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more in keeping with the primitive than the luxurious age of a great nation. His tall graceful person, his dark searching eyes, strongly defined forehead, and singularly expressive mouth, indicated a noble disposition and a refined understanding. The lofty sentiments of honour habitual to his mind, adorned by a subtle playful wit, gave him in conversation an ascendancy that he could well preserve by the decisive vigour of his actions. He maintained the right with a vehemence bordering upon fierceness, and every important transaction in which he was engaged increased his reputation for talent, and confirmed his character as a stern enemy to vice, a steadfast friend to merit, a just and faithful servant of his country. The honest loved him, the dishonest feared him; for while he lived, he did not shun, but scorned and spurned the base. and, with characteristic propriety, they spurned at him when he was dead.

A soldier from his earliest youth, he thirsted for the honours of his profession, and feeling that he was worthy to lead a British army, hailed the fortune that placed him at the head of the troops destined for Spain. The stream of time passed rapidly, and the inspiring hopes of triumph disappeared, but the austerer glory of suffering remained; with a firm heart he accepted that gift of a severe fate, and confiding in the strength of his genius, disregarded the clamours of presumptuous ignorance, opposing sound military views to the foolish projects so insolently thrust upon him by the ambassador, he conducted a long and arduous retreat with sagacity, intelligence, and fortitude. No insult could disturb, no falsehood deceive him, no remonstrance shake his determination; fortune frowned without subduing his constancy, death struck, and the spirit of man remained unbroken, when his shattered body scarcely afforded it a habitation.

RUSTICATING AND GYPSYING

PREFERABLE TO
CIVIC REVELRY.

I Do not agree with several periodical writers who can see nothing in the country worth admiring, and who, while they disdain to taste a draught of water at a spring, extol the vinous and spirituous potion which is mixed with critical avidity and drunk with rapture by bons vivants beyond measure. I would rather this were a sober essay to invite my friends (and with whom am I not friendl?) to the true enjoyment of life which is so pre

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cious, by the looking out a day, and giving them a ramble with me over the hills and far away" from the gaseous effluvia and prison-smelling streets of London; rather than, as an essayist in the New Monthly, or a bacchanalian coterie in Blackwood, endeavour to persuade readers, that nothing short of living in the oversized Babel, like its exclusive and repleted Aldermen and cooks, as brawny as their annual prize cattle, is worthy of attention; and, that the continuity of gustation kept in bachelor parties, and carried by them into the noctes ambrosianæ, is of infinite more value than the vivid gusto of nature's creative loveliness and beautiful pictures whose colours decay not, and whose canvas is the sky in light and shade of fire, air, and water, and tone, and illustrated by the very exquisite abundance of animal, vegetable, and etherial matter and motion.

Not that I am an enemy to good living; but, as a creature with rational existence, it behoves me to use it temperately and to diffuse the same feeling far and wide; for of all seasons, to the Lover of Nature, more than the lover of gourmanderie, and gold, and riotous brawls, clouded in to bacco fumes, and full of fermenting and acetous liquors, the Summer is the most inviting. The sky is in the dress of lightness, like that of Ladies, the ground stocked with ripe grass and ripening corn the water clear and rippling, the sycamore oft musical with bees'the sun converging his rays every where, and warming every nook, calling out new life every moment, and giving red hues to the cheek as well as the rose, brightness to the eye as well as the star. The Shepherd

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exercise, if he does not quench the thirst Sketches of Orators, No. 4. of his people and reanimate their spirits with the wholesome beverage of his pantry and cellar.

At the foot of the lane, which leads to a bridge, and over which passengers must go, is fixed the tilt-looking camp. It catches the eye of every pleasure-taker, and turns the feet into a romantic scene. Not far hence, rather branched from the open roadway, are four females sitting in the form of a crescent, and a little old shrewd gipsy woman is on her knees facing them. She is pleading severally the prescient knowledge she possesses, or professes to be gifted with, respecting with what they are to blessed, and who are to claim the especial indulgence of their hearts. Though the secrets she imparts are in the cauldron of fate, and disclosed by her only, yet as they are worth knowing, the females in pleased anticipation, titter at each other's folly, and jog their sides in ecstacies which they only know and appreciate. Stretched in a ditch beside his dog and the bray ing ass, the masculine owner of the camp wastes his hours. If he sleeps it is sweet, if he wakes, it is like that of his animals, to protect his family. The daughter, a true gypsy girl, slim, sleek and tricksome, about fifteen years of age, sits at the mouth of the camp, and she lifts her tongue with her bewitching eyes, and points her tawny finger, indicating to the gazer on her own fatality, that she, like her mother, can unravel the mysteries of palmistry and occult science, with a pretty behaviour, and fluent colloquy, touched with the concord of sweet sounds. Over the hedges and farther in the fields, the cattle are gazing at ease, and like happy sailors, chewing the cud; and the roads which are good, and the rivers which are calm, enable Gipseying parties to attain their welcome homes, and make their accepted visits, journeyings, and rambles, in woods and vales, the forest, Richmond eyots, punting and heart catching.

But a Sunday evening is proof of cockneys' pleasures. Whether they are viewed by the ingress or egress through suburban avenues, the spirit of Liberty is joyously and generously evinced-though limbs are tired, children drowsy, pockets emptied, and fine clothes are tinged, yet the return to labour and peace enables thousands to repeat their enjoyments ere the summer is over.

Where the scenes make pictures with the materials of nature, and such as vary vet are ever new, they never fail to charm the poet, the painter, the time-taker, health-seeker, health-keeper, and every person that reads " sermons in stones and good in every thing."

P.

DEMOSTHENES.

THIS orator and statesman, the son of a cutler at Athens, was born two years after Philip, and 280 before Cicero. Although his father left him considerable property, yet by the dishonesty of his guardians, his circumstances were much reduced, and with difficulty he obtained the means of instruction, being only seven years old when his father died. He found means, however, to be taught rhetoric by Isocrates; but Plato in reality contribut ed the most to form Demosthenes; he read his works with great application and even received lessons from him, and it is easy to distinguish in the writings of the disciple, the noble and sublime air of the master, by whom he attained to such perfection in Oratory, that he became the only maintainer of the liberties of Greece,making Philip odious by his orations, for his endeavouring the infringement of them. Aristides, Thucydides, and Demosthenes, were called the three stars of rhetoric. He had a weak voice, an impediment in his speech, and a very short breath. He stammered to such a degree, that he could not pronounce some letters, this he overcame by retirement and perseverance, by which means, he was enabled to appear effectively before the public. His declamation is compared to an eloquent trumpet. Sallust learned by heart all his speeches and Nonnus read them six times. When he was asked three several times, which quality he thought most necessary in an orator, he gave no other answer than PRONUNCIATION. By the light of a small lamp, his orations were composed, which were said to smell of oil. He was an early riser. He copied the History by Thucydides eight times, to acquire his manner and perfection. His harangues were like machines of war, and batteries, which overthrew all that opposed them. To prove that he was perfectly acquainted with the disposition of Philip, and was very far from praising him like the generality of orators.-Two colleagues with whom he had been associated in an embassy to that great prince, were continually praising the King of Macedonia, at their return, and saying, that he was a very eloquent and handsome Prince, and a most extraordinary drinker. strange commendations are these!" replied Demosthenes. "The first is the accomplishment of a Rhetorician; the second of a woman; and the third of a sponge, but none of them the qualifications of a king."

"What

The Athenians erected a statue of brass to his memory, on the foot of which they

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REMARKS ON THE SATIRE OF EMINENT ENGLISH AUTHORS.

(Continued from page 348.)

The satire of the Anti-Jacobin was often fine and good. What else could it be when Ellis, and Frere, and Smith, and CANNING, were triumphing in the "noble rage "of their youthful genius! It stung the Whigs into the impotence of palsyto drivelling death. But " 'tis pitiful, 'tis wond'rous pitiful," to think how po litics do so soon all pass away! it possible to remember satires on forgotten fools-knaves buried in oblivion? “Thelwall, and ye that lecture as ye go; And for your pains get pelted,-praise Lepaux!"

How is

Who was Thelwall-who Lepaux? "The one was a tailor, the other a butcher," some reader, with a historical me mory for small facts, replies, and

"Sic transit gloria Mundi."

enduring, even in their least divine spirit and most perishable form, so have the "Pursuits" a glimmering existence, while those others have nearly or wholly ceased to be. The text is still occasionally quotable-there are things in the notes not yet extinguished in the dark. The eulogy on

"The self-secluded melancholy Gray."

we for one have by heart; and we can say what few can, that by working in the gloom and the glimmer,

"Hunting half a day for a forgotten dream."

we could pierce together his affectionate tribute of admiration to the learning, the asks our gentle reader, was he?) the wisdom, and the genius of Glynn, (who, mild Japus of the Cam, Poet and Physician, and in both capacities not unbeloved by Apollo.

Mercy on us! we have forgotten Junius- -good, stupid, old, gray-headed Taylor and Hessey's darling pet, Sir Philip Francis! Ay, he was indeed a satirist-spirited and splendid ever-and it is only wonderful how he should have been so written about by blockheads. But his winged words were not in verse,

"So fades, so flourishes, grows dim and dies, for the "Vices," we hope, he never even All that this world was proud of."

And the two-guinea quarto edition of the poetry of those true wits and true wits they were-sells on the stalls at the reduced price of six and eight-pence, a pettifogger's fee!

Of the once famous Rolliad-the cele brated Probationary Odes-what man under fifty can recite a line? Yet they were chiefly the work of a man of great talents, learning, almost genius-Lawrence- -assisted by the ingenious, the graceful, the classical, and the romantic George Ellis, from whose pen, and from whose tongue, and from whose eyes, everything fell in power and beauty, for he was one of England's rarest spirits witness the immortal Specimens, immortal because true Poetry is so, and kind and congenial and erudite criticism, devoted to the elucidation of her darkness, shares in her immortality.

Old Mathias is not yet dead-and may he breathe the air of Italy till he is a century old, for he is a scholar, and therefore we shall say no severe thing of the "Pursuits of Literature." But, our dear ancient sir, is it not a little feeble or sodealing too much with the illustrious obscure? Yet, in as far as literature, and poetry, and philosophy, are by their nature higher than politics, and more

saw-and therefore for the present we leave him to the fondling of his last discoverer and dry-nurse, and the rest of the old women.

What shall we say of the Edinburgh Review?-Least said is soonest mended. Jeffrey is at once a deep and delicate cutter-up; and nature made him, in his amiability, almost-perhaps entirely-a first rate satirist. He often touches you, by a seemingly careless pass, with equal dexterity, when you are off and on your guard; but prefers disabling your swordarm to pinking you through the body. When he does deal a mortal blow, it is always on the right side, never on the left; he seems to think it cruel to pierce your heart, and therefore contents himself with spitting your liver. The old Fencers were fond of the eye, as you may see from the pictures in that curious and scientific old folio on the Art, in the possession of our sound-hearted, nimblewristed Signior Francalanza, whom, without any disparagement to the illustrious Roland, we delight to honour as a master, and as a man. Jeffrey is up to this trick, and pokes his point-better for the blockhead if it be of foil than of rapierinto the great staring goggle eye of his antagonist, till, blind as a bat, the bully cuts and runs, in plight of Polyphemus or Caeus of old, and is hissed off the stage.

His light play is beautiful-and his own guard close, compact, and firm; so that it requires an Admirable Crichton to touch him on a vital part. But he is rather out of practice rests on his former fame-and is careless about accepting the challenge of a clever Tyro. About the year 1804, or 1805, or 1806, he won the prize-sword, at a public exhibition, from a crowd of no contemptible competitors and whoever taught him fence, has endless honour in his scholar-for, as our worthy and ingenious friend, Pierce Egan, would say, "Jack's as good as his master."

Brougham is but an indifferent and awkward hand at the small-sword-the deadliest by far of all weapons-and prides himself in his use of the sabre, the broad-sword, or claymore. He is an ugly customer. Nor should we at all relish having our head broken by such a player at single-stick. But he has a loose hanging guard--nor is it difficult, as we opine, for a clever and active antagonist in no long encounter, to make the blood trickle an inch down his formidable forehead. He blusters and bullies too much during the set-to-is not particularly conscientious about a foul blow-and it is acknowledged on all hands, that he is too much given to ruffianing it. It will be in the recollection of all our sporting readers, that he once suddenly attacked George Canning, that most skilful smallswordsman,-unawares, and out of the ring-and for his pains, got punished by a thrust in the mouth, that almost cut his tongue in two, the point coming out at the cheek, a rueful and ghastly wound that left a scar. He flies at high game. Once on a day, when the " Great Lord" was in Spain, he challenged Wellington himself but now he wears his arm in a sling, and seems in no mood for fighting.

The King of Prussia, and the Emperors of Austria and Russia, has he also roared on to enter the lists and indeed all the members-either one after another, or all at once-of that invisible, and hitherto apparently pacific body-the Holy Alliance. But fretting and fuming, and foaming, is not fighting; and though we grant that the odds would be on his head at Tattersall's and Brookes', if matched against old Fred-or the Austrian-we back Nicholas against him at six to four

who, we understand, has threatened to take the shine out of him, were it only to revenge the insult offered of old to his late brother Sandy, who was not a mar, had he come to the scratch, to have let Brougham off without a bellyful.

As for Sydney Smith, to him fighting is fun, and he cuts as many capers in the ring as young Spring, the Conqueror. But he is formidable in his frolic-though rather too showy, yet a clean, straight, and even heavy hitter; and most of his antagonists, though heavier men than himself, and deficient in neither science nor bottom, have, after a few rounds, in which their gravity was most amusingly, and to the infinite mirth of all beholders, contrasted with the antics of the Parson, who kept hopping about like a mountebank, yet all the while dealing out right and left-handers like lightning, been carried out of the ring deaf as a house, and blind as the pier of Leith, or the mole of Tyre. He has fought one or two drawn battles, especially one with the best man then in the ring, under the nomme de guerre of Peter Plymley, which was brought to a wrangle, and ended in a draw-but he has never yet been fairly defeated; and to accomplish that, will require an out-and-outer.-Blackwood's Mag.

JULY.

This month the seventh of the year was ordered by Marc Anthony to be so called in compliment to the Mighty Julius who reformed the old Roman calendar established by Romulus, by whom the month was termed Quintilis, and accounted the fifth of the year which begun with March. The word July is derived from the Latin Julius, the surname of Caius Ceaser the dictator, who was born this month. Our Saxon ancestors gave it the name of Heu-monat, or Hey-monat, from its being the month "therein they usually mowed and made their hay-harvest." July by the Romans was considered as under the protection of Jupiter, and during its progress they kept the following festivals and ceremonies.

On the first day of this month the leases of the houses in Rome generally expired, and were renewed. And on the fifth or the third before the Nones was celebrated the festival of the Poplifugia, in memory of the retreat of the people to the Aventine hill, when Romulus was killed. The festival of Fortuna muliebris was held on the sixth. This holiday was established by the mother and wife of Coriolanus to commemorate their obtaining peace from him for their country. On this day also commenced the Ludi Appollinaris which lasted eight days in honour of Apollo, these games were under the direction of the prætor, and were celebrated in the great circus. The seventh or day of the Nones, a festival called Caprotinæ None was celebrated in honour of Juno,

this feast was held in remembrance of a female servant or slave called Tutola, having climbed a wild-fig-tree with a burning torch which she held in her hand as a sign to the Romans to surprise the army of the Latins. On the day succeeding this feast was another rejoicing day termed Vitulatio in honour of Vitula, the goddess of rejoicing. The twelfth was kept holy from the circumstance of its being the day on which Julius Caesar was born. The Mercuriales or feast of the Mercantile people kept in honour of Mercury, began on the fourteenth and lasted for six days. On the fifteenth or day of the Ides the Tranvectio or general muster of the Roman Knights took place, on which occasion the Knights adorned with coronets made with branches of the olive-tree rode in procession from the temple of Honour to the Capitol, the Censors being present at the ceremony. And on the same day was kept the feast of Castor and Pollux in the temple, built by the son of Aulus Posthumius in the great place of Rome, because they had fought for the Romans against the Latins, who attempted to restore Tarquinus Superbus to Rome, when solemn sports and combats took place. The seventeenth was accounted fatal from the battle of Allia being lost thereon. On the nineteenth the games called Lucaria commenced and lasted for four days, these games derived their name from a sacred wood Lucus, situated between the Tiber and the Salarian Way, and were celebrated in this place to commemorate the Romans, having sought refuge in the sacred wood after having been defeated by the Gauls. Sports were held in honour of Neptune on the twenty-second. And on the twenty-third pregnant women offered sacrifices to the Goddess Opigena, (another name for Juno,) when they carried small wax figures to her temple, and offered up prayers to her to propitiate their deliverance. On the twenty-fourth the feasts of the Pontiffs were held. The twenty-fifth was devoted to the Furinalia and the Ambarvalia, the former feast was kept in honour of Furina, the Goddess of Robbers, sometimes called Laverna,' by some of the ancients, among whom is Cicero, she is considered as being the same with the furies, be this as it may, she had a wood consecrated to her, and a temple, with a priest of her own. The latter was called the feast of Perambulation, when it was usual for the citizens who had lands and vineyards, without the city to go in procession crowned with oak leaves, preceeded by twelve priests three times round the ground, chanting hymns in honour of Mars, and Ceres. The intent of this ceremony was to obtain a plentiful harvest from the gods. On the twenty-eighth sacrifices of wine and honey were offered to Ceres; and at the end of the month red haired dogs was sacrificed to the dog-star to moderate the excessive heat of the season.

The month of July may be viewed as the reverse of January, for as the one is considered the coldest, the other may be looked on the hottest, for, though the direct influence of the sun diminishes after the summer solstice, yet the earth and air has been heated to such excess, that the warmth which they retain, more than compensates, for a time, the diminution of the sun's rays. Summer may be reckoned this month, as being fully with us, apparelled in her gayest attire, revelling in all the varied colours of the rainbow, for now" the Woods and Groves, the Hills and Plains have put off the bright green livery of Spring; but, unlike them, they have changed it for one dyed in as many colours as a harlequin's coat. The Rye is yellow, and almost ripe for the sickle. The Wheat and Barley are of a dull green, from their swelling ears being alone visible, as they bow before every breeze that blows on them. The Oats are ripening apace, and quivering on their fragile stems, as they hang like rain drops in the air," waiting the gathering hand of the husbandmen. Let the eye of the admirer of nature be directed which way it may, whether to the garden, the orchard, or the open field, it meets with something picturesque and beautiful, that affects the beholder with pleasure unspeakable, and fills his mind with vast and wondering ideas of his great creators munificent bounty and infinite wisdom.

This subject would admit of our being more diffuse, were we not confined by the limits of space. Therefore we must forego speaking of the feathered tenantry of the groves, and the insect tribe now in their full vigour, myriads of which haunt the air and take full possession of the leaf, the trees antique branches and their covering rind, the blossom and bud, the mossy bank made brilliant by the sun's bright beam, the bare earth, the pool, the ditch, all of which may be seen teeming with animal life, affording to the enquiring entomologist, food for his contemplative mind. Having presented our readers with a slight sketch of this glowing and beautiful month, we shall here conclude with a brief and striking picture of this season by a poet of no common ability, though but little known :

Now glowing in full summer's heat,
The sun pours down his genial rays;
Yet rip'ning crops the traveller greet,
And cooling fruit his thirst allays,
Thus, like the sun in splendid might,
On man celestial glory shines;
Still ripening to perfection bright,
Eternal Bounty's vast designs.

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