excellent and attached servant, or rather humble friend, who in adversity had cleaved to him, enters the room. Sam knew nothing of London life or London wages, or official bribes, or perquisites; but I should like to know if ever Lord Thurlow had such a servant as Mr. Cowper's Sam; for this is no inconsiderable item in a man's domestic happiness. And unless we know all these little matters, how can we pronounce a true deliverance."

"We may guess that honest Sam and his qualities would have been of little utility, and of small value to Edward, Lord Thnrlow, any way," said Mrs. Herbert; " and so throw the attached servant out of his scale altogether."

"I fear so :-Well Sam, civilly, but rather formally, neither like a footman of parts nor figure, mentions that John Cox, the parish clerk of All Saints' Parish, Northampton, waits in the kitchen for those obituary verses engrossed with the annual bill of mortality, which Mr. Cowper had for some years furnished on his solicitation.

“Ay, Sam,—say I will be ready for him in a few minutes, and give the poor man a cup of beer,' said the courteous poet. I must first read the first verses to you, Mary,' continued he, as Sam left the parlour; you are my critic, my Sam Johnson, and Monthly Reviewer:-and he reads those fine verses beginning, He who sits from day to day.'

"I like them, Mr. Cowper,' said his calm friend; and that was praise enough.John Cox was ushered in, brushed his eye hastily over the paper, scraped with his foot, and said he dared to say these lines might do well enough. The gentleman he employed before was so learned, no one in the parish understood him. And Cowper smiles, and says, 'If the verses please, and are not found too learned, he hopes Mr. Cox will employ him again.""

And now the postboy's horn is heard, and Sam hies forth. Mr. Cowper is not rich enough to buy newspapers; but his friends don't forget him, nor his tastes. Whenever any thing likely to interest his feelings occurs in the busy world, some kind friend addresses a paper to Olney. Thus he keeps pace with the world, though remote from its stir and contamination. He reads aloud another portion of the trial of Hastings, most reluctant as friend and as Christian to believe his old school-fellow the guilty blood-dyed oppressor that he is here described. He reads the heads of a bill brought in by the Lord Chancellor to change, to extend rather, the criminal code of the country; and says, passionately, Will they never try preventive means? There is no flesh in man's obdurate heart, it doth not feel for man.' He skims the motley contents of the 'folio of four pages,' gathering the goings on of the great Babel, as food for future rumination; and he would have read the speech of the Chancellor, had not more important concerns carried him away,-for old John Queeney, the shoemaker in the back street, longs to see Mr. Cowper by his bed-side. Mr. Newton, John's minister, is in London; and though John and Mr. Cowper are in nowise acquainted, saving seeing each other in church, there are dear ties and blessed hopes common to both; so Cowper goes off immediately. But since Mrs. Unwin insists that it is a cold damp night, he takes his great-coat, though only to please her, and Sam marches before with the lantern. John Queeney has but one poor room, Sam would be an intruder there; and as it is harsh to have him wait in the street, like the attendant horses of a fine lady, Sam is sent home by his amiable master.

"When, in an hour afterwards, Mr. Cowper returns, he tells that John Queeney is dying, and will probably not see over the night; that he is ill indeed, but that the King and the nobles of England might gladly exchange states with that poor shoemaker, in the back street of Olney :-his warfare was accomplished! Mrs. Unwin understands him: she breathes a silent inward prayer, for her dying fellow-creature, and fellow-christian; and no more is said on this subject. Cowper, now in a steady and cheerful voice, reads the outline of a petition, he has drawn out in name of the poor lace-workers of Olney, against an intended duty on candles. On them such a tax would have fallen greviously. My dear Mr. Cowper, this is more like an indignant remonstrance than an humble petition,' said his friend, with her placid smile. "Indeed and I fear it is. How could it well be otherwise? But this must be modified; the poet's imprudence must not hurt the poor lace-workers' cause.'

"And now Sam brings in supper-a Roman meal, in the days of Rome's heroic simplicity; and when it is withdrawn, Hannah, the sole maid-servant, comes in to say she has carried one blanket to Widow Jennings, and another to Jenny Hibberts; and that the shivering children had actually danced round, and hugged, and kissed the comfortable night-clothing, for lack of which they perished; and the women themselves shed tears of thankfulness, for this well-timed, much-wanted supply.

“And you were sure to tell them they came not from us,' said the poet. Hannah replied that she had, and withdrew.

"These blankets cannot cost the generous Thornton above ten shillings a-piece, Mr. Cowper,' says Mrs. Unwin. Oh! how many a ten-shillings that would, in this severe season, soften the lot of the industrious poor, are every night lavished in the city he inhabits! How many blankets would the opera-tickets of this one night purchase! And can any one human creature have the heart or the right thus to lavish, yea, not sinfully, yet surely not without blame, while but one other of the same great family perishes of hunger, or of cold?'

"And they speak of their poor neighbours by name; they know many of them, their good qualities, their faults, and their necessities. And fireside discourse flows on in the easy current of old, endeared, and perfect intimacy; and Cowper is led incidentally to talk of dark passages in his earlier life; of the Providence which had guided and led him to this resting-place by the green pastures and still waters;' of the mercy in which he had been afflicted; of a great deliverance suddenly wrought; of the ARM which had led him into the wilderness, while the banner over him was love.' And then the talk ebbs back to old friends, now absent; to domestic cares, and little family concerns and plaus; the garden, or the greenhouse, matter 'fond and trivial,' yet interesting, and clothed in the language of a poet, and adorned by a poet's fancy. "I must again ask, had the Lord High Chancellor ever gained to his heart any one intelligent and affectionate woman, to whom he could thus unbend his mindpour forth his heart of hearts-in the unchilled confidence of a never-failing sympathy: This I shall consider the possession of this friend—an immense weight in Cowper's scale, when we come to adjust the balance," said Mr. Dodsley.

"I must now read you the fruits of my morning's study, Ma'am,' says our poet, after a pause; I had well-nigh forgot that.'-And he reads his sublime requiem on the loss of the Royal George.

"I am mistaken if this be not wonderfully grand, Mr. Cowper,' says his ancient critic. But hark! our cuckoo clock. It must be regulated-you forget your duties, Sir-Tiney must be put up, and'—

"You must just allow me, Mary, to give one puff of the bellows to the greenhouse embers. The air feels chilly to-night-my precious orange-tree.' And Mrs. Unwin smiles over his fond care, as the gentleman walks off with the bellows under his arm.

"And now it is the stated hour of family worship. Sam and Hannah march forward in decent order. But I shall not attempt to describe the pious household rites, where the author of the Task is priest and worshipper. Affectionate Goodnights' close the scene. And this is the order of the evenings at Olney.

"Cowper regulates the cuckoo clock; for though he has no alarum watch, or im. pending audience of Majesty, he lays many duties on himself, lowly, yet not ignoble; so about the same hour that the Chancellor rolls off for Windsor, Cowper, also alert in duty, is penning his fair copy of the lace-worker's petition to Parliament, or despatching one of his playful, affectionate epistles to his cousin, Lady Hesketh, or acknowledging the bounty of the benevolent Thornton to the poor of Olney. And now, body and mind refreshed, the blessings of the night remembered, and the labours of the day dedicated in short prayer and with fervent praise, and he is in his greenhouse study, chill though it be, for it is quiet and sequestered. See here, Fanny-our last picture. But so minutely has the poet described his favourite retreat that this sketch may be deemed superfluous labour. Yet this is and will ever be a cherished spot; for here many of his virtuous days were spent.

"Why pursue the theme farther," continued the Curate, ❝ you all know the simple tenor of his life :

Thus did he travel on life's common way,
In cheerful godliness,'

The visitations to which his delicately-organized mind was liable, I put out of view. They were a mystery beyond his mortal being-far beyond our limited human intelligence. And tell me now, my young friends, which, at the close of his memorable life, may be pronounced the best, and, by consequence, the happiest man of our Three Westminster Boys? Each was sprung of earth's first blood;' and though I do not assert that any one of the three is a faultless model, it is a fair question to ask, which has your suffrage ?-He who, by the force of his intellect and ambition, the hardihood and energy of his character, took his place at the head of the councils of this mighty empire,-he, the conqueror of so fair a portion of the East, who, by arms and policy, knit another mighty empire to this,-or he- the stricken deer,' who sought the shades, the arrow rankling in his side-who dwelt apart, inblest seclusion from a jarring world,' and who, as his sole memorial and trophy, has left us

This single volume paramount.""

And Mr. Dodsley lifted Sophia's small and elegant copy of Cowper's works, and gave it into the hand of the youth next him.

An animated discussion now arose; and when Miss Harding collected the votes, ahe found the young gentlemen were equally divided between Hastings and Thurlow. The young ladies were, however, unanimous for Cowper; and the Curate gave his suffrage with theirs, repeating,

"Blessings be with them, and eternal praise,
Who gave us nobler loves and nobler cares
The poets who on earth have made us heirs
Of truth, aud pure delight, by heavenly lays."

May the excellent authoress of this Tale long instruct and delight both old and young, in the convenient vehicle for diffusing knowledge and amusement, to which she has now betaken herself!

LOVE'S DEFEAT.

IMITATED FROM THE ITALIAN?

Love, on his rambles one summer day,

Made bold to call at the bower of Beauty;
Dame Reason arose to send him away,
But he push'd her aside and came swaggering in,
Chuck'd the matron Prudence under the chin,

And flung his scarf o'er the eyes of Duty.
"Now," the little god thought, "the field is clear,"
But he saw not where Pride in a corner stood;
And he marvelled much, and thought it queer,
That though Beauty at first received him well,
Yet soon a cold shade o'er her features fell,

And she frowned in very disdainful mood.
"Twas Pride that so wrought on the hapless maid,
Chilling her glance with his own stern eye;
He caught up the words that Love had said,
Until all their passionate warmth was gone,
And so they fell with a listless tone

On Beauty's ear, though Love knew not why.
Love bade a morn of bliss arise,-

A tranquil home in a spot of green ;

And Beauty beheld it with smiling eyes,
Till Pride, behind Love, his finger set

On a jewel-emblazoned coronet,

Then Beauty look'd cold on Love's fairy scene.
Love next sought to lead the maid along

In a chain of flowers all soft and gay;
But Pride had a chain of gold more strong,
And Beauty stoop'd to the glittering yoke,
While Love's frail band asunder broke:

Then Love spread his wings and flew away.
Beauty now felt she was fastly bound,

And wildly strove Pride's chain to sever;
But the more she struggled, the more around
Her limbs it coiled. Then her breast she smote,
And called on Love, but Love heard her not;

So Beauty is Pride's poor slave for ever!-G. G. C.
G. G. C.

THE PASSIVE RESISTANCE OF EDINBURGH, TO THE
CLERGY-TAX.

A SYSTEM of Passive Resistance to the iniquitous local impost, disguised under the name of the ANNUITY TAX, has been brought to a crisis by the imprisonment of MR. TAIT, the proprietor of this Magazine, for his proportion of the tax by which our clergy are maintained. How he should have had the honour thrust upon him of inflicting the death-blow on this obnoxious tax, it is easier to know than to tell. Mr. Tait had neither been an active, nor obtrusive resister: though, like thousands of the most respectable citizens of Edinburgh, and particularly the booksellers, he refused to pay annuity. This tax has ever been hateful to the people, from almost every reason which can render an impost odious. It is considered a tax on conscience with many. It is a tax unknown in the Kirk Establishment, and peculiar to Edinburgh; unequal in its pressure; and arbitrary and irritating in the mode of exaction; and it is one which gives, as has been seen, power to the clergy to disgrace themselves and their profession, and wound the cause of Christianity. Power of imprisonment over their hearers and townsmen, is not a power for ministers of the Gospel. For four years, measures have been taken to resist this impost; and for the last eighteen months it has been successfully opposed, so far as goods were concerned, by a well-concerted Passive Resistance. Many of the citizens were (and are) under horning,* and liable to caption, at the time the clergy selected Mr. Tait. For Passive Resistance, during the last eighteen months, has been, as we shall have occasion to explain, so well organized, and has wrought so well to defeat the collection of the tax, that, unless the ministers had turned the kirks into old-furniture warehouses, it was idle to seize any more feather-beds, teakettles, and chests of drawers; either from those who could not, or those who would not pay this irritating and unjust local impost, marked by every deformity which can render a tax hateful. The legal right of the ministers of the Kirk in Edinburgh, to imprison for stipend, was questioned. Mr. Tait is probably the first imprisoned victim of the Kirk; nor will there be many more, or we greatly misunderstand the character of the people and of the times in Scotland. A few weeks back, it was decided by the Law Courts that the ministers had the right of imprisonment; though an appeal to the Lord Chancellor still lay open to the

The legal jargon of which the Edinburgh prints are full just now, must amuse and perplex the English and Irish. What can they think of widows under caption; and hornings issued by the ministers? By one of the many beautiful fictions of our law, no man can be imprisoned for debt. His crime is rebellion. The King having sent "greeting," ordering the debtor to pay his creditor, if the debtor refuse to comply, he is presumed to be denounced rebel at Edinburgh Cross and Leith Pier by the horn, and is sent to jail for resistance of the King's command. The whole thing is admirably described by the Antiquary to his nephew, Hector Macintyre, who remained about as wise as before; or as wise as a recusant Irishman in the Cowgate, on whom our clergy lately made a charge of horning. "Horning! horning!-by the powers! if they bring a horning against me, I'll bring a horning against them." When the King's messenger-at-arms, as tipstaves are called in Scotland, brought his horning to the Cowgate, the Irishman, previously provided with a tremendous bullock's horn, blew a blast "so loud and dread," that it might have brought down the Castle wall; and a faction mustered as quickly as if it had sounded in the suburbs of Kilkenny. The messenger-at-arms took leave as rapidly as possible, and without making the charge of horning at this time.

inhabitants, who have petitioned against the tax, till they are tired of petitioning. The clergy, to give them their due, lost no time in exercising their new power. Hornings and captions were flying on all sides ;* though no one would believe that Presbyterian Divines, the Fathers of the Scottish Kirk, calling themselves ministers of the gospel of love, and peace, and charity, would ever proceed to the fearful extremity of throwing their townsmen and hearers into jail. The first experiment was made on a gentleman in very delicate health, about a fortnight before Mr. Tait's arrest. This gentleman was attended to the jail door by numbers of the most respectable citizens-resisters-in carriages. He paid, and the procession returned home. Two of his escort were Mr. Adam Black, publisher of the Edinburgh Review, and Mr. Francis Howden, a wealthy retired jeweller of the highest respectability. These two gentlemen were, some few months before, chairman and deputychairman of the Lord Advocate's election committee. These are the kind of men who have actively opposed the tax.

There was a lull for ten days. A Quaker was expected to be the next victim; but the unexpected honour fell on Mr. Tait. The clergy could not have committed so capital a blunder if they had aimed at it; or so effectually have laid the axe to the root of the tree. This grand stroke of policy was, doubtless, intended to finish the thing at once. Once compel him to submit, and glory and gain were secure. That there might be no more processions, he was waylaid coming into town in the morning; and, to the consternation of the clergy themselves, submitted to the alternative of going to prison rather than pay the tax. His first letter. which is subjoined, † explains the nature of our clergy

The agent of the clergy, Mr. H. Inglis, son of the Reverend Dr. Inglis, the leader of the Church, and the grand instrument in smuggling the clause into the Bill under which the clergy distrain and imprison,-acted in such energetic haste against the citizens, in obtaining these profitable hornings, that it is said he forgot to take out the attorney license before he commenced horning; which neglect infers a penalty of L.200. Will it be exacted ?-Every tax-payer is against the tax, but every one would neither have gone to jail nor incurred prosecution. "Mr. Tait should just have paid," said one of the cautious disapprovers. "No man will uphold the tax; but where's the good of putting two-three more guineas in the pouch of POPE JOHN'S son." The argument has force. Surely, for the sake of common decency, another of our multitudinous W. S.'s might have been found for the lucrative office devolved on the son of the great leader of the Kirk Assemblies.

†TO THE EDITOR OF THE CALEDONIAN MERCURY.

"SIR,—I wish to be allowed, through the medium of your paper, to explain the reasons which have induced me to submit to imprisonment, rather than pay the annuity or ministers' stipend. My reasons are these:

The tax was imposed by the act 1661, and preceding acts, to raise 19,000 merks, which were to be applied to the maintenance of only six of the twelve Edinburgh clergymen ; whereas a sum very much larger has been collected, under the name of annuity, and applied to the maintenance of all the Edinburgh clergymen, and to other purposes.

The collection and application of the annuity was illegal up to 1809; and was only then made legal (if legal it yet is) by a clause surreptitiously and illegally inserted in an act of Parliament, which had been intimated as one for simply extending the royalty of the city. Unless an act of Parliament, fraudulently obtained by the clergy, can make the annuity, as now collected and applied, legal, the collection and application are still illegal.

Altogether, by the annuity, impost, seat rents, shore dues at Leith, &c., about L.21,000 are collected, in name of the Church Establishment, while only about half that sum is applied to its legitimate purposes.