deluded by the ultra-lying of this tract, about the pleasures of opium-eating, to follow the foolish example---but we answer for it, that they soon stopped ---and the most that little Quincy can charge his conscience with, is the having contributed to send out of the world one or two incautious blockheads, who, like himself, were neither useful nor ornamental in it.

In the last sentence we called this fellow, Quincy-and that, because it is right. He is humbug even to his name; he has no right whatever to the Norman De. His father was an honest shopkeeper, who lived and died Quincy; and his son might just as well designate himself Mr. Quin Daisy, as Mr. De Quincy. Humbug also is he as to his personal appearance, for he directs a painter (p. 142.) to paint him according to his own fancy of beautiful creation. We own that he does this in badinage; but badinage or not, no insinuation can be more contrary to the fact. Conceive an animal about five feet high, propped on two trapsticks, which have the size but not the delicate proportions of rolling-pins, with a comical sort of indescribable body, and a head of most portentous magnitude, which puts one in 'mind of those queer big-headed caricatures that you see occasionally from whimsical pencils. As for the face, its utter grotesqueness and inanity is totally beyond the reach of the pen to describe; it is one in which George Cruikshank would revel, and we strongly recommend that capital artist to draw the picture of Quincy's household, as sketched by himself in the 139th and following pages of his Magnum Opus.

He comes forward principally, as we know, on the ground of his having swallowed a large quantity of laudanum ; just as a beggar, in a foreign lazaretto, thrusts his leprous leg under your nose, in the hopes of disgusting you out of some money. If we were medically disposed, we should show the utter nonsense of every word he vents on the subject, and hold up his fictitious facts to the public gaze. But, as that would not be very entertaining to our readers, we shall just briefly analyze one of his results, and, having so done, leave him to their candid opinion.

He tells us, that one day his servantmaid (of whom we shall speak anon) possessed by the idea of her master's learning, (of which we shall also speak anon) called him down to see a stranger

who had made his way into Quincy's kitchen. It was, he says, a Malay, though how he, who does not know a word of any oriental language, discovered it, we are at a loss to find out. How think you, gentle reader, did this man, who tells you in every page that he is a philosopher-that he has a superb analytic head-that he, Coleridge, Hazlitt, and Ricardo, each in his department a splendid humbug, were the only thinkers in England-address the Eastern wanderer? In some lines of the Iliad!! on what ground? why, on this ground? That Greek, in point of longitude, came nearer the oriental languages!!! After this wise salutation-he might as well have addressed him in Cherokee-instead of giving the poor devil any thing to eat or drink, he makes him a present of a piece of opium, "enough to kill three dragoons and their horses,' as Q. himself confesses, which the Malay bolts at one mouthful. He hopes, because the body was not found that the poor man did not die of his hospitality.

Was there ever a greater mass of folly and stupidity than here displayed? But mark the consequences of a Malay walking into his house. Henceforth he saw all the East, in all its deformities, opened to him. "I was stared at, hooted at, grinned at, chattered at, by monkeys, by paroquets, by cockatoosI was an idol-I was the priest-I was worshipped- I was sacrificed”-in a word, he was an ass; all because a poor lascar had strayed away from a homeward-bound East-Indiaman. If he saw any of these things, and there is five pages full of the stuff, it was not opium that ailed him, but insanity.

We said just now, that we should speak anon of his servant-maid. There is something excessively disgusting in being obliged to look into any man's private life, but when we have it tossed into our faces, we must now and then do so. Now, in the 83d and 84th pages of Quincy's book, he bursts out into an apostrophe to his wife, very fine, and very affecting:— "Beloved M., thou wert my Electra- thou thoughtest not much to stoop to humble offices of kindness, and to servile ministrations

-" and much more trash, which we have not room to quote. The truth of the business is, that this Electra, who did not think much (affected puppy) to stoop to servile offices, was his servantmaid long before he married her, and

had often made his bed before she ascended it. This is no blame to the woman: but who can bear to hear Quincy wondering at her stooping to servile offices, when it was to such that she was bred; and comparing a Westmoreland waiting-wench to the daughter of Agamemnon, the king of men. As we are fond of biographical researches, we should request Quincy to give us an extract from his parish-register, dating the birth of his first child, and also his marriage with Electra. It would be an important addition to the chronology of the county.

As for his learning, he deafens us with it at every page. He tells us, that he can write Greek; speak Greek; turn newspapers into Greek; in a word, his Greek is as great a bore to us as it was to the poor Malay. He laments over Hazlitt for not having read Plato in his youth. He exults over his being able to pose his Archididascalus in Sophocles, while yet amere boy. Now, except these absurd and disgusting boasts, he gives no proof whatever of his being able to translate a Greek page. He has never written a sentence on any classical subject; he affords no evidence in any of his writings of any minute acquaintance with the language; he has never reviewed a Greek book, nor given an opinion on a Greek sentence. Sometime last year, under his` signature of X. Y. Z. he reviewed, in the London Magazine, Miss Hawkins's Life of her Father, in the course of which she gives us some specimens of her brother's Greek jeux d'esprit. Now it so happens, that these are all pitiful affairs, as far as concerns the mere scholarship of the thing, and this Quincy had tact enough to suspect. Accordingly, he puts in a general caveat, that "in these verses were some little hiatuses not adapted to the fastidious race of an Athenian audience!" This was a fine general way of cutting the knot. Why did he not, like a great Grecian as he is, point out these little hiatuses, instead of hinting at them; or what would have been rather more satisfactory, why did he not see that beside the little hiatuses there were gross grammatical blunders. Clearly, for one plain reason, that he has not the knowledge which he pretends to. In the same article, he quotes some Latin sapphics, all of which are wrong, without once pointing out the defects, but endeavouring to slip out under the flimsy cover of saying, that they were less delicate in expression than another little

pcem, which very little poem so quoted abounds in errors. We say not this to blame Mr. Hawkins, who, of course, took no trouble with such trifles, but to show up the great powers of this unequalled scholar, to whom the learned languages are vernacular. He confesses that he imposed on the ignorant poor people of his house, some verses of Homer as Malayan, during his celebrated dialogue with the Lascar, in order to preserve his reputation for learningand it is quite evident, that a similar feeling of humbug actuates him in the nauseating succession of idle boasts with which he is continually deluging that portion of the public which thinks of him or his lucubrations.

He also wishes to pass for a profound philosopher, and sets up to be one of the few who can understand Kant. In one respect we believe him. Cant and Humbug are blood-relations, and so pure a specimen of the latter must, of course, know something of the former. But, setting the pun apart, (we own punning is poor wit, but it is good enough for our subject,) we are rather of opinion that here, too, he is drawing the long-bow. Few Germans are able to master the involved, peculiar, technical language of that obscure and worthless metaphysician;-there is no translation of his works, that is, no competent translation of them, into English, and we, therefore, must strenuously doubt Quincy's ability to read, much less to understand them. In this, perhaps, we may be mistaken-we suspect his ignorance of German, solely because he pretends to be intimate with it-but he may set us right easily. Let him translate for Taylor and Hessey's September number, for we wish to give him sufficient time, Kant's Chapter on the Quintessence of Spirit verbum verbo-or, if that be too hard on him, let him give the substance of each separate sentence in good English; that is, as good as he can write, which, however, is beastly enough, and we shall confess our error. Perhaps it might be impertinent if we asked him to affix to it a psychological commentary; though even with such an addition it would be pleasanter reading than his Letters to a Young Man, whose education has been neglected. Whoever that unhappy youth is, we sincerely pity him, if it be expected that he should read these epistles-it would have been less torment had he been whipped by all the Busbys in the kingdom, into a state of

knowledge, which would have saved him from the awful infliction of the Epistolæ Quincianæ.

We are getting completely tired of exposing this humbug any farther, and, therefore, shall conclude with one more observation. In his own nonsensical style of bombast, he calls upon "Stonyhearted Oxford-street,"-had he said stony-paved Oxford-street, there might have been some sense in it," thou who listenest to the sighs of orphans, and drinkest the tears of children," with much more childish verbiage of the same kind; all on account, it seems, of his having, for some time, sojourned in an empty house there, with a strumpet, concerning whom nothing farther is recorded than that her name was Ann, and that out of her honest earnings she treated Quincy to a glass-he says, of wine and spices. (p. 51.) (It was, most probably, of gin and bitters-but, Heaven knows, it is of little consequence.) Now, we happen to know Oxford-street well, and must be permitted to doubt the existence, in that quarter, of such

a house and household as are described in Quincy's book. Conceive, a large house-no furniture--no tenant, but a forlorn child---the master an attorney, or some such thing---dabbling in the law-courts, yet afraid to appear, through dread of bailiffs---the house open---a roomy suit of apartments, at the command of every vagrant---and all this in Oxford-street.--Why, to be sure, it may be vrai, for nothing is impossible; but he must be of large credulity, indeed, who would declare it, vraisemblable. We must humbly request from Quincy the number of the house in which he, and his friend Ann, used to spend their evenings then, with which request we bid him good evening, now.

For now the Sun has stretched out all the hills,

And now is dropt into the western bay; At last we rise, and twitch our mantle blue, To-morrow to fresh woods and pastures

new,

i.e. next month, for the dissection of another "Humbug of the Age." What say you to Dr. Kitchiner? Will He do?

THANKS to chivalry, and to the liberal and free spirit which it has diffused through Christendom, the restraint and seclusion imposed upon our fair domestic. companions have, in modern times, been in a great measure removed; and even philosophy has been partly stripped of her repulsive gravity, and has condescended to become the occasional visitant of the toilette, the drawing-room, and the tea-table. We like this order of things; we like to share our more attractive studies with our female relations and friends; though, perhaps, after all, our likings may take their rise from a sort of latent, but surely an excusable vanity, in seeing ourselves the object of attention, and feeling the influence of lovely looks, bright with ntelligence and inquiry, when we are solicited to descant on the metamorphoses of a butterfly, the beauties of a flower, the characteristics of a gem, or the formation of a dew-drop.

But we may give our vanity to the winds; the subject is more important than the cherishment it affords to any little passion of ours; for one of the most sovereign cosmetics for the im

provement of beauty, which we know, is intelligence-a secret long understood and acted upon by most ladies who have had-we will not say the misfortune, but the good fortune, to be plain, or who have, by accident, been deprived of traits of countenance that would otherwise have rendered them handsome. Intelligence goes far to make up for all deficiences of form or feature, while it gives a finish and an enchantment to the highest order of beauty, that can by no other means be imparted. It adds lustre to the eyes, expression to the countenance, elegance to the speech, and meaning to every movement. Milton has given to the picture we wish to draw, the richest colours of his fancy,

"Heaven was in her eye,
In every gesture, dignity and love."
Par. Lost.

Intelligence, likewise, confers happiness and pleasure on many a long hour, which would, by the ignorant and listless, be spent in yawning vacuity, and all the fashionable horrors of ennui. It is by this very means, indeed, that it improves beauty; for, according to the unalterable

laws of habit, the face that always wears the wrinkle of weariness and dissatisfaction, will not be readily smoothed into good humour, nor even into the calm tender mien of pensive feeling. Ennui should be repelled in all its approaches; for it will always leave behind its repulsive expression; the eye will be deadened with the sickliness of discontentment, and the often-repeated yawn will mark the young cheek with the dimples (if we may profane the expression) of old age. We aver then, and pledge our honour on the issue, that the lady who shall discard ennui, and court the friendship of knowledge, will shine forth in more bright and permanent beauty, than "When fayre Cynthia in darksome night Is in a noyous cloud enveloped, Where she may find the substance thin and light,

Breakes forth her silver beames; and her bright head

Discovers to the world."

Spenser's Faerie Queene.

All the injuries now enumerated, and hundreds more, can most easily be prevented, by the simple expedient of keeping the mind amused and active, and not suffering it to slumber till the eyes become vacant, and the countenance as motionless as marble. We think, therefore, that it is one of the richest gifts we can confer on our fair readers, to display our receipt for improving beauty in its most attractive form. The ways in which it may be varied, indeed, are innumerable; for it may be prepared so as to suit every complexion, and every shape. The choice of the varieties we leave to be made at the toilette, as we must take care to avoid the imputation of empiricism, by recommending the same form of our cosmetic to all ages and temperaments.

We shall not be so unpolite, then, in recommending gems as a female study, to require a commencement with the ruder materials of mineralogy :-let that be an after-consideration, growing out of the progress of inquisitiveness into the secrets of nature and art. Our space is too limited, and we could expect no thanks for going into all the minutiae of ores of gold and silver, or of the no less useful minerals, marble, gypsum, and coal. We must, for the present, be contented with gems, and, probably at some future time, we may come to talk of Antres vast, and deserts idle, Rough quarries, rocks, and hills. Shakespeare.

VOL. I.

And if we at any time be in a critical
humour, we may possibly show a little
of our learning, in tracing the lines of
Gray-" Full many a gem," &c. to the
Odes of Celio Magno, who has
"Ma (qual in parte ignota

Ben ricca Gemma altrui cela il suo pregio,
O fior, ch' alta virtù ha in se riposta)
Visse in sen di castità nascosta

In sua virtute e 'n Dio contento visse
Lunge dal visco mondan, che l'alma intrica.
Canz. 6.

Or, to come nearer home, we may probably find some resemblance in Thom

son:

Th' unfruitful rock itself, impregn'd by
thee,

In dark retirement forms the lucid stone."
Summer.

But we must arrest our sacrilegious hand from thus despoiling a poet of his beauties; and the task, now before us, is more delightful than the crabbed and ungainly labour of hunting for plagiarisın. We wish to lead our fair readers to the beauties of nature, and direct

Their liberal heart, their judging eye,
The flower, unheeded, to descry,
And bid it round heaven's altar shed
The fragrance of its blushing head;
And raise from earth the latent gem
To glitter on the diadem.-GRAY.

The word gem, though sometimes confined to the diamond, is commonly applied to all the precious stones, and particularly to those which are engraved. It is derived (a word is nothing at present without a derivation)—it is derived from the Latin gemma, which signifies a bud; because, perhaps, the Romans had their jewels cut in form of flower-buds. This may be a fancy, and we do not affirm it. Those who wish for a higher derivation, we refer to the Greek verb Yew (begging pardon for our pedantry) which means, I am full, and gemma, a bud, may be said to fill or expand: this, also, may be a fancy.

The high refractive power of the diamond throws back the light that falls on it, instead of allowing the rays to pass through it as glass does. This gives the gem a sparkling brilliance, which no art can fully imitate. It is this, and not any phosphorescent property, that causes it even to sparkle in the dark-of which so many fables are related in the Arabian Tales. In the deepest darkness, there are always some wandering rays-some stray pencils of light to render the "darkness visible,"

E

and these, how few or small soever, the diamond collects to a point and flashes them back into the gloom. The property of sparkling, therefore, is one test by which a genuine diamond may be known from spurious imitations or from the more splendent sorts of rock-crystal and other gems, which are sometimes passed off for diamonds.

A more obvious and practical test, is the extreme hardness of the diamond, so much superior to all other substances, that it will penetrate and cut, not only glass and flint, but also the topaz and other precious stones. Paste, and all imitations, even the admirable ones of Fontanieu, may, on this principle, be at once detected; for the suspected gem has only to be tried with glass or rockcrystal, or with the glazier's diamond. If it scratch glass, it may either be paste of uncommon hardness, or some inferior stone; if rock-crystal or a file make any impression on it, there can be no doubt that it is artificial. The striking fire with steel, though sometimes used as a test, is not to be trusted; as in this way flint and quartz would appear superior to the diamond in hardness; for it is the little chip of the steel which catches fire by being struck, and the sharp edge of a flint is best adapted to detach it.

In the instance of small gems, suspected to be spurious, Mr. Mawe re

commends squeezing them between two pieces of money; when, if spurious, they will easily be broken or crushed; but as it is not pleasant to perform the work of destruction, even on what is spurious, all that is required is a bit of flint or quartz to scratch the gems with, and those who do so can never be deceived with the finest paste; while rockcrystal and other stones of inferior value can always be detected by their lustre and their inferior weight.

The nova minas, or Brazilian diamonds, which are only a variety of the topaz, are the least easy to detect; but the property of refracting light, will, when well understood, be the best test. The real diamond is never set on a foil; yet, when it is looked at perpendicularly, a small black point appears in the centre, as if it had been marked with ink, while the rest appears brilliant and sparkling. This, which is overlooked by the common observer, is taken advantage of by the jeweller, who sets his nova minas on a foil, with a black point in the centre, in order to deceive even those who pretend to connoisseurship. The reason of the diamond's showing a black point is, that the ray of light which falls on the centre passes through and is lost, while all the other rays are refracted and reflected to the eye.

WHEN We said that we drank ale with our cheese, we knew what a serious responsibility we were taking on ourselves. But our attachment to the cause of Sir John Barlycorn-in his most genuine and hopeful character, fiercely, after much long internal struggle, due deliberation on the momentous subject, determined us at last to make the avowal in the face of the world. We know that the dandy young gentlemen of the tenth will be horrified at the declaration; and we, moreover, give up all the glory of figuring in a quadrille at Almack's; but, in return for these deprivations, we have the happiness of a clear conscience and a quart of ale.

In praise of this magnificent fluid, much may be said-A volume as thick as one of Coxe's histories, and as heavy as Foscolo's brains, might be concerted on so glorious a theme; but, at present, not having the orgasm of panegyric very

66

strong on us, and moreover reflecting that it has been done already by a much more brilliant hand than ours, we shall content ourselves with favouring our readers with a short critique and analysis of the celebrated poem of the Exale-tation of ale, ascribed, according to Lord Bacon, by several judicious people, to Bishop Andrews, a great man, teste the Verulamian" who, (like the grass in hot countries, of which they are wont to say that it groweth hay) was born grave and sober," and of which, indeed, this beautiful composition of his affords conspicuous proof. It begins well and graphically; we think we actually see the author and his friend before us. Not drunken, nor sober, but neighbour to both,

I met with a friend in Alesbury vale: He saw by my face, that I was in good case To speak no great harm of a pot of good

ale.