this despatch he recounts the causes which have made his actual expenditure so much exceed the expected estimate; gives a list of the things he has had to do; and adds, all this has been done (not has yet to be done') in a very expensive period.' This account therefore did not indicate an increased, but rather a diminished expenditure thereafter. Now, the bills drawn by Colonel Gawler, in excess of the regulated estimate, for the services of this year, amounted to L.42,000 ;an excess quite large enough to answer the general terms in which he had spoken, and to justify his anxiety. But while this account was on its way home, at what rate was Colonel Gawler actually drawing upon them? At a rate of L.50,000 per annum, or L.60,000, or L.100,000? No, but of L.140,000! Now, we contend that Colonel Gawler-however impossible it may have been for him to form an exact estimate, or even an estimate nearly approaching to accuracy, of the expenditure for the half year before him-ought to have been able to make a guess within a hundred thousand pounds. He should have been able to give his employers some idea whether, when he talked of enormous

6

6

excesses above the regulated estimate, he meant twice as much, or twelve times as much. And this was the rather required of him, because the very ground on which he justifies his assumption of such responsibility, is the total incapacity of his Commissioners to form any judgment for themselves; and because he knows that their resourses were not unlimited, and that his drafts must be trespassing very closely on the limits of these. The Committee say that they are not' prepared to affirm the insufficiency of the grounds on which he has alleged his inability 'to furnish information as to the specific services for which he was ' about to draw, or to supply any estimates of the total amount he should be compelled to draw in the course of the year.' appears to us that the Committee ought to have been prepared to allege the insufficiency of these grounds; and that, from the principle involved in their hesitation to do so, inferences may be drawn, of which very inconvenient and dangerous applications may be made by all officers serving the Government in distant places. If the excuse is good for the expenditure of hundreds of thousands, it is as good, or better, for the expenditure of unauthorized millions; inasmuch as the inability to furnish infor'mation as to the specific services, and to supply estimates of the 'total amount,' would be ten times as great. We regret this piece of false candour and indulgence on the part of the Committee; because it may be construed into an intimation that there were not sufficient grounds for recalling Colonel Gawlera measure than which none was ever more imperatively called for. In other respects, the Report appears to us to contain a fair judgment upon the conduct of all parties.

The Evidence contains a good deal of interesting and conflicting testimony as to the natural productive capacities of South Australia; of which Mr Angus has a high opinion. But there is so little solid experience as yet to build on, that such opinions can be entertained only as conjectures; and, as we said before, we must wait to see what fruit the tree will bear, and what it will sell for, before we can form any grounded conclusions. What is certain is, that a very large proportion of this selected territory turns out to be unavailable from natural sterility-so barren that it will be worth nothing to a purchaser, however much you make him pay for it-and so much of it, that it was at one time thought advisable to alter the boundaries of the colony, for the purpose of taking in a more fertile tract between it and Port Philip. Some considerable tracts of very good land have, however, been discovered since; and we hope that the barren parts will only operate as an anti-dispersive; and that no practical evil will result from the unfortunate selection of the field of

VOL. LXXV. NO. CLI.

L

operations. With regard to this part of the question, however, pending the arrival of some more decisive indications, we must be content with quoting, in their own words, the result of the enquiries of the Committee as to the present position and prospects of the province :

The public debt charged on the future revenues of South Australia, including the sums raised by the Commissioners, the advance recently made by Parliament, and the proposed further advance to the Emigration Fund, will amount to L.296,000. The annual interest payable upon it will be about L.15,000. The number of inhabitants is supposed to be about 15,000. The ordinary revenue, which has been progressively increasing, may now be estimated at about L.30,000 per annum. The ordinary expenditure, which has been increasing still more rapidly, is now proceeding at a rate amounting, together with the interest of the loan, to about L.70,000 a-year; and although it may be hoped that some reduction may be effected by the present Governor, your Committee are unable, from want of detailed evidence in this country, to speak with any confidence on the subject.

6

With regard to the natural resources of the colony, the value of the produce, and the amount of revenue which it may hereafter yield, your Committee have not been able to obtain sufficient data to justify them in pronouncing a decided opinion; they would, however, refer to the evidence given by Mr Angus, as showing the recent progress of agriculture, and the aptness of the soil for raising grain, and for pasturage; to that of Mr Elliot in explanation of the quantity of available land still unsold; to a statistical report transmitted by Colonel Gawler, and to the general tenor of his despatches, as encouraging the hope that, after making allowance for very large tracts of wholly unavailable land, the natural capacities of the colony are considerable; and that as its tillage extends, and its stock multiplies, it may in due time yield an ample revenue, and become a valuable appendage to the British crown. For the present, however, it does not appear to your Committee that there are any certain grounds for expecting either such an increase of revenue or such a reduction of expenditure, as would obviate the necessity of making provision out of some fund, over and above the ordinary revenue, for an annual deficit of a large amount.'-(Report, p. x.)

ART. V.-The Poetical Works of Thomas Moore, Esq. Collected by Himself. 10 vols. 12mo. Longman and Company. Lon

don: 1840-42.

W E are glad that Mr Moore has thought fit to raise for himself, in his own lifetime, the Monument which has been erected for other distinguished poets after their death only,

and by the hand of editors more or less qualified for the task, by publishing this edition of his complete works. We are glad also to see that his eminent publishers, at whose judicious request this Monument was undertaken, have done their part to render it worthy of the name inscribed upon it. The edition is, indeed, a very tasteful and desirable one; and, enriched as it largely is with introductory and prefatory recitals and notices, replete with interesting biographical and critical details and remarks, it cannot but be hailed as a precious addition to other similar collections of elegant literature.

But we do not regard Mr Moore as having, by yielding to the wish for a complete edition of his published poems, in that way settled his accounts with posterity, and relinquished all further control over his poetical testament. On the contrary, we perceive intimations in some of his prefaces that there still remain additions to be made-unfinished fragments, and sketches of compositionswhich only await a little resolution on his part to be moulded into shape and rendered presentable. And really, when we remember how few years have elapsed since the appearance of his last poetical work of importance the Epicurean;' how thoroughly that beautiful fiction, though destitute of the ornament of verse, bore witness to the undiminished vigour of the poetical faculties of the writer-we feel that the public has some further claims upon him, before he finally relinquishes the Lyre. Thus much, most assuredly, we would not say, did we feel that with him the period of excellence had past. Nothing is more painful than the exhibition of genius in decay. Nothing is more distressing than to witness those who have already won for themselves a safe and lofty eminence, descending again into the arena with decayed strength and fires, and seemingly unconscious of their own decline-making a poor profit of the popularity of their well-known names, to the utter loss of all that peculiar dignity which belongs to self-respecting retirement. But, as we have said before, this appears to us to be a destiny which Mr Moore has no reason whatever to fear. He has rather withdrawn from the field with his powers, if we may so express ourselves, not yet fully developed; for poets of a highly imaginative order do indeed grow very prematurely old. The richest outpourings of their genius are commonly the earliest, and the decline is soon perceptible. Not so with poets of quick wit, sensibility, and graceful thought-the class in which Mr Moore holds so very distinguished a position. With them there are generally two very distinct epochs of perfection: they ripen twice, if we may so express ourselves. The first has the character of youthful fire; the second, that of pathos and reflection. Their task has been

chastised by time; the luxuriance of their imagery repressed. They have lost something, probably, in buoyancy as well as in brilliancy; but those intellectual powers which lie at the foundation of excellence of this description remain the same, or rather improved and mellowed by age; for these faculties are not of the same exhausting character as imagination, and do not react with its restless and terrible power on the mind and the body.

6

We cannot but think that the reader of these collected poems, now placed for the first time in the order of their production, will be able to trace in them the details of the little history which we have endeavoured to sketch out. From the youthful poems, full of fire and freshness, he passes to the author's first work of importance, and as yet his greatest, Lalla Rookh;' written, it should seem, about the mid-way of this our life's career,' although not published until later. Here he will find that brilliancy of thought and diction, which in so remarkable a degree characterize the author, carried even to excess. As we proceed onwards, we perceive his occasional poetry becoming more and more coloured with the tints of reflection and of tenderness-less exciting, and more satisfying; until at last we find the gradual change of tone completed in the Epicurean'-in our view, the most perfect of all Mr Moore's compositions as a work of art; and which probably, if it had not wanted the ornament of verse, would have been the most popular.

On this account, we cannot avoid expressing our earnest hope that the expectations vaguely held out, as we have above observed, in some parts of the prefaces, may be fulfilled. For instance, we have no doubt that out of the rejected materials for Lalla Rookh,' which Mr Moore describes as lying by him, it is in his power to produce what might not perhaps attain the almost incredible popularity reached at once by that poem, but might prove even more acceptable to genuine lovers of poetry. There is, perhaps, no other bard alive (except one) to whom we could honestly give this advice-to vanquish the temptation, whether of indolence or diffidence, and write more; and we shall resolutely refuse to consider these ten volumes as a fait accompli, until the time for making farther observations' is hopelessly gone by.

We have said that we do not regard Mr Moore as a poet of the high imaginative order; nor do we suppose that this is a point which will be much contested even by his warmest admirers, amongst whom we rank ourselves; but in adding that we cannot either attribute to him the characteristic of much fancy, in the higher and more poetical sense, we shall probably encounter more opposition. And this leads us to devote a few

pages to