of that kind, would grow stale with repetition.

Those who cannot afford to cross the ocean, must be satisfied with the report of others: but this is one of those things to which a verbal description can never do justice. One volcano, at least, must be seen, before any adequate notion can be formed of another. All our ideas of unseen objects must be drawn from comparisons with what we have seen, but what has any one among us seen, what have any of us heard, in our native country, by comparison with which our imagination may be enabled to gain a glimpse of Etna and Vesuvius?

I am called upon by one of these describers to figure to myself Vesuvius, near four thousand feet high; Etna, which is more than twelve thousand; Pichinca, which is fifteen thousand; Cotopaxis, or Antisana, which are eighteen thousand; or, in fine, the insular volcano, which is thought to exceed Chinboraco, and which, were it only equal to it, would still be nineteen thousand four hundred feet in height: I am required to imagine a column of fire more than a mile in diameter, whose height is more than double that of the mountain; rising from it with a thundering noise; lightnings flashing from it. The dazzling brightness of its flame could not be be endured by the eye, did not immense spiral clouds of smoke, at intervals, moderate its fierceness. These spread through the atmosphere, which they thicken; the whole horizon is covered with darkness; and at length nothing is to be seen but the burning summit of the mountain, and the wonderful column of fire.

In a short time the whole of the column turns into a horrible shower of red-hot rocks, flints, and ashes. Monstrous burning masses are seen bounding and rolling down the side of the mountain. Woe be to those places which lie in the direction of the wind prevailing at the time of this tremendous shower! Pompeii,

VOL. III. NO. XIX.

Herculaneum, and Stabiæ, three towns to the south-west of Vesuvius, disappeared, about seventeen centu ries ago, by a similar occurrence, and it was only in the eighteenth century that they were discovered. A column, such as we have described, broke over them and the land about them: they were buried more than fifty feet under a mass of ashes and calcined flints, which was further covered by a bed of lava several feet deep. If the wind be strong, these cinders are carried to the distance of two, three, and four hundred miles. Nay, there is indubitable evidence that, on one occasion, the ashes of Etna were blown to Constantinople, a distance of a thousand miles, in such quantities, that the day was darkened as by a pitchy cloud, and the roofs and pavements covered with volcanic cinders more than two inches deep.

These wonderful facts, to which I cannot refuse my belief, aid me not at all in conjuring up the sensations which one of these eruptions must produce upon a near spectator. Before I can talk of a volcano as a spectacle, I must patiently wait for that turn of fortune, which shall place me at the foot of Vesuvius, or on the hoarse Trinacreon shore.

United States are no more than a league of several nations, in many important respects as dissimilar to each other as any two nations of Europe. In climate, we have, of course, all the varieties between the south of Spain and the north of England; but in our manners and habits, social and political, we are, in many particulars, as unlike each other as the Provencals and Livonians.

The following particulars of the mode in which internal trade is carried on in America, are given by a person who resided twenty years in the United States. They were no doubt very new and surprising to European readers, but I much doubt whether nine out of ten among American readers will not regard them with the same wonder. The book in which they are contained was published in London on ly four years ago.

As the easy reared horse of America (and even him habit continues to import from England, notwithstanding many advantages of superior propagation) affords himself and rider an easy and agreeable mean of transfer to every little neighbouring race-ground, or some such place of frequent meetings, among some classes of the people the custom has followed of converting every little casual convention of this kind into a sort of fair for buying and selling, and for exchanging surplus commodities, which are frequently bartered in kind. Sometimes several sorts are given for a horse or cow, or several of these for a piece of land, &c., without the intervention of any circulating coin.

This species of traffic is termed trucking or trading; and at some places you are thus asked, in local phrase, to truck or trade for a horse, a cow, or a little tackie, a term which signifies a poney, or little horse, of low price. Or you are perhaps told, that such a one wishes to give you trade for your horse: this bargain is considered to imply value for value, at a fair price set

upon various articles agreed upon; sometimes settling this price by mutual agreement of the parties, and at other times having recourse to what is called sending out: for example, I will truck for your horse, with such and such articles, and send out. If the party propo sed to agrees to this proposition, each party chooses an indifferent bystander; the two examine the articles to be exchanged. These arbitrators then retire, and report the prices affixed on their return to the company, always fixing the forfeit to be paid in punch, &c., to the company, by the party who refused to abide by the award; which is optional in either, on paying the forfeit to the company. If the bargain takes place, both parties are almost sure to treat, and, perhaps, many more of the company will do the same; which creates a great deal of mirth and good-humour among all but those who happen to be, sometimes, disposed to interrupt rural harmony with high-bred airs.

Sometimes two black balls and two white ones are put into a hat: if both take white balls, the bargain is fixed in all events, let who may lose by it, for this optional ceremony precedes the report; if both take black balls, both must treat the company; if one black and the other white, the black pays for the punch.

In some cases, the consenting par ty draws a straw from the hand of the referees: if he gets the longest straw, he is at option on the disclosure of terms; if he gets the short one, he is bound. If he refuses, at option, he pays the punch; the proposing party is bound ab initio.

Such are the merry laws of horseswapping and trucking. I am thus particular in regard to them, not merely on the ground of novelty: they are intimately related to the doctrine of supply and demand, which they tend to elucidate; and they form a strong link in those benevolent maxims of hospitality, which I hope never to see the Americans abridge.

For the Literary Magazine.

GOVERNMENT OF LOUISIANA, AS ORGANIZED BY LAW, MARCH 3, 1805.

THE executive power is vested in a governor, to reside in the territory, and hold his office three years, unless sooner removed by the president of the United States. He is commander in chief of the militia; superintendant, ex officio, of Indian affairs; and appoints all officers in the same, below the rank of general officers; has power to grant pardons for offences against the same, and reprieves for those against the United States, till the decision of the president is known.

There is a secretary, whose commission is for four years, uniess sooner revoked by the president, who resides in the territory, and whose duty it is, under the direction of the governor, to record and preserve all the papers and proceedings of the executive, and all the acts of the governor and the legislative body, and to transmit copies of the same, every six months, to the president. In case of vacancy in the office of governor, the government is exercised by the secretary.

The legislative power is vested in the governor and in three judges, or a majority of them, who have power to establish inferior courts and prescribe their jurisdiction and duties, and to make all laws which they may deem necessary. No law is valid which is inconsistent with the constitution and laws of the United States, or which shall lay any person under restraint or disability on account of religious opinions, profession, or worship. In all criminal prosecutions, a jury shall try, and, in all civil cases, of the value of one hundred dollars, the trial shall be by jury, if either party require it. The governor publishes throughout the territory all the laws

which may be made, and from time to time reports them to the president, to be laid before congress, which, if disapproved by congress, shall thenceforth cease.

There are three judges, to hold their offices four years, who, or any two of them, hold annually two courts within the district, at such place as is most convenient to the inhabitants in general, and possess the jurisdiction of the judges of the Indiana territory, and continue in session till all the business before them is disposed of.

The governor proceeds, from time to time, as circumstances require, to lay out those parts of the territory, in which the Indian title is extinguished, into districts, subject to such alterations as may be found necessary; and appoints magistrates and civil officers, whose powers are to be defined by law.

The governor, secretary, and judges receive the compensation established for similar offices in the Indiana territory.

The governor, secretary, judges, justices of the peace, and all other officers, civil or military, before they enter upon duty, take an oath, or affirmation, to support the constitution of the United States, and for the faithful discharge of the du ties of their office; the governor before the president, or a judge of the supreme or district court of the United States, or such person as the president shall authorize to administer the same; the secretary and judges before the governor; and all other officers before such person as the governor directs.

All the above-named officers are appointed by the president, in the recess of the senate, but nominated, at their next meeting, for their advice and consent.

The laws in force in the district, at the commencement of this act, and not inconsistent with it, continue in force till altered, modified, or repealed by the legislature.

W.

For the Literary Magazine.

VANITY.

VANITY is commonly judged of by external appearances: he who betrays his desire of applause most, who practices most assiduously the tricks and stratagems by which approbation can be gained, is deemed the vainest man; but this distinction seems to be groundless. The difference between him who does this, and him who does it not, seems to imply, not a difference in their vanity, that is, in their desire of applause, but only in their judgment as to the best means of gaining the approbation they desire.

Some minds are so firmly and forcibly convinced, that praise is always withheld with an obstinacy proportioned to the importunity with which it is exacted or besought; that men bestow applause and attribute merit just in that degree in which it is disclaimed or shunned; that their vanity, or desire of ap plause, produces in them all the symptoms of extreme diffidence and modesty. They carefully forbear introducing themselves and their exploits into conversation. They even take pains to lead away our thoughts from every thing connected with their own merits. Instead of assuming the merit of offices or performances which belong to others, they even disclaim what is properly their due, and take the same pains to make their good actions be ascribed to others, which some take to appropriate the praise of deeds not their own. And all this they do, in submission to a violent and fervent love of praise; and merely because observation and experience teach them that this is the only sure road to the goal of their ambition, Such persons are thought the reverse of vain; but, if it be allowed that the passion for praise will most successfully attain its object by a system of reserve and exterior diffidence, and that it is possible for a man to have the perception of this

truth, united with this passion, it follows, that the most seemingly diffident may be the most vain.

Vanity, however, is generally ascribed to those who make their own good opinion of themselves manifest, and who take obvious, and, of course, self-defeating methods of obtaining the praise they deem their due. The mere desire of applause, and the consciousness of deserving it, do not entitle a man to be called vain; he must also evince such a weakness of judgment, as leads him to defeat his own purpose, by the means made use of to attain it.

W.

For the Literary Magazine.

ANECDOTE.

WHEN Michael Angelo had finished his painting of the day of judgment, the most serious exception made to the general composition, by his contemporaries, was that of violating decorum, in representing so many figures without drapery. The first person who made this objection was the pope's master of the ceremonies, who, seeing the picture when three parts finished, and being asked his opinion, told his holiness, that it was more fit for a brothel than the pope's chapel. This circumstance caused Michael Angelo to introduce his portrait into the picture with ass's ears; and, not overlooking the duties of his temporal office, he represented him as master of the ceremonies in the lower world, ordering and directing the disposal of the damned; and, to heighten the character, wreathed him with a serpent, Dante's well known attribute of Minos.

It is recorded, that the monsig. nore petitioned the pope to have this portrait taken out of the picture, and that of the painter put in its stead; to which the pope is said to have replied, "had you been in purgatory, there might have been

some remedy, but from hell nulla est redemptio."

For the Literary Magazine.

THE LATEST NEWS, LITERARY AND PHILOSOPHICAL, FROM EU

ROPE.

Great Britain.

MR. MURPHY has undertaken the publication of a series of engravings from the most esteemed masters, ancient and modern, illustrating the history of the propagation of the gospel, and its coincidence with the predictions of the prophets. In the arrangement of the work, he proposes to exhibit it in two divisions, the first to comprehend, in twentyfive plates, an illustration of such passages in the Gospels, and Acts of the Apostles, as are of a picturesque kind, with a supplementary print of Daniel interpreting the dream of Nebuchadnezzar. The second part to represent the combat of Religion with the Roman power, from its rise to its establishment under Constantine; together with the subjection of the barbarous nations to the cross; in which the particular exertions of the ministers of Christ in propagating his religion will be displayed. Several of these plates are already executed by Smirke and other first artists, and are very favourable indications of Mr. Murphy's undertaking.

Mr. Hayley's new poem, entitled the Triumph of Music, is ready for publication, in quarto.

The Memoirs of the Life of Lee Lewes, for which he left behind him the most ample documents, will be published by his son, John Lee Lewes, Esq., of Liverpool, in the course of the month of January.

Mrs. Barbauld's Selection of Choice Papers from the Spectator, Tatler, and Guardian, with notes and a preface, has been lately published, in three volumes, with a cheaper edition for schools.

A translation is in the press of the Posthumous Works of Marmontel. They consist of the life of that celebrated writer, and of some miscellaneous pieces. The life is peculiarly interesting, not only for the facts and anecdotes with which it abounds, but on account of its having been written expressly for the confidential perusal of the author's children.

The History of modern and contemporary Voyages and Travels has already proceeded with the grand picturesque Travels of M. Cassas in Istria and Dalmatia, with Kuttner's Travels in Denmark and Sweden; and the third number begins the late Travels in the Back Settlements of North America, by M. Michaux, which will be completed with the two preceding works in the first volume. The three first numbers of this Journal are enriched by a recent original Tour to Constantinople, and by copious analyses of Woodward's Shipwreck, Kotzebue's Travels, and Grant's Voyage. Other important recent voyages and travels are in a state of preparation for the subsequent numbers; and the editors promise every valuable work in this branch of literature, as soon as it appears.

Dr. Carey had just ready for publication, "A Key to As in præsenti," &c. intended to facilitate to young beginners the application of Lily's Metrical Rules.

A new edition of Mr. Malthus's Essay on Population was preparing for publication.

Dr. Milne's Botanical Dictionary was ready for publication. This edition embraces all the modern improvements, and being embellished by the first artists of the country, will be justly considered as valuable to students and proficients in botany.

A new edition of the Life of Agricola, and an Account of the Ancient Germans, translated from Tacitus, by Dr. Aikin.

A general Treatise on Cattle, including their Breed, Management, and medical Treatment, by Mr. Lawrence.