where he solaced the weary hours of sickness, by such field-sports as his failing health enabled him to pursue, in the revision of an improved edition of ❝Salmonia,' and in the composition of the Last Days of a Philosopher.' Of this he says, in a letter dated Rome, February 6, 1829, "I write and philosophise a good deal, and have nearly finished a work, with a higher aim than Salmonia.' It contains the essence of my philosophical opinions, and some of my poetical reveries." Under this sanction, the reader will peruse with pleasure the sketch contained in the third dialogue of a geological history of the earth, and the other questions of natural philosophy which are discussed. A large portion of the work is occupied by metaphysical and religious disquisitions. As a moral philosopher, his opinions do not seem entitled to peculiar weight. Of his visionary excursion to the limits of the solar system, it is not fair to speak but as the play of an exuberant imagination, mastering the sober faculties of the mind. The work contains many passages, reflective and descriptive, of unusual beauty; and is a remarkable production to have been composed under the wasting influence of that disease, which, of all others, usually exerts the most benumbing influence.

The winter of 1828-9 he spent at Rome; with returning spring he expressed a wish to visit Geneva, but his hours were numbered. He reached that city on May 28, unusually cheerful; dined heartily on fish, and desired to be daily supplied with every variety which the lake afforded: a trifling circumstance, yet interesting from its connexion with his love of sport. In the course of the night he was seized with a fresh attack, and expired early in the morning without a struggle. His remains were honoured by the magistrates with a public funeral, and repose in the cemetery of Plain Palais. He died without issue, and the baronetcy is in consequence extinct.

THE history of Bolivar is that of the revolutions in Columbia and Peru. Nothing remarkable is related of his early life; and with respect to his personal merits as a soldier and statesman, he has shared the common lot of eminent men, in being extravagantly praised and violently censured. He has been compared to Cæsar and Napoleon on the one hand; and he has been accused of frivolity, incompetency, and even cowardice, on the other. The time for forming a dispassionate opinion of his character is not yet arrived. We shall, therefore, confine ourselves to a short sketch of the establishment of independence on the Spanish Main, so far as Bolivar was concerned in it; premising that we merely follow the course of history in giving him the credit of those measures

which were carried into execution under his authority and ostensible guidance.

Simon Bolivar was born in the city of Caracas, the capital of Venezuela, on the 24th or 25th of July, 1783. In early childhood he lost both his parents, who were of noble family, and possessed of large estates. At the age of fourteen or sixteen, he was sent to Spain for education. His habits are said to have been dissipated; but he paid some attention to the study of jurisprudence. After visiting Italy and France, he returned to Madrid, married, and in 1809 returned to reside on his estates near Caracas. It is positively asserted, and as positively denied, that Bolivar had an active share in the decisive movement at Caracas, April 19, 1810, when the Spanish authorities were deposed. A congress was summoned, which met March 2, 1811. Bolivar received a colonel's commission, and was sent to claim the protection of Great Britain. The date of his return to South America we do not find; but he is said to have been concerned in the first military operations of the patriots; and in September, 1811, he was appointed governor of the strong sea-port of Puerto Cabello. In March, 1812, a violent earthquake took place. The clergy succeeded in producing a considerable reaction in favour of royalist principles, by representing this calamity to be a manifestation of God's wrath against revolution. Monteverde, the royal general, then advanced, and met with rapid success. The strong hold of Puerto Cabello, the chief depôt of the patriots was wrested from Bolivar by an insurrection of the prisoners confined in it; the patriot army became dispirited; and General Miranda, under the sanction of congress, concluded a treaty, July 26, 1812, by which an amnesty was concluded, and the province of Venezuela returned under the dominion of Spain. Miranda was subsequently arrested on a futile charge of

treachery to the patriot cause, and delivered to the Spaniards, who kept him in prison till the day of his death. In this unjustifiable transaction, Bolivar had a principal share.

Bolivar retired for a short time to his estate; but he soon became uneasy at the frequency of arrests, and obtained a passport to quit the country. He retired to Curaçoa. In the following September, his active temper led him to seek employment in the patriot army of New Granada, which had declared itself independent in 1811, and still held out, with better fortune than Venezuela. He obtained a trifling command, not such as to satisfy his ambition; and, on his own responsibility, he undertook an expedition against the Spaniards on the east bank of the river Magdalena, in which he succeeded; clearing the country of Spanish posts from Mompox, on the above named river, to the town of Ocaña, on the frontier of Caracas. This exploit attracted public notice. He conceived the bold plan of invading Venezuela with his small forces, and the congress of New Granada consented to his making the attempt, and raised him to the rank of brigadier. He crossed the frontier with little more than 500 men; but the country rose in arms to second him; and after several engagements, in which the patriots were successful, he defeated Monteverde in person at the battle of Lastoguanes, and, finally, entered Caracas, the capital of Venezuela, in triumph, August 4, 1813.

At this time no regular government could be said to exist; but a convention of the chief civil and military functionaries, held at Caracas, January 2, 1814, conferred on Bolivar the title of Liberator of Venezuela, and invested him with the office of Dictator, and the supreme control over both branches of the executive. But these successes were followed by a rapid reverse; and before the end of the year, he was beaten out of

say,

He

Venezuela, and obliged to return to New Granada. That country was harassed by the contests of numerous and discordant parties. Bolivar was received with respect by the congress; and was entrusted with the task of compelling the dissentient province of Santa Fe de Bogotá, afterwards named Cundinamarca, to accede to the union of the other provinces. marched against the city of Bogotá in December, at the head of 2000 men. It was not in a condition to resist, and capitulated, after the suburbs had been taken by storm. It will afford an instance of the difficulty of getting at the real character of Bolivar, to that we find it stated in one account that his behaviour at Bogotá received not only the thanks of congress, but the approbation of the citizens; while another author asserts, that notwithstanding the capitulation, and in spite of the most urgent remonstrances, he permitted the pillage of part of the city for the space of forty-eight hours. He was then appointed to act against the strong town of Santa Martha, which commands the mouth of the river Magdalena. Unfortunately, private enmity between himself and Castillo, the governor of Carthagena, led to dissensions which ended in the investment of Carthagena, instead of Santa Martha, by Bolivar. During this civil strife, which led to consequences most injurious to the patriot cause, General Morillo arrived from Spain, now enabled by the peace of 1814 to act with more vigour against her revolted colonies; and Bolivar gave up his command, on the pretext that the harmony and advantage of the army required it, and embarked for Jamaica, May 10, 1815. During his abode at Kings ton, he narrowly escaped assassination at the hands of a Spaniard, who stabbed to the heart a person who chanced to occupy the bed in which Bolivar usually slept. From Jamaica he went to Hayti, where, with the help of the president Petion, and in conjunction