corruption, and makes thus perpetually migrating? It is true, indeed, to all this may be answered, that the present convenience of travelling throughout England facilitates the intercourse of distant places; gives activity to the internal trade of the country; and above all, improves, promotes, and extends civilization through the land. Allowing thus much, however, I would still contend, we are yet without sufficient proof that the improvements in our public roads are promotive of the real happiness of our country. Frequent and intimate intercourse gives wings to that licentiousness general, which, without its aid, would be only partial. Internal trade, beyond a certain limit, is the parent of luxury and profuse expense; of which the one only increases our wants, and the other, in endeavouring to satisfy them, plunges us into misery and ruin; and civilization is an ambiguous term, being either a good or an evil, a blessing or a curse, according to the degree to which it has arrived, or the measure which it has exceeded. Indeed, there is no question relating to the happiness of man in his aggregate character so difficult to be determined, as the exact point at which civilization should stop in order to produce the greatest possible degree of public felicity. To me, I confess, it appears, that all the writers on political economy are equally distant from the truth in their reasonings on this subject. Without, however, attempting to settle the dispute between the disciples of Rousseau and the followers of Adam Smith, I would lay this axiom down as an incontrovertible one; that, in proportion as civilization is promotive of virtue, morality, and religion amongst a people, so far is it a source of public felicity; but, on the contrary, that it becomes subversive of real national happiness, in the exact ratio of its producing opposite effects to these on the general character of a country. Whether or not our admirable turnpike-roads are likely to have any influence in giving either, or which, of these colourings to the English moral character, I leave it to you to determine. The gloom of these speculations was however in some degree dispersed, on our being informed, that in consequence of the new road, and an Act for Inclosure, a prodigious rise had taken place in the value of the land through which it runs. Six and twenty thousand acres had been rescued from the winter's floods, drained, cultivated, and raised in annual rent from 5s. to 45s, and three guineas per acre. Noble crops of corn were now waving over large districts of land which had formerly been the exclusive possession of the gander, his wife, and family; and large herds of black cattle were grazing and fattening on rich inclosures that heretofore could only have been trodden by the light step of the adventurous snipe-shooter. A short time before we reached Borough-Bridge, we were induced to quit the turnpike in order to examine a little stone structure to the left hand, which appeared to have been raised in commemoration of some remarkable person or event. We found it to be elegant in design, and neat in workmanship; and bearing the following inscription : "KING ALFRED THE GREAT, "In the year of our Lord 879, having been defeated by the "Danes, fled for refuge to the Forest of Athelney, where "he lay concealed from his enemies for the space of a "whole year. He foon after resigned the possession of "his throne, and in grateful remembrance of the pro"tection he had received under the favour of Heaven, " erected a Monastery on this spot; and endowed it with "the land contained in the Isle of Athelney. "To perpetuate the memory of so remarkable an incident "in the life of that illustrious prince, this edifice was "founded by John Slade, esq; of Mansol, the proprietor "of Athelney Farm, and lord of the manor of North"Petherton, A. D. 1801.” It was not without considerable pleasure, and some little feeling of national vanity, that we recollected we were now on a spot, immortalized by the rents. greatest public character, perhaps, that adorns the page of history; and that this character was a countryman of our own. To this secluded spot, after a strenuous conflict of nine years with the Danes, who in tumultuous crowds had over-run and laid waste the Eastern part of his dominions, was Alfred under the necessity of retiring, with a few faithful adheHere he concealed himself for the space of a year, employing the period of his concealment in arranging those measures, and making those prepations, which enabled him to retaliate with a dreadful vengeance upon his enemies, and by their signal overthrow at Eddington, to reduce them to unconditional submission. It was here that he exhibited that exalted proof of his beneficence, when he supplied the wants of an hungry beggar, by giving him the only loaf in his possession, and left himself without a meal; and was rewarded for his humanity by an unhoped-for and almost miraculous supply of provision. And it was from hence he made his celebrated visit to the Danish camp, in the disguise of a harper, which gave him an opportunity of observing the carelesness and want of discipline of his enemies, and enabled him to attack them with that success which crowned the Battle of Eddington. When we consider the conduct of this great man under the strange reverses to which he was at different times exposed, it is difficult to say whether he is most the object of admiration in prosperity or adversity. His moderation in the one, and his firmness in the other, were equally uncommon and exemplary. In short, viewed either as a legislator, a warrior, a scholar, a philosopher, or a Christian, I think we may venture to say, that the character of Alfred stands unrivalled in the history of the world; and every way deserves the splendid eulogies which have been accumulated upon it. Would to Heaven, that encomium and desert were always as legitimately joined together, as in this instance ! But it is melancholy to reflect how seldom this is the case; how few of what the world calls great men, can claim the applause of the wise, or the approbation of the good; how infre quently the character of the true hero appears; or how rarely the conqueror deserves the blessings of mankind! I may be faftidious, or perhaps forgetful; but at present none such occur to my recollection, save the august subject of the present page, and the illustrious deliverer of America: "Thou, patriot conqueror! Who in the western world "Thine own delivered country, for thyself |