the ground; the other, high meadows and hilly ground, with fhallow fprings, which ouze up, and rife into, the upper ftratum or ftaple, and keep that wet and cold: this fort is called fpuey, not boggy land. Secondly, that fort of land which is wet and cold, and yet has few if any fprings in it, is also of two forts, First, thofe low meadows which lie flat and below the level of the country, with a deep foil or bottom. The wetness of this foil is principally caufed by its lowness, flatness, and depth. Secondly, thofe higher meadows, and hilly grounds, whose wetness is caufed by the clofenefs and clayeynefs of the foil, by which it holds the water, and will not let it filter through :-though this and the spuey fort are fometimes found together. Thirdly, our Authors might have added, as an improvement to low, meadow, boggy, faggy, rufhy grounds,-fuperinductions of hard, dry, earths, as gravels, fands, chalks, ftones, &c. which, laid on fuch lands, are of vaft fervice, to bind, settle, stiffen, faften, and warm it; and keep the springs from ouzing up, and rifing into it: they, as it were, fqueeze and prefs them out at other cavities. The reft of the chapters in this book, to the number of fourteen, treat of hedges: the methods of raifing quickfets from feeds; to plant them for fences; to keep these in order, and to make and plash them, when at proper growth: alfo of the different forts of hedges, and the profits of them, &c. In which there are fome ufeful directions, (13.) though we think few that are unknown to the real practical hufbandman; and then they are fo blended with numbers of trifling notions and chimerical fancies (14), that (13) Such as the hint that the roots of old white thorns being beautifully knotted and veined, are fit for many of the elegant works of cabinet-makers, &c.-The beft method of making a ditch, viz. with floping fides and a narrow bottom, to cramp the feet of the cattle, and render it difficult for them to ftand in it to crop the quick on the bank. The method of managing the elder I, for a fence, &c. which feems ufeful and curious; and we apprehend feveral other quick-growing rubs of which our Authors have not given the leaft hint, might be ordered in the fame manner. A fhrub they fay, (and we believe truly) that cattle will not touch. (14) Such as, to felect the poorest spot of land for a nurfery of quickfets! Did thefe Gentlemen confider how weak their fets must be on fuch poor flow ground; how long in growing to a proper fize for tranfplanting; the lofs of time this will occafion to an already (as they fay) tedious method;' the danger fuch weak, flowgrowing tender plants are in of being killed by infects and vermin, extremes of weather, &c. on poor land, beyord what ftrong forward, quick-growing plants on good land are; and how fmall a num that the ignorant in husbandry will not be able to difcern one from the other: and to the experienced, we may reasonably fuppose, they are already known. There are likewife feveral, as we think, confiderable defects; on some of which (15) (that we may not ber may (for the above reasons) probably furvive on fuch land, not- And what a fancy is that to fhade the plants! to keep the fun, the It is equally chimerical to affert, that the richness of a soil tends to throw the nourishment in all fhrubs into the leaves, and not into the woody part.' Were this true, the poorest ground would be the most proper for hedges; and yet, on fuch land, it is found, by obfervation and experience, that only furze, ling, and fuch like infignificant shrubs will grow. (15) It is certainly an omiffion, or defect, of confiderable confequence, in fuch a complete work as this, not to give us any account of, nor even to mention, several useful and common fhrubs for hedges and firing, as the nut-hazel, afh, beech, maple, &c. &c. inftead of which we are entertained with long harangues on the holly, a fhrub fo flow of growth, that it is not worth any farmer's care; the furze, a fhrub of little value, and not worth planting where any thing else will grow; and the bramble, or blackberry, (a ruiner and dellroyer of hedges, and good for nothing but that, and to tear the wool off the backs of the sheep. And where we are told, that the principal weeds which are deftructive to hedges, are the white and black briony, bind-weed, and tra veller's joy;' briars, as bad for hedges as fome of the others, are omitted: on the contrary, one kind of them, (the bramble or blackberry) is entered into the article of hedge-wood fhrubs, with a hint at the fhame in the propagation of it: because, that art does not imitate nature forfooth, she sometimes fupplies the defects of hedges with brambles, Whereas, in truth, they much oftener occafion thofe defects, by killing the hedge-wood where they are fuffered to grow. *Here our Authors feems to have expreffed themfelves fomewhat inaccurately. Their words run thus, Nature-fupplies the defects of hedges 1 not be thought to bring any charge without proofs to fupport it) we have animadverted in the notes. The Epigoniad. A Poem, in nine books. THE 12mo. 3s. 6d. Edin burgh. Hamilton, &c. HIS Poem, as the Author informs us, is called the Epigoniad, because the heroes, whofe actions it celebrates, have got the name of Epigones,' (Epigoni, he should have faid) being the fons of thofe who attempted the conquest of Thebes in a former expedition.' When the Poet carries his Readers back into claffic antiquity, he feems in a peculiar manner to befpeak the patronage of the learned; for them his labours appear to be calculated, and from them alone he muft expect an adequate reward: but then, as he writes for the scholar, it is expected that he himself should be one of the number. Pofleffed of this advantage, the learned will regard him with fraternal tendernefs; and though he may not obtain the higheft applaufe, he is fure at least to meet with indulgence for flight defects. On the contrary, if he be detected of ignorance, when he pretends to learning, his cafe, indeed, will deferve our pity: too antique to please one party, and too modern for the other, he is deferted by both, read by few, and foon forgotten by all, except his enemies. The Epigoniad feems to be one of thefe new old performances; a work that would no more have pleased a peripatetic of the academic grove, than it will captivate the unlettered fubfcriber to one of our circulating libraries. Tradition,' fays the Author in his preface) is the best ground on which a fable can be built, not only because it gives the appearance of reality to things that are merely fictitious, but likewife because it fupplies a poet with the most proper materials for his invention to work upon.' We might have expected from this remark, that he had not only taken tradition for the ground of his fable, but employed it alfo to guide hin through the narration; nevertheless, unfortunately, he has not only forfook, but contradicted it, on almoft every occafion: and given up the conduct of his poem, to an invention barren of incidents, or at best productive of trifling ones. Euftathius, in his commentary upon the fourth book of the Iliad, gives us a lift of the nine warriors, who were called the Epi Epigoni; most of which our Author never once mentions in this poem, but, inftead of them introduces, not the defcendants of thofe unfortunate heroes who fell before Thebes in a former expedition, but feveral of their cotemporaries: as Thefeus and Neftor, who had no motives of revenge to prompt them to this undertaking. Thefeus in particular was not there; for we find in the Suppliants of Euripides, that Thefeus went upon a former expedition to Thebes, to procure funeral honours for the feven fathers of the Epigoni, who lay unburied before the walls of that city; and at the end of the fame tragedy we are told, that the capture of the city was referved for the Epigoni alone. Our Poet alfo gives Thefeus the conduct of the war, in contradiction to Diodorus Siculus, who affirms, that by the advice of the oracle of Apollo, Alcmeon was conftituted Generaliffimo. He likewife makes Creon King of Thebes; but Creon had been dead four years before; and Euftathius pofitively fays, that Laodamas was at that time their King. The Author's difregard of the traditions of the antients, is not more flagrant than his neglect of their manners and cuftoms; thus he introduces Virgins as priestesses at the altar of Venus*, talks of Styx as a river of fire t, gives a nymph the conveyance of winged fhoes, the caduceus of Mercury he calls his fceptres, and inftead of the whistle which Virgil describes as pendant from the neck of Polyphemus, our Author claps a bag on the giant's back, around his shoulders flung, His bag enormous, by a cable hung. Here is a large bag, and a very strong rope to tie it withal; but we cannot conceive what ufe the Cyclops had for fuch a bag, unless he chose to wear it as our phyficians wear their fwords, merely for ornament. However, we muft acknowlege, though he had been minutely exact, nor ever tranfgrefied in any of the above mentioned particulars, his fubject is of fuch a nature as could at best have afforded us but fmail fatisfaction. We speak with regard to our own particular feelings; and fome may perhaps wonder, when we aflign as a reason of our difguft, our being confcious, that the Poet believes not a fyllable of all he tells us. Poets, like flatterers, are only heard with pleafure, when they themfelves feem pertuaued of the truth of all they deliver. Boileau, to convince us that he believes what he writes, avers, that if he has any fuccefs beyond his cotemporary poets, it is wholly owing to his being fuperior to them in point of truth. We have no reason to doubt + Page 9. § Page 75. * Page 5. + Page 8. but Homer, who lived in an age of ignorance, and confequently of credulity, believed, or at leaft was thought to believe, what he relates and Virgil, though he might not credit the story of Eneas, yet his countrymen gave credit to it. Witches and enchanters, too, made a part of the popish mythology (if we may fo call it) in the days of Taffo: and the fubject of Paradise Loft is reverenced with almost universal affent. As we have nothing to commend in this Author's plan, fo we have little to praise with refpect to his execution. He has, indeed, fome good lines, and here and there fomething of the true fpirit of poetry flashes out; but what can be said for fuch -paffages as the following? The Gods affembled met; and view'd from far, That the Gods not only affembled but met, is truly marvellous and as truly piteous is the diftrefs of poor Venus :-but we are chiefly ftruck with the Broughtonian Idea of Diomed's mutton-fifts; which the Author feems fond of displaying upon moft occafions. Thus in another place, p. 13. The regal ftaff. Again, p. 67. grafping in his mighty hand Andremon first, beneath his mighty hand, The hands of Minerva, too, though a lady, were, it seems, caft in the fame mould with those of her favourite Tydides, vide page 132, the prayer of Ulyffes. Great Queen of arts! on thee my hopes depend: By thee my infant-arms were taught to throw Our witty countryman, Butler, fays, that - Rhime the rudder is of verses, With which, like fhips, they feer their courfes. And therefore, • Those |