About one-fourth of the embankment had settled down a foot. It was intended to have been raised eighteen inches during the preceding summer had not the expenses of building incurred by the fire made it necessary to defer it. This unfortunate delay occasioned the loss of the island. But the spirit of Mr. Harriott always rises against emergencies with proportionate resistance. It is this which stamps a value upon his book, and makes us forgive its want of refinement. A young man, setting out in life, may here see the advantages which a calm, courageous spirit enjoys over that pusillanimity and confusion which palsy the multitude when their efforts and exertion are most wanted. He may see also the homage which is paid to high honour and integrity.

Instead of desponding, Mr. Harriott, within a few days after the accident, had drained the water by extraordinary exertions four feet below the surface of the land: the tide had flowed over his walls, and by leaving the island full of water gave a fatal proof of their strength. To repair the mischief required a capital of which he was now bereft. He immediately called all his creditors of more than 201. together, and stated the situation of his affairs, being resolved not to borrow a capital where there was no certainty of payment. "My creditors, instead of distressing, soothed me. They were entirely satisfied with my conduct, and voluntarily proposed to accept ten shillings in the pound." Not content with their own private contributions, they advertised and solicited for subscriptions. The peculiarity of Mr. Harriott's misfortunes attracted the publick attention, and of course excited its sympathy. Above 1001. was subscribed for the relief of an unknown individual, when that individual nobly put a stop to the subscription of his own accord. There is something a thousand times more interesting, more affecting in this patient struggle against adversity, than in all the romantick perils which Mr. Harriott encountered.

From a sense of delicacy, which, if in itself false, yet commands respect, Mr. Harriott, immediately on the destruction of his property, had declined acting as a magistrate. It was a high testimony to the rectitude with which he performed its duties, that he was induced to resume them at the pressing solicitation of his neighbours, and of the lord lieutenant of the county.

The crops upon the island were totally destroyed; and although the land was again recovered from the sea, its vegetative powers were so injured by the salt water, that great time, labour, and expense, would yet be necessary to restore its fertility. His family was too large, and his means too small, to repeat the risk. Feeling it a duty to his children to exert himself to the utmost for their advantage, he now resolved, after much deliberation, to cross the Atlantick, and rear his family in America.

In May 1793 Mr. Harriot embarks with his family for Baltimore, charters two vessels for the sake of obtaining a passage to Rhode Island, where he hires a house for them, while he himself travels through the United States, and into the back settlements, for the purpose of purchasing a tract of land. The account of this long and laborious excursion occupies a considerable portion of the second volume. It will be found of use to those who project an emigration to America. Mr. Harriott has appreciated the American character with great fairness, and estimated deliberately the advantages and disadvantages of different situations. He was disappointed in the sanguine expectations he had formed of establishing his family to advantage; but is not on that account morose and abusive, like Mr. Janson, and some other travellers, whose names we could mention. He had purchased a small farm at Rhode Island; but finding, after all his wanderings, that his projected

scheme of farming on a large scale would not be advantageous, he once again returns to his native shores.

Being entirely unsettled again, and at a loss what to do, as wild and magnificent a project enters into his brain as ever speculator dreamed of. "At the time I am speaking of, there were seventeen millions of acres of land to be sold in Georgia; and this in truth was my real grand object. I knew that no foreign government would be permitted to purchase: but a private unsuspected individual might, as a matter of speculation, buy all he was able to agree and pay for; through whose agency it might afterwards be managed. The settling and inhabiting those parts bordering on the river Mississippi, by the influence of any powerful maritime nation, might easily be effected. A rupture with Spain was then expected; who, either by treaty, might have been induced to give up the Floridas for an equivalent, or be compelled so to do. Supposing, then, that Great Britain was again possessed of Florida, as well as Canada, she would have had the two grand navigable inlets and outlets of communication for commerce, with a command of all the rich back territories of North America.

Kentucky, and most of the western back countries, were then complaining and threatening to withdraw from the union, if the navigation of the Mississippi was not made free for them, and which it was in the power of the United States then to do. Any new settled country, increasing in population to 100,000, has a right to claim being free and independent, and this would not have been long under the influence of the government I had in contemplation.

Imagination led me to consider my intended purchase as the link of the chain to join the Floridas with Kentucky, and all the rich tract of back country along the Ohio; and, as the western posts were not then given up, and doubts entertained whether, they would or not, the connexion with Upper Canada would have been easily accomplished, and the United States insulated."

He immediately set off with his eldest son to the Bahamas, and there collected such preliminary information as rendered it unnecessary to proceed to Georgia. The price of the land was from three pence half-penny to five pence an acre; but there was some difficulty with respect to congress which claimed a right of controlling the sale of this tract, whilst Georgia disallowed it. Matters, however, went on very swimmingly, and our speculator proceeds to Philadelphia. Where he meant to apply for money to make good his purchase, or what authority he derived from this country for his proceedings we are not informed: suffice it to say that when he made application to- for the advance of money, it was refused; and he was awakened from a dream of ambition to the keenest disappointment.

The world again all before him, chance directed Mr. Harriott to a farm in Long Island. There was a good house on it, and it contained about 140 acres of good land. This estate he purchased for 2,8001 ready money, and sent for his wife and family to come over to him. Here they resided for some years; but the impossibility of obtaining sufficient workmen, the expense of labour, the solitude, the difficulty of educating the children, and afterwards of forming connexions for them in business-these and various other circumstances, which are detailed here at length, and which we recommend to the perusal of any who project an emigration to America, induced Mr. Harriott to take a final farewell of this land of promise. He sold his estate for 6001. more than it cost him, and crossed the Atlantick for the fourteenth time.

Returned to England, his spirit of enterprise does not yet flag; but we have no room to detail the minor speculations which the teeming brain of our adventurer projected. One, however, yet remains to be mentioned, because it took effect, because it has acquired a permanency in practice, and because it has been and continues to be of the greatest service to the publick. They who have read Mr. Colquhoun's treatise on the police of the River Thames can alone form an idea of the daring and audacious

plunder which in open day was systematically committed on the shipping before its establishment. So well known was the ferocity of these river pirates that they who saw them in the very act of committing their depredations were afraid to divulge their knowledge. The impunity with which they plundered, induced others to join in the practice, till, with their numbers, the outrages increased to so great a height as to threaten with very serious consequences the commerce of the Port of London. The present Thames police originated entirely with Mr. Harriott. Impressed with the magnitude of the evil, he chalked out the plan of a River Police and applied to the Lord Mayor, the Duke of Portland and others in the year 1797 for the purpose of having it matured and carried into effect. The estimated expense of this institution, which was to protect the commercial interests of the country, was 14,000l. a year. The magnitude of the sum, trifling as it is in comparison with the benefits proposed and accomplished, might probably deter those who were consulted from encouraging the bu siness. In the year 1798, however, Mr. Harriott was introduced to Mr. Colquhoun, who approved the project and approved the plan. Through his influence and activity, in conjunction with that of Mr. Harriott, the Thames police was in Midsummer 1798 organized and carried into complete execution under their united management The extensive benefits soon became so conspicuous, that after two years trial of its efficacy, government passed an act making the institution permanent with an allowance of 80001. a year for its support. This small allowance under good management has sufficed, if not totally to suppress, very much to diminish, smuggling on the river. The office was established in the very centre of the plunderers. From 1200 to 1400 half savage Irish coal-heavers resided in its neighbourhood. "Previously to the establishment, these men had long been in the constant practice of each man taking his sack, containing two or three bushels of coals, whenever he went on shore from the ship he was unloading. Neither the captain nor owner of the ship or cargo durst resist their taking what they claimed as a perquisite: and most of these men, having followed it as a custom of their predecessors, thought they had a fair title to such coals. When found with a boat ready to sink with their plunder, and made to account before a magistrate how they came by it, they conceived themselves to be the injured party. Custom was their invariable plea (and so it was with every other description of working men on the river, when detected in the act of bringing on shore with them from forty pounds to two hundred weight of sugar, cofee, pepper, tea, or other articles) and in vain was it that Mr. Colquhoun and myself laboured hard to convince them of their errour; and, by reprimanding only at first and ordering the coals, &c. to be taken away, endeavoured to correct the evil." When severer measures were resorted to, from the inefficiency of repeated admonition, relying on their strength of numbers, several hundred of them assembled before the office, and with horrid imprecations threatened vengeance if some individuals then under examination were not discharged. It will not be suspected of Mr. Harriott that he was intimidated into compliance. A riot ensued; the pavement was torn up; and repeated vollies of stones discharged into the room in which Mr. Harriott and Mr. Colquhoun and four or five more gentlemen were assembled. A pistol was discharged, which at the first shot killed one of the ringleaders. They retreated, procured fire arms, wounded one and killed another of the officers belonging to the institution. By firmness and courage, however, the mob was kept at bay till a party of volunteers came and dispersed them. One of the ringleaders was tried and condemned; others fled for a time, but afterwards returned. Mr. Harriott, however, and his very worthy colleague considering the purpose of publick justice to have been answered, declined proceeding against these men, and admonished them to make a grateful use of their forbearance. "I have often since received

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much satisfaction," says Mr. Harriott, "in seeing some of those who might have suffered if tried, now maintaining themselves and families in comfort, and are among the most orderly."

We have now brought these eventful memoirs to a close. After the storms and struggles of an adventurous life, Mr. Harriott expresses in the concluding chapter his grateful satisfaction at having brought his vessel safe into port. "Though somewhat shattered and unfit for sailing far, under a roving commission, the timbers are yet sound and still capable of harbour duty." Two of his children are gone out to India, and three others of the remaining five are so far advanced in life that they must rely on their own exertions. Mr. Harriott has a competency of the good things of this world and is content. Very sincerely do we hope that he may long live to enjoy that honourable repose which he has so dearly earned. It is incumbent on us to acknowledge that when we had read about a hundred pages of the first volume, we threw it down with something like disgust at the vulgarity of some stories introduced, and the appropriate vulgarity of the manner in which they are related. It was our duty to proceed, however, and we have been gradually and agreeably led into more serious matter related in more serious language. There is a chapter at the close of the first volume (chap. LXVII.) on a subject so odious that if ever this work comes to asecond edition, we strongly recommend it to be expunged. The secondvolume, we have already said, contains a mass of very useful information relative to America; some observations on our own settlements there, and on the Bahamas are also worth attending to.

In all his struggles, Mr. Harriott has behaved like an honest man, and like an honourable one. but she has taught him to appreciate his present possessions. A lesson He was hard tutored in the school of adversity, so valuable can scarcely be learned at too great an expense.

This work has been noticed in several of the British Journals, and in all of them very favourably. We shall, however, merely annex a few extracts from the Literary Panorama for January 1808.

THIS book is the composition of a man of strong natural good sense; of a brave heart, an active disposition, and undaunted perseverance. seems to be endued with that rare faculty which distinguishes heroes,-a perfect self possession, in the midst of peril. He manfully grapples with He labour, and subdues it; he boldly faces danger and overcomes it. His education, confessedly, was not the most refined; but his work is well put together; the style, if not highly polished, is commendable for its uniformity; and though the sentences be not curiously constructed, they convey the author's ideas in intelligible language. We give him credit for a strict regard to truth; and we doubt not but he describes men and things correctly. He thinks for himself and commonly decides well. He may perhaps be deemed, to a certain degree, an egotist; but, how can a man be otherwise, when writing his own life. He is now and then a little jocular; and a pleasant story agreeably relieves the narrative and diversifies the scene. life has been checkered with abundant variety; he has visited each quarter of the globe, and appears as a sailor, a mercantile man, a soldier, an agriHis culturist; and even as executing the office of a judge advocate, and in the remote parts of India performing certain functions of a clergyman. At last we view him as one of the magistrates of the Thames Police, of which he was the original projector; and we heartily wish he may spend the evening of his days in honourable tranquillity,—with just that quantity of busi

ness which may employ, without fatiguing him; for we are perfectly convinced that inaction would soon be fatal to him. We well know that he discharges the duties of his situation with great respectability; that his judgment is clear, and his heart incorruptible; that he is prompt to punish guilt, but happy to reform and to reclaim; and is always delighted in an opportunity of showing mercy, when it is compatible with distributive justice.

The chapter entitled "Earthquake off Lisbon," is very interesting. This was in the year 1755. By the way, we are much at a loss for dates throughout the book.

Earthquake off Lisbon.

Off Lisbon we had a foul wind, blowing hard all night and the next forenoon, when it suddenly dropped to a calm, leaving a heavy cross popling swell.

The people were all at dinner, when a general alarm spread quickly throughout the ship, above and below, occasioned by a violent tremulous motion of the ship, as if likely to shake to pieces. The guns and carriages actually rattled on the decks; and, in our more deliberate thoughts afterwards, we could compare the agitation of the ship to nothing but that of a vessel driven violently by a very strong current, or tide, over a hard gravelly bottom, which she raked all the way.

The consternation in every countenance was stronger than language can describe, for no one could divine the cause, though all expected immediate destruction. A rumbling noise accompanied the agitation, arising gradually but speedily from the bottom upwards. It lasted between two and three minutes, subsided, and left us as if nothing had happened.

The first thing ordered was to sound the well. All was right there. The next was to try for soundings; but none were found with more than two hundred fathoms. During this, the gunner was called on the quarter deck and examined as to the powder magazine, and when any one was last there. He declared that no person whatever had been there that day. The first lieutenant was ordered to go down with the gunner and examine all below, and I was ordered to attend them. We found every thing as it should be.

In the course of this search, the gunner, who was an old man, swore he knew what it was, and affirmed it to be an earthquake. This account, added to his being an Irishman, made us both laugh heartily at him, although our errand was not of a very laughable nature.

In making his report to the captain, the lieutenant told him what the gunner said of its being an earthquake, which created another laugh on deck. However, the old gunner was called aft, and directed to explain himself. He said he was on board a merchant ship, lying at anchor in the port, at the time of the great earthquake at Lisbon, in 1755; and, from the effect it had on that vessel, he concluded this to have proceeded from a similar cause. There was no denying the justice of this; yet not an officer on board could be persuaded it was probable; and, from arguing upon it, we deemed it impossible, from the immense body and weight of water, more than two hundred fathoms deep, that any thing afloat on the surface could be so violently and strangely affected by the concussion of the earth beneath.

I have noticed the consternation that so strongly and generally affected all on board during the shock; the rumbling noise excepted, all was still as death. But, the instant that orders were given by the captain to sound the well and let the top-sail halyards run, the difference between the British and foreign seamen on board was remarkably con spicuous. The former jumped about as alert as ever, seemingly rejoiced to be recovered from the panick; while the other poor miserable looking dogs of Italians, and other Roman Catholicks, we had shipped up the Mediterranean, were most of them on their knees and some flat on their faces, crossing themselves as true devotees. Many of them were known to have repeatedly committed murder and every species of villany; which sins, having purchased absolution from, they were hardened and wicked enough to boast of.

I remember one fellow in particular, who acknowledged the commission of seven murders, from all which he had been absolved by his priest. This very scoundrel, and others of the same stamp, as soon as they could open their mouths after the general panick ceased, roared out most lustily to Saint Anthony and other saints for help: nor could any thing induce them to move, until the boatswain, out of all patience with the most wicked reprobates we had on board, swore he had a saint would save and cure