sketched in his memorandum-book all the characters, which he has here introduced; but was at a lofs how to group them; and chofe rather to introduce them in detached figures, as he had fketched them, than to lofe any part of the expreffion by combining them.-The light is very ill diftributed. It is fpread indifcriminately over the print; and deftroys the whole.-We have no inftance of grace in any of the figures. The principal figure is very deficient. There is no contraft in the limbs; which is always attended with a degree of ungracefulness.-The execution is very good. It is elaborate, and yet free.-The fatire on operas, though it may be well directed, is forced and unnatural.

The third plate carries us ftill deeper in the hiftory. We meet our hero engaged in one of his evening-amufements. This print, on the whole, is no very extraordinary effort of genius.-The defign is good; and may be a very exact defcription of the humours of a brochel.-The compofition too is not amifs. But we have few of those masterly strokes. which diftinguifh the works of Hogarth. The whole is plain history. The lady fetting the world on fire, is the beft thought and there is fome humour in furnishing the room with a fet of Cefars; and not placing them in order.-The light is ill-managed. By a few alterations, which are obvious, particularly by throwing the lady dreifing, into the fhade, the difpofition of it might have been tolerable. But still we should have had an absurdity to answer, whence comes it? Here is light in abundance; but no visible fource-Expreffion we have very little through the whole print. The principal figure is the belt. The ladies have all the air of their profeffion; but no variety of character. Hogarth's women are, in general, very inferior to his men. For which reafon I prefer the Rake's Progress to the Harlot's. The female face indeed has feldom ftrength of feature enough to admit the ftrong markings of expreffion.

Very difagreeable accidents often befall gentlemen of pleasure. An event of this kind is recorded in the fourth print; which is now before us. Our hero going, in full drefs, to pay his compliments at court, on St. David's day, was accofted in the rude manner which is here reprefented.-The compofition is good. The form of the group, made up of the figures in action, the chair, and the lamp-lighter, is pleafing. Only here we have an opportunity of remarking, that a group is difgufting, when the extremities of it are heavy. A group in some respect should refemble a tree. The heavier part of the foliage, (the cup, as the landkip painter calls it) is always near the middle: the outside branches, which are relieved by the fky, are light and airy. An inattention to this rule has given a heavinefs to the group before us. The two bailiffs, the woman, and the chairman are all huddled together in that part of the group, which fhould have been the ligh:eft; while the middle part, where the hand holds the door, wants flrength and confiftence. It may be added too, that the four heads, in the form of a diamond, make an unpleafing fhape. All regular figures fhould fludioufly be avoided.The light would have been well diftributed, if the bail ff holding the arreft, and the chairman, had been a little lighter, and the woman darker. The glare of the white apron is difagreeable.-We have, in this print, fome beautiful inftances of expreffion. The furprize and terror of the poor gentleman is apparent in every limb, as far as is confitent with the fear of difcompofing his dres. The infolence of power

in

in one of the bailiffs, and the unfeeling heart in the other, which can jeft with mifery, are ftrongly marked. The felf-importance too of the honett Cambrian is not ill-portrayed; who is chiefly introduced to settle the chronology of the ftory.-In point of grace, we have nothing firiking. Hogarth might have introduced a degree of it in the female figure; at least he might have contrived to vary the disagreeable, and heavy form of her drapery. The perspective is good, and makes an agreeable fhape.-I cannot leave this print without remarking the falling band-box. Such reprefentations of quick motion are very abfurd; and every moment the abfurdity grows ftronger. You cannot deceive the The falling body must appear not to fall. Objects of that kind are beyond the power of reprefentation.

cye.

Difficulties croud fo faft upon our hero, that at the age of twentyfive, which he feems to have attained in the fifth plate, we find him driven to the neceffity of marrying a woman, whom he detelts, for her fortune. The compofition here is very good; and yet we have a difagreeable regularity in the climax of the three figures, the maid, the bride, and the bridegroom.-The light is not ill-diftributed. The principal figure too is graceful; and there is ftrong expreffion in the feeming tranquillity of his features. He hides his contempt of the object before him, as well as he can; and yet he cannot do it. She too has as much meaning, as can appear through the deformity of her features. The clergyman's face we are well acquainted with, and alfo his wig; tho' we cannot pretend to fay, where we have feen either. The clerk too is an admirable fellow. The perspective is well underflood; but the church is too finall; and the wooden pott, which feems to have no use, divides the picture very difagreeably.-The creed loft, the commandments broken, and the poor's box obstructed by a cob-web, are all excellent ftrokes of fatirical humour.

The fortune, which our adventurer has just received, enables him to make one pufh more at the gaming-table. He is exhibited in the fxth print, venting curfes on his folly for having loft his laft ftake.This is upon the whole perhaps the beft print of the fet. The horrid fcene it defcribes, was never more inimitably drawn. The compofition is artful, and natural. If the fhape of the whole be not quite pleafing, the figures are fo well grouped, and with fo much eafe and variety, that you cannot take offence.-In point of light, it is more culpable. There is not hade enough among the figures to balance the glare. If the neck-cloth, and weepers of the gentleman in mourning had been removed, and his hands thrown into fhade, even that alone would have improved the effect.-The expreffion, in almost every figure, is admirable; and the whole is a ftrong reprefentation of the human mind in a ftorm. Three stages of that fpecies of madness, which attends gaming, are here defcribed. On the first fhock, all is inward difmay. The ruined gameller is reprefented leaning against a wall, with his arms acrofs, loft in an agony of horror. Perhaps never paffion was defcribed with fo much force. In a fhort time this horrible gloom burfts into a form of fury: he tears in pieces what comes next him; and kneeling down, invokes curfes upon himself. He next attacks others; every one in his turn whom he imagines to have been inftrumental in his ruin. -The cager joy of the winning gamesters, the attention of the ufurer, the vehemense of the watchman, and the profound reverie of the high

wayman,

wayman, are all admirably marked. There is great coolness too expreffed in the little we fee of the fat gentleman at the end of the table. The figure oppofing the madman is bad: it has a drunken appearance; and drunkenness is not the vice of a gaming table.-The principal figure is ill drawn. The perspective is formal; and the execution but indifferent: in heightening his expreflion Hogarth has loft his fpirit.

• The seventh plate, which gives us the view of a jail, has very little in it. Many of the circumftances, which may well be fuppofed to increase the mifery of a confined debtor, are well contrived; but the fruitful genius of Hogarth, I should think, might have treated the fubject in a more copious manner. The epifode of the fainting woman might have given way to many circumftances more proper to the occafion. This is the fame woman, whom the rake difcards in the first print; by whom he is rescued in the fourth; who is prefent at his marriage; who follows him into jail; and laftly to Bedlam. The thought is rather unnatural, and the moral certainly culpable.-The compofition is bad. The group of the woman fainting, is a round heavy mafs: and the other group is very ill fhapen. The light could not be worfe managed; and, as the groups are contrived, can hardly be improved. -In the principal figure there is great expreffion; and the fainting fcene is well defcribed.-A fcheme to pay off the national debt by a man who cannot pay his own; and the attempt of a filly rake to retrieve his affairs by a work of genius, are admirable ftrokes of humour.

The eighth plate brings the fortunes of our hero to a conclusion. It is a very expreffive reprefentation of the most horrid scene, which human nature can exhibit.-The compofition is not bad. The group, in which the lunatic is chained, is well managed; and if it had been carried a little further towards the middle of the picture, and the two women (who feem very oddly introduced) had been removed, both the compofition, and the diftribution of light had been good.-The drawing of the principal figure is a more accurate piece of anatomy, than I fhould have expected from Hogarth. The expreffion of this figure is rather unmeaning; and very inferior to the ftrong characters of all the other lunatics. The fertile genius of the artift has introduced as many of the caufes of madness, as he could well have collected; though there is a little tautology. There are two religionists, and two aftronomers. Yet there is variety in each; and ftrong expreffion in all the characters. The felf-fatisfaction, and conviction of him, who has difcovered the longitude, the mock majefty of the monarch, the moody melancholy of the lover, and the fuperftitious horror of the popish devotée, are all admirable. The perspective is fimple and proper.'

The fifth and laft chapter contains a number of very ufeful cautions, neceffary to be obferved in collecting prints. But as we have already extended this article to a more than ordinary length, we must refer the Reader to the work itself, where he will meet with fome remarks that well deferve his attention.

B.

A Sentimental

A Sentimental Journey through France and Italy. By Mr. Yorick: 12mo. 2 Vols. 5s. few'd. Becket and Co.

F all the various productions of the prefs, none are fo eagerly received by us Reviewers, and other people who ftay at home and mind our bufinefs, as the writings of travellers;-over whom, by the way, we readers have prodigious advantage; for they undergo the fatigue, inconvenience, and expence, while we, in all the plenitude of leifure and an elbowchair, enjoy the pleasure and the profit, at so small a charge as -the price of the book. Why here, now, we have many dozens of fhrewd obfervations and choice fentiments, the groundwork of which must have cost our friend Yorick many a bright glittering guinea: all which our other friend, Becket, who is the most reasonable of all human booksellers,—is content to let us have at lefs than feven farthings a-piece!-Was ever any thing fo unreasonably reasonable! the inoculation of wit-still cheaper than that of the fmall-pox, even at its reduced Northamptonshire price, of five-and-three-pence a head.

Now of the genus of travellers, there are various fpecies,— which the curious naturalift before us (who is a very Linnæus in his way) has more diftinctly claffed and arranged ave, than ever they were claffed and arranged before, by any writer that we know of. The whole circle of travellers he reduces to the following heads:

Idle Travellers,

Inquifitive Travellers,
Lying Travellers,

Proud Travellers,

• Vain Travellers,

Splenetic Travellers.

Then follow the Travellers of Neceffity,

The delinquent and felonious Traveller,

The unfortunate and innocent Traveller,
The fimple Traveller,

And laft of all (if you pleafe) The

• Sentimental Traveller (meaning thereby myfelf) who have travelled, and of which I am now fitting down to give an account as much out of Neceffity, and the befoin de Voyager, as any one in the class.'

Our Author's descriptions of these feveral forts of travellers are quite in his own way-diverting, edifying, and fatirical. Of the edifying, take a fpecimen, from what he fays about travelling for improvement: Knowlege and improvement, quoth he, are to be got by failing and pofting for that purpose; but whether ufeful knowlege and real improvement, is all a lottery and even where the adventurer is fuccefsful, the acquired

Stock

ftock must be ufed with caution and fobriety to turn to any profit but as the chances run prodigiously the other way both. as to the acquifition and application, I am of opinion, that a man would act as wifely, if he could prevail upon himself, to live contented without foreign knowlege or foreign improvements, efpecially if he lives in a country that has no abfolute want of either-and indeed, much grief of heart has it oft and many a time coft me, when I have obferved how many a foul ftep the inquifitive traveller has measured to fee fights and look into discoveries, all which, as Sancho Pança faid to Don Quixote, they might have seen dry-hod at home. It is an age fo full of light, that there is fcarce a country or corner of Europe whofe beams are not crofied and interchanged with others -Knowlege in most of its branches, and in most affairs, is like mufic in an Italian ftreet, whereof thofe may partake, who pay nothing-But there is no nation under heaven-and God is my record, (before whofe tribunal I muft one day come and give an account of this work) that I do not speak it vauntingly-But there is no nation under heaven abounding with more variety of learning-where the fciences may be more fitly woo'd, or more furely won than here-where art is encouraged, and will fo foon rife high-where Nature (take her all together) has fo little to answer for-and, to close all, where there is more wit and variety of character to feed the mind with.-Where then, my dear countrymen, are you going?'

Of the fplenetic traveller he gives the following picture, from a well-known original:

The learned Smelfungus travelled from Boulogne to Paris -from Paris to Rome-and fo on-but he fet out with the fpleen and jaundice, and every object he paffed by was difcoloured or distorted-He wrote an account of them, but 'twas nothing but an account of his miferable feelings.

I met Smelfungus in the grand portico of the Pantheonhe was juft coming out of it-'Tis nothing but a huge cock-pit, faid he-I wish you had faid nothing worfe of the Venus of Medicis, replied for in paffing through Florence, I had heard he had fallen foul upon the goddefs, and ufed her worse than a common ftrumpet, without the leaft provocation in nature.

I popp'd upon Smelfungus again at Turin, in his retur home; and a fad tale of forrowful adventures had he to tell, "wherein he spoke of moving accidents by flood and field, and of the cannibals which each other eat: the Anthropophagi"he had been Hea'd alive, and bedevil'd, and ufed worfe than St. Bartholomew, at every ftage he had come at

- —I'll tell it, cried Smelfungus, to the world. You had better tell it, faid I, to your phyfician.'-Reader! didst thou ever travel with our quondam brother, above-named? In fuch,

humour