common with the general market of Europe. In seasons of unusual fertility, no particular nation can relieve itself by exporting.-There can be no objection, however, to the proposal of this author to continue the old bounty, with the view of affording partial relief in such circumstances, although the efficacy of such an expedient, seems extremely questionable.-Neither does the proposal of Mr Malthus, to give to the restrictions the form of a constant duty upon foreign grain (" not to act as a prohibition but as a protecting, and at the same time profitable tax,") appear to be unreasonable. But as the tax must necessarily be such as, when added to the original price of foreign grain, to raise the whole to the limit. ing price to be fixed by the proposed law, and as it will probably be found expedient when the price of British corn rises so high, to remove the duty altogether, there seems to be but little prospect of making the regula tion in any way subservient to the in

But

terests of the public revenue. if the expedient can do little good, neither can it do any harm; the great object of any law on the subject being protection to the British farmer, which will be equally secured by either plan.

The inferences deducible from the preceding reflections seem to be,

1st, That the expediency of a bounty on the exportation of corn, in circumstances which may be expected to recur at no very distant period, is apparent from general principles, and has been proved by experience. And,

2ndly, That in the relative circumstances of this country, and of Europe, unless some efficient restraint be immediately imposed on the importation of foreign grain, the agriculture of Great Britain must experience a rapid and alarming decay, which it may be impossible to counteract by any future interference of legislative wisdom.

ALTHOUGH the life of a modest and retiring man of letters affords, in general, scanty materials for the pen of a biographer, yet a record of the principal facts and events which constitute the chain of his history often forms a useful and curious commentary on his writings, and enables us to enter into those associations that guide his mind in the choice and em bellishment of the subjects to which his attention is directed. It is an improving exercise to study the connection, in so far as its fugitive traces may be conjectured or ascertained, between the external situation and the intellectual and moral qualities which distinguish an individual, conspicuous for his talents and attainments, from the rest of his species. While such a study sometimes affords an explanation of, or an apology for, opinions and habits by which he is characterized, it enables us also to learn, from the experience of another, those lessons of practical wisdom from which we are but too apt to turn with indifference or aversion, when

they are presented to us under the stern aspect of precept or command.

But if long-cherished affection, mingled with recent emotions of unfeigned regret, blind not our eyes to the cold and accurate estimate of the merits of him, a sketch of whose life we now propose to offer to the public, we are inclined to think that he has a peculiar claim to be remembered and honoured; and that the public have a right to expect even a larger and fuller memorial of his mind and manners, than the limits prescribed for such compositions in a work like this permit us to attempt. In an age when the multitude of can didates for poetic fame renders origi. nality, without eccentricity or affec tation, an almost hopeless effort, he has had the merit of having discovered and pursued an untrodden path, and of having adorned it with the simplest graces of nature and fancy, which formerly lay in a great measure unobserved or neglected. To him also belongs the higher praise of having rendered these graces subser

vient to the noblest purposes, by connecting them with the charms of devotional and moral sentiment, and with the kindest sympathies of a feeling and benevolent heart.

We do not think it possible to peruse the works of Grahame without becoming wiser and better; and as he voluntarily devoted the choicest fruits of his genius to the service of the public, the readers and admirers of the author may reasonably expect to be favoured with some account of the man. Sincerely and deeply do we condemn the immoral and inhuman practice, which has of late years found too many abettors, of ransack. ing with unhallowed hand the sacred repositaries of the departed, and ex posing to vulgar gaze many private and confidential communications and transactions, which ought to remain for ever in oblivion. Such a practice tends to destroy the charm of private friendship and unreserved confidence, and to make men hypocrites and actors in the most retired intercourse of social life. We merely propose to give such an account of the life of this respected and lamented character as may introduce his readers to some acquaintance with himself, and with out seeking either too minutely to disclose his individual merits, or "draw his frailties from their dread abode," to exhibit a faithful portrait to those who knew little or nothing of the original. To render this delineation the more interesting, we shall, in the course of the narrative, offer a general criticism on his works, in the order of their publication, and reserve to the close some reflections which could not elsewhere be so properly introduced. In laying our strictures before the tribunal of the public, it shall be our study to divest ourselves of all partial feeling, and to offer our

VOL. V. PART II.

opinions with as much freedom and candour as if the author were known to us by his works alone.

James Grahame was a native of the city of Glasgow, and was born on the 22d day of April, 1765. His father, Mr Thomas Grahame, who was a writer (or attorney) in that place, enjoyed the fullest confidence of those who committed the manage ment of their affairs to his skill and integrity; while the gentleness of his manners, and the excellence of his character as a man, and a member of society, secured to him the affection and esteem of all who had the pleasure of his acquaintance. His mother was well qualified to be the partner of this worthy man, and was peculiarly fitted to cultivate in the minds of a numerous offspring those good dispositions and affectious which flou rish the most under the fostering hand of maternal care. A rare concurrence of circumstances calculated to form the temper, refine the taste, and expand the faculties of their son James, attended his early years. His nurserywoman, long a faithful domestic in the family, and regarded as one of its members, was endowed with so much good sense, united to so much gentleness and integrity, as to render her a most valuable guide of his infancy. It is to her grotesque appearance that he is supposed to allude in the amusing picture of the Harvest Home, or Kirn Feast, in his " British Georgics,' when he describes a matron arrayed in

Her gown of silken woof all figured thick With roses white far larger than the life, On azure ground,-her grannam's wedding garb,

Old as that year when Sheriffmuir was fought.

2 B

Several of his near relations were persons of cultivated minds and literary habits. Of these we shall only presume to particularize a female relative of the most fascinating manners, agreeable temper, and lively humour; and also his elder brother, Robert, who afterwards succeeded to the business of his father in Glasgow, where he still resides. He was several years older than James, who cherished for him the most tender affec. tion, and who received from him perhaps his earliest relish for the charms of poetry. The two brothers used frequently to accompany each other along the romantic banks of the Cart, in the vicinity of which their father had a summer residence. To this retirement Robert used frequently to repair, at the close of the week, from Glasgow, where he was pursuing his academical studies, bringing along with him his favourite poetical authors, for the purpose of perusing them amid scenes peculiarly congenial to the sentiments which their works were fitted to inspire. James, who was at that time a boy of nine or ten years of age, felt himself honoured in being his confidant and asso ciate on such occasions, and the youthful enthusiast would listen with delight to the finest passages of Milton, Thomson, Beattie, or Cowper. The language and sentiments of poetry thus became early familiar to him; and that habit of nice observation of nature was imperceptibly formed, which his writings so remarkably

evince.

To his residence near the banks of the Cart, in his boyish years, he alludes in an interesting passage of the Birds of Scotland, which, as it marks also the early sympathy of his heart with the joys and sufferings of the feathered race, we shall gratify our

the frolicsome humours in which he sometimes loved to indulge. From the school he passed to the university of his native city, at which he studied during five successive sessions. After attending the literary and philosophical classes during the first three sessions, he entered as a pupil of the late professor Millar, and took great delight in listening to the public prelections on law and government, and enjoying the private conversation of that celebrated man. The lectures of this profound and scientific teacher were more calculated, perhaps, to form the accomplished legislator, than the adroit and successful lawyer. His well-known, avowed, and almost, we may say, excessive attachment to the cause of freedom, and to those principles of genuine liberty, under the happy influence of which Great Britain has attained to a height of political and moral greatness which renders her the admira tion and ornament of the world, confirmed the impression which had been formerly made on the mind of the young student, and gave, we believe, a decided bias to his opinions on the politics of the times. A desire to unfold and illustrate the circumstances which tended to form his mind at an earlier period, induces us to mention an interesting fact which occurs to our recollection. A gentleman well known to us, who had resided a considerable time in North America, and who had suffered much in consequence of his enthusiastic loyalty to the parent country, at the time of the great contest with the colonies, was intimately acquainted with Mr Thomas Grahame, and, in speaking of him, he used these remarkable expressions:-" He was the best and most amiable of men. His only fault was, that he warmly espoused the

American cause "" This testimony, the more honourable to him in whose behalf it was given, from the qualifying exception with which it was thus accompanied, will shew how naturally his son was predisposed to enter with generous, and even perhaps imprudent warmth, into the cause of France during the memorable period of the revolution, and to oppose with zeal the proceedings of the British administration, by whom its folly and extravagance were early withstood, and eventually defeated. It will appear, however, in the sequel, that his feelings of true patriotism prevailed over all the attachments of party, and that, unlike many pseudo-patriots, he did not make an unnatural transfer of his regard for the principles on which that great revolution was founded, to the unhappy individual, more to be envied in his fall than in the plenitude of his guilty power; who, trampling under foot all laws, human and divine, sought only to aggrandise himself, and cared not if the world were converted into a desert, so that he and his minions might sit enthroned amid its ruins.

Nothing tends, in general, more to destroy the undefined illusions of youthful hope and ambition, than the necessity of choosing a profession, and of descending from the dreams of fancy, or the theories of philosophy and science, to the sober realities of ordinary life. In some instances, indeed, it happens that the mind insensibly forms those predilections in early life, which determine the question long before it is fairly proposed to the understanding; and when the period arrives at which the decision must be made, the persons of whom we speak, seem, in making it, to be simply pursuing the natural