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mountains, and the tuneful falls of water, to which we came in Westmorland. In all the world, I believe, there is not a more glorious rural fcene to be feen, in the fine time of the year.

In this fine vale, I found one pretty little houfe, which had gardens very beautifully laid out, and ufefully, filled with the fineft dwarf fruit trees and ever-greens, vegetables, herbs, and fhrubs. The manfion, and the improved spot of ground, were at the end of the beautiful lake, fo as to have the whole charming piece of water before the door. The projecting fhaded fells feemed to nod or hang over the habitation, and on either hand, a few yards from the front of the house, cafcades much higher than that of dread Lodore, in Cumberland, fell into the lake. There is not any thing fo beautiful and striking as the whole in any part of the globe that I have feen: and I have been in higher latitudes, north and fouth, than most men living. I have converfed with nations who live many degrees beyond the poor frozen Laplander. I have travelled among the barbarians who fcorch beneath the burning zone.

Who lived in this delightful valley, was, in the next place, my enquiry, after I had admired for an hour the amazing beauties of the place. I walked up to the house, and in one of the parlour windows, that had a view up the loch, I faw a young Beauty fitting with a mufic-book in her hand, and heard her fing in a masterly manner. She could not fee me, but I had a full view of her fine face, and as I remembred to have seen her fomewhere, I ftood gazing at her with wonder and delight, and was ftriving to recollect where I had been in her company, when another young one came into the room, whom I had reafon to remember very well, on account of an accident, and then I knew they were the two young ladies I had seen at Mr. Harcourt's, (fee p. 374. of Memoirs of feveral Ladies of Great Britain,) and admired very greatly for the charms of their perfons, and the beauties of their minds. Upon this I walked up to the window, and after a little aftonifhment at feeing me, they behaved with the greateft civility, and feemed to be highly pleafed with the accidental meeting. While we were talking, their mamma came into the appartment, and on their letting her know who I was, and where they had been acquainted with me, the old lady was pleafed to afk me to stay at her house that night, and to affure me the was glad to fee me, as she had often heard her daughters fpeak of me. Three days I patled with great pleature in this fweet place, and then with regret took my

leave.'

What foundation our wonder-loving Author may have for his furprizing reprefentations of the wildst he met with in thefe lefs. frequented parts of our island,-whether.there is much ground

for

for his very romantic defcriptions and adventures,and how far he may have exaggerated the truth; we cannot pretend to fay, having travelled but little, ourselves, into those northern counties: fuch of our readers as are better acquainted with those remote parts, will better judge of his regard both to truth and probability, in these extraordinary inftances.

On the 5th Mr. B. left the pleafing habitation of Mrs. Thurloe and her two lovely daughters, and at night, in a very retired place, he fell in with a Carthufian monaftery, confifting of seven monks, men of fome fortune, who had agreed to live together, in this remote fituation, and pafs their lives in piety, tudy, and gardening. He had a letter of recommendation, from a friend often mentioned in thefe memoirs, to the fuperior of this fociety, which procured him all the kindness and honours these gentlemen could beftow. They were all learned and devout perfons; had a large collection of books, and many manuscript volumes, the productions of their own pens. With thefe reclufes he ftaid two days, which he chiefly spent in converfing with them, on the works of the Rabbies, the ufefulness of which, fictitious and extravagant as they are, the good friars endeavoured to demonftrate. Here our Author makes a confiderable difplay of his Talmudical learning, through feveral pages, handfomely mottled with Latin, Greek, and Hebrew criticisms: at the close of which he expreffes his fatisfaction on account of the advantages we may gain by reading the books of the Rabbins.' He adds, " to me it is pleafing to fee. these great Hebrew mafters granting fo much to us for our Meffias, while they hate our holy religon beyond every thing. Even the gay among the Jews, (if I have been truly informed by one who danced a night with them) have, in contempt and abhorrence of our faith, a country-dance, called, The Little Jefus."

At length, July 8. our Author actually does arrive at Knarefborough; of which, and its fulphurous and petrifying waters, he gives an entertaining and perhaps ufeful detail. Next comes a curious pofiilla, containing a pleafing account of Wardrew fulphur-water, the life of Claudius Hobart, and a learned differtation on Reafon and Revelation. The ftory of Mr. Hobart, the worthy and amiable hermit, is, we apprehend, purely fictitious; but the tract on the rule of reafon, and the difcourfe on revelation, are very entertaining, and will be generally agreeable to readers of every perfuafion, who are not bigotted to the doctrine of tritheifm, and who can bear to hear the name and doctrines of Socinus fpoken of with approbation.

We are now arrived at fection 8. which mentions our Au thor's departure from Knaresborough, and arrival at Harrogate; where he found a letter from Mifs Spence, in confe

quence

quence of which, he accompanied that lady to London, where he had the happiness to become her husband. Of this peerless lady we have the following account, prefaced by a defcription of Cleator-lodge, her feat in Weftmorland; the reader, if he has any tafte for landscape-painting, and is not too cynical, will be pleased with the latter:

Cleator is one of the finest spots that can be feen, in a wild romantic country. The natural views are wonderful, and afford the eye vaft pleafure. The charming profpects of different kinds, from the edges of the mountains, are very fine.The winding hills, pretty plains, vaft precipices, hanging woods, deep vales, the eafy falls of water in fome places, and in others cataracts tumbling over rocks,-form all together the most beautiful and delightful scenes. All the decorations of art are but foils and fhadows to fuch natural charms.

In the midst of thefe fcenes, and in a theatrical space of about two hundred acres, which the hand of nature cut, or hollowed out, on the fide of a mountain, ftands Cleator-lodge, a neat and pretty manfion. Near it were groves of various trees, and the water of a strong spring murmured from the front down to a lake at the bottom of the hill.'.

This was Mifs Spence's country refidence. • Here, adds Mr. B. the wife and excellent Maria paffed the best part of her time, and never went to any public place but Harrogate once a year. In reading, riding, fishing, and fome vifits to and from three or four neighbours now and then, her hours were happily and usefully employed. Hiftory and mathematics fhe took great delight in, and had a very furprifing knowledge in the laft. She was another of thofe ladies I met with in my travels, who understood that method of calculation, beyond which nothing further is to be hoped or expected; I mean the arithmetic of fluxions.'

There is fomething very uncommon, indeed, in the character of this female mathematician; and, fuppofing it a real one, we hardly know whether to approve fuch an example; although Mr. Buncle fo ftrongly recommends it. What he fays in praife of the fluxionary method of calculation, is undoubtedly juft, but this auftere and profound fcience feems to be no part of a lady's province; yet Mifs Spence, our Author fays, in the 24th year of her age, was a master of it: perhaps he would have deemed it a diminution of her excellence in this way, to have styled her miftrefs of this art.-Be this as it may, in the courfe of his journey with this lady, from Weftmorland to London, he had a very fcientific converfation with her, on the doctrine of fluxions; in which they entered deeply into fome investigations of this nature, which, at least, ferve to fhew how well Mr. B. himself, underftands the fubject. He feems con

fcious, however, that the picture of a mathematical lady would, in all likelihood, prove no very alluring object to the generality of his readers; and therefore he takes care to inform us, that this accomplishment was not, even with him, the principal of Mifs Spence's charms: for, he adds, befides this excellence, the advantages of a faultless perfon, a modefty more graceful than her exquifite beauty, her converfation, (than which nothing could be more lively and delightful) and her fine fortune, -there was yet a perfection above them all :--it was ‹ her manners.' She was, he continues, a Chriftian Deift, and confidered benevolence and integrity as the effentials of her religion. She imitated the piety and devotion of Jefus Chrift, and worshipped his God and our God, his father and our father, as St. John exprefsly ftyles the God of Chriftians, xx. 17.—'

But what availed it to Mr. B. that fhe poffeffed all these virtues and endowments? He was not, it seems, fated to be long happy in the enjoyment of matrimonial fociety. This wife, too, was very foon torn from his arms, by the cruel hand of

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He, nevertheless, ftrongly afferts the propriety of a learned educa. tion for ladies: he certainly ftretches this point too far; but let us hear what he fays on the fubject. He is of opinion, that the mental faculties of women, properly cultivated, may equal thofe of the greatest men. And fince women, he continues, have the fame improvable minds as the male part of the fpecies, why should they not be cultivated by the fame method? Why fhould reafon be left to itself in one of the fexes, and be difciplined with fo much care in the other. Learning and knowledge are perfections in us not as we are men, but as we are rational creatures, in which order of beings the female world is upon the fame level with the male. We ought to confider in this particular, not what is the fex, but what is the fpecies they belong to. And if women of fortune were fo confidered, and educated accordingly, I am fure the world would foon be the better for it. It would be fo far from making them thofe ridiculous mortals Moliere has defcribed under the character of learned ladies; that it would render them more agreeable and useful, and enable them by the acquisition of true fenfe and know. ledge, to be fuperior to gaiety and fpe&tacle, drefs and diffipation. They would fee that the fevereign good can be placed in nothing elfe but in rectitude of conduct; as that is agreeable to our nature; conducive to well-being; accommodate to all places and times; durable, felf derived, indeprivable; and of con equence, that on rational and mafculine religion only they can reft the foal of the foot, and the fooner they turn to it, the happier here and hereafter they fhall be. Long before the power of fenfe, like the fetting fun, is gradually forfaking them, (that fouer on which the pleasures of the world depend) they would, by their acquired underflanding and knowledge, fee the foily of pleasure, and that they were born not only to virtue, friendship, honesty, and faith, but to religion, pety, adoration, and a generous furrender of their minds to the fupreme caufe. They would be glorious creatures then. Every family would be happy.' This argument we fubmit to the de cafion of our learned readers, both male and female.

Death,

Death, at the end of about fix months from the date of their union-and the difconfolate husband went into the world again, to relieve his mind, and try his fortune once more!"' But before he proceeds to relate what fteps he took towards renewing the Hymeneal connection, he gives fome account of the cafe of his laft deceafed wife, and tells a droll ftory of the four phyficians who attended her. We fhall give the narrative in his own words:

This young lady was feized with that fatal distemper, called a malignant fever: Something foreign to nature got into her blood, by a cold, and other accidents, it may be, and the luctus or ftrife to get clear thereof became very great. The effervefcence or perturbation was very foon fo violent as to fhew, that it not only endangered, but would quickly fubvert the animal fabrick, unless the blood was fpeedily difperfed, and nature got the victory by an exclufion of the noxious fhut-in. particles. The thirst, the dry tongue, the coming caufus, were terrible, and gave me too much reafon to apprehend this charming woman would fink under the conflict. To fave her, if poffible, I fent immediately for a great phyfician, Dr. Sharp, a man who talked with great fluency of medicine and difeases.

This gentleman told me, the alkaline was the root of fevers, as well as of other diftempers, and therefore, to take off the effervefcence of the blood in the ebullitions of it, to incide the viscous humour, to drain the tartarous falts from the kidnies, to allay the preternatural ferment, and to brace up the relaxed tones, he ordered orange and vinegar in whey, and prefcribed fpirit of fulphur, and vitriol, the cream, chryftals, and vitriolate tartar in other vehicles. If any thing can relieve, it must be plenty of acid. In acidis pofita eft omni curatio. But these things gave no relief to the fufferer.

I fent then in all hafte for Dr. Hough, a man of great reputation, and he differed fo much in opinion from Sharp, that he called an acid the chief enemy. It keeps up the luctus dr ftruggle, and if not expelled very quickly, will certainly prove fatal. Our fheet anchor then must be the teflacca, in vehicles of mineral water, and accordingly he ordered the abforbent powders to conflict with this acidity, the principal caufe of all difeafes. Pearl and coral, crabs eyes, and crabs claws, he prescribed in diverse forms; but they were of no ufe to the fick woShe became worfe every hour.

man.

Dr. Pym was next called in, a great practitioner, and a learned man. His notion of a fever was quite different from the opinions of Sharp and Hough. He maintained that a for was a poisonous ferment or venom, which feized on the animal foiREV. Auguft, 1766.

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