th ON COMPLETING HIS LXXVI VOLUME. How ftrange and various are the ways, And that, alas! to few. But while much more of grief and pain For what is Man's precarious life, Whether we toil in Fortune's frown, For fuch the merit of thy race, That Time himself to thee gives place, With undiminish'd luftre still And energies fublime, FIVE fifteen years your plan you fill, Progreffive towards an Hundred Years, The fum of all thy toil and cares, Dec 31, 1806 HENRY LEMOINE. AVERAGE PRICES of CORN, from the Returns ending July 19, 1806.. INLAND COUNTIES. MARITIME COUNTIES. Wheat Rye Barley Oats Beans se d. s. d. s. d. s. d. s. d. 837 633 939 644 6 638 035 37 640 82 139 9 021 139 3 8 26 11 36 3 87 70 400 036 832 Leicester 78 1000 035 Nottingh. 86 455 043 231 026 1139 6 York 8 32 11 26 542 8 000 029 800 O 032 530 9/00 547 933 200 864 049 2:35 448. 10 241 3 Lancafter 83 Chefter 78 5 Flint o Denbigh 9 Anglefea 6 Carnarvon 83 8 Merionet. 86 746 4,24 000 o Cardigan 84 Montgo. 91 600 000 027 100 Pembroke 72 Radnor 91 1.00 0140 2-28 8100 Carmarth. 90 Glamorg, 88 000 000 026 Glouceft. 86 1000 038 930 Somerset 86 4,00 '000 025 746 Mono. 97 400 000 000 0100 Devon 84 033 326 1100 Cornwall 86. 1,00 035 226 500 78 600 0100 036 900 Hants 76 8l00 ol36 Ο 035 8.00 000 5 Dorfet 033 10/19 Districts AVERAGE PRICES, by which Exportation and Bounty are to be regulated. Mr. URBAN, ၁ ROM rain. F uch eans 0 9 3 8 July 4. the wellknown accuracy and acutenefs of Dr. Symmons, I had no doubt of finding, in ရိုး the newly-published Life of Milton, a fatisfactory answer to the enquiry in your p. 420, after Milton's fecond tutor Mr. Tovey; but, to my no fmall aftonifh ment, the name is not even mentioned, though pointed out very diftinctly in the paragraph of Aubrey, which leads to fuch a Philippic against Johnfon and Tom Warton, as muft almoft call forth their ghofts to vengeance. Perhaps the learned Biographer might deem it beneath him to stoop to the minutiae of Academic dates. His foaring pen feems bent principally to the vindication of Milton's Politicks: and in this favourite talk he is not fparing of his kicks "at the dead Lion." But, waving for the prefent a fubject on which I may hereafter trouble you, unless the defence of our fturdy Moralift is taken up by other pens, 1 haften to a more pleafing task, by extracting for your readers a paffage from Dr. Symmons's Preface, which will excite their tendereft fvmpathy; and a character from the Work itfelf, which reflects credit on the delineator. Unacquainted with the general progrefs of the publication with which my biography was to be connected, I already looked forward to its early appearance, when it pleased the Almighty to vifit me with an affliction, of fuch over-whelming force as to opprefs all my faculties, and, during a heavy interval of many fucceffive months, to render me incapable of the flighteft mental exertion. From this half-animated ftate I was, at length, roufed by a fenfe of the duty which I owed to my engagements, and by the fear of having injured, with the confequences of my weaknefs, thofe interefts which I had bound myfelf by promife to promote. On the completion, how ever, of my work, I difcovered, and not without fome fatisfaction, that my Life of Milton was yet to wait for its affociate volumes from the prefs, and confequently that I had contracted no obligations for indulgence either to the editors or the publick. Of all the parties, indeed, engaged in the tranfaction, I alone feemed to have experienced any effential change of fituation in the interval between the expected and the actual period of the publication. Eighteen months ago I felt an intereft in the scene around me, of which I muft never again hope to be fenfible; and my pen, which now moves only in obedience to duty, was then quickened by the influences of fame. Eighteen months ago, like the man who vifited the Roficrufian tomb, I was surrounded with brilliant light, but one blow diffolved the charm, broke the fource of the illu mination, and left me in fepulchral darknefs. It is only, however, in their refework that my calamities or my weakrence to the execution of the following neffes can be of confequence to the publick. If any paffages, then, in the prefent Life of Milton, fhould be noticed by the reader for peculiar deficiency in compofition or in fpirit, as he pronounces their merited condemnation let him be told, that they were written by a father, who, with a daughter, the delight and, alas! perhaps too much, the pride of his heart, has loft the great endearment of existence; the exhilaration of his cheerful, and the folace of his melancholy hour." The volume is thus infcribed, "To the memory of my most dear and accomplished fon, CHARLES SYMMONS *, by the co-operation of whofe fine mind and perfect tafte I have been largely benefited as a writer, and to the contempla tion of whofe piety and virtues, the fources of much of my paft happiness, I am indebted for all my prefent confolation, I inferibe this Life of Milton; which, as it grew under his eye, and was favoured with his regard, cannot be without value in my partial eftimation. On the 23d of May, 1895, before he had completed *Of whom, fee an ample character in our vol. LXXV, p. 584. his twenty-fecond year, he was torn from my affection and my hopes, experiencing from his God, in, requital of a pure life, the mercy of an early death. CHARLES SYMMONS." Speaking of Milton's Il Penferofo and L'Allegro, Dr. Symmons fays, "Although thefe Poems obtained fome early notice, the number of their admirers was for a long time fmal. Even from the wits of our Auguftan age, as the age of Addifon and Pope has fometimes been called, their fhare of notice was inconfiderable: and it is only in what may be confidered as the prefent generation, that they have acquired any large proportion of their juft praife. Their reputation feems to be ftill increafing; and we may venture to predict that it will yet increafe, till fome of thofe great viciffitudes, to which all that is human is perpetually expofed, and which all must eventually experience, fhall blot out our name and our language, and bury us in barbarifm. But even amid the ruins of Britain, Milton will furvive: Europe will preferve one portion of him; and his native ftrains will be cherished in the expanding bofom of the great Queen of the Atlantic, when his own London may prefent the fpectacle of Thebes, and his Thames roll a filent and folitary ftream through heaps of blended defolation. "I am reminded on this occafion of a beautiful paffage in the Effay on the dramatic character of Sir John Falftaff, written by the late Maurice Morgann, efq. 'Yet whatever may be the neglect of fome, or the cenfure of others, there are thofe who firmly believe that this wild and uncultivated Barbarian (Shaktpeare, fo called by Voltaire) has not obtained one half of his fame.-When the hand of time fhall have brufhed off his prefent editors and commentators, and when the very name of Voltaire, and even the memory of the language, in which he has written, fhall be no more, the Apalachian mountains, the banks of the Ohio, and the plains of Sciola fhall refound with the accents of this barbarian. In his native tongue he fhall roll the genuine paffions of nature: nor fhall the griefs of Lear be alleviated, or the charms and wit of Rotalind be abated by time.' p. 61. "This Effay forms a more honourable monument to the memory of Shakspeare than any which has been reared to him by the united labours of his commenta "With the name of Maurice Morgann, who has fondled my infancy in his arms; who was the friend of my youth, who expanded the liberality of my opening heart, and firft taught me to think, and to judge, with this interefting name fo many fadly-pleafing recollections are affociated, that I cannot difnrifs it without reluctance. He was my friend: but he was the friend alfo of his fpecies. The embrace of his mind was ample; that of his benevolence was unbounded. With great rectitude of understanding, he poffeffed a fancy that was always creative and playful. On every fubject, for on every fubject he thought acutely and deeply, his ideas were original and ftriking. Even when he was in error he continued to be fpecious and to please and he never failed of your applaufe, though he might fometimes of your affent. When your judgment coyly held back, your imagination yielded to his feductive addreffes; and you wifhed him to be right, when you were forced to pronounce that he was wrong. This is fpoken only of those webs, which his fancy perpetually fpun, and dipped in the rainbow: his heart was always in the right. With a mind of too fine a texture for bu-, finefs, too theoretical and abstract to be executive, he discharged with honour the office of Under-fecretary of State, when the prefent Marquis of Lanfdown was for the first time in power; and he was fubfequently fent by that nobleman acrofs the Atlantic as the intended Legislator of Canada. His public and his private life were impelled by the fame principles to the fame object;-by the love of liberty and virtue to the happiness of man. If his folicitous and enlightened reprefentations had experienced attention, the temporary and the abiding evils of the American conteft would not have exifted; and the mother and her offspring would still have been fupported and fupporting with their mutual embrace. From a long intercourfe with the world he acquired no fufpicion, no narrownels, no hardnefs, no morofenefs. With the fimplicity and candour, he retained to the laft the cheerfulnefs and the fenfibility of childhood. The tale of diftrefs, which he never ftaid to investigate, paffed immediately through his open ear into his refponfive heart; and his fortune, fmall as his difinterestedness had fuffered it to remain, was inftantly communicated to relieve. His humanity comprehended the whole animated creation, and nothing could break the tenor of his temper but the fpectacle of oppreffion or of cruelty. His failings (and the most favoured of our poor fpecies are not without failings) were few, and untinctured with malignity. High as he was |