Have you ever seen my Rosa? Naughty, little, laughing Rosa! Queen of Smiles is pretty Rosa; Passing sweet's the voice of Rosa ;- Should have liv'd to hear my Rosa! The pouting lip of wicked Rosa ; Countless are the charms of Rosa When I read, my book is Rosa: How sweet, if Cupid conquered Rosa, Can you love me, gentle Rosa? me, THE REWARD OF MERIT.-Gentlemen, -The following paragraph has (as the phrase is) gone the round of the newspapers : "Joseph Lancaster, the celebrated founder of the new system of education, is residing in poverty at Montreal, in Canada, labouring for his living, and the maintenance of a wife and family." the words, he would be more likely to prosper than he is at present, with no other claims than that of being the founder of a system for the instruction of his species.-I am, Gentlemen, &c. THE DIGNITY OF JUSTICE.-Gentlemen, -Much has been said, from time to time, of the efficacy of certain outward appearances in a court of justice, much of the dignity of which has been attributed to the mountain of wig upon the head of the judge, or to the gown in which the nature of his office demands that he should wrap himself. It seems strange that solemnity should be ensured by the assumption of an unnatural pile of powdered hair, or that wisdom should be found in a few yards of blue drapery. So far, however, does this notion prevail, that a learned judge, who, perhaps, felt how much he depended upon his outward trappings for his own dignity, positively refused to listen to a celebrated counsel who presented himself in court without the usual professional appurtenance. If a wig really exercises a magic spell upon the judicial caput, why is not the charm tried upon the metropolitan magistrates? If wisdom be really communicable by the medium of false hair, why is the Bench suffered to continue to expose the folly and imbecility which a general assumption of wigs by the great paid might at once remedy? These observations are suggested by the accounts of a recent inquest, where, it is said, the jurymen took off their coats and waistcoats in the course of the investigation. It does not, however, appear that justice was at all retarded by the circumstance; for though they abandoned part of their Here, indeed, is an illustration of the habiliments, they adhered pertinaciously to march of intellect, for in this case intellect the verdict which they conscientiously arrivhas been obliged to march to Canada, be- ed at. There are, doubtless, many who will cause it found no reward in its native coun- maintain that justice could not have been try. It has been, indeed, truly said that administered in so undignified a scene; but we pay least of all to those who instruct it appears, that though the jurymen continuus," since the founder of a system of educa-ed to dispense with dignity, they were retion is obliged to resort to manual labour solved to maintain their authority. They abroad, because at home he did not meet would not allow a verdict to be dictated to with adequate encouragment. An Italian them, but persisted in their liberty to give fiddler who plays upon one string, (so well an unbiassed decision; and thus, coatless as is the English character known to foreign- they were, they succeeded in preserving ers,) visits our country with the professed their right as jurymen, though, in one sense object of taking away from it so many at least, it could not be said to be vested.—I thousand pounds. He observes, "I know am, Gentlemen, &c. &c. John Bull has got them for me," and the result proves him to be right. Had Mr. Lancaster been able to play the overture to BIOGRAPHICAL PARTICULARS OF CELE"Tancredi " upon a single string of a piano, or to stand upon his little finger for a quarter of an hour, without fatigue, he might have counted on making a ripid fortune at home, the only drawback then being the fact of his being an Englishman. Could he contrive, instead of trusting to his intellect, to stand upon his head in the literal sense of BRATED PERSONS LATELY DECEASED. WILLIAM WILBERFORCE, ESQ.-This distinguished and excellent gentleman died in Cadogan-place on the 3d of August, in the 74th year of his age. He was born at Hull, in 1759, of respectable parents, his father having been twice mayor. St. John's Hon. C. Long (Lord Farnborough), who had always been his steadfast friend and patron, deputy paymaster-general to the forces in the Windward and Leeward Islands. On his return he received the appointment of Comptroller of the Royal College, Chelsea. College, Cambridge, was his alma mater; and he was contemporary with William Pitt, with whom he contracted an intimate friendship. On coming of age, he was sent to parliament for Hull; and at the ensuing general election being returned for that place and the county of York, he chose to sit for the latter. In 1787, he brought for- N. G. CLARKE, Esq., K.C.-Died on the ward his first motion for the abolition of the 24th ult., at his residence at Handsworth, slave-trade; and to the end of his public life near Birmingham, Nathaniel Gooding steadily and earnestly persevered in endeav- Clarke, Esq., King's Counsel, and late Chief ouring to effect this important measure, the Justice of Brecon. The learned gentleman consummation of which may be said to be had practised for half a century honourably almost contemporary with his decease. Mr. and successfully at the bar, and had been Wilberforce's publications have been chiefly for some years senior counsel on the Midpamphlets-his speeches in parliament, let-land Circuit, from which he had very recentters, &c. &c.; but his most popular produc-ly retired. He also held for nearly forty tion (having run through fifteen or twenty years the Office of Recorder of Walsall; editions,) is, "A Practical View of the pre- and during a long and active life he devoted vailing Religious System of Professed Chris- much of his intervals of relaxation as a bartians, contrasted with Real Christianity," rister, to the duties of a magistrate for Stafwhich appeared in 1799. We may also fordshire and Warwickshire. His occasionmention his "Apology for the Christian Sab- al and valuable services as a Judge on the bath," in 1799, and frequently reprinted. In circuit must also be within the remembrance person, Mr. Wilberforce was diminutive, but of most of our readers. He was elevated in mind his proportions were great and admi- to the distinction of a Welsh Judge shortly rable. His voice, in speaking, was exceed- before the abolition of that office, but did ingly clear and musical; and his influence not proceed on more than two or three cirin the House of Commons for many years cuits. Mr. Clarke for many years commandsuperior to that of any individual not posed the Handsworth Troop of Staffordshire sessed of official power. In private life he Yeomanry Cavalry; and in that capacity, was most amiable and exemplary; and, al- as well as in his magisterial character, he together, he must be classed amongst the rendered on many occasions important sermost eminent men of a period full of event-vices to the town of Birmingham. He was ful circumstances, and illustrated by many striking examples of human genius. universally esteemed for his zeal, accomplishments, and eloquence as an advocatehis steady principles as a politician-his uprightness and impartiality as a magistrateand as an amiable man in all the relations of private life. CRITICAL NOTICES. Lectures on Poetry and General Literature, delivered at the Royal Institution in 1830 and 1831. By James Montgomery, Author of “The World before the Flood." The Pelican Island," &c. &c. 12mo. JOHN HERIOT, Esq.-Mr. Heriot was originally an officer in the marines; but, as well as his elder brother George, much attached to literary pursuits. They were both natives of Haddington, Scotland, and severally born in 1759 and 1760. George published a poem descriptive of the West Indies in 1781: a history of Canada (being deputy postmaster-general of British America) in 1804, and Travels through the same province in 1807, with some free and admirable plates from his own drawings. He is, we believe, still living. John commenced his SELDOM is the enthusiasm of the poetic literary career by publishing "The Sorrows temperament united with the calm reasonof the Heart," a poem, in 1787; which he ing spirit of philosophy. Yet the combination followed by a novel, entitled "The Half-pay is indispensable when the genius and art of Officer;" and, in 1792, "An Account of the poetry are the subject of critical inquiry and Siege of Gibraltar." When the Pitt admin- popular appeal. In Mr. Montgomery it existration resolved to have a newspaper faith-ists in a pre-eminent degree, and these lecful to its cause, and the "Sun" daily even-tures fully justify the fame he has acquired ing journal was established with that view, in the departments of literature to which, Mr. Heriot was chosen to be its first editor, for so many years, he has devoted his adwith the able co-operation of Mr. R. G. mirable talents. Few of our poets excel as Clarke, now the printer of the "London Ga- writers of prose, but Mr. Montgomery's Leczette." Countenanced by the government, tures (like his "Prose by a Poet") are a fine the "Sun" rose rapidly into public notice; specimen of pure English composition. The and within a few months circulated above style is simple; just what prose ought to four thousand a day. About twenty years be; and yet every sentence breathes of ago Mr. Heriot was appointed by the Right poetry. Leaving the ancient poets in the hands of the critic, we select the following " modern instance," because it is not only fine as an illustration, but powerful as an appeal to the feelings of the heart. We care not how hackneyed a subject, characters are engaged. All these are bodied the man of genius undertakes to illustrate. forth to the eye through the mind, as sculpture In his hands, if not a new creation, it will addresses the mind through the eye." come forth a new coinage. The essential elements may remain, but the metal will be purified, its substance enriched, and its form embellished. We had, indeed, imagined that poetry was an exception-that Sir Philip Sidney and Ben Johnson in pronouncing its eulogy had exhausted eloquence itself that nature and art could no farther go; but we had not calculated upon the powers of modern ingenuity. In acquaintance with his subject, in enthusiasm, in the variety and beauty of his illustrations, Mr. Montgomery's lecture on the pre-eminence of poetry among the fine arts is not only equal to the essays of his illustrious predecessors, but in some important particulars it is decidedly superior to them both. This lecture may be considered as intended to establish the position which the author assumes at the commencement, and which he has thus eloquently expressed. "Let us bring-not into gladiatorial conflict, but into honourable competition where neither can suffer disparagement-one of the masterChilde Harold,' in which that very statue is pieces of ancient sculpture, and two stanzas from turned into verse which seems almost to make it visible. "THE DYING GLADIATOR. "I see before me the gladiator lie; "Poetry is the eldest, the rarest, and the most excellent of the fine arts. It was the first fixed form of language; the earliest perpetuation of "Now all this sculpture has embodied in perthought; it existed before prose in history, before petual marble, and every association touched upmusic in melody, before painting in description, on in the description might spring up in a welland before sculpture in imagery. Anterior to the instructed mind while contemplating the insulatdiscovery of letters, it was employed to communi-ed figure which personifies the expiring champion. cate the lessons of wisdom, to celebrate the achievements of valour, and to promulgate the sanctions of law. Music was invented to accompany, and painting and sculpture to illustrate it." We dare not indulge at any length in the luxury of quotation, for we should really know not where to begin nor where to end; we must therefore content ourselves with two short extracts, in which the lecturer contends for the pre-eminence of poetry over sculpture. Painting might take up the same subject, and represent the amphitheatre thronged to the height with ferocious faces, all bent upon the exulting conqueror and his postrate antagonist-a thousand for one of them sympathizing rather with the transport of the former than the agony of the lat reached their climax: neither of them can give ter. Here, then, sculpture and painting have the actual thoughts of the personages whom they exhibit so palpably to the outward sense that the character of those thoughts cannot be mistaken. Poetry goes further than both, and when one of the sisters had laid down her chisel, the other her pencil, she continues her strain; wherein having already sung what each have pictured, she thus reveals that secret of the sufferer's breaking heart which neither of them could intimate by any visible sign. But, we must return to the swoon of the dying man: wretch who won. "Poetry is a school of sculpture in which the art flourishes not in marble or brass, but in that which outlasts both,-in letters which the fingers of a child may write or blot; but which once written, Time himself may not be able to obliterate; and in sounds which are but passing breath, yet being once uttered, by possibility may never cease to be repeated. Sculpture to the eye, in palpable "The arena swims around him-he is gone, materials, is of necessity confined to a few forms, Ere ceased the inhuman shout that hail'd the aspects, and attitudes. The poet's images are living, breathing, moving creatures; they stand,"He heard it and he heeded not,―his eyes walk, run, fly, speak, love, fight, fall, labour, suffer, die ;-in a word, they are men of like passions with ourselves, undergoing all the changes of actual existence, and presenting to the mind of the reader solitary figures or complicated groups more easily retained (for words are better recollected than shapen substances), and infinitely more diversified than the chisel could hew out of all the rocks under the sun. Nor is this a fanciful or metaphorical illustration of the pre-eminence "Myriads of eyes had gazed upon that statue: which I claim for the art I am advocating. In through myriads of minds all the images and ideas proof of it I appeal at once to the works of the connected with the combat and the fall, the oldest and greatest poets of every country. In spectators and the scene, had passed in the presHomer, Dante, and Chaucer, for example, it is ence of that unconscious marble, which has given exceedingly curious to remark with what scrupu-immortality to the pangs of death; but not a soul lous care and minuteness personal appearance, among all the beholders through eighteen centustature, bulk, complexion, age, and other incidents, ries,-not one had ever before thought of the are exhibited for the purpose of giving life and rude hut,' the Dacian mother,' the young barreality to the scenes and actions in which their barians. At length came the poet of passion; Were with his heart, and that was far away; turn to his wife and his little children." and looking down upon the dying gladiator, ing to its imperishable distinctions the glo(less as what it was than what it represented,) ry of patriotic martyrdom. The Stewart turned the marble into man, and endowed it with human affections; then away over the Apennines, and the Russel are placed in everlasting and over the Alps, away, on the wings of irre- contrast,-the royal murderer will be exepressible sympathy, flew his spirit to the banks of crated through all time-his illustrious victhe Danube, where, with his heart,' were the tim will be renowned as long as public and eyes' of the victim, under the nightfall of death; private virtue, ennobled by suffering, can for there were his young barbarians all at play, awaken sympathy and admiration in the huand there their Dacian mother.' This is nature, this is truth. While the conflict continued, the man bosom. It is remarkable that one memcombatant thought of himself only; he aimed at ber of the name of Russel was destined to nothing but victory-when life and this were disgust the nation with tyranny, and to haslost, his last thoughts, his sole thoughts, would ten its downfall; and another to achieve the liberties of his country by purifying its conWe assure our readers that this volume stitution and reforming its abuses. There abounds with such touches of nature as are some portions of these memoirs that exthese, united with the same critical acumen, cite an intense interest. It has been observand softened and beautified by the taste and ed that the romance of real life often exdelicacy of the most refined poetical senti- ceeds that of the imagination, and the adment. The five remaining lectures are on ventures and hairbreadth escapes of one of the following topics:-What is poetical?- the early ancestors of the Bedford family the form of poetry—the diction of poetry-abundantly confirm the truth of the obserthe various classes of poetry-the poetical vation. character-the theories and influences of No man could have had better opportunipoetry. These lectures must have been hailed by the lovers of poetry at the Royal Institution with enthusiastic pleasure; and to their powerful effect may be traced, we have little doubt, the cultivation of a taste for poetry among many who had never before heard its "planet-like music." Their appearance from the press, we confidently hope, will awaken the love of this delightful art in many a bosom yet untouched by its blessed influences; and as for those who can resist them, who," with creeping minds," cannot lift themselves up to look at the sky of poetry, this merited curse we must send them, in behalf of all poets, (as Sir Philip Sidney quaintly hath it,)-" that while they live they may live in love, and never get favour for lacking skill of a sonnet; and when they die, their memory may die from the earth for want of an epitaph." ties for accomplishing the task of domestic historian to this illustrious house than Mr. Wiffen. No man, from his acquirements and pursuits; could be more competent to undertake it; and, we are happy to add, all that knowledge, taste, and industry can perform, under these advantages, these volumes exhibit. Old Bailey Experience. Fraser. For the first time in our remembrance, a literary man has undertaken the task of proving that our legislators are wrong, and our laws founded upon mistaken principles, without stating his proofs with high-coloured party feeling, and mingling his condemnation of a system with the bitter spirit of political sectarianism. The mischief has ever been, when plans have been propounded for the amelioration of society, that soHistorical Memoirs of the House of Russel;ciety has itself too often opposed them, on from the Time of the Roman Conquest. By account of the attack which accompanied J. H. Wiffen, M.R.S.L., Corresponding the doctrines of the propounder on some Member of the Society of Antiquaries of Nor-offending class who were irritated into opmandy, &c. &c. 2 vols. 8vo. position: this will not be the case in the Mr. Wiffen is most happy in the selection present instance. The philosopher who of his motto "It is a reverend thing to see attacks legislation is always excused by all an ancient castle or building not in decay, or parties; for all parties consider that they to see a fair timber tree sound and perfect; are the exceptions, and chuckle with delight how much more to behold an ancient noble at the fancied exposure of their opponents. family, which hath stood against the waves Manifold are the causes to which our author and weathers of time." Such a spectacle attributes the present increase of crime, and is presented to us in the illustrious family of the general depravity of the lower classes; Russel. We contemplate its origin through but chiefly, and rightly, he arraigns our horthe dim obscurity of remote time-we follow rible penal code. With the feeling of a its line in an unbroken series-we behold it philanthropist, and the brain of a logician, a continued ascent to greatness till it reach- he brings home the causes of the disease of es the highest rank in the aristocracy, pre- society to their proper source. He exposes, serving that rank down to the present day with eloquence, and quotes innumerable without the slightest taint in its blood, or facts in support of his exposition, the miserimputation upon its honour-a noble tree, able method in which our bad laws are so one branch only severed from the trunk by badly administered. He shows the prethe hand of despotism, but that branch add-'mium that is given to pauperism, the hon ours that wait upon crime, and the infamy, main in their present state of moral, intelthat accompanies honest poverty: the poor- lectual, and religious ignorance, so long house is found to be the retreat of the indi- will every large town in the empire be the gent, broken-down, and often diseased centre and resort of a petty bandit of picktradesman, where he is compelled to herd pockets and burglars, whose interest it is to with the lowest of the low, the outcasts of thieve rather than to be honest. From the abject; a new soil, in a far land, with youth they have followed their calling; they certain freedom and probable competency, have gloried in its hazards and its exciteare the blessings that await the convicted ment; they are part of a well-organized felon.* Excess of crime is not met with fraternity, who assist each other in their proportionable punishment, and the petty need; they never knew the advantage of dabbler in guilt is visited with penalties honesty; they have no sympathy with the equal to those endured by the hardened honest, and love not the society that they rogue, while reform is rendered impossible are taught to believe is their hereditary from the nature of his associates, and, with hater. But educate them, let there be, as the particular prospects before him after his our author proposes, in each parish a school; conviction, amendment is to him the least not like our present national schools, but desirable of matters. To the practised where the judgment and the reasoning pauper, or the lazy and dissipated villager, powers of the children are cultivated and our poor-laws offer every inducement for they will then begin to perceive the advanindigence and trickery. The honest hus- tages of those laws of order that they now bandman, who struggles hard to keep him- either break or elude, and will become good self from the work house, has his indepen-citizens, where, without such a system, they dence mortified by perceiving that those who have half his industry and none of his honest pride, receive a relief from the churchwardens that places them in comparative affluence, while he meets with no encouragement-with no reward. Thus, "a bold peasantry, its country's pride," are hourly falling into self-abasement, and we, as a people, into national degradation. What would only have been good thieves. The Another matter that our author primarily insists upon is the badness of our present system of instruction, if the teaching that some small portion of the poor receive is worthy of that dignified name, and the necessity of an immediate improvement in our present meagre plans of education. "It cannot be denied," says our author, "but this country is embellished with some noble instances of bounty and munificence, but why spend time and money in sciomachy, leaving the substance untouched? Why employ your time and means in baling out at the ex-its certain reward. treme end of the drain dribblets of impurity, The arts of reading, writing, and figuring when by going to the cesspool at the other, you could stop up the source from whence all the feculent matter flows?" Why, indeed, we ask? So long as the poor re are now the utmost that is taught in the generality of schools. The two former are only the means of acquiring knowledge; the latter is only the commencement of knowledge itself; it is the commencement *It appears, however, from very numerous state- of the calculating power, essentially necesments in the work, that there is nothing the con- sary to the formation of a reasoning mind. vict in general dreads so much as transportation, Were children, previous to their being they frequently having been known to express a wish that they might suffer capital punishment taught the pro forma accomplishments, to rather than undergo transportation. The author- have questions put to them, in the answerity is too great for us to dispute. We cannot, ing of which they would have to exercise however, divest ourselves of the remembrance of their infantine ingenuity, and their latent many convicts, whose tales we have heard, having risen to some degree of eminence by their in-reason-questions involving the difference dustry and good conduct while under their sen- between good and bad, between just and tence in N. S. Wales, and of having afterwards unjust-we should doubtless have less of returned to this country and pursued a course of the peculations of servants and the embezhonesty and honour. Many too who have been zlements of clerks, less of petty concealed transported for life have, in conseqcence of their good conduct, obtained leave to return to Eng- dishonesty, less of open and daring crime. land, after having served a certain period in the colony. In such a way would our author alter part of our present vicious social system, and |