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"Pour un peuple aussi grand, la naissance n'est rien,
La richesse encore moins: son plus précieux bien
C'est un mérite rare, un courage invincible,

Le respect pour les Dieux, un coeur juste et sensible,
Le plus tendre retour aux soins de ses parens,
L'amour de son pays; la haine des Tirans,
L'obéissance aux loix, le mépris de la vie,
Un ame inaccessible à l'orgueil, à l'envie,
Un esprit tolerant, et de l'humanité
Respectant les devoirs avec sincerité.

Ce tableau si frappant n'est point une chimere,
Je pretendrais en vain tromper toute la terre.

Tu le sais cher *Jennings; en tracant ton portrait,

Je te prens pour garant, si, loin de mon objet,

Loin d'outrer les couleurs dont je peins tes semblables,
Les traits de mon pinceau sont faux ou véritables :
Si toutes ces vertus, dans les Américains,

N s'offrent chaque jour au reste des humains.
O vous, sage Dana, Isar et tendre $ Austine,
Des perfides Toris, la fureur intestine.

Eut beau pour vous seduire, emprunter tout son art,
La vertu vous couvrait d'un

puissant rempart,

Que bravant son courroux, ses forfaits, ses promesses,
Vous sûtes mépriser ses perfides largesses,
Et fideles aux loix que vos coeurs avouaient,
Servir votre pays en hâtant ses succès.

Telles sont en ce jour, cher ce peuple estimable,
Les nobles qualités qui rendent respectable

Le mortel assez grand pour en sentir le prix.

Il peut prétendre à tout la voix de son pays
D'un hommage eternel honorera son buste:

Et son nom radieux, toujours saint, noble, auguste,
De la nuit du tombeau percant l'obscurité,
Des siècles á venir se verra respecté."

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"Mr. Jennings, Esquire, born in Maryland, now at Brussels, unites in his character all the qualities which are here traced. To be convinced that flattery has no part in this picture, it is only necessary to visit this wise and beneficent American, or to take the opinion of all those who have had an opportunity of being in his company.

"Mr. Dana, Esquire, born in the environs of Boston, was appointed by Congress Secretary of Legation to his Excellency John Adams, in 1781, and came with that minister to Europe in that quality. Mr. Laurens, the eldest son of the illustrious President of Congress, brought him at Paris, where Mr. Dana then was on a particular mission to the court of Versailles, a commission from Congress, appointing him Minister Plenipotentiary to the Empress of all the Russias, and he is now at the Court of St. Petersburg. No man ever merited better than Mr. Dana, the title of wise.

"Mr. Isar (Izard) Esquire, one of the richest citizens of Charleston before the war, was named in one of the first sessions of Congress to go to Italy, and fill the place of Minister Plenipotentiary at the Court of Tuscany. But the Grand Duke did not think proper to receive a minister from this new power. Mr. Isar has travelled in the four quarters of the world; and his lady, the most amiable and most virtuous of women, has partaken with him all these dangerous and fatiguing journies. But what is more rare, this tender_wife has brought children to her husband in the four quarters of the world. Mr. Isar, since Charleston is in the power of the English, has lost the greater part of his immense fortune, which has not at all diminished the amenity of his character. It is a brilliant sacrifice which he has made to the liberty of his country, and he is now at Paris with his family.

S" Mr. Austine (Austin) Esquire, a rich merchant of Boston, has been twice named by the state of Massachusetts agent of that republick in France, where he gained the esteem of M. de Vergennes, and the friendship of all honest persons who knew him."

R

Though there are some errours in the names, they are tolerably correct for a Frenchman. Of the words prix and pays, we believe the rhyme is unjustifiable. It may be remarked, that, by an inconsistency not uncommon, though in this very passage there is a note declaiming against nobility, the writer is extremely careful of placing at the end of each name the word Ecuyer, Esquire, which he mistook for a distinction of rank. In the ardour of his feelings, he sometimes becomes burlesque; and the following description, which compares lord Cornwallis besieged in Yorktown to a fox in a poultry yard, is more suited to the levity of fable than the gravity of the epick muse.

"Tel qu'on voit un Renard fécond en artifices,
Pressé par la famine, ou mu par ses caprices,
Chercher à découvrir un serrail emplumé
Qui puisse satisfaire un Renard affamé.
Bien loin de se livrer à l'espoir téméraire
D'assouvir aisement son ardeur sanguinaire ;
Il remarque, il parcourt les sentiers tortueux
Qui menent du bocage à l'objet de ses voeux.
Choisissant le plus sombre, et rampant sur le ventre,
Il se traine sans bruit vers le ténébreux antre,
Ou, la tête sous l'aile, un troupeau de dindons
Dort d'un profond sommeil, parmi d'autres oisons,
Plus le Renard approche, au milieu des ténebres,
Plus il croit entrevoir mille images funebres,
D'un butin précédent gracieux souvenir,
Qui ne fait qu' irriter son violent desir.
Autour de lui tout être a fermé la paupiere,
De la cour mal gardée il franchit la barriere,
Un fumet attrayant embaume son palais,
Il croit déja toucher au moment du succès.
Son coeur se sent ému de la plus vive joie,
Une seule cloison environne sa proie :

En un instant il peut en forcer les barreaux,
If a pour réussir mille projets nouveaux.

Il allait battre en breche-une tendre poulette,

Qu'un amoureux courroux a fait coucher seulette,
Brûlant de jalousie, et juchée à l'écart,

A l'aide de la lune, avec un oeil hagard,

De son volage Coq cherchait partout le gite

Sa rivale le joint-ce seul aspect l'irrite;

Elle va s'élancer sur le couple odieux

Quand un autre ennemi vient s'offrir à ses yeux.
Craignant pour son amant, plus que pour ellememe,
Tout inconstant qu'il est, il fait son bien suprême :
Elle se bat les flancs, elle pousse des cris,
Qui penetrent d'effroi les coqs les plus hardis.
Mille eris dans les airs répetent ses allarmes :
Le Rustre epouvanté se leve et prend ses armes :
A sa voix tous les chiens, par d'affreux aboiemens,
Des mâtins d'alentour hâtent les hurlemens.
Le Renard effrayé par la premiere alerte,
S'enfuit pour eviter le moment de sa perte.
Mais o destin cruel! deux hardis lévriers,
De la mort qui les suit precurseurs meurtriers,
D'un Hobereau voisin dévancant le courage,
Ont vu Maitre Renard courir vers la bocage:
Ils volent sur ses pas, et malgré ses detours,

*

Ses ruses et ses bonds, ils le suivent toujours.

*An inferiour country gentleman, whose principal merit is a knowledge of hunting, and the nourishing a number of dogs which ruin the peasant, and in this way to furnish proofs of his noble extraction.

Bientôt, de vingt mâtins une meute abboyante
Du fuyard malheureux vient grossir l'épouvante;
Par ce cordon terrible il est environné ;

Au sort le plus cruel il parait condamné.
Il ne peut échapper à ses fiers adversaires;
Mais, avant de périr sous leurs dens meurtieres,
Il songe à sa vengeance; et soudain furieux,
Courant aux levriers, il saisit un des deux ;
Le renverse sanglant, dechire ses entrailles,
Se prepare du moins d'illustres funérailles,
Et tombant à son tour sous cent coups réunis,
Il expire en voyant ses meurtriers punis.

"Tel parut Cornwallis; habile en sa retraite,
Pressé de toutes parts, poussé par la Fayette,
Dans les murs d'Yorktown il traine ses drapeaux,
Pour se défendre en brave, ou périren hérès.
Ses pales Légions de travaux harassées,
Et par tous les besoins à la fois épuisées,
Ont oublié leurs maux, demandent le combat
Sous un chef intrépidé, adoré du soldat.”

We shall close our extracts from this work with two of the notes the first affords a strong instance of the bathos, and the second of the force of superstition.

"In 1778, the author defied M. Neckar, to levy any new tax upon the peo ple. Invention had been exhausted by his predecessors. The illustrious Genevan promised to provide for all the demands of the war during five years, without augmenting the publick taxes. M. Neckar kept his word; but the retiring of this great man, produced by the artifices of the Count de Maurepas, will be more fatal to France than the retreat of Sully. Mr. His, merchant of Hamburg, has already felt the unfortunate effects of it.

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"A Spaniard walking with a Spanish officer, after this unfortunate action, (the battle between Admiral Rodney and Admiral Langara) on the smiling banks of the Mancanares, and discoursing on the misfortune of Langara, remarked to him, that none of the Spanish vessels which bore the name of a Saint had fallen into the power of the English. The officer reminded him, that the Saint Dorothea had been blown into the air with her whole crew. Well! answered the pious Spaniard, Was it not better to be blown into the air than to fall into the hands of hereticks ?"

The work is very elegantly printed, and though there are several errours, they are not more numerous than would be expected from a work, printed in one country in the language of another.

INTELLIGENCE AND MISCELLANEOUS ARTICLES,

FOREIGN.

DR. FORBES, of Edinburgh, is engaged on a translation of Pliny's Natural History, which is to be accompanied with such notes and illustrations as may be necessary to elucidate the context, a Life of the Author, and a Preliminary Dissertation on the Origin of Natural History, and on its progress and gradual improvement from infancy, to its present state of comparative maturity. The trans lator, in thus announcing his intention to the publick, may be per mitted to observe, that the thirty seven books of the Natural History of Caius Plinius Secundus, may justly be regarded as the encyclo

paedia of antiquity, since the most inquisitive and industrious author, has collected all the facts recorded by every Greek and Roman writer, previous to his own time, concerning the animal, the vegetable, and the mineral kingdoms; and detailed in a clear and luminous arrangement, all that the accumulated experience of past ages had ascertained relative to the nature of animals and vegetables, to meteorology, astronomy, botany, medicine, chymistry, &c. Pliny's work may be divided into three parts, geography, natural history, and the materia medica. Of his geographical inquiries, the most important, perhaps, are his Strictures on the Interiour Part of Africa. He derived the sources of his information on this subject, from the Carthaginians; and from what he has recorded respecting the natives and products of these regions, it appears that the ancients were much better informed than the moderns are, regarding this quarter of the globe, which, from recent events, and the consequences likely to ensue from a great act of national justice, deservedly excites in this country no small share of publick interest. The Materia Medica exclusively occupies fifteen books, and constitutes a most curious and instructive department of he author's investigations. It can not be denied that Pliny discovers his ignorance in particular points, and that he records with great gravity many absurd fables, and anile stories. But he, perhaps, might have adopted the language of Quintus Curtius, Equidem plura transcribo, quam credo, (Lib. IX. cap. 1.) and we know that he occasionally discovers a proper degree of scepticism on various points which come under his review, and directs his severe rebukes against the vanity and self confidence of the Greek authors, from whom he derived his information. And notwithstanding all the censure to which he is obnoxious on the score of credulity, his eloquent and instructive history must ever be regarded, as an immortal monument of its author's indefatigable industry, and Roman spirit. Pliny's History is indeed to be considered as an invaluable treasure, more especially on account of its containing an infinite number of excerpts and observations, illustrative of the various subjects of which the author treats, extracted from the books of many ancient writers, whose works have perished through the injury of time. It may then appear surprising that no English translation of this admirable work, has been offered to the publick for more than two centuries. It is the present translator's wish to supply, to the best of his abilities, (such as they are) this desideratum in English literature. One great object which the translator will keep in view in his notes and illustrations, shall be to accommodate Pliny's descriptions of animals, plants, and minerals, to the nomenclature of the Systema Naturae Linnaei. This, he is duly aware, will constitute by much the most difficult part of his labour, and he despairs of executing it with fullsatisfaction either to the publick or to himself. But as in the present state of natural history, a translation of Pliny can not be excused from making the attempt, he may be permitted to hope, that he shall be able to contribute in some degree at least, towards its accomplishment. The translation thus enlarged, must extend to six or seven volumes in octavo; and will be published either in separate volumes

successively, or when the whole shall have been finished, as future circumstances may render adviseable. The translator will render all the diligence and despatch in the exécution of his task, which his health, other necessary avocations, the contingencies of life, the extent and the difficulty of the undertaking, may enable him to command.

Notice of French publications, for the month of September 1808; translated for the Anthology, from the Mercure de France of that date.

LEGISLATION......If Spain was indebted to the prowess of the Moors for that fame which she was unable to preserve after their expulsion, still some cities which passed from her dominion into the power of the French, appear to have gained by the exchange. Thus, Barcelona, after having been wrested from her by the victorious arms of Charlemagne, soon acquired a most extensive commerce. She even reached, under the auspices of that powerful monarch, such a degree of consequence, that she became the common mart of nations, and the arbiter of commercial and maritime transactions. Then appeared in that capital, the celebrated compilation of marine laws, known originally by the name of the laws of Barcelona, and afterwards under the title of Il Consolato del mare. This, which was then the only system on the subject, was considered as law by the merchants and navigators of all nations.

Towards the end of the XVth. century, the laws of Barcelona were considerably altered and corrupted. At this period, Francis Celelles, a Catalonian, through charity alone, as he himself asserts, with much labour, frequent conferences, and advice with skillful and aged persons, and recurrence to many authorities, undertook to restore the Consolato del mare to its ancient purity. His work, written in Catalan, was printed for the first time, at Barcelona in 1494. The edition was almost immediately exhausted, and at last became so rare, that there were doubts of its existence. In the mean time, many fragments of the Consolato became known to foreigners, who adopted them, and among the rest, the English, although they were the first to violate it.

What must have been the surprise and joy of the jurisconsult Boucher, when in his researches into the antiquities of commercial and maritime law, he met with an original copy of the Consolato del mare, of 1494! His first step was to restore to his country this valuable code of maritime laws, which the French may, in reality, claim as their own, having established, or at least revived them under their government.

It is, in fact, the Consolato del mare, purified by Celelles, that M. Bou cher has translated from the Catalan into French, and of which he has just given an impression.* We cannot convey a more exalted idea of this work, than in announcing it as the only long known marine code, of which the first digest was made by the French Catalonians, and as having furnished the basis of our present commercial and maritime jurisprudence ; being ever an authority in all cases not provided for by our laws.

The edition of Celelles is divided into three parts, of which the intermediate one, by far the best, comprehends the Consolato, properly so called, which treats of the usages and customs of the sea; the part which precedes and that which follows, contain some ordinances of the kings of Arragon, that Celelles acknowledges he added of his own head. M. Bou

Consulat de la mer, or Pandects of commercial and maritime law, being the law of Spain, Italy, Marseilles, and England, and consulted by all nations as written reason, according to the original edition of Barcelona, of the year 1494; dedicated to Mons. Regnier, Prince Cambacérès, Arch-Chancellor of the empire. By P. B. Boucher, professor of commercial and maritime law in the Academy of Legislation, &c. 2 Large vols. in 8vo. p. 1500.

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