dents, which rapidly fucceed one another with very little attention to confiftency or nature; but if Reafon wanders ungratified, Rifibility meets with ample indulgence; and in moft of our popular modern comedies the currency of the latter is accepted in lieu of the fterling value of the former.

This piece was received with great applaufe.

23.] Lee's Rival Queens was revived at Drury Lane with a degree of fplendour feldom feen on the English ftage. An additional act, as it may be called, was prefixed, of a battle between the Macedonians, and their enemies, in dumb fhow. The part of Alexander was fupported by Mr. Kemble in a ftyle which will fuffer nothing by a comparison with any former perfor mers of that part. The reft of the play was intitled to, and received applaufe.

30.] Mr. Cooper attempted the character of Macbeth, the moft arduous one in the whole range of the theatre, and, as might be expected, entirely failed. Why will young performers rafhly undertake important characters?

Epilogue to the New Comedy of Specu. lation. Written by Miles Peter Andrews, Efq. Spoken by Mr. Lewis.

THE drama done, permit us now to fay [play Something about or not about the Good fubject ours! rare times! when Speculation

Engroffes every fubject of the nation To ferve the ftate-Jews, Gentiles, all are willing, [fhilling; And for the omnium venture their laft Nay fome fubfcribe their thousands to the loan,

dies fair,

What a fine harvest this gay feafon yields! [ble fields; Some female heads appear like fubWho now of threaten'd famine dare complain, (with grain? When every female forehead teems See how the wheat fheaves nod amid the plumes; [ing-rooms; Our barns are now transferred to drawWhile husbands who delight in active lives, [wives. To fill their granaries may thresh their Nor wives alone prolific, notice draw, Old maids and young ones, all are in the firaw.

That damfel wrapt in fhawls, who looks fo blue, [doIs a return from India-things won't That market's up, the could not change her name, [WOPPAS came;

No RAMRAMROWS nor YANGWHANG"Bad Speculation, Bet, fo far to roam, Black-legs go out, and jail-birds now come home."

That ftripling there, all trowsers and

With back to fire, flouch'd hat, and vulgar flang, Charangue: He charms his miffrefs with this fweet What lovely, chaming_Kitty-how d'ye do? [to fee you." Come-fee my puppy ?"-"No, Harry, "You're vaftly welcome-you fhall fee my flud, [too good." And ride my poney."-" Harry, you're "Zounds how it freezes !-Fly was my Sancho's fire:

Mifs, would you fee"-" Harry, I'd

try,

Whim

age,

[the rage; With true tiptops of tafte, grotesque's Beaux with fhort waifts, and fmallcloaths close confin'd!

Belles bunch'd before, and bundled up behind,

The flights of fashion bordering on buffoon, [taloon:

One looks like Punch, the other PanBut hold-my raillery makes fome look gruff, [enough. Therefore I'm off-I'm fure I've faid

Prologue to the Battle of Haftings. Writ.

ten by the Rev. Mr. Wife. To be fpoken by a Youth of Mr. STOCK's School at Poplar, December 1795.

TOO much, too long, Poetic Genius fings [doms, kings; The rage of war, the feuds of kingAnd decks with honours thofe enormous deeds, [breeds; Which villain luft of pow'r and riches As if fuch feuds were duties of our race; Man's higheft glory was his deep difgrace;

Right was in wrong, good was in evil known, [alone. And ev'n exiftence flood thro' crimes If fuch prevail, can we expect repofe? Or common good by wife and righteous

laws?

prefs'd

[trefs'd? Who chiefly caufe their kind to be difWill fuch intreat for human good by pray'r [heart is bare? To HIM, with whom the feigning Away! away!-Go act as you entreat; The Good will come: act All, it will be great.

O Man! is God to do thy duties?— No! [grow. Do thou act right, then ills will icantly Thou art God's Agent: thou, his Steward made, [fhade. Fulfil thy truft, or dread his dungeon's Come, bleffed time! O come ! when men, more wife, Shall cease to glory in war's facrifice; Shall, with abhorrence, from their follies cease, [peace; And occupy their fields in chearful With Juftice, with benevolence confpire, [Sire! As fubjects fit for Heav'n's all-ruling Our scenes, to night, will introduce

to view

A fort of state of things, alas! not new: Experience, dear experience, long has taught [wrought. The guilt, the bane, yet no reform is Our beft exertions fhall acquit our parts, [hearts, To make our leffons penetrate your No task is useless, which the mind employs [and joys; To mufe the fprings of human griefs To fee both right and wrong, what they inftil [that, ill. In life's mix'd cup; this dropping good; Our tafk, this night, affords this ufe, but pow'rs

Of energy it afks exceeding ours. Hope leads us on; though we not much afpire, [mire. We hope you may approve, if not adUs it contents, if our endeavour draws The only fought reward, your kind ap plause.

Character of the late Earl of Chatham. (From Anecdotes of Diftinguished PerJons. Lately published.)

been one of thofe fuperior Spirits, who, in mercy to mankind, are permit

ORD CHATHAM feems to have

ted

ted occasionally to vifit this lower world, to revive or create nations, and to decide the fate of empires.

The British empire, finking under the difability of his immediate predeceffors, foon regained its priftine vigour under the influence of Lord Chatham, His great mind pervaded every part of it, and, like the torch of Prometheus, illumined and animated the whole. Called into power at the middle time of life, and with fome experience in the complicated bufinefs of politics, by the voice of the people, and againft the inclination of his fovereign, he never had the infolence to declare with what rank only of the executive department of government he would do his country the honour and favour to be contented. In oppofition to the minifters of his fove. reign, he never, from spleen or from indignation, dared to attempt to innovate upon the established conftitution of his country, and, with a view to be a favourite with the people, cajole them with the hopes of an increafe of their power and of their confequence, which he never in his heart intended they fhould poffefs. When prime minifter, he never dealt out the dignities and emoluments of office to perfons merely because they were related to and con nected with him, and whom he intended to direct, from the fuperiority of his underftanding to theirs, and from his knowledge of their incapacity to fill the arduous and important ftations which, at a very critical period of the State, he had affigned to them. In Council, when a baneful influence prevailed, which from jealoufy of authority, and perhaps from meaner motives, by its improper interpofition and dangerous interference, like the pernicious remora, impeded and counteracted the motion of the great veffel of Government, he difdained to temporize, and, from views of intereft or of fear, to keep the helm which he was not permitted to manage as he pleafed. He nobly, and in the true fpirit of the conftitution, declared, that he would be no longer refponfible for measures which he was not permit ted to guide. Of the manlinefs, of the wifdom, and of the virtue of this declaration, his fellow-citizens were fo fenfi

ble, that when his Sovereign, the idol of his people, and himself met on an occafion of public feftivity, he appeared to divide with the beloved Vicegerent of Heaven the applaufes of the multitude!

Lord Chatham never degraded his mind with that attention to the patronage which his high fituation afforded, nor divided and diftracted his underfanding by the minuteness of detail and the meaner operations of finance, which the most ordinary clerk in his office could have managed as well as himself. The great powers of his mind were always directed to fome magnificent object. He faw with the eye of intuition itfelf into the characters of mankind: he faw for what each man was fitted. His fagacity pervaded the fecrets of the cabinets of other countries; and the energy of his mind informed and in fpired that of his own. The annals of his glorious Adminiftration will not be remembered by the rife of Stocks, or by the favings of a few thousand pounds, but by the importation of foreign mil lions, the fpoil of cities, the fack of nations, by conquefts in every part globe.

of the

and

Lord Chatham thought it difgrace ful in a prime minifter, becaufe fome of his colleagues differed in opinion from him, to fee armies wafte away, fleets become ufelefs: to behold money ineffectually fquandered, that had been wrung from the fweat of the brow of the poor and of the laborious; and the lives of thoufands of his fellow-fubjects facrificed to murmuring compliance, and to pride that indignantly licks the duft.

On certain occafions, Lord Chat ham oppofed not only the opinions of his brethren in office, but even the prejudices of his fovereign. The following anecdote, which was communicated by his under fecretary of ftate, Mr. Wood,

a friend of his, is a ftriking proof of his honefty and firmnets of mind.

·་

Lord Chatham had appointed Mr. Wolfe to command at the fiege of Que bec, and as he told him that he could not give him as many forces as he wanted for that expedition, he would make it up as well to him as he could,

by

by giving him the appointment of all bis Officers. Mr. Wolfe fent in his lift, included in which was a gentleman who was obnoxious to the fovereign, then George the Second, for fome advice which, as a military man, he had given to his fon the Duke of Cumberland. Lord figonier, then commander + in chief, took in the lift to the king, who (as he expected) made fome objections to a particular name, and refed to fign the commiffion. Lord Chatham fent him into the closet a fecond time, with no better fuccefs. Lord Ligonier refufed to go in a third time at Lord Chatham's "fuggellion. He was, however, told that he fhould lofe his place if he did not; and that, on his prefenting the name to the fovereign, he hould tell him the peculiar fituation of the fate of the expedition, and that in order to make any general completely refponfible for his conduct, he fhould be made, as much as poffible inexcufable if he does not fucceed; and that, in confequence, whatever an Officer, who was rufted with any fervice of confidence and of confequence, defired, thould (if poffible) be complied with. Lord Ligonier went in a third time, and told his fovereign what he was directed to tell him. The good fenfe of the Monarch fo completely difarmed his prejudice, that he figned the particular commiffion, as he was defired."

Lord Chatham was educated at Eton, and in no very particular manner diftinguifhed himfelf at that celebrated feminary. Virgil in early life was his favourite author. He was by no means a good Greek fcholar; and though he occafionally copied the arrangement and the exprellions of Demofthenes with great fuccefs in his fpeeches, he perhaps drew them from the Collana tranflation of that admirable orator (that book having been frequently feen in his room by a great Lawyer fome time deceased). The fermons of the great Dr. Barrow and of Abernethy were favourite books with him; and of the fermons of the late Mr. Mudge of Plymouth he always fpoke very highly. He once declared in the Houfe of Commons, that no book had ever been pe

rufed by him with equal inftruction with the Lives of Plutarch*.

Lord Chatham was an extremely fine reader of Tragedy; and a Lady of rank and tafte, now living, declares with what fatisfaction fhe has heard him read fome of Shakespeare's Historical Plays, particularly thofe of Henry the Fourth and Fifth. She however uniformly obferved, that when he came to the comic or buffoon parts of those plays, he always gave the book to one of his relations, and when they were gone through, he took the book again.

Dr. Johnfon fays acutely, that no man is a hypocrite in his amusements; and thofe of Lord Chatham feems always to have borne the ftamp of greatnefs about them.

Lord Chatham wrote occafionally very good verfes. His tafte in laying out grounds was exquifite. One scene in the gardens of South Lodge on Enfield Chafe (which was defigned by him), that of the Temple of Pan and its accompaniments, is mentioned by Mr. Whateley, in his "Obfervations on Modern Gardening," as one of the happieft efforts of well-directed and appropriate decoration.

Of Lord Chatham's eloquence who can fpeak that has not heard it; and who that had the happiness to hear it, can do juftice to it by defcription? it was neither the rounded and the monotonous declamation, the exuberance of images, the acute fophiftry, or the attic wit and fatirical point, that we have feen admired in our times. It was very various; it poffeffed great force of light and fhade; it occafionally funk to colloquial familiarity, and occa fionally rofe to epic fublimity. If he crept fometimes with Timæus, he as often thundered and lightened with Pericles. His irony, though ftrong, was ever dignified; his power of ridicule irrefiftible; and his invective fo terrible, that the objects of it shrunk under it like fhrubs before the withering and the blasting eaft wind. Who. ever heard this great man fpeak, always N

T E.

* Lord Monboddo on the Origin of Language. brought