222

SURGEONS' COLLEGE.

HE Royal College of Surgeons, situate in Lincoln's Inn Fields, is a dignified structure of the lonic order, with an elegant portico, over which are inscribed the words "Collegium Regale Chirurgorum, &c." On the summit are placed the arms of the College, supported by two whole length figures intended to represent Machaon and Podalirius, the sons of Esculapius.

The interior of the College is spacious and grand. The Museum is one of its principal features. Amongst the valuable materials that are to be found here, is the admirable and extensive collection of the celebrated John Hunter, which he purchased by order of government. It contains preparations of the human frame in all its variety of shapes: also rare objects of Natural History, which greatly contribute to physiological and pathological illustration. Here is a beautiful arrangement of mineral and vegetable productions; amounting to upwards of twenty thousand specimens and preparations: also numerous choice contributions made by Sir Joseph Banks; five hundred specimens of natural and diseased structure, given by Sir W. Blizard; and others by Sir E. Home.

One thing above all others arrests the attention of the stranger:-it is the wife of the far-famed Van Butchel, laid out in a square box, which is filled up with preservative composition; over the face is a square of glass

which can be removed at pleasure. The features are still entire; and certainly it must be considered a curious specimen of the art of chemistry.

Surgeons were (until the year 1809,) incorporated with the Barbers; when they obtained a new charter, which constituted them a separate body; since which, they have justly been considered an enlightened and respectable race.

222

THE LAWYER'S FAREWELL TO HIS MUSE.*
AS by some tyrant's stern command,
A wretch forsakes his native land,
In foreign climes condemn'd to roam,
An endless exile from his home,
Pensive he treads the destined way,
Till on some neighbouring mountain's brow
He stops, and turns his eyes below,
There, melting at the well-known view,
Drops a last tear, and bids adieu :-
So 1, from thee thus doom'd to part,
Gay Queen of Fancy and of Art,
Reluctant move with doubtful mind,
Oft stop, and often look behind.

Companion of my tender age,
Serenely gay and sweetly sage,
How blithesome were we wont to rove
By verdant hill or shady grove,

Where fervent bees, with humming voice,
Around the honied oak rejoice,
Aud aged elms, with awful bend,
In long cathedral walks extend:
Lull'd by the lapse of gliding floods,
Cheer'd by the warbling of the woods,

How blest my days, my thoughts how free,

In sweet society with thee!

Then all was joyous, all was young,

And years unheeded roll'd along.

But now the pleasing dream is o'er,

These scenes must charm me now no more;
Lost to the fields, and torn from you,
Farewell, a long-a last adieu !

Me wrangling courts and stubborn law,
To smoke, and crowds, and cities draw."

We are indebted to that excellent Work the Batchelor's Wife, for this Poem by Sir W. Blackstone, as well as for two other Minor Pieces.

There selfish faction rules the day,
And pride and avarice throng the way;
Diseases taint the murky air,

And midnight conflagrations glare;
Loose revelry and riot bold

In frighted streets their orgies hold;
Or where in silence all is drown'd,
Fell murder walks his nightly round.
No room for peace-no room for you—
Adieu, celestial Nymph! adieu.

Shakspeare, no more thy sylvan song,
Nor all the art of Addison,

Pope's heaven-strung lyre, nor Waller's ease,
Nor Milton's mighty self must please.

Instead of these, a formal band

With furs and coifs around me stand,
With sounds uncouth and accents dry
That grate the soul of harmony.
Each pedant sage unlocks his store
Of mystic, dark, discordant lore,
And points with tottering hand the ways
That lead me to the thorny maze.
There, in a winding close retreat,
Is Justice doom'd to fix her seat;
There, fenced by bulwarks of the law,
She keeps the wondering world in awe;
And there, from vulgar sight retired,
Like Eastern queens, is more admired.
O let me pierce the secret shade,
Where dwells the venerable maid,
There humbly mark, with reverend awe,
The guardian of Britannia's law;
Unfold with joy her sacred page,
The united boast of many au age;
Where mix'd, yet uniform, appears
The wisdom of a thousand years;
In that pure spring the bottom view,
Clear, deep, and regularly true;
And other doctrine thence imbibe,
Than lurk within the sordid tribe;
Observe how parts with parts unite
In one harmonious rule of right;
See countless wheels distinctly tend,
By various laws to one great end,
While mighty Alfred's piercing soul
Pervades and regulates the whole.

Then, welcome business-welcome strife,
Welcome the cares-the thorns of life,
The visage wan-the poreblind sight,
The toil by day-the lamp at night,
The tedious forms-the solemn prate,
The pert dispute-the dull debate,
The drowsy bench-the babbling hall:
For thee, fair Justice, welcome all.
Thus let my noon of life be past,
Yet let my setting sun at last,
Find out the still, the rural cell,
Where sage Retirement loves to dwell.
There let me taste the homefelt bliss
Of innocence and inward peace;
Untainted by the guilty bribe-
Uncursed amid the harpy tribe-
No orphan's cry to wound my ear,
My honour and my conscience clear.
Thus I calmly meet my end,
Thus to the grave in peace descend!

CUMBERLAND, in his Memoirs, observes that "At Madrid there was but one theatre for plays, no opera, and a most unsocial gloomy style of living seemed to characterize the whole body of the nobles and grandees. I was not often tempted to the theatre, which was small, dark, ill-furnished, and ill-attended, yet, when the celebrated tragic actress, known by the title of Tiranna, played, it was a treat, which I should suppose no other stage then in Europe could compare with. That extraordinary woman, whose real name I do not remember, and whose real origin cannot be traced, till it is settled from what particular nation or people we are to derive the outcast race of Gipsies, was not less formed to strike beholders with the beauty and commanding majesty of her person, than to astonish all that heard her, by the powers that nature and art had

combined to give her. My friend Count Pietra Santa, who had honourable access to this great stage heroine, intimated to her the very high expectation I had formed of her performances and the eager desire I had to see her in one of her capital characters, telling her, at the same time, that I had been a writer for the stage in my own country. In consequence of this intimation, she sent me word that I should have notice from her when she wished me to come to the theatre, till when, she desired I would not present myself in my box upon any night, though her name might be in the bill, for it was only when she liked her part, and was in humour to play well, that she wished me to be present.

In obedience to her message, I waited several days, and at last received the looked for summons. I had not been many minutes in the theatre before she sent a maudate to me to go home, for that she was in no dispositon that evening for playing well, and should neither do justice to her own talents, nor to my expectations. I instantly obeyed this whimsical injunction, knowing it to be so perfectly in character with the capricious humour of her tribe. When something more than a week had passed, I was again invited to the theatre, and permitted to sit out the whole representation. I had not then enough of the language to understand much more than the incidents and actions of the play, which was of the deepest cast of tragedy; for in the course of the plot she murdered her infant children, and exhibited them dead on the stage, lying on each side of her, whilst she, sitting on the bare floor between them (her attitude, action, features, tones, defying all description), presented such a high-wrought picture of hysteric phrensy, laughing wild amidst severest woe, as placed her in my judgment at the very summit of her art; in fact I have no conception that the powers of acting can be carried higher, and such was the effect upon the audience, that whilst the spectators in the pit, having caught a kind of sympathetic phrensy from the scene, were rising up in a tumultuous manner, the word was given out by authority for letting fall the curtain, and a catastrophe, probably too strong for exhibition, was not allowed to be completed.

A few minutes had passed when this wonderful creature, led in by Pietra Santa, entered my box; the artificial paleness, her eyes which she had dyed of a bright vermilion round the edge of the lids, her fine arms bare to the