their teachers. Yet these men are necessary evils, and we hope that they are not all of the same class as the castigators. Besides, they can be rendered useful in spite of themselves, if we deprive them of the power of playing off like quacks and impostors. We pledge our promise to suggest, in some of our succeeding numbers, a plan, which will enable any scholar to ascertain whether his Italian master is really fit for his profession; for we must now hasten to make our remarks on the advantages and inconveniences, attached to the literary pursuits of ladies. Such as from rank, fortune, or fashion, are doomed to the obligation of making either the great or little tour, will act prudently to provide themselves with a small stock of enthusiasm for the literature and arts of other countries. This will neutralize the contempt, which Englishwomen, from possessing a superior education and more correct manners, are apt to affect for foreign customs. If affectation were to render women hateful, it would be no great matter: the misfortune is, that it makes them ridiculous. As to the ladies, who do not travel, to them the study of foreign languages and literature is not unserviceable. They study them in general from the historians, the poets, and the novelists. History teaches the most useful of sciences, which consists in the knowledge of mankind, of facts, and of dates. Poetry assists the imagination, in colouring the dull realities of life with ideal beauties; which man loves to do, but which woman can not live without doing. Few of them can enter into the feelings of statesmen, warriors, and merchants, and calculate what advantages are to be derived from the revolution of a neighbouring state, or from a war by sea or land, or from bankruptcies, or from dearth, which lowers the public funds, raises the price of necessaries, and places, at the mercy of the speculator, both the purse and the stomach of his fellow-citizen. Novels, on the other hand, teach the Art of loving, which many young ladies have need to learn, and improve them in the still more necessary Art of exciting love, for which Nature has given them all more or less genius, and an irresistible vocation. But though we are far from recommending the Ars amandi, which Ovid taught Corinna of old, in verses much resembling prose; neither do we admire the lessons in love, which the modern Corinna has given in a prose that aspires to the character of poetry, and with too much matter of speculation, to her fair contemporaries. It is true, that 'Tis a like sense, 'twill serve the turn as well.-Cowley. But Shakspeare assures us, that "Love talks with better knowledge, and knowledge with dearer love." When too much art is discoverable; it serves only to put people on their guard: and if a stupid woman deserves pity, a foolish one never escapes contempt. For folly consists precisely, not in paucity of knowledge, or poverty of understanding, but in making a bad use of both. The most miserable of creatures are those who do not avail themselves of their means for attaining the end, for which Nature has destined them. Now what other destination can a woman have, than that of becoming a wife and mother? When talents and accomplishments are well employed, they procure husbands for young ladies, and furnish them with all that is requisite for bringing up a family. In fact, young ladies, by studying the modern languages, qualify themselves for instructing their children, and especially their daughters, which will afford them the pleasure of performing the noblest and tenderest of duties, and likewise that of saving the money, which is too frequently thrown away on worthless masters. They will, moreover, be relieved from the necessity of sending to the Continent for governesses, who can not leave behind them the habits of their respective countries, or conceal them, without assuming in England a thicker veil of prudery and hypocrisy. Previously to marriage, during marriage, and even in old age, the accomplishments of females ought to tend to one single object-that of love: and the same instinct of loving, which makes young girls coquettes, warms even the selfish souls of grandmothers, with tender, domestic affections. But now a-days, Vien la fanciulla fra la dotta schiera, BERNI, Orlando Innamorato. There was a girl, among the learned squad, With a view to gratify young ladies of this class, we shall conclude with a string of learned quotations.-In the select, exalted, and solemn assemblies of fashionable life, there is an attraction to learned women, which surrounds every distinguished individual of the stronger sex; and he comes to participate the divine power of women, by being an object of their mutual admiration. Ille Deûm vitam accipiet, divisque videbit Permixtos heroas, et ipse videbitur illis,-VIRGIL. and at the balls at Almack's, and the Argyll Rooms, Ubi suevit illa Divæ volitaire vaga cohors,-CATULLUS. and where almost always Pubertate ferox juvenis, viridique juventa, Labitur oblitus studiorum, festam primus celebrare choream, primus captare susurrum Virgineum, lepidique argutum murmur amoris, Museum Crit. IV. 1814. which, in plain English, means that young gentlemen leave the universities in order to flirt with young ladies. But young ladies— Gratia cum Nymphis geminisque sororibus audet,-HORACE. venture to launch out chiefly into literary discussions, and many a Grace, and many a Nymph is transformed into a Sibyl: Bacchatur demens aliena per antrum LUCAN. We are, nevertheless, assured that one of the ancient Sibyls exclaimed: Αἳ αἴ εγὼ δουλὴ τι γενήσομαι ηματι τῳδε; Ah, wretched virgin! what shall be my fate? When the cold wings of Time, in his silent and invisible passage, begin to weave wrinkles at the external angles of the eyes of young ladies, and to freeze the freshness of their lips, then it is that they are desirous of showing that they have profited, by the lapse of years, to adorn their minds. Then it is that they obstinately dispute, like Amazons, the literary victory with some old pedant, who at length loses all patience, and, renouncing a gallantry, which is of no service to him, grapples with his enemy, attacks her at a distance with a volley of epigrams, and never forgives her, till she lies prostrate at his feet. And then? Thy graceful form instilling soft desire, Thy curling tresses and thy silver lyre, When youth and beauty shall be laid in dust. Iliad. or After these lines of the first poet that ever lived, by the most elegant of his interpreters, we dare not prolong our quotations, or say, what we should have done, concerning a poem, "On Blue Stocking Ladies," which has just reached us in manuscript. The writer may be a man of merit, but his work and its object are very mean. What end does it answer to satirize without flattering at the same time, and to retail bon-mots in bitter verses? or to point, almost with the finger, at the person, whom one's shafts are aimed at? Such a proceeding serves only to furnish food for the malignity and gossip of the beautiful and the young, without correcting the pedantry of the plain and the old. A single passage appears tolerable, and had not the author spun it out into thirty-four couplets, it would have been tolerably amusing. We will, therefore, translate it concisely into plain prose: "Some ladies at * * * * took it into their heads to mount the horse Pegasus; but he is a wild animal, which absolutely requires to be reined in by a masculine hand. When, therefore, the impatient steed perceived the weakness and inexperience of his female riders, away he scampered, the devil knows whither, but apparently into the thickest clouds, and such as were most impregnated with smoke. At last he shook them from his back, and down the poor creatures dropped in the middle of a ball or assembly-room, with their dresses in the utmost disorder, and of a dirty blue colour, very different from that lovely tint, which the French denominate bleu du ciel.” EPITAPH. GEORGE CHARLES CANNING, Eldest Son of The Right Honourable George Canning, Born April 25th, 1801. Died March 31st, 1820. Though short thy span, God's unimpeach'd decrees, And since this world was not the world for thee, Oh! mark'd from birth, and nurtur'd from the skies! Simple as unwean'd infancy, and pure! Pure from all stain (save that of human clay, WEDDED LOVE. A FRAGMENT. It was a lovely sight to witness, when, At times would fill the eyes, and ease the heart.— Have cast on Juno, when that skiey queen First show'd her unto Jove smiling, was born: A gentle link of love, yet firmer far Than bonds, (tho' useful these) or forced vows, Was that fair child, who from each parent's heart (More beautiful than words) and murmur'd sounds, Gentle and wedded Love, how fair art thou,- Without a sigh or backward look of sorrow: But, in thy train, Beauty and blooming Joy Pass, hand in hand, and young-eyed Hope, whose glance (Not dimm'd, yet soften'd by a touch of care,) Looks forward still; and serious Happiness ር. |