Curious Remarks on the Trade and Ancient THE HE trade of Manchefter may be divided into four periods. The firit is that, when the manufacturers worked hard merely for a livelihood, without having accumulated any capital. The fecond is that, when they have begun to acquire little fortunes, but worked as hard, and lived in as plain a manner as before, increafing their fortunes as well by economy as by moderate gains. The third is that, when luxury began to appear,and trade was pufhed by fending out riders for orders to every market town in the kingdom. The fourth is the period in which expenfe and luxury had made a great progrefs, and was fupported by a trade extended by means of riders and factors through every part of Europ It is not eafy to afcertain when the fecond of these periods commenced; but it is probable that few or no capitals of 3000l. or 4000l. acquired by trade, exifted here before 1690. However, towards the latter end of the laft centary and the beginning of the prefent, the traders had certainly got money beforehand, and began to build modern brick houfes, in place of thofe of wood and plaifter. For the first thirty years of the prefent century, the old established boufes confined their trade to the wholefale dealers in London, Briftol, Norwich, Newcastle, aud those who frequented Chefter fair. The profits were thus divided between the manufacturer, the wholefale, and the retail, dealer; and those of the manufacturer were probably (though this is contrary to the received opinion) lefs per cent. upon the bufinefs they did, than in the prefent times. The improvement of their fortunes was chiefly owing to their economy in living, the expenfe of which was much below the intereft of the capital employed. Apprentices at that time were now and then taken from families which could pay a moderate fee. By an indenture dated 1695 the fee paid appears to have been fixty pounds, the young man ferving seven years. But all apprentices were obliged to undergo a vaft deal of laborious work, fuch as turning warping mills, carrying goods on their fhoulders through the treets, and the like. An eminent manufacturer in that age used to be in his warehoufe before fix in the morning, accompanied by his children and apprentices. At feven they all came in to breakfast, which confifted of one large dish of water-pottage, made of oat-meal, water, and a little falt, boiled thick, and poured into a difh. At the fide was a pan or bafon of milk, and the mafter and apprentices, each with a wooden spoon in his hand, without lofs of time, dipped into the fame dish, and thence into the milk-pan; and as foon as it was finished they all returned to their work. In George the firft's reign many country gentlemen began to fend their fons apprentices to the Manchetter manufacturers; but though the little country gentry did not then live in the luxurious manner they have done fince, the young men found it fo different from home, that they could not brook this treatment, and either got away before their time, or, if the ftaid till they expiration of their indentures, they then, for the most part, entered into the army or went to fea. The little attention paid to rendering the evenings of apprentices agreeable at home, where they were confidered rather as fervants than pupils, drove many of them to taverns, where they acquired habits of drinking that frequently proved injurious in after life. To this, in part, is to be attributed the bad cuftom of gilling, or drinking white wine as a whet before dinner, to which at one period a number of young men fell a facrifice. When the Manchester trade began to extend, the chapmen ufed to keep gangs of pack-horfes, and accompany them to the principal towns with goods in packs, which they opened and fold to fhop-keepers, lodging what was unfold in fmall ftores at the inns. The pack-horfes brought back fheep's wool, which was bought on the journey, and fold to the makers of worsted yarn at Manchester, Manchester, or to the clothiers of Rochdale, Saddleworth, and the WeftRiding of Yorkshire.. On the improvement of turnpike roads waggons were fet up, and the pack-horfes difcontinued; and the chapen only rode out for orders, carrying with them patterns in their bags. It was during the forty years from 1730 to 1770 that trade was greatly pushed by the practice of fending thefe riders all over the kingdom, to thofe towns which before had been fupplied from the wholefale dealers in the capital places before mentioned. As this was attended not only with more trouble, but with much more risk, fome of the old traders withdrew from bufinefs, or confined themselves to as much as they could do on the old footing, which, by a competition of young adventurers, diminished yearly. In this period ftrangers flocked in from various quarters, which introduced a great proportion of young men of fome fortune into the town, with a confequent increafe of luxury and gaiety. The fees of apprentices becoming an object of profit, a different manner of treating them began to prevail. Somewhat before 1760, a confiderable manufacturer allotted a back parlour with a fire for the ufe of his apprentices, and gave them tea twice a day. His fees in confequence rofe higher than had before been known, from 250l. to 300l.; and he had three or four apprentices at a time. The higheft fee known as late as 1769, was 500l. Within the laft twenty or thirty years the vaft increase of foreign trade had caufed many of the Manchester manufacturers to travel abroad, and agents or partners to be fixed for a confiderable time on the Continent, as well as foreigners to refide at Manchester. And the town has now in every refpect affumed the ftyle and manners of one of the commercial capials of Europe. A proof of the early hours then kept ppears in the following fact: in 1705 manufacturer married a phyfician's aughter who had been genteely edusted and kept a good deal of company. he hour of afternoon vifiting was then two o'clock, fo that for fome years after her marriage, the had always finished her vifit foon enough to go to the old church prayers at four. They then dined at twelve; and there being no fuch thing as a hair-dreffer, it was easy to be ready for vifiting at two. In 1708 the act paffed for building St. Ann's church, which in a few years was followed by the fquare and streets adjoining, where was difplayed a new ftyle of light and convenient rooms, very different from thofe in the rest of the town. The front parlours however were referved for company only; and the family ufualy lived in the back parlours. This fashion continued to our own times, and in fmall houses, fubfifts in fome degree at prefent. The great fums of money brought into circulation by the wars and taxes in queen Ann's reign, and by the fubfequent commercial fpeculations, muft have rapidly forwarded the progrefs of luxury in Manchefter. Lady Bland of Hulme, who was herself a great heirefs, and had married a gentleman of large fortune, was then chief promoter of whatever could embellish the town, or polish the taste of its inhabitants. She had fubfcribed liberally to the building of St. Ann's church, and the initials of her name were put upon the cover of the communion table. A few years afterwards he was the principal patroness of a dancing affembly; and a handsome room for the purpose was erected upon pillars, leaving a space beneath to walk in. This was in the middle of the new fashionable street called King-street, and opened a convenient paffage to the new church-yard. The affembly was held once a week at the low price of half a crown a quarter; and the ladies had their maids to come with lanthorns and pattens to conduct them home; nor was it unufual for their partners alfo to attend them. Lady Bland was of a chearful difpofition, and fo fond of young company, that he had frequent balls in her hall at Hulme, and often, when an old woman, danced in the fame fet with her grandfon. About About 1720 there were not above three or four carriages kept in the town. One of thefe belonged to a madam D-in Salford This refpectable old lady #5 of a fociable difpofition, but could nct bring herfelf to conform to the new-neffes to this affaffination are still alive; and beverage of tea and coffee; I learned the fact from two perfons of watever, therefore, fhe made her af- credit who beheld Tallien clad in rags, torneon's vifit, her friends prefented felling with a club fuch of the prifoher with a tankard of ale and a pipe of ners as the people condemned to death; tobacco. A little before this period a they heard him tell the populace" not country gentleman had married the to pardon one fingle priest or noble," daughter of a citizen of London: fhe obferving at the fame time to the murbad been used to tea, and in compliment derers who furrounded him," that they to her it was introduced by fome of her had been interrogated in fecret, that aeghbours, but the ufual afternoon's none of them were innocent, and that entertainment at gentlemen's houfes at the commune of Paris poffeffed the most that time was wet and dry fweet-meats, inconteftable evidence, that they had different forts of cake and gingerbread, formed a plot to burn the fuburbs, St. apples, or other fruits of the feafon, and Antoine, St. Jacques, and St. Marceau, a variety of home-made wines. The and to cut the throats of all the inhabimanufacture of thefe wines was a great tants above fifteen years of age." This point with all good houfe-wifes both in charge has undoubtedly fome colouring the country and town. They made an of truth, for it has been repeatedly effential part of all feafts, and were urged against Tallien, and he has never brought forth when the London or Briftol hitherto chofen either to deny, or to dealers came down to fettle their ac- refute it.' In addition to this, he is counts and give orders. A young manu- accused of having affaffinated' eighteen facturer about this time having a valua perfons at Bourdeaux; it is faid alfo ble cuftomer to fup with him, fent to the that he carried feventeen hundred thoutavern for a pint of foreign wine, which fand livres from that city, which he had next morning furnished a fubject for received as a ranfom for the lives of the farcaftic remarks of all his neigh- the rich merchants: that he has fince bours. In order to perfect young ladies efpoufed madame Fontenai, formerly in what was then thought a neceffary mademoiselle Gabarrus, one of his part of their education, a pastry-cook agents in this tranfaction, who adorned was fet up in Manchefter, which was with the crown diamonds, fuperbly frequented, not only by the daughter's dreffed a-la-grecque, and furrounded by of the town's-people, but thofe of the an unbounded difplay of luxury, daily neighbouring gentlemen. At this time infults inodefty, the public mifery, and there was a girl's boarding-school; and the virtuous mediocrity of her nulband.’ alfo a dancing-mafter, who, on particular It is to the lewdnels' of this member occafions, ufed to make the boys and we are affured, that the republic is in a girls parade two by two through fome great measure indebted for the revoluof the ftreets; a difplay which was not tion of the ninth of thermidor. very pleafing to fome of the bafhful youths of that day. among whom was a priest nearly eighty years of age, belonging to the diocefe of Luçon, during the day of the third, and the night between the third and fourth of September, 1792. The wit Anecdotes of fome of the leading Men in of Paris, and the moft ferocious robbery André Dumont is here faid to have been guilty of exactions in the departand Cife, and the north, of which it ments of Somme, Pas-de Calais, Seine is impoffible to convey even an idea. He is afferted to be the most ignorant venal deputy tion; he indeed spilt but little blood in Picardy, but he caufed more than three thoufand five hundred perfons to t arre!! arrested. Among other great crimes laid to his charge, is that of having ordered all the faints bones, relics, and holy mummeries in the communes of St. Vallery, Montreuil, and Boulogne, to to be thrown to the dogs! The incorruptible' Fréron is faid to have shared the fum of two hundred and seventeen thousand livres in money, taken from an ariftocrat of Toulon, with Robefpierre's brother. It is afferted that Legendre, formerly a butcher in Paris, and now a reprefentative of the people, was one of the friends and advisers of Marat; that he has been ⚫ one of the most bloody jacobins,' the author of many of the atrocities committed after the 2d of September, and the abettor of Robespierre on the 31st of May, and the first and fecond of June, 1793. Bourdon de l'Oife is reprefented as not yielding in point of virtues to Legendre and Tallien. He proposed the murdering of the feventy deputies be "O mother, thy bofom bore me; I was the firft fruit of thy love; what crime have I committed to deferve a life of flavery? I alleviate the forrows of thy age. For thee I labour the ground; for thee I gather flowers; for thee I enfnare the fifh of the flood., I have defended thee from the cold; I have. borne thee, when it was hot, into the fhades of fragrant trees; I watched thee while thou flumbereft, and drove away from thy face the ftings of the mofkitoes. O mother, what will become of thee, when thou haft me no longer? The money thou received will not give thee another daughter; thou wilt die in mifery, and my bittereft grief will be, that I cannot affift thee. Omother, fell not thy only daughter." In vain did the implore! She was fold, was loaded with chains, conducted to the fhip; and conveyed from her dear parent and country for ever. The Debtor. THAT a croud!--I paffed through longing to the party of the Gironde, to W it with difficulty-a poor wretch which Robespierre would not confent, until he had prepared the people for it. He was one of the affiftants of Marat, and is made to say that a cipher ought to have been added to the 400,000 heads demanded by that execrable wretch. Cambon, in the month of December 1793, exclaimed, "I will take it upon me to guillotine all thofe whofe names are inferted in the great book, and I undertake to pay off the debt of the republic, but you muft not recede in the profecution of grand principles. The fquare of the revolution is the mint of the republic. You ought to coin there night and day, if you with me to produce any great refult." Cambon is one of the bafeft villains which the revolution has produced in France: but equally timid and fanguinary, he never quits the national treasury; he was always the treasurer of Robespierre and the jacobins.' was going to prifon for debt-he lifted "Compaffion," said I, " has this day drawn from my purfe more than I could afford but I will wear this old coat and hat twelve months longer than I intended, MOTHER was dragging her only and that will almoft make things even A Madagascar Song. A daughter to the beach, in order my coat is almoft rufty, 'tis truc-but to fell her to the white men, the debtor is free. The The Affecting Hiftory of M. de M that delicious country, the pride of and Adelaide. -(From Mifs France, the garden of Europe, the clafWilliams's Letters on the Politics of fical haunt of Petrarch, no longer prefents France.) the delightful images of beauty, of poetry, of paflion; the magical fpell is broken, the foothing charm is diffolved; the fairy fcenes have been polluted, the wizard bowers profaned; the orangegroves are defpoiled of their aromatic fweetnefs; the waters are tinged with blood; the hollow moans of calamity iffue from the caverns, and the shrieks of defpair re-echo from the cliffs; the guillotine has arifen amid thofe confecrated fhades where love alone had reared its altars!-no longer with the name of Vauclufe is affociated the idea of Petrarch; that of Maignet, the deftroying Maignet, prefents itfelf to the fhuddering imagination, and the aftonished foul farts back with horror HE cities of Paris and Lyons, and the extenfive department of the Vendée, were not the only fcenes of horror which France exhibited during the tyranny of Robefpierre; alas, there was fcarcely a valley of that defolated country, whose flowerets were not bruifed with the tread of hoftile paces!' Robespierre could not have fo long maintained his iron fceptre, had he not found, to ufe the words of Shakespeare, Slaves that took his humours for a warrant, To break into the bloody houfe of life, While Carrier ravaged the country of the weft, and Collet d'Herbois laid the opulent city of the eaft in afhes, Le Bon hung like a deftroying vulture over the north, feafting his favage foul with the fight of mangled carcafes; and Maignet confumed the lovely villages of the fouth in the flames of a general conflagration. The fcene of Maignet's proconfulate was the departments of Vauclufe, and the mouth of the Rhone--thofe celebrated regions for ever dear to the lovers of the elegant arts, where, cheering the gloom of gothic barbarifm, to use the language of Offian, the light of the fong arofe; where the Troubadours ftrung their early harps, and where the inmortal Petrarch poured forth his impaflioned ftrains. Divine poet! no more hall the unhappy lover feck for confolation in fhedding delicious tears on the brink of that fountain where thou haft wept for Laura-no more fhall he haunt with penfive enthufiafm that folita17 valley, thofe craggy rocks, thofe hanging woods, and torrent-treams, where thou hast wandered with congenial feelings, and to which thy tender complaints have given everlaiting renown!-thofe enchanting dreams, thofe dear illufions have for ever vanished Hib. Mag. Jan. 1796, One of the first acts of Maignet, upon his arrival in the department of Vauclufe, was the deftru&tion of the village of Bedouin, fituated in a country of the most romantic beauty, and where the benign climate fofters all the rich productions of fummer, and forms a tiriking contralt to the eternal fnows which cover the mountain of Ventoux, at the foot of which the village is placed. A finall tree of liberty which had been placed on a folitary ipot near Bedouin, was, during the night, torn from the ground by fome wretches who knew that this incident would furnish a pretext for pillage and devastation. At break of day the very perfons who were the perpetrators of this act, one of whom was the prefident of the popular fociety, founded a general alarm, and accufed the guiltless inhabitants of Bedouin of H the |