circumstances interposed so as to prevent any thing of consequence being effected,

Having returned to England, in 1810, Sir John was nominated to the Newfoundland station, which he retained during three years. At the end of that period he was appointed to the Plymouth station, and died on the 14th of April, 1817, in the 70th year of his age, leaving behind him the name and reputation of a great, humane, and experienced commander. The last years of his life, were doubtless embittered, by the painful recollection of losing an only son, who had obtained the rank of Colonel in the army, while fighting gallantly under the Duke of Wellington, in Spain. A daughter, some years since, became the wife of Admiral Sir Richard King.

Sir John Duckworth sat in Parliament, for some time, as one of the members for the borough of New Romney, and at the period of his demise, was Commander-in-Chief on the Plymouth station.

LATE MASTER OF THE ROLLS IN IRELAND, AND A MEMBER OF HIS MAJESTY'S MOST HONOURABLE PRIVY COUNCIL, &c. &c. &c.

THAT rare and extraordinary talent called ELOQUENCE, has in all ages excited the admiration, and been accompanied by the applause of mankind. In both ancient and modern times, it has produced fame, as well as fortune, to such as have excelled in it; but it is only in free countries, that it is ever cultivated with success.

We are well acquainted with the names of the orators of Greece, of Rome, and of England; but whoever heard of those of Russia, Persia, or Hindostan? And how many ages must elapse, before the banks of the Danube, and the Dwina, the borders of the Arabian gulf, or the shores of the Hellespont shall produce a Cicero, a Demosthenes, or a Chatham? John Philpot Curran, who is indebted for his rise in life, and all his subsequent celebrity, to eloquence alone, was

a native of Ireland. Indeed, his country appears to have been indelibly engraved on his tongue, as well as in his heart, for it is not a little remarkable, that a peculiar, but not disagree able cadence, was easily distinguishable in his pronunciation, even in the latter part of his life.

Some difficulties occur, in respect to the history of his early years, for his infancy was involved in a gloom of poverty, and obscurity, which a youthful spirit of enterprise luckily contrived to burst through. It is certain, however, that he is indebted for his birth to the province of Munster; and the little obscure town of Newmarket in the county of Cork, lays claim to the honour of having produced him. It appears from the inscription on his coffin, that he was born in 1750, but the occupation of his father *, and the precise situation of his family remains unknown.

There is reason, however, to suppose, that his parents were protestants; and that his ancestors were emigrants from the north of England, who had been long settled in Ireland. To the former circumstance, perhaps, he owes his education; any claims or pretensions in respect to the latter, he was wholly ignorant of, or too modest ever to disclose. In Scotland, the parochial schools bring instruction home to the door of every cottager; but this is not, and never was the case in Ireland: it is indeed, but of late years, that a system so intimately connected with religion, morals, and general information, has begun to diffuse the blessings of instruction over England. And this too has been attained, not as in the northern portion of the British dominions, by a positive law, and a permanent specific revenue arising out of land; but by voluntary and liberal subscriptions on the part of all orders and denominations of men.

In the sister kingdom, an attempt was made upwards of a century since, by means of PROTESTANT FREE-SCHOOLS, to convey the seeds of instruction to a certain number of the inhabitants, but as this blessing was partial and exclusive,

* It has since been discovered, that the elder Mr. Curran, was occasionally employed in collecting the rents for a gentleman of small fortune in that neighbourhood.

being confined to a specific denomination of Christians only, the Catholics were of course prohibited from all its benefits. That very circumstance, perhaps, will account for the present unhappy and uncivilized state of Ireland: for in what consists the difference between barbarous and polished nations, but in mind and manners? and both these are closely and evidently connected with instruction.

But be this as it may, the probability is, that as the Currans were poor Protestants, actuated by the commendable ambition of advancing their son John, they contrived to obtain for him all the advantages that could be derived from an institution of this kind. Had he been, what is there termed a Papist, in consequence of a superstitious veneration for the successors of those very orthodox Popes, Julius II. and Alexander VI. the probability is, that as his parents were utterly unable to have afforded the expences of a foreign education, and were denied the advantage of one in their own country, he would have been a little lively peasant, renting half an acre of potatoe-ground, from an avaricious and hardhearted extortioner, commonly called a middle man; and if his constitution, which was always feeble, had not been destroyed by intense labour, and his mind rendered dull and dismal, by servitude, his lively fancy might have made him a "Munster poet," and in this capacity he would, perhaps, have attempted to write verses in the vernacular language of his native province.

Fortunately, however, a better fate awaited young Curran, for he had certainly acquired the rudiments at least of a classical education, before he attempted to obtain an introduction into the University of his native country; and it was in the humble station of a Sizer *, that our aspiring candidate first procured admission to the College of the Holy Trinity.

* This is said to be a situation in which the emoluments are trivial, while it is accompanied with the most mortifying mark of inferiority. The Sizers have their education, however, free of expence, but they are obliged to keep the weekly rolls of the tutors, while on them devolves the arduous task of superintending the weekly distribution of fines, and punishments. At that period they had their commons gratis.

Here he is said to have remained during the space of two years, not only undistinguished and unknown, but almost in a state of want. Whether the distresses of that period have been since magnified, in order to form a more direct contrast with his future prosperity, is not exactly known; but certain it is that at the conclusion of two years he obtained a scholarship. This was a fortunate circumstance, as it raised him a little above actual distress; and enabled him to look forward with hope and expectation.

The means by which this youth effected a journey to England, and kept his commons at one of our Inns of Court, are merely conjectural; it has been indeed asserted, that at this early and trying period of his life, he maintained himself by the labours of his pen: but we suspect that he was indebted to some source, both more certain and more bounteous.

After a few terms spent in London, he was called to the bar, and was accustomed to travel one of the Irish circuits in search of briefs and business. It was during an excursion of this kind, that he first saw, and formed an acquaintance with Miss Creagh, who soon after became his wife. With that lady, he is not supposed to have received any great acquisition, in point of fortune; but in consequence of this connection, he soon beheld himself the father of a family of many children.

Immediately after their marriage they took up their residence in Dublin, and there waited for more prosperous times.

It was then, and perhaps still is, the practice in Ireland, for a female to relinquish all the maternal duties; to entrust her offspring to mercenary hands; and to banish from her house, and from her presence, the unhappy being to whom she had given life. This unnatural habit prevailed also in France, until Rousseau, in the name of reason and of sensibility, invoking all the fine feelings of the human heart on the side of nature and humanity, thus for ever banished a custom which barbarous nations have always held in just abhorrence. Whether it arose from a due share of affection, or that the means of following this fashionable and prevalent mode were actually wanting, is now difficult to decide; but certain it is, that Mrs.

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