of sixteen, when he became a member of the university of Oxford, till his death, at the age of sixty-three, his life was entirely academical. He indeed held a parochial cure for some time, but his labours in this character were desultory, and to himself probably little agreeable. In 1745, he sent some articles to Dodsley's museum, but his first detached publication was 'The Pleasures of Melancholy.' In 1751 he succeeded to a fellowship, and in the same year he published his excellent satire, entitled, Newmarket.' In 1754 he published Observations on the Faerie Queene of Spenser,' his favourite poet. It produced an impression highly favourable to his critical talents, and led the way in a department of literature which has since been cultivated with much success amongst us. In 1757, on the resignation of Mr Hawkins, the Oxford professor of poetry, Mr Warton was elected to that office. A variety of minor publications fell from his pen during the interval which preceded the appearance of the first volume of his great work, "The History of English Poetry,' in 1774. Among these were his life of Sir Thomas Pope, and a splendid edition of Theocritus.

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The design of a history of English poetry had been already entertained by Pope, Gray, and Mason, each of whom had made some preparations for the task. But they wanted the indefatigable perseverance which was necessary for the accomplishment of such a labour; and even Warton himself, with all his diligence and varied ' means and appliances' to boot, left the work in an unfinished state. To that portion which he has executed, forming three volumes in quarto, the praise of accuracy and research is unquestionably due; but it has been well observed that there is a certain lifeless massiveness' about it which renders the perusal of it an operose and dissatisfying labour to a mind of quick perception. It is in fact a great storehouse of learning, from which one may at all times procure what it would probably cost him not a little labour to obtain elsewhere, but the informing spirit of generalization is wanting to it. Still it is a highly respectable work of its kind, and forms the most solid basis of its author's reputation. During the publication of the successive volumes of this work, Mr Warton sent forth various minor literary productions. He took an active part in the Chattertonian controversy, and his Enquiry into the authenticity of the poem attributed to Thomas Rowley,' is a very able exposé of that ingenious forgery. His edition of the Juvenilia of Milton is a good specimen of that species of commentating, learned but minute to trifling, in which Warton excelled.

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In 1782 it was his fortune, or we should better say, perhaps, his misfortune, to be nominated poet-laureate, at the express command of his majesty. He wore the courtly laurel with a better grace than either of his immediate predecessors, but his official odes' betray the sickliness of the atmosphere in which they were forced into unnatural life.

Mr Warton enjoyed vigorous and uninterrupted health until a very short time preceding his death, which occurred on the 20th of May, 1790. His character was that of an amiable, accomplished, but retiring man, with sufficient genius and taste to redeem his erudition from the charge of pedantry, but destitute of the higher order of intellectual powers which alone could place him as a poet by the side of his favourites, Spenser and Milton. Mr Mant was informed that Dr Johnson had been pleased to say, on some unrecorded occasion, that Warton was

the only man of genius that he knew without a heart. It is doubtful whether Johnson ever did say this; but, if he did, the charge is not borne out by any thing we know of Warton's private life.

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Dr Richard Price.

BORN A. D. 1723.-DIED A. D. 1791.

RICHARD PRICE, a political writer of respectable talent, was born in Glamorganshire in 1723, and was educated at Talgarth, in his native county, whence he removed to a dissenting academy near London. After having for some time resided at Stoke-Newington, he became pastor of an Arian congregation at Hackney, amongst whom he continued to officiate until his death. In the year 1758 he first appeared as an author in a treatise 'On the Foundation of Morals,' in which he opposed Hume's doctrines. This was followed, in 1767, by four dissertations of a religious character, which were favourably received, and, in conjunction with his former publication, procured for him the diploma of D.D. from the university of Glasgow. About the year 1770 he published an excellent treatise on 'Reversionary Payments,' a subject which his mathematical acquirements enabled him to discuss with much originality and ability. Soon afterwards, he appeared as a political arithmetician, in An Appeal to the Public on the subject of the National Debt.' In 1775 Dr Price published Observations on Civil Liberty, and the Justice and Policy of the War with America.' This work secured for him the esteem of Franklin and the enmity of Burke. Soon after this, he engaged in an epistolary controversy with his friend Priestley, on the subjects of materialism and necessity. We next find him corresponding with the premier himself on the subject of finance. The establishment of the sinking fund was the result of the doctor's exposition of the marvellous augmentation of money by compound interest. Having shown that a penny, improved by annual compound interest at 5 per cent. would, in 1773 years, amount to an inconceivable sum, Dr Price went on to argue that "a state, if there is no misapplication of money, must necessarily make this improvement of any savings which can be applied to the payments of its debts. It need never, therefore, be under any difficulties; for, with the smallest savings, it may, in a little time, as its interest can require, pay off the largest debts.' Extravagant and paradoxical as the whole reasoning is, it sufficed to influence the measures of Pitt, and for a time satisfied the nation itself. The breaking out of the French revolution was hailed by Dr Price as an omen of good to all Europe; and in a sermon On the Love of our Country,' which he published in 1789, he gave expression to his feelings regarding this event in language which drew upon him the indignation of Burke, and excited that eloquent man to the publication of his famous Reflections.' On the 14th of July, 1790, Dr Price closed his public life, by serving in the office of steward at a dinner in commemoration of the French revolution. After this he went into the country, but returned soon again to town in a declining state of health. friends urged him to reply to the Reflections,' but he felt his strength too far gone to attempt the task. In the following spring he was seized

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His

Dr Price

with a complaint which quickly brought him to his grave. was a man of considerable powers and great worth of moral character. The general tendency of his political writings is salutary, though his enthusiasm often prompted him to theorize too finely in the science of government. He exercised very considerable influence over public opinion during one of the most eventful periods of modern history, and numbered amongst his correspondents some of the principal leaders in the American and French revolutions.

John Smeaton.

BORN A. D. 1724.-DIED A. D. 1792.

THIS distinguished mechanic and civil engineer was born at Ansthorpe, near Leeds, on the 28th of May, 1724. His father was an attorney, and wished to educate his son for his own profession, but was ultimately compelled to allow the youth to follow the bent of his own genius for mechanics. From a very early age he had discovered a strong propensity towards the arts in which he afterwards so distinguished himself: "his playthings"--to use the words of one of his acquaintances—“ were not the playthings of children, but the tools men work with; and he appeared to have greater entertainment in seeing the men in the neighbourhood work, and asking them questions, than in any thing else. At the age of eighteen he used to forge iron and steel with considerable dexterity, and had tools of every sort for working in ivory, wood, and metals.'

In the year 1750 he took lodgings in Turnstile, Holborn, where he commenced the business of a mathematical-instrument maker. His ingenious inventions soon introduced him to the notice of men of science in the capital, and in 1753 he was elected fellow of the Royal society, to whose Transactions' he subsequently contributed various papers, one of which, entitled 'An Experimental enquiry concerning the natural powers of wind and water to turn mills and other machines depending on a circular motion,' received the society's gold medal in 1759. This paper was the result of experiments made in his 27th and 28th years. In 1754 he visited Holland, and minutely inspected the principal works of the Dutch engineers.

In 1755 the Eddystone light-house was destroyed by fire. Mr Smeaton had not yet practised as an engineer, yet such was the high opinion entertained of his abilities that he was recommended to the proprietors by the president of the Royal society, as upon the whole the person best qualified to superintend the reconstruction of such an edifice, and to overcome, if the thing were at all possible, the numerous obstacles and disadvantages attending the construction of a secure lighthouse on this spot, which had hitherto been deemed insurmountable. He undertook the work immediately, and completed it in the summer of 1759. His reputation was now established as a civil engineer. In 1764 he was appointed one of the receivers of the Greenwich hospital estates, but resigned that office in 1777, in consequence of the increase of other business. During this last year he completed the erection of new light-houses at the Spurn-head at the mouth of the Humber.

Among other undertakings, he rendered the river Calder navigable; he built the fine bridge over the Tay at Perth; he laid out the line of the great canal connecting the Forth and Clyde; and he secured the piers of the centre arch of London bridge, which had been undermined by the action of the stream, by a very simple expedient. In 1771 he became joint-proprietor with his friend Mr Holmes of the works for supplying Greenwich and Deptford with water. His reputation was now so completely established that no great works were undertaken throughout the kingdom without his opinion being first obtained regarding them; he was constantly consulted in parliament, and was regarded as an ultimate reference on all difficult questions connected with his profession. He made an attempt to retire from public life in 1785, but was prevailed upon to continue his services as engineer to the trustees for Ramsgate harbour. The works at Ramsgate were begun in 1749, but had been conducted with very indifferent success, until Smeaton was called in to superintend them in 1774. He completed the magnificent pier and harbour of this place in 1791, and then established a secure and much-needed place of shelter in the Downs. His health had begun to decline about 1785. Over-exertion at last brought on an attack of paralysis on the 16th of September, 1792, which carried him off on the 28th of the next month, in the 69th year of his age.

ner.

Smeaton was a man of indefatigable industry and great moral probity. With ample opportunity of amassing wealth, he rendered its acquisition but a secondary object on all occasions; his first aim always being to execute the task intrusted to him in the most skilful and perfect manHad he been more set upon amassing a fortune than he was, he might have received many lucrative appointments besides those which he held. The empress Catherine of Russia attempted to secure his services for her own country by most magnificent offers; but Smeaton preferred to dedicate his time and talents to the service of his country. "The disinterested moderation of his pecuniary ambition," says his daughter, " every transaction in private life evinced; his public ones bore the same stamp; and after his health had withdrawn him from the labours of his profession, many instances may be instanced by those whose concerns induced them to press importunately for a resumption of it and when some of them seemed disposed to enforce their entreaties by further prospects of lucrative recompense, his reply was strongly characteristic of his simple manners and moderation. He introduced the old woman, who took care of his chambers in Gray's-inn, and, showing her, asserted that her attendance sufficed for all his wants.' The inference was indisputable, for money could not tempt that man to forego his ease, leisure, or independence, whose requisites of accommodation were compressed within such limits!" Before this, the Princess de Askoff made an apt comment upon this trait of his character; when, after vainly using every persuasion to induce him to accept a carte blanche from the empress of Russia-as a recompense for directing the vast projects in that kingdom-she observed, “Sir, you are a great man, and I honour you! You may have an equal in abilities, perhaps, but in character you stand single. The English minister, Sir Robert Walpole, was mistaken, and my sovereign has the misfortune to find one man who has not his price." In all the social duties of life he was most exemplary; and he was a lover and encourager of real

merit in whatever station of life he found it. His papers, consisting of plans, reports, and treatises on almost every branch of engineering, were published after his death by the society of Civil engineers.

During his own lifetime Smeaton published A Narrative of the building, and a Description of the construction of Eddystone Lighthouse,' from which we learn the following facts connected with the progress and completion of that extraordinary work. The Eddystone light-house is situated on a reef of rocks directly between the Lizard and Start points at the entrance of Plymouth Sound. The first lighthouse constructed on this spot was entirely carried away in the memorable storm of 26th November, 1703. Its successor was burnt down in 1755. To guard against a repetition of the latter accident Smeaton resolved that his should be entirely of stone. After much time spent in deliberating upon the best form and method of construction, he adopted the model furnished by the trunk of an oak for his building. That tree swells out towards its roots so as to obtain a broad and firm base, while, diminishing as it rises, it again swells out as it approaches towards the insertion of the branches, so as to afford them a secure hold on the trunk. This outline is evidently well-adapted for a light-house exposed to violent storms. The storm spends itself on the broad and circular base without being able to effect a breach, while the curved cornice, or bulging head of the pillar, throws off the heavy seas from the lantern. For the height of twelve feet from the rock the building is solid, of Portland stone faced with Cornish granite. The interior, which consists of four rooms, one above the other, is accessible by a moveable ladder, and surmounted with a glass-lantern 21 feet in height. The height from the lowest point of the foundation to the floor of the lantern is 70 feet. It has withstood, uninjured, every storm since its erection, and bids fair to last for centuries to come.

James Bruce.

BORN A. D. 1733.-DIED A. D. 1794.

JAMES BRUCE was born about the year 1733. His family was descended from one of the brothers, or other collateral relations, of the heroic Robert Bruce, king of Scotland. Robert Bruce of Kinnaird, an eminent presbyterian minister in the reign of James VI., was one of his immediate ancestors. His parents held a respectable rank among the gentry of Stirlingshire in Scotland.

He received a very excellent education at some of the most distinguished seminaries in England. The languages of Greece and Rome, -mathematics, and the sciences dependent upon it,-the arts of design, -the more polished of the European tongues,-and gymnastic exercises, were comprehended in the curriculum of the youth. His studies were finished at the university of Edinburgh; and the usual course of travel on the continent followed soon after. About the year 1760 young Bruce, then in possession of his paternal estate, was looked upon as one of the most promising young Scotsmen of his age. The late earl of Chatham, whose patronage he courted, was about to have brought him into some employment in the public service at the very time he