thing that related to them. All this he affected in that fpirit of judicious enquiry for which he is fo remarkable.

In the year 1766, he published the first volume of the work above alluded to, under the title of Samlungen biftorischer nachrichten ueber die Mongelifchen volkerfchaften. This voJume contains refearches into the hiftory, the phyfical and civil state, of this primitive nation of Asia.

"The fecond volume, not yet publifhed, but which will foon appear, is to contain an investigation and explanation of the religion of Tibet, to which the Mongolian nations now adhere; a work that will enrich the stock of human knowledge with discoveries, the greatest part entirely new, and which no perfon in Europe, except Mr. Pallas, is able to communicate."

The first volume contains an account of Finnish nations; the fecond that of Tartar nations: their barbarous names we will not tranfcribe, pronounce them Among the former are the Laplanders, of whom the following is the defcription:

we cannot.

"The Laplanders are of a middling ftature. They have generally a flattith face, fallen cheeks, dark grey eyes, thin beard, brown hair, are well-built, ftrait, and of a yellowish complexion, occafioned by the weather, the fmoke of their habitations, and their habitual filthinefs. Their manner of life ren. ders them hardy, agile, and fupple; but, at the fame time, much incluted to laziness. They have plain common fenfe, are peaceable, obedient to their fuperiors, not given to theft, not fickle, chearful in company; but mif. trustful, cheats in commerce, proud of their country and conte tution, and have fo high a notion of it and of themfelves, that, when removed from the place of their nativity, they ufually die of the nostalgia, or longing to return. Their women are thort, complaifant, chafte, often well made, and extremely nervous; which is alfo obfervable among the men, although more rarely. It frequently happens that a Lapland woman will faint away, or even fall into a fit of frenzy, on a fpark of fire flying towards fer, an unexpected noife, or the fudden fight of an uncommon obje&, though in its own nature not in the leaft alarming; in hort, at the moft ifling things imaginable. During thefe paroxyfins of terror, they deal about blows with the first thing that prefents itff; and, GENT. MAG. February, 1780.

on coming to themselves, are utterly ignorant of all that has paffed."

The following account of the Votiaks will fhew that the Irish are not fingular in thofe matrimonial manœuvres with which the Dublin Journal often entertains us.

Among the Tfcheremiffes, and indeed amongst all the people who thus buy their wives, it often happens that a lover who is poor, or has been refufed for any other caufe, carries off his mistress by force; but the Votiaks put this expedient into practice moft frequently of any of them. The manner in which this gallant expedition is conducted is as follows: The young hero comes by night, accompanied with feveral other determined champions, to furprise the girl in bed, whom they put upon a horie, and then all ride off as faft as they can gallop. If it happens that the rape is immediately dif covered, and the ravifher taken, he may expect to lose his fweetheart, and to receive a hearty drubbing to boot. It is not uncommon for a young Votiak to carry off from the fields a young woman whom he never knew before."

Each of thefe volumes is ornamented with two picturefque views. One of thefe, which we have been permitted to copy, will receive illuftrations from the following extract :

"The huts of the Nogayans of Koundourof are of a very fingular constraction, hardly two fathoms in diameter, and fo interwoven with bushes as not to be taken to pieces. Their roof is a fort of flatted vault, made of bent fticks united at top to form a circle, whofe opening lets out the smoke and admits the light: by way of ornament they hang out of this hole a rag of different colours as a miferable subfitute for a flag. To transport this hut they place it on a two-wheel cart, in fuch a manner that the wheels are hid within the hut. In the fummer feafon, when the habitation is to continue but a fhort time in one place, it remains on its cart, and the family eat and fleep on the ground under it. The rich have commonly two or more huts and carts, to which they fometines add little closets for fleeping in; infomuch that when thefe Tartars are on the march they give the appearance of a moving village or a camp. The houfehold furniture of thefe wandering nations is generally very mean; but that of the Nogayans is niiferable even for a wandering

a wandering people. Pots, veffels of wood or fkin, bottles made of hollow gourds, a cart with two wheels, mats, felt tapestry, and a hatchet, compofe nearly the whole catalogue."

Two more volumes of this work, which is equally entertaining and authentic, are intended for publication.

11. Authentic Minutes of the Debate in the Irith House of Commons, on the 20th Day of December, 1779, on receiving the Refolutions of the British Hrufe of Commons for granting to Ireland a Free Trade. To which are added, the Speeches of fome noble Lords, Spoken on the fame Occafion, the Day following. 8vo. 15. 6d. Dilly.

AS the affairs of Ireland have now engaged, and will for fome time engage, the public attention; the authentic documents here laid before the publick, are feasonable teftimonies of that nation upon thofe important affairs. The cordiality and gratitude obfervable in the Senate of Ireland cannot but be a pleafing return to the promoters of these falutary and conciliatory measures. Affectionate reverence to Majefty, and fuitable acknowledgements to the Ministry, particularly to Lord North and the prefent Viceroy, are the characteristics of almost every speech. And the fidelity with which the account of the whole debate is here delineated will obviate, no doubt, the cenfure which the attorney general (the Right Hon. Jobu Scott) has fulminated against those who fhould mifreprefent it. The conclusion of his fpeech fhall be tranfcribed:

"I have been fortunate enough to forefee (for I am no prophet) that Great Britain would, and muft do, because it ought, what it has been dong. I have faid, and I am fure it will not be an unpleafant circumftance to the recollection of a fincere friend of mine; I have long fince faid, when the Volunteers were in their infancy, they would be one time or other the falvation of this country. I know not whether what proceeded from me had the effect I wished it to have. I have lived to fee this great truth established, that Great Britain has done every thing we thought it ought to do; that the Volunteers, as far as they have gone, have been the falvation of this country. Let me defcend from the degree of grandeur this debate has been carried on with to offer a piece

of advice to what purpofe is it, that men fpeak fentiments in this houfe equal to any of the ableft orators, if that voice is to be conveyed contaminated, mifreprefented, and abused? If it be in the power of any man to convey thofe fentiments, he will deferve ten-fold penalty, if the fentiments fhall come diftorted, or mifreprefented either to the public of this country, or any other. It is of great value that your fentiments fhould be FAITHFULLY reprefented, because they have been honourably expreffed. IF

THE DEBATE OF THIS DAY SHOULD BE SO FOULLY BELIED AS I HAVE SEEN MANY, IT CANNOT BE DONE BUT BY THE EMISSARY HIRELING OF THE COMMON ENEMY, HIRED TO MISREPRESENT OUR SENTIMENTS

IN THIS COUNTRY. I love the prefs, I always ftood up for it. I hope it will be understood that the misreprefentation of this debate fhall call for parliamentary cenfure, if ever it shall be called for."

12. A Sele Collection of Poems, with Notes Biographical and Historical. 4 Vols Small 8vo. 10s. 6d. Nichols.

THIS felection feems a very fuitable appendage to Dodfley's, Pearch's, and Johnfon's English Poets :-but let Mr. Nichols fpeak for himself.

"On Dryden's foundation the prefent fuperftructure is begun. In its progress almost every undertaking of a fimilar nature has been confulted, and material parts incorporated. The collections formed by Fenton and Steele have been epitomised; whilft Pope's, Pemberton's, Lintot's, and C. Tooke's, have occafionally contributed to embellishment....

"The reader will find in these volumes fome of the earliest productions of Dryden; fome originals by Sir William Temple; an ode by Swift [To King William on his Succeffes in Ireland], which had long been confidered as irrecoverable; a confiderable number of good poems by Steele, Parnell, Fenton, Broome, and Yalden, with a few pieces by Halifax, Dorfet, Rochester, Sprat, Prior †, Pope, Boling

Not a fingle poem in either of those collections is intended to be inferted.

The following anecdotes of this excellent poet being curious, I print them in the words of the friend from whom they are received:" At Lord Oxford's feat at Wimple (now Lord Hardwicke's) there hung a fine picture of Harley in his Speaker's

robes,

broke, Philips, King, Smith, Watts, Pitt, Hughes, A. Philips, and Tickell, which are not to be found in any edition of their works.

"The alfiftance of fome intelligent friends has enabled me to add a biographical account of almost every writer here felected; and their perfuafions have induced me to lay before the public four Volumes as part of the plan I have undertaken. Two others are in the prefs."...

A fhort index to the notes is annexed, and a complete poetical index is promifed. Thefe notes, we must add, have great intrinfic merit, being a repofitory of biographical and hiftorical knowledge, and, in thort, replete with much incidental information, that, to us at leaft, is equally new and curious. Of thefe the note on Prior in the preface may ferve as a fpecimen. And our intelligent editor having retrieved from oblivion one of Dryden's earliest productions, (written in 1650, the year he went to college,) and two Latin poems (from the Cambridge verses), the first "On the Deaths of the D. of Gloucester and the Princefs of Orange, 1661," the fecond "On the Marriage

robes, with the roll of the bill in his hand for bringing in the prefent family; which, if I mistake nor, was done by his calling vote. In allofion to Haley's being afterwards fen' to the Tower, Prior wrote with a pencil on the white feroll, Bill paid fuch a day-The late Recorder of Cambridge [Pont] had feen fome MS. Dialogues of the Ded of Prior's; they were profe, but had verfe intermixed freely and the fpecimen. I heard proved it. The dialogue was be ween Sir Tho mas More and the Vicar of Bray. You mut allow that the characters are well chofen, and the fpeakers maintain their refpective opinions fmartly: at last the Knight feems to come over to his advorfary, at least fo far as to allow that the doctrine was convenient, if not honourable; but that he did not fee how any man could allow himself to act thus: when the Vicar concludes; 'Nothing eafier, with proper management, &c. You must go the right way to work

For confcience, like a fiery horfe, Will ftumble. if you check his course, But ride him with an easy rein, And rub him down with worldly gain, He'll carry you through thick and thin, Safe, although dirty, to your inn.' This certainly is sterling fenfe.-It would give me great pleasure to be enabled to prefent thefe dialogues to the world; but where they are now depofitedis unknown,"

of King Charles II, 1662," where the author ftyles himfelf B. A. Fellow of Trinity college;" Mr. Nichols very pertinently obferves, "If there poems had come to light before the publication of Dr. Johnfon's excellent Life of Dryden, that judicious Biographer would certainly have made fome alteration in the following paragraph: :-"At the univerfity he does not appear to have been eager of pestical distinction, or to have lavished his early wit either on fictitious fubje&s or public occafions. He probably confdered, that he, who purpoled to be an author, ought fit to be a student. He obtained, whatever was the reafon, no jellowship in the college. Why he was excluded, cannot now he'known, and it is vain to guets: had he thought himfelf injured, he knew how to complain. In the Life of Plutarch, he inentions his education in the college with gratitude; but in a prologue at Oxford, he has thefe lines:

Oxford to him a deater name shall be
Thin his own nother univerfity;
Thebes did his rude unknowing youth

engage:

He choofes Athens in his riper age. It was not till the death of Cromwell, in 1658, that he became a pub'e candidate for fame, by publishing Heroick Stanzas on the late Lord Protector'; which, compared with the veries of Sprat and Waller on the fame occafion, were futficient to raife great expectations of the tiling poet.'

Having thus given us what Dryden did write, in another volume we are informed of fome pieces which he did not write, tho' they have hitherto been afcribed to him. But for them we mut refer to the work. By the way, that Dryden fhould be admitted at Cambridge in 1650, and twelve years afterwards, though Fellow of the cot. lege, be only B. A. when at feven years he might, and by the statutes ought to have been M. A. feems unaccountable.

We are much pleafed with this Editor's ingenuous method of pointing out, as he goes on, the new fights he Las received, or miftakes he has com mitted: and, as he announces a coutinuation of his plan, we shall fuggeft fuch remarks as have occurred on peruling the volumts now before .

Vol. I. p. 1. "An Elegy by the Wife of St. Alexias." In Mrs. Rowe's Works, I. 158, is an Epittle fie [the fame] Alexias to his Wife."

r.