ated by a sublime enthusiasm, and enriched by an extensive converse with books and men. His eloquence is characterised by a nervous and concise simplicity, always dignified, often sublime; and his speeches in Parliament may be classed among the best and purest specimens of oratory which the age produced. His free opinions were confined to no sect in religion, nor party in the state. The love of his country was the ruling passion of his breast, and the uniform principle of his whole life. In a corrupt age, and amidst the violence of contending factions, he appeared a rare example of the most upright and steady integrity, the purest honour, the most disinterested patriotism; and, while the characters of his venal, but more successful competitors, are consigned to infamy or oblivion, his memory is revered and cherished as the last of the Scots."- Ibid. Vol. IV. 296-298. Is laid so thinly, that the light of day Is through it seen.—P. 39. l. 2, 3. The pigeon lays only two eggs. She is, besides, a large bird, and possesses an uncommon degree of animal heat. How differently she and the wren construct their respective nests! Four pointed leaves luxuriant,&c.—P. 39. l. 17. The herb Paris. Amid the leafless thorn the merry wren. P. 41. 1. 21.. The wren "braves our severest winters, which it contributes to enliven by its sprightly note.... It continues its song till late in the evening, and not unfrequently during a fall of snow."-BEILBY and BEWICK. The prints, in the work here quoted, are the most accurate, and, at the same time, lively representations of birds that I ever saw. No threatening board forewarns the homeward hind. "For the honour of humanity, there are minds which require no other motive than what passes within. And here I cannot resist paying a tribute to the memory of a beloved uncle, and recording a benevolence towards all the inhabitants around him, that struck me from my earliest remembrance; and it is an impression I wish always to cherish. It seemed as if he had made his extensive walks as much for them as for himself; they used them as freely, and their enjoyment was his. The village bore as strong marks of his and of his brother's attentions (for in that respect they appeared to have but one mind) to the comforts and pleasures of its inhabitants. Such attentive kindnesses are amply repaid by affectionate regard and reverence; and were they general throughout the kingdom, they would do much more towards guarding us against democratical opinions, 'Than twenty thousand soldiers armed in proof.' "The cheerfulness of the scene I have mentioned; and all the interesting circumstances attending it, (so different from those of solitary grandeur,) have convinced me, that he who destroys dwellings, gardens, and inclosures, for the sake of mere extent, and parade of property, only extends the bounds of monotony, and of dreary, selfish pride; but contracts those of variety, amusement, and humanity. "I own it does not surprise me, that in an age, and in a country where the arts are so highly cultivated, one single plan, (and that but moderate) should have been so adopted; and that even the love of peculiarity should not sometimes have checked this method of levelling all distinctions, of making all places alike, all equally tame and insipid."-PRICE'S Essay, Vol. I. p. 379-382. Nor be the lowly dwellings of the poor "I could wish to turn the minds of improvers from too much attachment to solitary parade, towards objects more connected with general habitation and embellishment. Where a mansion-house, and a place upon a large scale, happen to be situated as close to a village, as some of the most magnificent seats in the kingdom are to small towns, both styles of embellishment might be adopted: Far from interfering, they would add to each other's effect; and it may be truly said, that there is no way in which wealth can produce such natural unaffected variety, and such interest, as by adorning a real village, and promoting the comforts and enjoyments of its inhabitants. "Goldsmith has most feelingly described (more, I trust, from the warmth of a poetical imagination and quick sensibility, than from real fact) the ravages of wealthy pride. My aim is to shew, that they are no less hostile to real taste, than to humanity; and should I succeed, it is possible that those, whom all the affecting images and pathetic touches of Goldsmith would not have restrained from destroying a village, may even be induced to build one, in order to shew their taste in the decoration and disposition of village houses and cotta ges. "As human vanity is very fond of new creations, it may not be useless to observe, that, to build an entirely new village, is not only a more expensive undertaking than to add to an old one, but that it is likewise a much more difficult task to execute it with the same naturalness and variety of disposition; and that it is hardly possible to imitate those circumstances of long established habitation, which, at the same time that they suggest pleasing reflections to an observing mind, are sure to afford delight to the painter's eye.”—Ibid. Vol. II. p. 399-404. "There is, indeed, something despotic in the general system of improvement; all must be laid open, all that obstructs levelled to the ground,-houses, orchards, gardens, all swept away. Painting, on the contrary, tends to humanize the mind: Where a despot thinks every person an intruder who enters his domain, and wishes to destroy cottages and pathways, and to reign alone; the lover of painting considers the dwellings, the inhabitants, and the marks of their intercourse, as ornaments to the landscape."-Ibid. Vol. I. p. 378, 379. And oft she's seen beneath her little perch. P. 49. 1. 11. I have been charged by a critic* (whom, though unknown to me, I highly respect) with an error here. He accuses me of having described the common swallow "as building its nest under the corners of windows, a situation sought only by the martin." Now, I do aver, that the common swallow, i. e. the swallow with the reddish, brown throat, does build in the upper corners of windows. I have seen the nest of the common swallow in such situations a thousand times. I am aware, at the same time, that the swallow, which, in England, is usually called the martin, or martlet, does also build in the corners of windows. 7 The martins, too, The dwellers in the ruined castle wall. P. 49. 1. 19, 20. The description which follows these lines (says the same critic) might be transferred, with much more propriety, to the Swift. Now, in the description alluded to, I did certainly intend to describe the bird, sometimes called the Swift. But the Swift is also sometimes called, even by ornithologists, the Black Martin; and in the west of Scotland, where I was born and bred, it is often In the Christian Observer. |