*

been accustomed to the unspeakable quickness and inimitable grace of our celestial waiting women. Or that the most delicious comfits, or high seasoned earthly dainties; (nay, even potted lampreys dressed in a silver saucepan†) should appear dry and tasteless to one who had sat down to the dishes of the sky, garnished with celestial amaranth, and washed down with nectar.

My friends in the air soon found me out, and used very kindly to come and see me when I lived at Lord Bolingbroke's. We had many invisible nightly interviews in my bedchamber. How it would have astonished his lordship, could his mortal eyes have witnessed these strange parties. There used to be Puck and Ariel sitting chatting on each side of my pillow, and diverting me with all the sky-scandal they could collect,whilst Peaseblossom and Mustardseed, with a whole coterie of other spirits of less distinction, were assembled round my bed. Some other spirits of less distinction would be hopping about on the coverlet, or playing at hide-andseek in and about the bed-curtains. But these visits had a bad effect on my spirits. They talked much of the delightful and romantic scenery of a new planet which had been just discover ed, and of the uncommon gayety of the last winter in the moon. This used to make me often impatient and fretful: the world ascribed it to the enemies my talents had raised against me, but I was only longing for a jaunt to my own element. Still, however, I continued to write. Pastoral, Satire, Criticism, Burlesque, Heroic, were all equally familiar to me, and I concluded my literary career by giving your globe some little insight into the world of which I was an original inhabitant,

and introducing them to my fellowspirits and invisible brethren, in my Rape of the Lock, a very clever production certainly for a mortal, but for which, as a spirit, I take no great merit.

"All praise is foreign, but of true desert.”

I

Excuse me quoting from myself. After having completed my stated period of existence upon earth, and resumed my ærial essence, I continued for a long time entirely occupied in the invisible world; but at last I was seized with an inclination to revisit your globe, and more particularly, because I had learnt that innumerable commentaries had been written on my works,-that there were disputes concerning the meaning of some of my best passages, and that I had actually been again accused of infidelity in my Essay on Man. Accordingly, leaving the upper regions, I landed invisible in the streets of Ed- at that time distinguished, as I well knew, for its literary and philosophic society. walked straight to the library of the Faculty of Advocates, but I must own, that, accustomed as I had long been to the lightness and beauty of our aerial libraries in the upper world, and to the gentle bibliopolists of the heavens, the horrible descent to this darksome region put me in mind of the proverb of veritas in puteo. I found at length an edition of my own poems, and was just turning over to the disputed passages, when one of those little insects, which we call bookworms, came crawling out of my Rape of the Lock, on the very page I was consulting. It had already ate its way through the Wife of Bath's Tale, and had just begun to fix on The poor Indian, whose untutor'd mind,' when I cast my eye on the little reptile. At that unfortunate moment it happened unknown to myself (there are many things in which the capacities of us spirits are limited), that my stated tract of existence, as an unembodied being, had expired, and, dreadful to relate, I found my essence, obedient to the laws of our fraternity, suddenly lessen and contract into the shape of that frightful little bookworm, which I had been on the point of destroying.

Ibid.

My only object now, was to provide for my personal safety, for it is in this interval of our earthly existence that we are subject to all the accidents and

calamities of your globe; and should we be maimed, wounded, or destroyed, we possess no power either of cure or of resuscitation. I began therefore to revolve deeply into what forgotten or neglected volume I ought to insinuate myself, there taking up my abode, so as to ensure myself a quiet and unviolated retreat during the appointed years of my imprisonment. The Commentators on the Civil Law were the first that naturally suggested themselves. They had slept, unprofaned, in deep and primeval solitude since the days of my friend Cujacius (who lay near me mouldering, or rather moulding, in a green and yellow melancholy'), till the present hour; and I had just determined to creep in along with the Nauta Caupones et Stabularii,' ,"* in the 5th book of the Digest, when a troop of young sparks of candidates came into the library to consult about the subjects for their Theses. I knew well the ransacking of ancient authors, the pruning and patching of mutilated passages, and the severe contributions that are levied in these cases on Oldendorpius, Ulpian, Duarenus, and the rest. Terrified that this business was just commencing, and fearful of discovery, I bade my learned jurisconsults adieu.

'Dixit et tenui murmure lingua vale.' "The old Romances were my next resource. Clelia and Cassandra held out open arms to me. The Diana of Montemayor offered me an equally kind reception, and I might either have accepted this, or have retreated into some of the lovely, though neglected, cottages in the Arcadia of Sir Philip Sydney. But I was staggered here, by my acquaintance with the late work of that strange young gentleman of your own profession, whose taste and talent for the marvellous (between you and me, make me shrewdly suspect he is one of ourselves), and whose uncommon ingenuity has created a temporary reputation for these fantastic performances.

"It were in vain to enumerate all the various shifts I was reduced to before I could find any thing like a comfort

* By this the bookworm seems certainly to have been no contemptible jurisconsult. The Nautæ Caupones and Stabularii were liable for the safety of all goods placed under their charge. And aware of this responsibility, no doubt, he was led to creep in.

able retreat. I thought of stepping into the Dilucidationes Arcangeli Mercenarii, who writes so admirably on the subject of old men seeing with young men's eyes; but I dreaded the interest occasioned by this amongst the short-sighted and elderly members of your Faculty. I thought next of Picus Mirandola's Treatise de Ente et Uno (which certainly may be very good entertainment to his friends the Antipodes, though dull enough to you and me), but Scaliger had told the world that he was the phonix of his age, the darling of the muses, the favourite of philosophy, the encyclopædia of the sciences, and with such a character I dared not to trust even to the work on Entities. Spallanzani's Dissertation on the reproduction of the Heads of Snails was placed next to Picus; but the Abbé, like one of his own snails, had risen into a second life in the Pursuits of Literature.

"Atlength I encountered a huge folio Bible, and morally certain that there were no Divines among your Faculty, I had insinuated myself into the third chapter of Genesis, when I discovered there, to my utter dismay, that it was the famous Breeches Bible, and imagining, in my terror, that I already saw

Picus Mirandola Princeps.-The text alludes to his celebrated epitaph by Hercules Strozza, in the church of St Mark, at Florence.

"Joannes jacet hic Mirandula-Cætera

norunt

Et Tagus et Ganges-forsan et Antipodes."

Picus Mirandola was born at Florence in the year 1463, and died there at the of 32. age He was master, we are told

by contemporary writers, of thirty different languages. He published nine hundred philosophical positions, which he challenged the whole world to impugn, offering generously to pay the travelling expenses of the impugners from distant parts. works of this young Prince (whom not only the venal pens of the eulogists Boisardus, Paulus Jovius, and Angelus Politianus,

The

have extolled to the skies, but whom Erasmus, Scaliger, and Vossius, have pronounced the unrivalled phoenix of all mortal perfection,) are now utterly forgotten. Those who are willing to ponder on the vanity of human greatness, may find ample room for meditation in the different characters of Joannes Picus, as they are collected by Blount, in his Censura Celebriorum Auctorum, page 350, fol. ed.

+Nothing certainly can be more extraordinary than that black letter mania which

Mr, and his black letter dogs at his heels, I made a rapid retreat; and, at last, thanks to the forgotten labours of ancient and modern geologists, I crept into a snug corner between Father Kircher's Mundus Subterraneus and Dr Calcott's Theory of the Earth, where I have lain undisturbed for the last twenty years. By what unlooked-for accident you came to consult the work and disturb the venerable dust of my old friend the Jesuit, whom I recollect well conversing with in one of my little Continental trips in the seventeenth century, I cannot tell. Many a good hint did I then give him for his Magia Universalis.Poor Kirchy! He had always a warm heart to the unknown world, and loved us spirits, and any thing mystic or magical, better than the fat paunches, and often lean pates, of his reverend fraternity. You will perhaps recollect that you discovered me in the Mundus Subterraneus, to which I had retreated in the chapter De Fine et Scopo Geocosmi. I dreaded instant destruction. This moment was to me decisive of my destiny. Had you swept me from the page, or crushed me, like the generality of collectors, in a rage, or carelessly closed the volume, I should have been either destroyed past all redemption, or become a maimed, disfigured, and unhappy spirit, unfit for ever to mingle in aerial society. Conceive then my delight, when you not only proceeded to no violent measures, but favoured my escape, and appeared even solicitous about my safety.

has infected the higher classes of collectors of books, in England more particularly. The passion for collecting books, when under proper modifications, and directed to the higher kinds of literature and philosophy, is of the very first utility, and is an interesting, rational, and delightful amusement. But the rage for buying up all the Mack letter old treatises, all the smokedried, worm-eaten principes editiones;-the taste which gives two thousand guineas for an Ariosto or a Bocacce, which, in accuracy and beauty, is probably infinitely inferior to the more modern editions; the knowledge which leads some men to detect the age of any work by the smell of the parchment or the taste of the paper;-all which conduces them, in short, to spend on such trivial follies, that time, talents, and industry, which might extend the range of more solid improvement, or enlarge the bounds of more important knowledge,all this is truly ridiculous.

Nothing since this adventure has occurred to disturb my retreat; I have passed the years of my pilgrimage on earth in unbroken privacy; and the moment that the laws of our order have restored me to my original brightness, I have appeared before you, to show you, that although you have forgotten this benevolence of yours, I cannot rest till I have conferred on you some lasting mark of my gratitude.'

I remained so entirely overcome, so utterly amazed at this singular and learned address of the Spirit, that I did not open my eyes for some moments. "How can I possibly be persuaded of the reality of all this?" I at last exclaimed. "Stay, stay, my friend! on this point I am about to give you most ample satisfaction." She waved her wand, and at this moment a sight was presented to these eyes, so varied, so astonishing, and so beautiful, that I sunk, overcome with the mingled feelings, into the very farthest corner of my rustic chair.

(To be continued.)

have deferred our journey, till the approaching harvest and the ripening of the fruits shall better the condition of the people.

We ourselves have escaped from these dreadful evils by the prudence of the government of Geneva, and the patriotism of the citizens, who procured such a supply of corn from Odessa, as not only to save ourselves from scarcity, but to enable us to assist our miserable neighbours of Savoy, who, from the scantiness of last year's crops, were literally perishing by famine. In April last, some of the inhabitants of Geneva proposed to open a subscription for furnishing them with Rumford soups, till the harvest should supply them with food. A boiler was, for this purpose, established beyond Mount Saleve, at the expense of Mr Pointz, an English gentleman, and the composition and distribution of the soups was directed by an excellent Genevese lady, Madame Prevost, who took up lodgings at the house of the curate, and still remains there in the performance of this charitable work.

All

The good example which was thus set was rapidly followed, and no fewer than eleven boilers have been erected in as many parishes, within a semicircle of four or five leagues radius, furnishing 3260 soups a-day. this is at our expense; the English have furnished about one-fourth or one-fifth of the subscription, and the lowest classes of citizens have made it a point, and considered it an honour, to contribute.

Necessity has suggested an astonishing resource for supplying the animal part of the soups from bones, which, in ordinary cases, are thrown away. Experience has shewn, that a first boiling for some hours extracts a rich broth, which turns into a mass of jelly, covered with a stratum of fat like butter. This jelly, which can be transported, supplies the boilers. A second boiling of the same bones, after being bruised, extracts a second quantity of broth, not much inferior to the first; and if new bones cannot be obtained, a third boiling may be resorted to with success. The same bones which have furnished all this nutritive matter, when treated with diluted muriatic acid, according to Darcet's method, are converted into gelatine, which is dried; and a single ounce of this gelatine will, by sufficient

boiling, convert thirty-two ounces of water into jelly.

As there are more bones collected in the city than can be immediately employed, they are first steeped for twenty-four hours in the running water of the Rhone, and then boiled with potash, so as to take away all the superficial grease, without affecting the animal soluble matter within. They are next dried in the open air, and may be preserved in a dry place for an indefinite length of time, without suffering any change. In this way we might prepare a granary of bones, as well as a granary of corn, and thus keep in reserve, animal as well as vegetable food. This, in my opinion, is one of the most generally useful discoveries that want has ever suggested. The broth made of bones is really as good, if not better and more nutritive than broth made of meat. Four or five hours' boiling, in a covered vessel, is sufficient, without any compression beyond the weight of the atmosphere.

MARLOW'S TRAGICAL HISTORY OF

THE LIFE AND DEATH OF DOCTOR
FAUSTUS.

As in all probability the greater number of our readers are unacquainted with this very singular composition, and as, independently of its own great merits, it possesses an extraordinary interest at the present time, from the general resemblance of its subject to that of Lord Byron's last poem, we now shall give an analysis of it, accompanied with extracts sufficiently copious to exhibit its peculiar spirit and character.

It opens, in somewhat rude imitation of the Greek Tragedy, with the Chorus, who gives a short sketch of the pursuits and character of Faustus." "Till swollne with cunning and a selfeconceit,

And melting, Heavens conspir'd his overHis waxen wings did mount above his reach

throw:

For, falling to a Devillish exercise, And glutted now with Learning's golden gifts,

He surfeits on the cursed Necromancy. Nothing so sweet as Magicke is to him!"

Faustus is then seen sitting in his study; and he enters into an elaborate discussion on the emptiness of all human knowledge, from the Analy