most established commercial houfes, an annuity of one thousand crowns, at nine per cent. by a principal fum of about thirty thoufand livres. The contract was figned before notaries, at the beginning of the year 1791. The remainder of the fame capital increased, by a small addition, to the fum of fourteen thousand livres, was entrusted to one of his brothers, to be invested in landed property, at the distance of more than two hundred leagues from Paris. The laft decrees refpecting the indemnities of ancient incumbents having reduced the ecclefiaftical revenue of Sieyes, like thofe of all others, to one thoufand livres, he offered the fame to his country in the tribune of the Convention, on the 20th of Brumaire, in the fecond year of the Republic [Nov. 10, 1793]: fo that the fortune of Sieyes confifts, if he is to be credited, in one life annuity of three thoufand livres, and another of eight hundred and forty livres, befides the fum before-mentioned entrusted to his brother. The caution which Sieyes had hitherto ufed had preferved him amidst the deftruction both of friends and enemies, and feems to have impofed on him a refolution to avoid any fitua tion of refponfibility, which could not but be held with danger. From the time, therefore, that he publicly gave up the emoluments of his ecclefiafti cal preferments, we hear nothing of him until after the fall of Robespierre, when he was in fome measure forced into public notice, and compelled to take a fhare in the administration, of affairs. He has fince come forwards on the formation of the new conftitu tion, with a propofal which has been rejected, and has lately been named, one of the five fovereigns of the new monarchy of France, which elevation he has alfo declined. A perfon wha has had fo great a fhare in the tranfactions of the laft feven years in France is not likely, at the prefent period, to be fpoken of with a 'temperate regard to truth: by one party he will be vilified and abused; by the other he will be elevated above the point of humanity. To time, there fore, we leave him, with a wish that the horrid fcenes which have lately degraded that unfortunate kingdom may never be repeated, and that the perpetrators and advisers, whoever they may be, who have hitherto efcaped, may yet meet with condign punishment. SKETCH OF THE CHARACTER OF THE LATE LORD CHATHAM. FROM ANECDOTES OF SOME DISTINGUISHED PERSONS, CHIEFLY OF THE PRESENT AND TWO PRECEDING CENTURIES. LORD CHATHAM feems to havebeen one of those fuperior fpirits, who, in mercy to mankind, are permitted occafionally 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 against the inclination of his Sovereign, he never had the infolence to declare with what rank only of the executive depart," ment of Government he would do his Country the honour and favour to be contented. In oppofition to the the Ministers of his Sovereign, 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 should poffefs. When Prime Minifter, he never dealt out the dignities and emoluments of office to perfons merely because they were related to and connected 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 wbich, 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 permitted to guide. Of the manlinefs, of the wisdom, and of the virtue of this declaration, his fellow-citizens were fo fenfible, 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 understanding by the minutenefs 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 infpired that of his own. The annals of his glorious Adminiftration will not be remembered by the rife of the Stocks, or by the favings of a few thoufand pounds, but by the importation of foreign millions, the spoil of cities, the fack of Nations, by conquefts in every part of the Globe. Lord Chatham thought it dif graceful in a Prime Minifter, because fome of his colleagues differed in opinion from him, to fee, armies walte away, and 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... "Oncertain occafions, Lord Chatham oppofed not only the opinions of his brethren in office, but even the prejudices of the Sovereign. The fol lowing anecdote, which was communicated by his Under Secretary of State, Mr Wood, to a friend of his, is a friking proof of his honefty and firmness of mind. "Lord Chatham had appointed Mr Wolfe to command at the fiege of Quebec, and as he told him that he could not give him fo many forces as he wanted for that expedition, he would make it up as well to him as he could, by giving him the appointment of all his Officers. Mr Wolfe fent in his lift, included in which was a Gentleman who was obnoxious to to the Sovereign, then George the Second, for fome advice which, as a military man, he had giv en en to his fon the Duke of Cumber- ways fpoke very highly. land. Lord Ligonier, then Commander in Chief, took in the lift to the King, who (as he expected) made fome objections to a particular name, and refused 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 fuggeftion. He was, however, told he should lofe his place if he did not; and that, on his prefenting the name to the Sovereign, he fhould tell him the peculiar fituation of the ftate of the expedition, and that in order to make any General completely refponfible for his conduct, he should be made, as much as poffible, inexcufable if he does not fucceed; and that, in confequence, whatever an Officer, who was entrufted with any fervice of confidence and of confequence, defired, fhould (if poffible) be complied with. Lord Ligonier went in a third time, and told his Sovereign 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 manmer diftinguished himself at that celebrated feminary. Virgil in early life was his favourite author. He was by no means a good Greek scholar; and though he occafionally copied the arrangement and the expreffions 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 fometime deceafed.) The fermons of the great Dr Barrow and of Abernethy were favourite books with him; and of the Sermons of the Pate Mr Mudge of Plymouth he al He' once declared in the Houfe of Commons, that no book had ever been perused by him with equal instruction 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 some of Shakespeare's Hiftorical Plays, particularly thofe of Henry the Fourth and Fifth. She however uniformly obferved, that when he came to the comic or buffoon parts of thofe plays, he always gave the book to one of his relations, and when they were gone through, he took the book again. Dr Johnson fays acutely, that no man is a hypocrite in his amusements; and thofe of Lord Chatham feem always to have borne the stamp of greatnefs about them. Lord Chatham wrote occafionally very good verfes. His tafte in laying out grounds was exquifite. One fcene 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 Gar. dening," as one of the happiest efforts of well-directed and appropri ate 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 seen admired in our times. It was very various; it poffeffed great force of light and fhade; it occafionally funk to colloquial familiarity, and occafionally rofe to Epic fublimity. If he crept fometimes with Timæus, he as often * Lord Monboddo on the Origin of Language. thun "You fhall have twelve thoufand faid the Minifter," and then if you do not fucceed, it is your fault." The original of the character of Praxiteles, in Mr Greville's very entertaining book of Maxims is faid to have been Lord Chatham. thundered and lightened with Peri- answer. Soon after Sir Robert Walpole had taken away his Cornet's commiffion from this extraordinary man, he ufed to drive himself about the country in a one-horse chaife, without a fervant. At each town to which he came, the people gathered round about his carriage, and received him with the loudeft acclama tions. Lord Chatham thought very highly of the effects of drefs and of dignity of manner upon mankind. He was never feen on bufinefs without a full-drefs coat and a tye wig, and he never permitted his UnderSecretaries to fit down before him. A General Officer was once asked by Lord Chatham, How many men he fhould require for a certain expedition?"Ten thoufand," was the "When Cardinal Stoppani (furnamed in the Conclave of Cardinals Il Politico) was informed that Lord Chatham had ceafed to be Minister of England, he told an English Gentleman that he could not give any credit to it. "What heir," he ad ded, "on coming to a confiderable eftate, and finding it excellently well managed by a steward, would difmifs that fteward merely because he had ferved his predeceffor?" The late King of Pruffia, in his Hiftory of the Seven Years War, thus defcribes Lord Chatham: "L eloquence et la genie de M. Pitt avoient rendu l'idole de la Nation, c'étoit la meilleure téte d'Angleterre. Il avoit fubjugué la Chambre Baffe par la force de la parole. Il y regnoit, il en étoit, pour ainfi dire, l'ame. Parvemu au timon des affaires, il appliqua toute l'étendue de fon genie à rendre à sa patrie la domination des mors: et penfant en grande homme, il fut indigné de la Convention de Clofter Seven, qu'il regardoit comme l'opprobre des Anglois." "This great Minitter was borne at Stratford Houfe, at the foot of the fortrefs of Old Sarum. REVIE W. The Loufiad. Canto V. and laft. By A T length this whimfical ftructure of the brain-this comical fomething, built upon nothing, which has been fo long unfinished, feems to be completed. Whether the little animal, whofe reported appearance at court ferved for the foundation of the work, ever made his unceremonious entrée, is, with many The vermin, rifing on his little rump, 26 Know, mighty. CowSLIP's fweet lips, your faithful dairy-maid: From whence we crawl'd (and who's without ambition? Charm'd with the fortune of a greater head; "Where many a time, at Court, I've join'd your Grace, "Just frighten'd fometimes out of all their wits, Dire with! for midit my travels, urg'd by Fate, "And |