of Niagara, shot down the side of Mont Velan, stripped away the gathered snow of half a century in an immense sheet, and hurled it full upon the convent. All was in instant commotion within. The table was deserted by the chief part of the brotherhood, who hurried to see that the casements and doors were made secure. The ground-floor of the building, which is occupied with stables, and storehouses for wood, and the other supplies of the convent, was a scene of immediate confusion, from the crowding in of the menials and peasantry. I ventured one glance from my window-summer was gone at once; and the winter wild' was come in its stead. The sun was blotted out of the heavens; snow, in every shape that it could be flung into by the most furious wind, whirlpool, drift, and hail, flashed and swept along. Before evening it was fourteen feet high in front of the Hospice. We could keep our fingers from being icicles only by thrusting them almost into the blazing wood fires; the bursts of wind shook the walls like cannon-shot; and I made a solemn recantation of all my raptures on the life of an Augustin of St Bernard. "As the night fell, the storm lulled at intervals, and I listened with anxiety to the cries and noises that announced the danger of travellers surprised in the storm. The fineness of the season had tempted many to cross Ithe mountain without much precaution against the change; and the sounds of horns, bells, and the barking of the dogs, as the strangers arrived, kept me long awake. By morning the convent was full; the world was turned to universal snow; the monks came down girded for their winter excursions; the domestics were busy equipping the dogs; fires blazed; cauldrons smoked; every stranger was pelissed and furred up to the chin; and the whole scene might have passed for a Lapland carnival. But the Hospice is provided for such casualties; and, after a little unavoidable tumult, all its new inhabitants were attended to with much more than the civility of a continental inn, and with infinitely less than its discomfort. The gentlemen adjourned to the reading-room, where they found books and papers which probably seldom passed the Italian frontier. The ladies turned over the portfolios of prints, many of which are the donations of strangers who had been indebted to the hospitality of the place; or amused themselves at the piano-forte in the drawing-room,-for music is there above the flight of the lark or pored over the shelves to plunge their souls in some flattering tale' of hope and love, orange groves, and chevaliers plumed, capped, and guitarred into irresistible captivation. The scientific manipulated the ingenious collection of the mountain minerals made by the brotherhood. Half a dozen herbals from the adjoining regions lay open for the botanist; a finely bound and decorated album, that owed obligations to every art but the art of poetry, lay open for the pleasantries, the memorials, and the wonderings of every body; and for those who loved sleep best, there were eighty beds."Vol. i. p. 10–15. 6 To our town readers, who have all the new books at their command, we shall not especially recommend the "Tales of the Great St Bernard;" to our country read. ers, who have not the same advantages, it is right to say that their leisure hours may be amused, as they perhaps, have often been before, with works a thousand times inferior in point of literary merit. Professor Fillans's Letters to T. F. Kennedy, Esq. M.P. on the Principles of Elementary Teaching, and the Parochial Schools of Scotland. Edin. Adam Black, 1828. No national institution, perhaps, ever operated more visibly, more beneficially, or more widely, on national character, than the parochial establishment of Scotland. Nor among the almost innumerable plans for the instruction of the people is there one which, in its entire efficiency, appears better adapted to accomplish an object so very desirable. A more important service, therefore, could hardly have been undertaken than Professor Pillans has recently performed in directing attention to the present defects and future improvement of this mighty instrument. The attempt, also, was the more meritorious, that the unshrinking discharge of the duty must have been foreseen as likely to arouse the clamours and misrepresentations of the prejudiced and the interested. We regret that our limits permit only a brief outline of the Professor's "Two Letters" on this subject, a work which, in the compass of one hundred and seven pages octavo, will be found to embrace every essential precept of practical tuition, forming a manual that ought to be in the hands of every teacher,-nay, of every parent really studious of the dearest interests of his children. The first of these admirable Letters contains illustrations of the leading principles of Elementary Education; the second points out the causes and the cure of imperfect discipline. The principles laid down in the First Letter are the three following:-I. That a child in being taught to read, should be taught at the same time to understand what he reads. II. That corporal punishment should never be resorted to till every other method has failed. III. That the office and duty of a public teacher are, so to arrange the business of his school, and the distribution of his time, that no child shall be idle. Although the "Letters" bear reference to Elementary Education alone, it will be at once apparent to those conversant with the subject, that the propositions now enumerated constitute, in fact, the science the philosophy-the art of teaching in all its stages. The first, in its varied application and extended uses, enlarging with the increasing years and acquirements of the pupil, is the only principle which can fully insure the primary object of all education-intellectual culture. While, therefore, we go along entirely and most heartily with the learned Professor in his always useful-often truly beautiful-il. lustrations of the greater rapidity, ease, and certainty with which the child will read when he is also taught to carry the meaning along with him, we look forward, and, grounding our assertion on experience of some extent, affirm, that just in proportion as this principle shall have been observed and acted upon from the commencement just as the understanding has been gradually unfolded from the Horn-book upwards, will the more difficult studies of succeeding years advance with facility, comfort, and success. The pupil who, from his earliest career at school, has thus been trained to apply both the judgment and the memory in every lesson, while, by the aid of two faculties he advances more securely than by one, will acquire powers of understanding growing with his growth, and strengthening with his strength. We may anticipate even more distant, but equally certain results, of this intellectual education,-and a consideration of infinitely greater importance than mere acquirement. Behold the youth carrying into the business of life those habits of calm inquiry and of sound judgment, without which scholarship were vain-which form the respectable man and the useful citizen. The second principle is the foundation of moral education. Every imperfection of character which displays itself in maturer years, is to be traced either to neglect, or to erroneous and un generous principles of action addressed, and consequenty improper associations formed, in early life. Fear, the the work before us is opposed, constitutes a powerful, principle addressed in the system of education to which indeed, but, with all its attendant brood of degraded feelings and revengeful passions, a most debasing agent in our moral nature. Here, however, we confess the difficulty of decidedly legislating,—a difficulty, not to say a dan ger, as respects both the teacher and the scholar. The former, in the want of confidence which prohibition would imply, the latter, in the license which it would give. Yet, agreeing fully with the general proposition, we do not hesitate to say, that the man who employs the lash as an ordinary means in education, is unworthy-utterly unworthy of the sacred trust reposed in him, who might wield each fresh and generous sympathy of the youthful breast. In his profession he is not less grossly ignorant and bungling, than would be the artisan who should break in pieces some precious casket, instead of opening it by a touch on the proper spring. The third principle includes the whole business of practical education. For one teacher who fails from defect of acquirement, hundreds err in this department: and here the Professor's remarks are peculiarly valuable, as explaining the monitorial system, the only one that can meet all the exigencies of a large and promiscuous school, and where many branches must necessarily be taught by one master, while his income will not permit of paid assistants; the only system, in short, applicable to our parish schools. We regret the more on this account, that we cannot enter at large into the subject, nor display the triumphant manner in which every objection is anticipated and refuted. It would have given us much pleasure to prove the soundness of the Professor's views, and the practical nature of the details, from our own experience of their efficacy even in the highest branches of education. As a general principle in the science of teaching, the Monitorial, or system of mutual instruction, is invaluable; and we ourselves are acquainted with successful applications of it not only to history and geography, but to logic and mathematics. The Beggar's Daughter of Bethnal Green, a Comedy, by James Sheridan Knowles, Author of Virginius, Caius Gracchus, and William Tell. Glasgow, Richard Griffin and Co. 1828. THIS Comedy is formed on the old English model, and that model is known to any one who may have seen or read the popular play of Tobin's "Honeymoon." It is in blank verse, with occasional sprinklings of prose, and is well studded with characters, incidents, and scenic effect. Like most comedies, it has a principal and an under plot, both simple in design, but, perhaps, scarcely sufficiently interwoven. The principal plot is briefly this :-Wilford, a young nobleman at the Court of Elizabeth, resolves to disguise himself as a peasant in order to seek a maiden worthy of his hand, in whose love selfishness shall have no share. It is not long before he meets with Bess, the Beggar's daughter, whose charms are so transcendent, and whose manners are so modest and winning, that he becomes deeply enamoured of her. Lord Thomas, however, another young nobleman, with far less honourable designs, contrives to have Bess carried off from her old blind father Albert. In great distress, the old man throws himself before Queen Elizabeth on one of her "progresses" from Westminster to Norwich, and states how he has lost his daughter. The Queen orders proclamation to be made, that whoever has carried her off shall make reparation for the wrong by marrying her, having first appeared at Court and confessed his fault. But Bess has, in the meantime, escaped from the ruffians into whose hands she had fallen, and seeks for shelter at an inn in Rumford. There she is exposed to several annoyances; but fortunately, Wilford, who had himself set out in search of her, arrives at the same inn. They meet; he protects her, and they become mutually attached. Her place of refuge being known, they are both commanded to appear before Elizabeth, who insists upon Lord Thomas offering his hand to Bess; but she refuses it, and remains constant to Wilford, whom she still believes a peasant. A discovery, however, now takes place. The blind beggar is the elder brother of Lord Woodville, by whom he has been unjustly dispossessed of his estates; and Lord Wilford is Woodville's only son-therefore, Bess and he are cousinsgerman. This denouement is very happily brought about, and is just as it should be. The under-plot consists of the adventures of Young Small and his servant Peter; the former an extravagant spendthrift in the lower ranks of life, and the latter a good-natured simpleton, who is often made the scape-goat of his master's follies. The Second Letter ranges the causes of imperfect discipline under the five following heads, while, in the discussion of each, is introduced the proper cure. I. The total want of all public provision for the professional education of schoolmasters. II. Want of proper elementary books. III. Prejudices of parents. IV. Little countenance shown to the parochial teachers, by the upper ranks, in visiting their schools, &c. V. The scanty pecuniary provision made for parochial teachers. The existence of these causes is universally acknowledged; to some, the remedy proposed in these Letters might instantly be applied; the rest, time and care will remove. On all, we think the remarks in the volume before us excellent. The last-mentioned has generally been considered as the origo mali-the principium et fons whence have proceeded all other evils; and, consequently, if the salaries were raised, every defect, it has been said, would be removed. This we cannot concede; but while we admit the necessity of more liberal provision, we deprecate an indiscriminate, fixed, and certain increase as far more likely to augment than to remove existing imperfections. For our reasons, we must refer to the "Letters," of which, not only the perusal, but the study, we again earnestly recommend to every one, whether professionally or otherwise interested in an establishment which, for nearly a century and a half, has been regarded as an honour to this country. The author's name is identified with the very idea of good Enter Lord WILFORD and BELMONT, the former dressed teaching, and perfect management of the youthful mind; permanent value and utility were consequently to be expected from remarks founded upon the inferences, and embodying the experiences of a whole life, devoted enthusiastically devoted-and, as proclaimed by the gratitude of his country-successfully devoted to the cause and the business of education. The great aim of the publication, indeed, is to base principle upon experiment to apply the philosophy of induction to " the noblest of all arts," (the words are those of Dr Thomas Brown,) "the art of teaching;" and what the labours of Reid and Stewart have done for Metaphysics, the plans of Professor Pillans are capable of accomplishing for Edu cation. It will be seen, by this short analysis of the play, that there is a want of strength and novelty in the story; and, accordingly, we think it is in the original ground-work of the fable, not in the author's execution, that it fails. It contains many scenes and passages of much spirit and beauty, and a few of these we shall now quote. The comedy opens in the following fresh and vigorous manner. SCENE FIRST-A GARDEN NEAR THE THAMES. as a peasant, the latter as a courtier. Lord Wilford. To doubt that woman loves, to ques tion were, If light her dwelling fair hath in the sun- Belmont. So, of love's gem possession to ensure, Wil. E'en so. Bel. The gem, such labour seeks, is prized. You'll take some pains to pick the casket too. Wil. I'll pick a casket fit to hold the gem. Bel. I prithee figure to me such a one. Wil. To try a metaphor, it shall be rare As may be; curious in the workmanship; But, in the use, the primal value still: Not shining chief where constant falls the eye, But opening brighter, that, to look within, The rich without seems poor, and to complete My casket fair, that shall love's jewel shrine, As worth's thrice worthy, modestly reveal'd, Its spring that does its value chief disclose, Shall coyly answer to the prying touch. Bel. May she be rich? Wil. Ay, if she knows it not. Bel. Titled? Wil. A princess, so the queen of wives. Bel. Shall she be brown or fair? Wil. Whatever hue, Fair truth commendeth with ingenuous blush. Bel. Say she is poor and low Wil. So nature proves At odds with fortune, she will answer me. Bel. But she must love thee? Wil Ay, 'bove earth and sea! Yea, 'bove herself, of twice their worth the sum! So that, while others my pretensions scan To be the master of such bravery, She shall account my wearing on't its pride, The following passages strike us as breathing much of the energy and poetical fire which so finely characterise almost every scene of "Virginius" and "William Tell:" A FATHER'S PRESENT TO A SPENDTHRIFT SON. To stand their buffeting! Here-have thy wish; PATRIOTISM. Albert. I will not-cannot quit my native land! Bann'd as I am, 'tis precious to me still. It is my father's land-'tis loved for that; 'Tis thine-thy child's it should be loved for you; It should be loved, if only for itself! 'Tis free; it hath no despot, but its laws; 'Tis independent; it can stand alone; 'Tis mighty, 'gainst its enemies, 'tis one. Where can I find a land the like of it! Its son, though under ban and forfeiture, Is envied for it. He's the brother of The free! I cannot quit my native land; For sight of other land I would not give The feeling of its breath. The wall of him That does not forfeit it, which none may scale, However proud, unscath'd to do him wrong. I cannot-will not quit my native land! Emma. Then let us seek some quiet corner on't, Nor spend on thriftless hope, what husbanded By wise content would keep us more than rich. Al. Nor can I that. Who sees his house pull'd down, And does not strive to build it up again? Who sees his vessel sunk, and does not look For other hull to plough the waves anew? I cannot do't! I've lived on the high seas Of restless life; I would be on them still. Say I'm unfit for't-I'd be near them still. The sailor, maim'd or superannuate, Seeks not an inland home, but on the cliff His hammock slings, in hearing of the surge He wont to cleave of yore. A LOVER'S CONSTANCY. Rouse thee, Wilford! rouse thee! To death? This malady is of the head But say but once I do behold the sun, And name the time will blot its image out! Bel. But of a single draught of love to die! Wil. Why not? There is your poison, strong and weak; One kind admits of antidote one, not One by the drachm, one by the scruple kills; So there are kinds in love! A dozen shafts A LOVER'S RESOLUTION. Look you, a man will let one take his life For less. Come, state the sum thou'dst set 'gainst her! In that which feeds the mint-the unwasting mine? There can be little doubt, and these quotations tend to make it less, that Mr Knowles's forte is tragedy. With a high and dignified subject before him, his imagination rises, and his feelings burst freshly forth. He is too much of the poet to be a great deal of the humourist. When he speaks of the simple and grand passions which agitate the bosom,-of liberty,-of paternal, filial, or conjugal affection,-of honest hatred, or indignant revenge, he is at home; and we trust his next effort will be of the same sort as his "Virginius" and his "Tell." The Elements of English Composition. By David Irving, LL.D. The eighth edition, corrected and enlarged. Edinburgh, John Boyd, 37, George Street. 1828. Pp. 378. WE know of few books which we can more sincerely recommend to the student of English composition, than that now before us. Dr Irving disclaims the merit of much originality in its execution, confessing his obliga tions to Bishop Lowth, Drs Campbell and Blair, Lord Kaimes, and others; but the judgment he has exhibited in the arrangement of his materials, and the clearness with which he has adapted himself even to the most juvenile capacities, whilst he conveys instruction that will be found profitable by those who are much farther advanced, entitle him to no mean approbation. The success his work has already experienced, proves its excellence. To the present edition, besides other improvements, there is subjoined an interesting series of quotations from distinguished authors, chronologically arranged, and exhibiting the progressive changes and advances in English style. FOREIGN LITERATURE. Lettere su Roma e Napoli. Milano.-Lettere su Firenze e Venezia, 2 tom. Milano.- Letters on Rome and Naples. Milan.-Letters on Florence and Venice, 2 vols. Milan. gination, it is scarcely to be denied that their productions are universally and chronologically tinctured by the momentous events and the passionate feelings of the period during which they were penned. In the dramas of Alfieri, for instance, we find all that longing for independence, that detestation of servility, that contempt for corrupt control, and that scorn of tyranny, which actuated the national mind for freedom, and at length ushered in the intoxicating prospect of Italy's redemption. In the bitter satire and moral pleadings of Parini's lyre, we mark the democratic spirit of the succeeding period, when every patriotic heart bounded to beard its tyrant sovereign and its effeminate and heartless aristocracy, and seemed determined to try the fancied panacea of a republic. In the strains of Monti, Pindemonte, and Cesarotti, who, like Jealousy, "Now courted love, now, raving, call'd on hate," we behold that dastardly tergiversation of opinion and of action which denote the time when universal discord held its sway, cursed as then the nation was with French and Austrian chicanery. In the glowing sentiments and heart-breaking musings of Foscolo,+ we discover the WHILE almost every nation of the world is at pre-rage and the despair which stung every patriot's heart, sent exhibiting the beneficial effects of that moral tem- when the avowed liberator of Italy recklessly partitioned pest, which, sweeping from one end of Europe to the and basely betrayed a people who trusted in the might other, regenerated in its progress enfeebled states and of his arms for union and independence. In the romancorrupted dynasties; Italy, the land, which, in infancy, tic Rime of Grossi, we trace the tears of a bleeding conquered countries by her liberty, and in manhood held country, who distractedly fled to bewail the sorrowful the world by her genius, displays, in age, the same ap- fate of Ildegonda, that they might weep for the approachpalling picture of disunion, and the same melancholy ing destiny of Ausonia. In the writings of Manzoni marks of woe, as when Filicajia penned his patriotic and Bertolotti are mirrored much of that bitter disapsonnet. No nation, nevertheless, listened with greater pointment and distrust which followed the last dismembreathlessness for the first indications of the approach- berment, or settlement as it was termed, of the garden ing tempest, than the one which had been prepared, by of Europe. Their pages show us that present realities the writings of Beccaria and Parini, to expect that are too agonizing to be thought of, far less to be dwelt that storm would bring a lightning in its gloom, which upon; and they follow the example of their brethren in would shiver the chains of a galling and a long-endured eschewing the transactions of the passing hour for the despotism. No people hailed the bursting of the thun- chronicles and the tombs of the past. And, in fine, from derbolt, which enkindled the fiercest passions of man the grave volumes of Botta‡ may be fairly deduced the from Domo d'Osola to Otranto, with greater joy, or sad conviction which he and his countrymen have been mingled in the turmoil with greater eagerness, than those at last brought to, of the almost utter hopelessness of who generally felt, as well they might,-that their only ever seeing Italy again great and independent. hope of beholding their land of glorious memories once more great and independent, lay in the tempest destroying the political divisions which its oppressors had created. And yet, after all the terrible sacrifices and the patriotic efforts which were offered at the shrine of liberty; after all the promises which were made to an afflicted people by monarchs amid defeat as well as victory; after all the miseries of a twenty years' warfare were endured, a warfare probably never surpassed for its desolating effects amid even the annals of the wildest revolutions,-Italy, the ancient mistress of the world -the cradle of literature and the arts, the land where every field is a page of history, and where every ruin tells a tale of interest even now, can be only looked at with satisfaction through the mist of ages, the monument of past might, and of modern misrule, and doomed, it seems, ever to exhibit the mournful character given to her by her own Fantoni "Or druda or serva di stranieri genti !" It may easily be believed that the literature of a nation so circumstanced could not fail to partake of the wild, the melancholy, and the desponding feelings which such struggles, such sacrifices, and such a consummation as we have alluded to, would successively engender. The poetry and the prose of modern Italy, in fact, present the sad record of the bright and the blasted hopes of that national regeneration which her children have indulged in and bewailed. For, whether the subjects which have elicited the genius of Italian writers for half a century, may have been those of fact or those of ima We have been led to hazard these opinions after perusing the volumes which stand at the head of this notice, their author having presented us, in his pages, with the most striking proofs of our position. Throughout the greater portion of these Lettere we find the writer, as may be naturally inferred from the present state of Italy, chiefly occupied with the Antiquities of his father-land. Stored, as his mind evidently is, with classical and historical lore, he seizes every opportunity of turning these to account. Italy is an endless theme for the scholar to descant upon, and the scholar here pours a flood of eru. dition over every step of his journey. Signor Dandolo, who indites these epistles, appears to be a lineal descend. ant of those noble Venetian sires whom Titian and Tintoretto took a pleasure in depicting, and, sorrowing for the sunset of their city's glory, he feels a solace to his sadness in the picturings of memory, and the creations of imagination. A time-hallowed church or a deserted temple-a tottering column or a crumbling aqueduct a ruined palace or a lonely tomb, are to him the themes of eloquent contemplation. Chronicles give him facts, and Fancy gives him figures. Beings of past ages flit before his eye, as History draws them; and long-stilled voices speak as Imagination dreams they would have The dead, but sceptr'd sovereigns, who still rule cravats and saltatory science, and blushes for the barbarism of ancestors to whom the inestimable blessings of "Weippert's quadrilles" were denied, and to whom the beautiful nomenclature of "La Belle Assemblée" was no more intelligible than the Jewish Cabala or Doctor Spurzheim's theories. "Who smiles with all, and weeps with none." For my own part, I join but feebly either in the comAlthough antiquities, however, are the leading charac-plaints or the felicitations. In such an affair, I am little teristics of the volumes before us, the author occasion- better than Byron's flirt, ally risks himself upon modern ground. And when we find him there, as is more frequently the case in his letters on Florence and Venice, we feel regret that he has not the fortitude to risk himself there oftener. We are tired with the oft-repeated opinions of strangers upon Italy, and sigh for something new from a native. Here, to a certain extent, we have had our wish gratified. The happy picture which Dandolo draws of the present condition of Tuscany is, we are happy to think, in full accordance with our own opinions arising from personal observation; and though rich in colouring, is, nevertheless, destitute of flattery. Under the mild government of Leopold, Tuscany has become an exception and an example to the rest of Italy. Unlike its suffering and weeping neighbours, it has bettered its condition, and is happy. "In this country, at the present hour," as Dandolo well says, "grievous and infamous proscriptions no longer sully the pages of Florentine story; while, in their stead, worth in every shape is found. The rule of a father is seen in the Prince, the obedience of children is displayed in the people; there is public prosperity and individual industry. These are the enchanting features which Tuscany displays in these latter times." What a melancholy contrast to this picture is to be found in the author's account of Florence, the city of his ancestors! To the sober-minded English reader, the style of these epistles may appear inflated and over-stretched; but it is a style well suited to Italian taste and Italian feeling. The inhabitants of the land, which for centuries has been "Sempre il premio della vittoria," Heaven forbid that I, or any one else, could feel or There is, however, one notable point in which the lapse of a century has produced a change, no less remarkable in itself, than deplorable in its consequences; name public, for every engine and opportunity of locomotion, and the insatiable cacoethes for spawning quartos thereanent. The time was, when a journey to the neighbouring market town was regarded as an epoch in the life of him who undertook it, and entitled him thereafter to the veneration of his fellow villagers; when geographical can only be attracted, at the present moment, by the ex-ly, in the taste, talents, and inordinate affection of the pression of deep passion or patriotic melancholy. Under such feelings, prose, in the dulcet tones of the Italian tongue, becomes poetry; and what perhaps appears little short of rodomontade and extravagance to us, is nothing else than the common food which is required to meet the cravings of morbid sensibilities. The style of a nation is invariably influenced, more or less, by its po-knowledge was limited to a space like that over which a litical history; and what we might reprove as affectation in some, is, in the Italian, the natural expression of brooding disappointment and deep-rooted melancholy. MISCELLANEOUS LITERATURE. fat pony, with a full-grown alderman on its back, could amble in the course of a summer day;-when the natives of Glasgow left home in the heavy coach, being then in the prime of youth, and reached Edinburgh grey haired, every individual having first taken the precaution to insure his life against the perils that awaited him; and lastly, when the "Leith Mail" changed horses three times on the road to town, thereby allow THOUGHTS ON ANCIENT, AND HINTS TO MODERN, ing the passengers sufficient time to breakfast, dine, and TRAVELLERS. IT is a constant theme of regret to some,-of joy to others, and of sage observation to all, that the national character has undergone a thorough metamorphosis during the last hundred years. The advocates of antiquity look with philanthropic grief on the extinction of the sublime principle that guided our progenitors, in matters of cocked-hats, long waists, and immeasurable hoops, and make little scruple to avow their belief, that with the tailorly and millinery virtue of former years, have vanished the secondary, but still important, qualities of national courage and sound morality. The "Laudator temporis præsentis," on the other hand, points with proud satisfaction to the modern reformation in starched sup-night-caps being always provided in cases of emergency. But, alas! these days are fled, and nothing now remains to recall to mind the dignity and importance of travelling in our great-grandmothers' time, save some mouldering remnant of a machine, that carried fortyfour souls and bodies at a time, drivers excluded ;-or an occasional instance of traditionary lore, that records the death of some adventurous spirit, the Mungo Park of his day, who purchased immortality in a fearless, though fatal, attempt to explore the fastnesses and boundaries of his native country. It is in vain to search modern annals for similar instances of noble daring. Long coaches and impassable roads have vanished from our land, and with them have gone the poetry and romance of travelling. Who, in this |
