given by Francifco Alcaforado, who was Equerry to the Duke de Vifco.

"It was in the glorious reign of Edward III. that Robert a Machin, or Macham, an English Gentleman of the fecond degree of nobility, beheld and loved the beautiful Anna D'Arfet (or, as fome hiftorians write it, Dorjet); their attachment was mutual; but the pride of the illuftrious family of Dorfet was infenfible to the happiness of their daughter; they preferred the indul gence of ambition to the voice of duty and love. The feudal tyranny of the age was friendly to their cruel defign; and a warrant from the King feemed to justify the vanity of a parent. The confolation of an ingenuous mind fupported Macham in confinement, nor did it yield to defpondency, when, on being releafed from prifon, he found that the innocent caufe of his perfecution had been forced to marry a Nobleman, who had carried her to his castle near Briflol. The friends of Macham made his misfortune their own; and one of them had the addrefs to get introduced, difguifed in the capacity of a groom, to the fervice of the afflicted Anna. The profpect of the fea, which in their rides extended before them, fuggefted the plan of efcape; and the probability of a fecure afylum was oppofed to the dangers of a paffage to France. Under the pretence of deriving benefit from fea air, the victim of parental ambition was enabled to elude fufpicion, while Macham, in the fuccefsful completion of his anxious defign, was equally infenfible to the particular feafon of the year, or the portentous appearance of the weather, which in calmer moments he would have duly obferved. On their paffage, a tempeft and the darkrefs of the night occafioned their miffing, or being unable to reach, the coaft of France. Their veffel drove at the mercy of the wind; and in the morning they found themfelves in the midit of an unknown ocean, without the skill that could determine their fituation, or the experience that might have directed their courfe. The dawn of twelve mornings returned without the fight of land; when at length, after a night of increafed anxiety, as they eagerly watched the earliest ftreaks of day, an object loomed on the horizon: continual difappointment produced at querulous defpondency: whilst they alternately believed and doubted, the

thick grey haze was difperfed by the rifing fun, and a general burst of joy welcomed the certainty of land. A luxuriancy of trees was foon visible, to whofe appearance they were utter ftrangers; and the beautiful plumage of unknown birds, who came in flocks from the inland, gave, at firit, the femblance of a dream to their aftonishing deliverance. The boat being hoisted out to examine the coaft, returned with a favourable account. Macham and his friends accompanied their trembling charge on fhore, leaving the crew to fecure the veffel. The wilderness of the adjacent country poffeffed additional charms to men efcaped from deftruction; and an opening in the extenfive woods, which was encircled with laurels and flowering fhrubs, prefented a delightful retreat: a venerable tree, the growth of ages, offered, on an adjacent eminence, its welcome thade; and the firft moments of liberty were employed in forming a romantic habi tation, with the abundant materials fupplied by nature.

"A curiofity to explore their new difcovery was increafed by the novelty of every object they beheld: this varied occupation continued for three days, until the furvey was interrupted by an alarming hurricane, which came on during the night, and rendered them painfully anxious for their companions on board. The enfuing morning de troyed every profpect of happiness: they in vain fought for the veffel, which had drove from her moorings, and was wrecked on the coast of Mo. rocco, where all on board were immediately feized as flaves, and fent to prifon. The afflicted Macham found this laft trial too fevere for his terrified and difconfolate mittrefs: her tender mind was overcome by the fcenes the had endured-from the moment it was reported that the veffel could not be found, he became dumb with grief, expired after a few days of filent defpair, and was foon followed by her inconfolable lover." Such is the brief abitract of the melancholy adventures of thefe fugitives from their native land, recorded more at large, with explanatory notes, by our indefatigable hiftorian.

John de Morales, a Spanish pilat, who had been taken by the Moors, and thrown into the fame prifon with the unhappy English feamen, was met at fea, in a cartel which had been fent

by

by the King of Spain to redeem Chriftian flaves, by Gonzales Zarco, who was fent by the Duke de Visco on a fecond expedition of discovery in 1420; Zarco took him into his fervice, and hearing from him the account of the difcovery of Madeira, as related to him by his fellow-prifoners, he returned with his new companion to Puerto Santo, where he was cordially received by Tristan Vaz Texeira, to whom he communicated his defign; and in a fhort time they failed, in company with Morales as their guide, in fearch of the island' defcribed to him by the English fea men: the account of its fresh difcovery, of taking poffeffion of all Madeira, in the names of King John the First of Portugal and his illuftrious fon Henry Duke of Visco, and of the Portuguese settlement there in the year 1421, contains many curious and entertaining particulars, well meriting the attention of men of letters and of modern navigators. The power of the Sovereign Pontiff was at this time obliged to be called in aid of the Portuguese increafing zeal for maritime discoveries, the influence of religion alone being able to ftifle the murmurs, and check the oppofition of the people to the expenfive enterprizes of the Duke of Vifco. For this purpose, Pope Martin the Fifth granted an exclufive right to the Portuguese nation of the islands they already poffeffed, and alfo to whatever countries their perfeverance might hereafter explore: conceffions which were afterwards confirmed and enlarged by Eugenius the Fourth, Nicholas the Fifth, and Sextus the Fourth. Thus fupported, the Duke of Vifco proceeded with refolution; but his energy was again depreffed by the death of his illustrious father John the First, who died at Lisbon in 1433. The fhort reign of his fucceffor Edward I. who died of the plague in 1438, opened the door to new voyages, as Don Pedro, who feconded all the views of his brother Henry, was appointed regent of the kingdom during the minority of his nephew Alphonfo the First. The first act of the Regent was to renew a treaty of friendship and commerce with England. The difpofition of the two brothers being equally inclined to favour the progrefs of maritime difcovery, a fucceffion of voyages took place; the gold-coaft of Africa was difcovered, ten negroes from different parts of that country, with a

confiderable quantity of gold-duft, was offered and accepted for two captive prifoners; and the fight of this precious metal encouraged the Portuguese to fail in queft of other acquifitions. The Duke de Vifco fubdued the islands of Canaria, Palma, Gratiofa, Inferno, Alegrazze, Santa Chiara, Rocca, and Lobos. The inhabitants of Lagos, in the kingdom of Algarve, now a province of Portugal, were the first to project a chartered Company on the difcoveries of their countrymen, and preparations were made to lay the foundation of that commerce which gradually extended from the Rio del Ouro (the gold river,) to the diftant feas both of India and China; and this event our Author styles, "the origin of the East India Company :" it bears date about the year 1444. Two years after this inftitution, Denis Fernandez, a Gentleman of Lif bon, who had belonged to the houfehold of King John, difcovered Cape Verde Islands; and in 1447, he failed a fecond time, further to the fouthward, till he reached the mouth of the river Gambia.

The discovery of the nine islands, by geographers fometimes called Terceras or Weltern, but more generally the Azores, commenced in 1432; but they were not completely fettled by the Portuguese, who still retain them, till the year 1450: but the Flemings lay claim to one of them, because John Vandenberg, a Flemith merchant, first explored Fayal, which is ftill inhabited by Flemings under the protection of a Portuguese garrifon. As the close to the difcoveries of the Duke of Visco, our Author fubjoins the first and fecond voyages of Cada Mojio, a noble Venetian, in which confiderable information is given of the difcoveries made along the coaft of Africa, and in the interior part of that country. The Duke died about the year 1463; and it was then left to King Alphonfo the Fifth to continue the maritime power and fpirit of enterprife which had rendered him fo famous. A further progrefs was made by this Monarch in difcoveries on the Western coast of Africa, from Cape Verga to Cape Catherine; and be concluded a commercial treaty in 1479, with Ferdinand of Caftile, by which the trade to Guinea and the navigation of its coat was guaranteed to Portugal, and the Canary Islands to Spain: this was the laft public a&t of the long reign of Alphonfo, who was feized

with the plague at Cintra in the year 1481, and died in the forty-ninth year of his age, and the forty-third of his reign, univerfally regretted.

John the Second, his worthy fucceffor, obtained, and justly merited, the title of Great; "the whole energy of his mind was directed to promote the maritime glory of his kingdom, and to extend the progrefs of difcovery by an uniform and liberal fupport. His first care was to fecure the valuable commerce with Guinea, and more particularly the importation of gold from the port of Mina; for this purpofe, he ordered a strong fort to be erected, and a church for Chriftian worship: it was in vain for the fpirit of oppofition to reprefent the dangers of the navigation, and the infalubrity of the climate; the pious King replied-that if one African was thus converted to the Faith, the threatening obstacles would easily be furmounted. The fort received the naine of St. George, was converted into a city by fuitable buildings in 1486, and a folemn mafs was performed in the church, to confecrate the memory of the illuftrious Henry Duke de Vifco, which was ordered to be an annual fervice. A beautiful engraved view of St. George de Mina decorates the pages containing the account of this fettlement. The difcovery of the territory of Congo followed; an Ambaffador from its African King was fent to the Court of Portugal, who, together with his retinue, being converted to 'Chriftianity, were baptized with confiderable pomp; John himfelf accompanied the devout African to the altar, attended by another fponfor, and the Queen as god-mother.

We now arrive at the grand era, which accomplished the first great object that the Duke de Vifco had incited his countrymen to purfue from the year 1412, "the difcovery of the Cape of Good Hope, by Bartholomew Diaz, an officer of the King's household at Lisbon, in the year 1487." From the heavy gales this navigator had experienced, he called the high table-land of the great promontory, Il Cabo des Tormentos; but the high expectations the King of Portugal entertained of the commercial benefits he fhould derive from the difcovery, fuggefted the more appropriate name he gave to it, and which it till retains.

The maritime power and glory of Portugal had now attained their me

ridian fplendour.-This great event adorned the clofe of the reign of John the Second, whofe decided fupremacy on the feas may be collected from the following anecdote: A Portuguese veffel being taken by a French privateer, he laid an embargo on all the French fhips in the ports of his kingdom, and directed Vafco de Gama to make reprifals. The French Monarch ordered inftant reftitution; but when the ship was reftored, a Paroquet be longing to one of the crew was milling. John refufed to give up the French hips until the bird was conveyed to Lisbon: all remontrance was ineffectual: "I would have it known," faid he, "that the Flag of Portugal can protect even a Paroquet."-Such was the Monarch who expired on the 25th of October 1495, in the fortieth year of his age, and the fourteenth of his reign, when, fays a diftinguished French Author, "The Portuguese name had filled all Europe, and had effaced the glory which the Phoeni cians, the Carthaginians, and the Romans, had acquired in the art of Navigation." But his great object was the Eaft Indies, on which he was fo intent, that it disturbed even his fleep--and this accounts for his neglect of the offers of Chriftopher Columbus refpecting the difcovery of America, noticed by our Author. Hydrographical remarks relative to the Atlantic Ocean terminate Chapter II.

Chapter III. contains a retrofpect of Indian Hiftory from the Macedonian difcgveries to the clofe of the fifteenth century, in Section I. The Portuguese annals are continued in Section II. : Emmanuel, the fucceffor of John the Second, in oppofition to the advice of his counfellors, purfued his plan of maritime difcoveries; and Vafco de Gama was fent on an expedition to India, furnished with letters from the King to the Princes of the Country. The fleet arrived on the coaft on the 20th of May 1498, and Gama was conducted by fome fishermen to Calicut, a city on the coaft of Malabar.

Here ends Book I. adorned with a vignette of a fhip under fail, as seen at four leagues' diftance from Cape Verde. In the pleafing expectation of feeing the Second Volume announced, we take our leave, referving a lift of appendixes for infertion when the work is completed.

M.

Or this Novel, which abounds with incidents ingenioufly imagined, and characters in high and low life well delineated, and properly contrafted, we have only room to give the following outline:

The Earl of Dormer, a diffipated young Nobleman, betrays the trust repofed in him, by feducing the wife of his abfent friend, who is likewife a near relation. The probability of this friend's return to England determines the guilty pair to avoid his prefence by fight. Edmund Greville the husband, who had gone to pafs a thort time in a retired village in Switzerland, receives, while there, information of his coutin's elopement, and fhortly after of his having taken up his refidence in the fame village with himself. Concluding that his relation had formed fome foolith or imprudent attachment, he determines to fee and prevail with him to rettore his indifcreet companion to her friends, and accordingly proceeds to his lodgings; but finding his friend from home, he is fhewn by the woman of the house to the apartment of the Lady, when, in the perfon of the fuppofed wanton, he difcovers his own wife in the act of fuckling an infant, which the length of his abfence from her would not permit him to confider as his. Unable to fupport this thock, he falls fenfelefs at her feet, and is conveyed home. On his recovery he fends a challenge to the deltroyer of his peace; which being declined by the Earl, Mr. Greville repairs to Eng land, and obtains a divorce, which is followed by the marriage of the criminal parties, who, after a few years, return to their native country, bring. ing with them their two fons, Leopold, the hero of the tale, and Lord Delfield, born fince their marriage.

With the return of thefe boys from fchool the book opens. Leopold, to the difmay of both his parents, afks, why he is not a Lord as well as his younger brother? declaring his diflike to be called a baftard, and begging to know what a baftard means. He is filenced, but not fatisfied; accident, however, shortly after furnithes the knowledge that he sought; in confequence of which he grows fullen and morofe, which, with his increased

VOL. XLIV. JULY 1803.

growth, determines his parents to fepa

rate him from his brother. He is ac

cordingly placed with a Clergyman, from whofe houfe he runs away after feveral years' refidence; and in his rambles is cheated by a Jew, tricked by a gipley, robbed by a pickpocket, and Rear perithing for want. In this tuation he is met and relieved by Ferdinand Marchmont, a youth of his own age, who takes him home with him, and introduces him to his parents by the name of Leopold Howorth. Here he is treated like a fon; and the young men go abroad, and return from their travels together. New characters are now brought forward, in the perfons of a Mrs. Westbrook, her fon and daugh ter, which give birth to fome very ludicrous fcenes, and end in the departure of the vifitants, and the dif appointment of Mr. Marchmont's longformed plan of uniting their families. The discovery of Mils Marchmont's attachment to Leopold occations the removal of the latter, who is received in the capacity of Private Secretary by a Gentleman of the name of Mountjoy, through whofe means he becomes an inmate in the family of Lord Grimftone, and is enamoured of Lady Caroline, the Earl's daughter. He returns in despair to his patron, from having difcovered that his brother Lord Delfield, with whom he had a momentary meeting, is the deftined husband of the idol of his affections. Mr. Mountjoy, who has conceived a warm attachment to this youth, attempts to calm his forrows by a detail of thofe which he' had himfelf fupported; when, to the amazement and horror of Leopold, he difcovers that Mr. Mountjoy and the deeply-injured Edmund Greville are the fame. Refolved to fly for ever from the man to whom his birth has been baneful, he quits his houfe, informing him by letter of the difcovery that he has made. After leaving this Gentleman, he receives two letters from his early protector, Mr. Marchmont, and his beloved friend Ferdinand; the first charging him with robbing him of his daughter, the fecond upbraiding him with depriving him of his mitrefs. Of the first change he feels himself innocent; but of the fecond he finds it will not be fo eafy to be acquitted. Anxious

H

and

and unhappy, he fets out for London; and, through the intereft of a fellow traveller, he is placed as tutor in the family of a Mr. Cleveland, a Gentle man whose brain is disturbed. Accompanying his pupil to the Opera, he meets and refcues Mifs Marchmont from infult; by which he is involved in a quarrel, and a duel enfues between him and his brother Lord Delfield, in which the former is flightly wounded; but, refusing to return the fire, they feparate, Lord Delfield having no know ledge of his affinity to his antagonist. Lady Caroline Grimstone, who was under the conduct of Lord Delfield, and prefent at the affray, acquaints her guardian, Mr. Mountjoy, with the particulars, and is in return informed to whom Leopold owed his birth; foon after which the meets with an advertilement in a new paper, wherein a reward is offered for the apprehenfion of Leopold Greville, who ftiled himself the fon of the Earl of Dormer, and who ftood convicted of high crimes and misdemeanors. Without an idea remaining on her mind that this was any other than her late favourite, the accompanies her father on a visit at some distance from town; here the finds Leopold with the Cleveland family, inmates of the fame house; and her conduct to the former is dictated by the contempt which his fuppofed vices have infpired, until he learns that peace-officers have traced the adver. tifed culprit to the neighbouring vil

lage; when, alarmed and anxious for his fafety, the feeks and obtains a pri vate interview with him to warn him of his danger; becoming now convinced of the injuftice that he had done him, he is hurried into a confeffion of her long attachment to his perfon, and concludes with a vow of becoming his wife. Here they feparate; and Leopold, rambling into the country, refcues Lord Dormer from the hands of a highwayman; but is himifelf taken up for the robbery, committed upon ftrong circumstances to prifon, and after fome time brought to trial; when he is confronted by the Earl, who by means of a watch found upon him when he was fecured, discovers him to be his fon; and the impoltor who had affumed his name is found to be not only the robber of Lord Dormer, but the seducer of Mifs Marchmont; he is detected in the act of impofing upon the deranged Mr. Cleveland, and finishes a life of infamy by a violent death.

Though we cannot but think that fome of the adventures of this amufing and interesting Novel are carried to the very verge of probability; yet, on the whole, the work is evidently the production of an experienced wri ter, capable of deducing useful inftruc tion from the paffing fcenes of life; and we have been too well pleated in the perufal, to be always fastidious in inquiring why we were fo.

T HIS letter is pregnant with sensible and important animadverfion and advice. clothed in the animating language of loyalty and patriotifm. With the Writer's atlumptions refpecting the Union with Ireland, we do not altogether accord; nor do we think that, as the Union has taken place. its propriety is now a proper object of allu. fion; but there is much truth, we think, in his obfervations refpecting the wisdom of immediate meatures for conciliating the entire affections of all claffes of people in that country; "a people," as the Author defcribes them,

light, generous, angry, and inconftant, quick in malevolence, indifcreet in affection, exuberant in zeal."

We fhall felect a fingle paragraph as a fpecimen of the ftile of this pamphlet:

J.

"Circumftanced as we now are, we have only to study how we may best act : the fword is inftantly about to be drawn, and war with all its horrors is impending. Let it be remembered, that the conteft which awaits us is of no ordinary kind; that France has added to her population and her firength in a degree which has rendered her far more formidable than the ever was at any former period of her eventful hiftory; that her numerous bands, accustomed to difcipline, enured to hardships, and familiarized with danger, have all that careleffnefs of life, and love of enter prife, which may naturally be looked for in men who have nothing to lose, whilst they may reafonably hope to gain; that they are flushed with the most unprecedented fucceffes; that the

Generals