W

learn

from our friends who have lately travelled to Rome, in what state the City appears at this time, respecting its original grandeur in buildings, colonnades, porticos, and arches; and we find that the representations which we have in prints are very ill calculated to afford us very clear ideas of the real appearance which these massy records of antiquity now present to the eye; for they are made from drawings of artists and ingenious men, who, desirous of representing the whole in as complete a state as possible, assist by their genius, and also by their labour, bases covered by earth, and many feet buried under ground; and capitals made out from one or two that remain perfect; and porticos, catching, as it were, their only support from the angles of flights of steps, which the student rather studies at a secure distance. Fallen columns have, been not only disfigured, but purposely mutilated, by the builders of small habitations, stables, and warehouses, who sought for materials near at hand, and at as cheap a rate as possible: these are freely affixed to the remnants of some high colonnade, where once a Brutus or a Cæsar trod. There seems to have exercised the minds of modern men, of either letters or opulence, no primary desire to preserve any of these eviGENT. MAG. MAG. July, 1816.

dences of ancient annals in the same state as their original compilers relate them; their minds have rather acted in unison with the mouldering Elemeuts of Fact, by yielding to the Triumph of Time. The arch of Titus, the palace of Adrian, the Forum, and the Temple, alike declare how little their modern possessors have regarded their beauty or their value; and whatever may be the variety of their pro-1. fessions in the admiration of their celebrated grandeur, they can have been actuated by very little zeal for the Arts, and for the perpetuity of Roman Architecture, while the best of these remains are disfigured by modern abutments and adjuncts of the meanest dwellings and materials, and by the careless neglect of unobserved decay. Much of the mutilations have been occasioned by the rapacity or avarice of travellers to enrich their own collections, or those of the great of other nations; but these are for the most part limited to busts and statues, which are not the subject of our present remarks: they are, though of infinite value, yet minor to the magnificence of extensive buildings in a city: at Rome we find their broken pedestals, which shew only the place where these eminent proofs of splendid genius once adorned the Capitol. It is the shameful perversion of great buildings themselves, of which we cannot help complaining: we would readily admit of alterations in their interior, to render them commodious for habitation in these times; but their exterior should have been sedulously preserved in all their ancient glory, giving, like their prototypes at Athens, the law of Architecture to all posterity,

"States once distinguished for military prowess, sometimes lay down their arms from lassitude, and are weary of fruitless contentions." The same remark is applicable to those once eminent, as Athens and Rome, for sculpture and architecture, which, in the modern lassitude of luxury, shrink from the exertion of repairing and preserving what decays around them, and whose beauty, familiar to their daily view, sinks at last into entire dissolution.

June 5.

:

A. H.

Mr.

June 29.

a

Comme nous fames vers les dernieres maisons de la ville, du costé du Temple de Thesée, qui est le chemin de l'Academie, notre Janissaire nous proposa d'entrer chez un Grec de sa connoissance qui demeuroit là, et qui estoit un Didascolos; c'est ainsi qu'ils appellent un maître d'ecole. Nous ne demandions pas mieux; mais quelle douleur pour nous qui avions l'imagination rempli du sublime savoir de Platon, de Zenon, et de l'Aristote; quelle douleur dis-je, quand le Janissaire nous eut dit que ce Didascolos estoit un artisan, et que nous vimmes a considérer qu'un homme de cette etoffe tenoit la place de ces grands personnages! Nous trouvames une trentaine de jeunes enfans assis sur les Bancs, et leur Regent à la teste, qui leur montroit à lire. II se leva et nous fit grand civilité: la nation n'en est point

avare.

Le Janissaire le pria de ne point interrompre ses leçons, pour nous en faire voir la méthode, que je trouvay très ingenieuse. Il s'en faut bien que la nostre n'en approche, car le maitre pouvoit fair lire toute la classe à la fois, sans confusion, et d'un manière à tenir toujours chaque ecolier attentif à ce que les autres lisaient. Ils avoient à la main chaqu'un un livre semblable; et si, par exemple, il y avoit trente ecoliers, il ne leur donnoit à lire que trente mots d'un discours continu; le premier ne lisoit que le premier mot, le second que le second, et le troisieme que le troisieme, et ainsi de suite. Et si chacun lisoit correctement son mot, il leur en fesoit lire encore trente: mais si quelqu'un venoit a manquer, il estoit incontinent repris par l'ecolier d'après, qui estoit exacte a l'observer, et celui-cy estoit encore observé par le plus proche, chacun se renvoyant le mot jusqu'à ce que les trente mots fussent lus. De sorte que les trente ecoliers estoient toujours en haleine, prêts à se reprendre, chaqu'un se piquant d'honneur d'être plus habile que son compagnon; et la leçon d'un particulier, devenoit une leçon commune, où il se mestoit une continuelle émulation.

Mais pour empescher que chaque écolier n'eludast eette ordre, en se preparant seulement à son mot particulier,

As we approached the last houses in the city, near the Temple of Theseus, leading towards the Academy, the Janissary proposed to us to call upon a Greek of his acquaintance, who lived there, and was a Didascolos; that was the title they gave to a schoolmaster. This was in fact one of the objects of our wishes; but we were very much disappointed, having entertained great expectations from the wisdom of Plato, of Zeno, and of Aristotle: what a mortification it was to us when the Janissary informed us that the Didascolos was a mechanic, and when we reflected that a man of this sort now fulfilled the duties of those renowned persons! We found about thirty children sitting on benches, and their conductor at their head, teaching them to read. He arose, and was very attentive to us: this nation abounds in civilities.

The Janissary begged that we might not interrupt his lessons, but that he would shew us his manner of teaching, which appeared to me very ingenious. OUR manner of teaching is very far inferior, for the master made the whole class read at the same time without confusion, and in such a way that every scholar was necessarily attentive to what another was reading. They each held a book of the same sort in their hand; and if there were thirty scholars, he gave them to read only thirty words of a sentence. The first scholar read the first word, the second the second word, and so forth. If they all read their word right, they then passed on to another similar sentence of thirty words. If any one made a mistake, he was immediately corrected by his neighbour, who watched him attentively; the latter by his neighbour; and thus passing the words round until they were all read perfectly. By this means the scholars always kept one another in exercise, and ready to take notice of any mistake; each endeavouring to surpass his neighbour; and the lesson of each individual became thus a lesson to all, by their constant emulation.

In order to prevent any idle scholar taking advantage of the regularity of his station, and preparing himself for any particular l'ordre des places n'estoit point fixé pour toujours; et celuy qui, à une leçon, avoit esté placé le premier, estoit mis dans un rang interrompu à une seconde: voila comment il ne falloit qu'une leçon pour toute une classe, quelque nombreuse qu'elle fust; et ce qu'il y avoit encore de commode pour le maitre, les ecoliers n'estoient pas obligés de venir tour à tour lire après lui, car chaqu'un d'eux estoit le précepteur de son compagnon.

Mr. URBAN,

I

Zurich, June 30.

N the present age, Literature is become an object of extensive commerce. How far this may tend to its exaltation or degradation, I have not now time to enquire. I shall only remark, that few Authors of real merit have ever reaped due benefit from their works, whilst they have ever been exposed with impunity to the rapacity of booksellers; who, now that they are become "commercial men," not only try to outwit the poor author, but likewise one another.

But to the matter in point. A bookseller at Paris is now about publishing what he calls "Manuel du Voyageur en Suissé," in one volume 12mo. This work is a barefaced plagiarism, from the justly-celebrated Manuel of Dr. Ebel, so well known in the scientific world, both as an eminent Naturalist, and as a man of general information; whose elegant and useful description of Switzerland is indispensable to every traveller in that charming country. A large portion of the English, who visit Switzerland every year, does not consist of those who travel merely to say they have seen the country, but of those who wish to study its natural or political history-points which the Paris editor entirely omits. I think it right, therefore, to caution my countrymen against purchasing an incomplete, and, probably, incorrect work; and I have the authority of Dr. Ebel in asserting, that no edition or abridgment of his work will be acknowledged as correct by him, except such as have been, or may be, printed under his own immediate superintendence, at the press of Orell, Fussli, and Co. Zurich.

Yours, &c.

An absent Friend and Correspondent.

Mr. URBAN, Limehouse, July 9. N the course of a recent excursion

I to the Continent, when visiting the Model Room in the Arsenal at Am.

particular word which might fall to his lot, their places were not always the same; and the scholar who was first at one lesson, had a different station at the next. Thus one lesson was sufficient for a numerous class, and there was no necessity for each scholar to read one after the other to the master, for they each served as preceptor to his next neighbour.'

sterdam, my attention was attracted by a letter in my own language, evidently preserved with much care, of which, on perusal, I was induced to take a copy. It is curious, as illustrative of the scrupulous attention with which, at the period when it was written, our forefathers cultivated every opportunity of contributing to the extension of their commercial relations; and asa proof that, in the arts by which diplomatic intrigues are effected, they were not much behind their descendants of the present day; it is, besides, not a little remarkable for the quaintness of its style, and the odd mixture of conciliating assurances and indirect threats with which it abounds. It appears to have been written during the reign of Charles the Second, by his brother James Duke of York, afterwards James the Second, then Governor of the East India Company; and was taken, together with the presents to which it alludes, on board an outward-bound East India Ship, by the celebrated Dutch Admiral De Ruyter. The crown is a paltry copper coronet, decorated with glass beads; the fate of the bed I was unable to ascertain. Should the letter, which is copied verbatim, afford any amusement to your numerous readers, it will be a source of gratification to

Yours, &c.

G.F.Y.

they come, and give us a freedome of trade in your dominions with all your subjects, it will move us to send you from time to time a plentifull supply of all sorts of goods, that shall be most to your liking; but if wee shall be straigtened in our trade, and diminished in the priviledges wee have formerly enjoyed, wee shall be forced to seeke our convenience in some other place. But wee are confident you will have so much esteeme for the preserving of a full and friendly intercourse of traffique betweene us, that you will rather enlarge your kindnesse towards our sarvants employed by us. Wee have so great a value for your person and dignity, that wee have sent you a present of a crown, which is the badge of the highest authority, and a bed, such as is used in these parts, which wee desire you to

sequent edition during his life. The edition of 1778 appeared in eight volumes, under the direction of the late Mr. Barak Longmate, who added a ninth or supplementary volume in 1785. Thirty years elapsed before this edition was exhausted in the market.

At length, after numerous titles had expired, and the Peerage had, principally by Mr. Pitt's profusion, been nearly doubled, Sir E. Brydges volunteered the Herculean task of bringing down the descents, supplying the new articles, and taking on himself the conduct and correction of another impression. Collins was an extraordinary man in his own vocation, but aspired to no higher character than that of a genealogist, or

any favour you shall shew our factors and sarvants. Dated att the Court at Whitehall, the twenty-second day of July, Anno Domini 1664. JAMES.

I

ELLIS LEIGHTON, Secretary.
By order of his Royal Highnesse,
Governour of the Royal Company."

MR. URBAN,

July 3.

F there be any subject which, in your labours of eighty-six years, has distinguished your CXVII volumes more than another, it is domestic history, biography, genealogy, and English antiquities. These being the departments in which your learned Printer has so much distinguished himself in the literary world, have naturally of late years attracted your more especial encouragement. It has therefore been a matter of a little surprise, that in the Review of Books in the Gent. Mag. you have, in the four years which have elapsed since its publication, taken no notice of a work of large extent, particularly congenial to the pursuits of the amiable Veteran from whose press your pages issue; I mean the new edition of Collins's Peerage, published in nine thick 8vo volumes in Jul 1812. It is more than a century since the first outline of that work appeared in a brief and meagre form in one 8vo volume. In the course of twenty years it swelled to four thick volumes by the great labours of ARTHUR COLLINS, who, by his indefatigable researches amongst records, deeds, wills, and MSS, made it a most valuable and authentic compilation, and continued to improve it in every sub

new Editor's turn and ambition were of a less humble cast. He has not been content to continue; he has almost new-modelled most of the articles of Collins; he has endeavoured to give them historical and biographical interest, to animate them with anecdote, to delineate characters, to speculate on the secrets of cabinets, and springs of state-actions, and to bring back the story of former days, as on the stage of life! Such a vast body of personal history, during a period of several centuries, of persons moving in the most elevated sphere of life-statesmen, lawyers, orators, generals, and admirals, will scarce any where be found in the same compass. There is an impression in the world, and among none more than among a large portion of the Literati, that a Peerage Book (as some call it in contempt) can contain nothing better than a heap of idle genealogies, matters of empty flattery to the parties recorded, and uninteresting and useless to all the world besides! On the use of mere naked pedigrees it is quite irrelevant to the present purpose to argue. The work of Collins, in its present shape, is of a very opposite nature: if it has any claim to notice, it is for teaching by example the moral and intellectual character of mankind, as developed in the duties of the great Officers of Government, in dispensing the laws from the Judicial Chair, in guiding armies, or winning the command of the ocean; for teaching the modes by which families have risen or decayed; for shewing the vanity of wealth and