quired to bind the children and apprentices to other persons, who would perform these duties. Thirteen offences were made capital by the original laws of Massachusetts'-Bay: Idolatry; witchcraft; blasphemy; murder; bestiality; sodomy; adultery; rape; man-stealing; false-witness; conspiracy, or rebellion against the government; cursing or smiting the father or mother after passing sixteen years of age, unless with justifying provocation, or with unchristianly neglect in education; and filial rebellion, after sixteen years of age. To these were added, in 1692, High treason; concealing the death of a bastard child; arson; and piracy. At this time, also, a particular law was made against witchcraft. You will remember, that this was the year in which the colony was convulsed by the Danvers witchcraft. In the original laws of Connecticut, revised and published by order of the court in 1672, the former of these lists is adopted, with the addition of arson; as are also in substance the ecclesiastical law, that concerning schools, and many others; not however without various alterations. No particular law against witchcraft is found in this statute-book. All the original laws of Massachusetts, and of Connecticut also, discover everywhere a high sense of the duties of piety and morality, of the value of liberty, and of the importance of exact submission to government. In some respects they would now be thought severe, and in my opinion are so. If they are considered with candour, and with a due deference to the circumstances of the people for whom they were made, and to the existing opinions of the age, they will be pronounced to be generally wise and just. The militia of this state are on a better footing than those of any other in the Union. They are distributed into 13 divisions, 28 brigades, and 103 regiments of infantry. The cavalry contains 71 companies, and the artillery 70. The whole number included in these several bodies is 70,710*. The whole number of white males between 16 and 45 was, in 1810, 133,354, exceeding the number of militia by 62,644. * 1811. The period of service is from 18 to 45. The deficiency is partly made up of persons between 16 and 18, and partly of persons excused. The militia are clad universally in a handsome uniform, and are well armed, accoutred, and disciplined. The laws by which this body of men are formed and regulated are, so far as I may be allowed to judge, wise and efficacious; and there is an uncommon, if not singular, ambition and energy in both the officers and privates of whom the militia is formed. I am, Sir, &c. PROSPECTS OF THE UNITED STATES. LETTER I. Opinions of Foreigners relative to the future Prospects of our Country. Bishop Berkley's Views of this Subject, in verse. Extent, Waters, Soil, Productions, and Population of the United States. DEAR SIR; My countrymen, in a variety of fugitive publications, have given the world their views concerning the future progress of the American republic in respectability and greatness. Most of these efforts have been extemporaneous; the result of feeling rather than of thought; specimens of idle declamation rather than of rational discussion. British writers have also busied themselves with the same subject; sometimes seriously, at others contemptuously. In the nature of this subject there is sufficient importance to make it a proper object of interesting examination to a philosopher, whether a politician, a moralist, or a divine. Yet it must be acknowledged, that scarcely an individual on either side of the Atlantic has investigated it with the degree or with the kind of attention, which is evidently demanded even by subjects of very inferior magnitude. Among the foreigners, who have published their thoughts concerning the future destinies of this country, Berkley, bishop of Cloyne, a man to whom few have been equal, and scarcely any superior in endowments or acquisitions, has published his in a small poem, inserted in his works, and not unfrequently transferred to the pages of other writers. This VOL. IV. 2 K extraordinary man, as has been already mentioned in these Letters, and as you must have undoubtedly known from other sources, came to America in the year 1732, in order to establish a college in the island of Bermuda. During this excursion he visited several parts of the continent; particularly, New-England, New-York, New-Jersey, and Pennsylvania, and resided a considerable time at New-Port in Rhode-Island. It is hardly necessary to observe, that the British colonies were then in their infancy, and exhibited little to attract the attention of ordinary observers. Berkley was not of this class. With the glance of the eye he discovered more than such observers by the examination of a life. Raised by the capacity of his mind, and not less by his disposition, far above the level where most other men walk through life, and standing always on a commanding eminence, he took a comprehensive, and at the same time an exact survey of the scenes beneath him. From such a survey he derived the thoughts expressed in the following VERSES, ON THE PROSPECT OF PLANTING ARTS AND LEARNING IN AMERICA. The muse, disgusted at an age and clime In distant lands now waits a better time, In happy climes, where from the genial sun In happy climes, the seat of innocence, Where nature guides, and virtue rules; There shall be sung another golden age, Not such as Europe breeds in her decay Such as she bred when fresh and young, When heav'nly flame did animate her clay, Westward the course of empire takes its way: A fifth shall close the drama with the day: I know not how Bishop Berkley, if he were now alive, would be able to make his peace with your Reviewers. The predictions, to which he has subscribed his name and lent his reputation, are, it must be confessed, of quite another cast than those, which these gentlemen have thought proper to utter from the Trophonian retreats in which they reside. The bishop may, however, be partially brought off, and his character in some measure saved by the consideration, that he has given his prophecy in verse, and may therefore be fairly believed intentionally to have given us fiction, and not sober truth. The United States of America, including Louisiana, form a territory of 1,800,000 square miles, or 1,152,000,000 acres; a larger empire than any, which the world has ever seen, except the Russian and the Chinese. This territory lies in a single, solid mass; in a form as near to a square as, in a region of so great an extent, our globe can well be supposed to admit. The climates, through which it passes, are undoubtedly those, which are most favourable to the prosperity of mankind. The seasons are not, indeed, as mild as those of Europe in the same latitudes; and the temperature is both higher and lower. The difference, however, is not such as to be of any material importance, either to the health or the happiness of man. Perhaps the defect is balanced by the superior brightness and serenity of the sky. This extensive region is well watered. Throughout as great a part of it as of any equal region of the globe, and incomparably more than in most, springs, brooks, mill-streams, and rivers abound. Wells, also, so far as there has been occasion to make experiments, are found near the surface, abounding in good water. It is indeed doubted whether these advantages exist, in the same degree, in any other country of the same extent. The navigation, supplied by the ocean, lakes, and rivers, is |