implicate him in the plot; but the evidence was far from clear, and his defence was masterly. Yet such dispositions had been shewn against him, that a violent populace surrounded the palace of justice; and it was asserted that the numerous troops assembled had declared that, if the sentence were death, they would throw down their arms: he being perhaps the most popular man in France with the army, as an able general; and with the people as a Frenchman: but his talents in the council are esteemed far inferior to those in the field. The court having sat till ten at night, an express was sent to St. Cloud to represent the state of the popular mind, and demand final instructions. All was silence and apprehension, till a message arrived at midnight; and it being sedulously reported that the punishment was only two days imprisonment at Gros-Bois, the general's country seat not far from Paris, the soldiery and the people were appeased. Mean while precautions were taken by the police; and next morning all the soldiers were consignés, or confined to their barracks. Never did the government display more vigour than on this trying occasion, when even the soldiery could not be trusted. Next day, when it was known that the imprisonment was for two years, apprehensions for his safety were entertained or affected, and furious groups appeared at the Palais Royal, which was shut up at noon. For three or four days the aweful tranquillity which precedes a tempest was observable at Paris, and appalled those who had witnessed the former commotions. The soldiers continued to be confined: nor was the public tranquillity considered as certain till Moreau's journey to Spain, in order to pass into America.' pp. 415-417.

Mr. P. entirely discredits the report of the sick French soldiers having been poisoned at Jaffa, and describes a picture in the Exhibition for 1804, in which Bonaparte is represented visiting that hospital, and inspecting a pestilential tumour which had been mistaken for the plague.

The effects of the revolution, and the advantages of the new order of things are thus candidly, though superficially discussed.

A free and candid inquiry what France has gained, or lost, by the most surprising revolution which occurs in the pages of human history, might form the subject of an ample and interesting work, which could only be. well executed by a dispassionate Frenchman, a lover of his country, and attached to no party. The acquisition of territory, and the influence over neighbouring states, are subjects of national glory and vanity, but confer little advantage on the inhabitants of France, who are equally loaded with taxation. The inhabitants of the cities, in particular, complain of the weight of taxes; which, as they are far from being so rich, they are much less able to pay than the people of England. Commerce has also visibly declined; and though the inland trade of so wide an empire must of course be considerable, yet the loss of St. Domingo will continue to balance many advantages.

But the grand staple of France, agriculture, has certainly been benefited by the revolution. A sensible writer has observed that, "farmers have in general been the chief gainers by the revolution; from a greater VOL. III.

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facility in bequeathing by will; from the abolition of feudal restraints : of mainsmortes; by the undisturbed possession and free alienation of all landed property; and lastly, by the division of land into smaller estates. Hence also the change in respect to money; formerly it flowed through the country to the cities; now it remains in free circulation in the country. This is attended with two very happy consequences. More land is actually cultivated than before, and in a better manner; and the stock of cattle is much more considerable.' pp. 475-477.

Mr. Pinkerton's speculations on the relative situation of France and England, are not deficient in sagacity, but they have lost their interest. The question between them is no longer of policy, but of existence; and if our readers want any additional motive to tremble at the consequences of invasion, they need only examine the picture of French morals, as it is here pourtrayed by an admiring witness.

We cannot join with Mr. P. in absolving our country and its colonies of guilt. For we can never bring ourselves to conceive that the murderous sacrifice of so many thousands of negroes to our commerce and wealth, is a mere peccadillo. Blest as we are with the light of mental cultivation, and still more with the diffusion of evangelical truth, the continuance of such a national crime deserves the severest of national punish

ments.

The epicures will find Mr. P.'s chapter on French dinners, cookery, and wines, a bonne bouche: though most of them will think that his animated relish for French hospitality has too much prevailed over his patriotic prepossessions.

The law of divorce now stands thus:

"The husband may demand a divorce on account of the adultery of his wife.

"The wife may demand a divorce on account of the adultery of her husband, if he keep his concubine in the mutual habitation.

"Either may demand a divorce on account of excessive abuse, bad usage, or great injuries.

"The condemnation of one to an infamous punishment, shall afford the other a plea of divorce.

"The mutual and persevering consent of the husband and wife, expressed in the manner prescribed by the law, and under the conditions and trials therein determined, shall sufficiently prove that their life is insupportable, and shall be regarded as a peremptory cause of divorce.” pp. 224. 225.

The reception of the Pope at Paris must have been very mortifying. When the wicked Parisians carried their folatrerie to such a length, that the Pope's mule was the chief sport at the imperial coronation, and was called for as the best farce at the theatre, and when his holiness durst not venture to give

the public blessing, the hierarchy must have been convinced, that the age of crosiers and mitres had not returned with that of sceptres and crowns.

But on the subject of religion, the information which Mr. P. affords is very scanty. This we the less regret, because the hints which he has occasionally dropped, discover at once a lamentable ignorance of its nature, and insensibility to its worth. While he asserts that it would be ridiculous to enforce on volatile Frenchmen the religious observance of the Sabbath, he seems either not to reflect, or not to know, that genuine Christianity is a citizen of the world, able to live and flourish wherever man is found, in all circumstances, and in all climates. From Mr. Pinkerton's views of morality, no one would expect him to be friendly to religion: for he supposes that the theatres of Paris being open on Sundays, greatly diminishes the number of crimes, and that the oaths and impiety of our seamen are essential to our naval victories. Equally censurable are his reflections on the religion of Holland.. Would not an impartial eye have seen, that Calvinism has no more influence at Rotterdam or the Hague, than. Popery at Paris; that the one in reality worships pleasure, and the other deifies wealth. Some atonement Mr. P. endeavours to make for his lax morality, by a sermon against Drunkenness. "The inventor

of toasts," says he, " may justly claim a niche by the side of. any hero who ever deluged the world with slaughter; and if the pestilence had been a human invention, he might certainly be stationed by the side of its great founder."

Mr. P. has, we acknowledge, given us information concerning Paris, which is various, pleasing, useful, and frequently superior to that which ordinary travellers could impart. Had he employed time and self-denial to compress into one volume the recollections truly Parisian, excluding all indelicate stories and allusions, he might have deserved considerable praise. The general propriety of his language is sometimes inter rupted by Gallicisms, which a traveller ceases to perceive when he begins to contract. He is also guilty of coining and uttering many words of such inferior quality, that we hope they will never obtain circulation. The paragraphs which he intended to be witty and poignant, are often dull and af fected; but then some of his serious phrases are laughable enough to atone for this defect. His absurd and unmannerly abuse of the Celts has been admitted even into the present work; a proof that, among his various acquisitions at Paris, he has not learnt civility. We hope indeed that his time, as a man of letters, was better employed in that city, than we have any reason to suspect from the contents of the present publication.

Art. VI. A New Theory and Prospectus of the Persian Verbs, with their Hindoostanee Synonimes, in Persian and English. By John Gilchrist, 4to. Calcutta. 1801. Price 12s. Black and Co. London. 1806.

BY

Y the Persian and English in this work, our readers are to understand a work in Persian on the above subject, comprised in 32 pages and a Table, neatly printed in the Nustaaleek character; and the same in a free English translation, 34 pages, beside the Table; both parts much more accurately and decently printed than most we have seen from the Hindoostanee press at Calcutta.

Mr. Gilchrist sets out with asserting (Advertisement, p. xi.) that though much has been done, yet still a great deal is wanting to complete a proper grammar of the Persian tongue.

When," says he," a scholar can be found, who can blend the minuteness of Otho with the elegance of Jones, and is cal pable of uniting to both the copiousness of Gladwin, on sys ystematic principles, we may then hope to see a philological production worthy of this charming language. In order to effect this desirable object, he thinks the two following things are indispensably necessary. 1st." To think boldly for ourselves, while we take every advantage of modern discoveries, without being chained to the scholastic trammels of the Oriental grammarians, and their servile imitators the Muoluees and Moonshees of India."-2dly. "While we do every justice to our predecessors in this walk of literature, we must carefully avoid blindly following their footsteps, or being deterred from our duty by the mere whistling of a great name. Tinnit quod inane est. ib.

These two directions, which are nearly the same in substance, are worthy the attention of writers in general; and it anust be allowed that Mr. G. has fully exemplified them in the work before us. It is well known that the native Persian grammarians, in general, make thirteen classes of verbs. In this Sir WJ Jones has closely followed them; see his Grammar, p. 61-70, where he exhibits the thirteen classes under the title of Irregulars. Mr. Gladwin, who in most cases is too closely attached to the native Arabico-Persian grammarians, has in this respect departed a little from the common track, and reduced these classes to eleven. Mr. Gilchrist has completely broken the trammels, and, taking an immense stride, has reduced the whole thirteen to two

Through all is diffuse reasoning on the subject of his system, it is impossible for us to follow him without taking up more room than can properly be allotted to a work like the present; we must therefore refer the reader to the book itself, after giving a few extracts illustrative of the writer's theory.

On the Persian infinitive, and the formation of the different persons and tenses from it, Mr. G. thus explains himself.

It is evident enough, that the particles dun and tun, are vulgarly but erroneously called the infinitive signs; whereas it is most probable that un, as in the old Hinduwee (and na, in the modern speech) occurs in the same manner also in the Persian tongue. It may be termed a declinable verbal termination, or the original constituent portion of all the verbs, because, by a very easy transition, all the parts of the substantive verb, (better known by the natives of India as the pronominal declinable signs) may thus spring from un. Let us commence with the first person singular um, and then go through the whole regularly, as far as the third person plural und, seeing they are all in a similar manner affixed to every tense of the Persian verb, in the whole of their various combinations, agreeably to the Eerance pronunciation; so um, ee, ud, eem, eed, und. These, by a hypothetical declension or process, will be clear enough to the reader who shall consider them in this manner. Taking it for granted that the short ǎ or u, is either a declinable imperative, a contracted infinitive, a perfect or pluperfect participle, from it let us form the primordial infinitive, or un, the root of all the rest, as stated above through the several persons. It can moreover be carried, by the trivial change of ud-u, und-u, and the coalition of u-u, to the active present and passive participles in eedu, indu, a, or an; and from the very same u and un, perhaps by an ancient mode of declension, the verbal nouns in ush or ish, u, ee, (or by some irregular process from awoordun and kurdun, &c.) ar, ak, gee, were originally constructed. To the present day, these are all apparent in the composition of Persian verbs, as poors-ish nal-u poors-ee, &c. If the first and other personal signs have not emanated by a particular change and inflection from the radical imperative u, or declinable particle of infinity un, whence can they be derived? In the beginning, perhaps, to express merely mental or ideal existence, abstracted from every thing else, the immaterial or simplest of all infinitives, viz. un, may have been applied, to denote mere entity; for in several languages, this abstract sign of the verb in its infinite state, is still found to be un, somewhat modified by particular vowels. It is a curious fact also, that, according to the Hindoos, this same un is denominated the ovum or matrix of all things; and we ourselves have the important monosyllables ens and mens probably from the same source. In appropriating the idea of existence, from its former absolute state, to the speaker and others, the u-n naturally enough becomes u-m, &c.: in some of which, however, the u is completely absorbed in its paramount vowel, as in u-ee, u-d or u-t, u-eem, u eed, und. When mental and corporeal existence were palpably combined, another infinitive, to wit, the material, may have become requisite; and we may reasonably presume that st-un, ust-un, or ist-un, ist-um, ist-ee, ist-ud, were introduced accordingly. We all know, that in several languages the letters st, or, as a Persian must write them, ust, ist, denote stability, station, &c.; nay, we cannot be ignorant that this very stun, istun, in question, is the final syllable of several verbs yet extant. The man who

understands the Persian language, and can analyse the verbs dan-istun, giree-stun, xee-stun, &c. will clearly perceive, that these are irrefragable