subscribed large sums of money expressly for this purpose. Not only at Whitby, at North and South Shields, at Exmouth, at Penzance, at Plymouth, at Newhaven, at Ramsgate, at Dover, at Liverpool, and at Lowestoffe, are life-boats now stationed, but at St. Andrew's, Montrose, Aberdeen, and Ayr. From Ireland also we learn that a spirited and beneficent individual* has lately obtained a vessel of this description for one of the most dangerous parts of its coast; while in Sweden, Denmark, and Russia, they have been introduced by the respective sovereigns of those countries, The emperor Alexander, indeed, with that attention to merit, which so eminently distinguished the reign of his grandmother Catherine II. not only ordered a life-boat to be built at South Shields in the yard of Mr. Greathead, but in addition to a liberal remuneration for his labours, presented him with a diamond ring as a mark of his esteem. We rejoice exceedingly in the distinguished suc cess of the inventor; we lament that the reward bestowed on him by parliament was not greater. We congratulate the country on a circumstance that he was first brought into general notice by the marked and discriminating attention of a provincial society of men of letters; and we now take our leave of a man whom we consider as the benefactor, not of his native country only, but of nations, with the con The Right Hon. David Latouche. cluding cluding stanza of an ode, composed by a physician,* who has himself frequently witnessed the havoc made by a dangerous and unrelenting element ; Thine was the task, advent'rous man! To snatch the victim from the wave;- A grateful crew shall incense burn; SIR JAMES MACKINTOSH, KNT, RECORDER OF BOMBAY. SOME writers have attempted to regulate genius as philosophers do heat, by means of a graduated scale, and boldly decide on the talents of the inhabitants by a mere reference to the geographical position of a country. The opinions of others are, on the contrary, nicely adjusted by the question of descent; and certain races are deemed by them utterly incapable of attaining excellence, being destitute of the power of either possessing or acquiring any considerable degree of mental superiority. Without presuming finally to decide on the latter * Dr. Trotter, Physician to the fleet. question, question, it is a well-known fact, that in the northern portion of this island, two apparently distinct species of men are produced; which, until of late years, were totally dissimilar in their language, country, occupations, character, and pursuits. The classes to which we now obviously refer are the inhabitants of the hills, as contrasted with those of the plains of Scotland, designated for ages past by the appellation of the Highlanders and the Lowlanders; and who, until a very recent period, not only were accustomed to treat each other with contempt, but seldom or never intermarried together, or even kept up any of the common relations of life. "The former of these," according to Sir John Dalrymple, who describes them very favourably indeed, and with great ability, "area people untouched by the Roman or Saxon invaders of the south, or by the Danish on the east and west skirts of their country; the unmixed remains of the Celtic empire, which once stretched from the Pillars of Hercules to Archangel. They were composed," adds he, "of a number of tribes, called Clans, each of which bore a different name, and lived upon the lands of a different chieftain. The members of every tribe were tied one to another, not only by the feudal but the patriarchal bond: for while the individuals who composed it were vassals or tenants of their own hereditary chieftain, they were also descended from his family, and could count the exact degrees of their descent: and the right of primogeniture, together with the weakness of the laws to reach inaccessible countries, and more inaccessible men, had, in the revolution of centuries, converted these natural principles of connexion between the chieftain and his people into the most sacred tics of human life. "The castle of the chieftain was a kind of palace, to which every man of his tribe was made welcome; where he was entertained according to his station in time of peace, and to which all flocked at the sound of war. Thus the meanest of the clan, know 1805-1806. P iug ing himself to be as well-born as the head of it, revered in his chieftain his own honour; loved in his clan his own blood; complained not of the difference of station into which fortune had thrown him, and respected himself. The chieftain, in return, bestowed a protection, founded on gratitude and the consciousness of his own interest. Hence the Highlanders, whom more savage nations called savage, carried, in the outward expression of their manners, the politeness of courts without their vices, and in their bosoms the high point of honour without its follies. "As they were, by the rugged sterility of their country, and the uncertainty of their climate, excluded alike from manufacture and extensive agriculture, every family raised just as much grain and made as much raiment as sufficed for itself: and nature destined them to the life of shepherds. Hence they had not that excess of industry which reduces man to a machine, nor that total want of it, which sinks him into a rank of animals below his own. They lived in villages, built in vallies and by the sides of rivers. At two seasons of the year they were busy; the one in the end of the spring and beginning of summer, when they put the plough into the little ground they had capable of receiving it; sowed their grain, and laid in provision of turf for their winter's fuel: the other just before winter, when they reaped their harvest: the rest of the year was all their own for amusement or for war. If not engaged in war, they indulged themselves in summer in the most delicious of all enjoyments, to men in a cold climate and romantic country, the enjoyment of the sun, and the summer views of nature; never in the house during the day, even sleeping often at night in the open air, among the mountains and woods. They spent the winter in the chase, while the sun was up; and in the evening, assembled round a common fire, they entertained themselves with the song, the tale, and the dance: but they were ignorant of sitting days and nights at games of skill or hazard, amusements that keep the body in inaction, and the mind in a state of vicious activity. "The want of a good, and even a fine ear for music, was almost unknown among them, because it was kept in continual practice among the multitude from passion; but by the wiser few, because they knew that the love of music heightened the courage, and softened the tempers of their people. Their vocal musić music was plaintive, even to the depth of melancholy; their instrumental, either lively for brisk dances, or martial for the battle. Some of their tunes contained the great but natural idea of a his tory described in music:-the joys of a marriage, the noise of a quarrel, the sounding to arms, the rage of a battle, the broken disorder of a flight; the whole concluding with a solemn dirge and lamentation for the slain. By the loudness and artificial jarring of their war-instrument, the bag-pipe, which played continually during the action, their spirits were exerted to a frenzy of courage in battle.” From the above quotation, which must be allowed to afford a specimen of the manners of the ancient rather than of the modern Highlanders, it will be readily perceived that they were but little acquainted with arts and manufactures, addicted to war and the chace, unused to the luxuries of polished societies, and totally divested of literary attainments (poetry, perhaps, excepted), which in general can only be acquired and cultivated in a high state of civilization and refinement. Hence have some vaguely inferred, that because the inhabitants of the Alpine regions of North Britain had not distinguished themselves by works of fancy and erudition, they were destitute of genius; while others, with still greater absurdity, have maintained that this peculiar race of men were incapable of attaining any high degree of excellence, in respect to mental endowments. That this theory is unsupported by facts, the life of the subject of this memoir, and the writings of a multitude of his countrymen, within these last twenty years, will sufficiently testify. James Mackintosh was born in the obscure parish |