?-1*-^-i^i^?3^ '>S^rMWfK:-^W YALE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY MORNING'S WALK from LONDON TO KEW. By sir RICHARD PHILLIPS. LONDON: PRINTED BY J. ADLARD, 23, BARTHOLOMEW-CLOSER SOLD BY JOHN SOVTER, 1, PATERNOSTER'ROTV; ANO BY ALL BOOKSELLERS. 1S17. PIlEFACEa »M« The Author of the following Obser vations,, made during a morning's. WALK, will doubtless be allowed tp possess but a moderate degree of literary ambition. He has not qua lified himself, by foreign travels, to transport his readers above the clouds, on the Andes^ the Alps, or the Appenines; to a;larm them by^ descriptions of Earthquakes, or Eruptions ; or to astojiish them by accounts of tremendous Chasms, Caverns, and Cataracts: but he has restricted his researches to subjects of home scenery, which thousands can daily examine after him; and consequently has not enjoyed that A 2 iV latitude of fancy, or been able to exercise any of those rare powers of hearing and seeing, by means of which travellers into distant regions are enabled to stimulate curiosity and monopolize fame. The class of readers who seek for sources of pleasure beyond the ordinary course of nature, will therefore feel disappointment in attempting to follow a pedestrian tourist through a route so destitute of wonders. Nor will this feeling, it is to be feared, be confined ta searchers after supernatural phe nomena in regard to the facts which appertain to such a work. In the Sentimeiits which accompany his narrations, it will be found that the Author, accustomed to think for himself, admits no standards of truth superior to the evidence of the senses and the deductions of reason ; consequently, that his con clusions on many important topics are at variance with existing prac- < tices, whenever it appears they have no better foundation than the con tinuity of prejudices and the arbi^- trary laws of custom. He there fore entertains very serious doubts whether his work will be accept able to those LEARNED PROFESSORS in Universities, who teach no doc^ trines or opinions but those of their predecessors ; or whether it will suit Students, whose advance ment depends on their submission to ; the dogmata of such superiors. He questions whether it will ever be quoted as an authority by Statesmen who consider the will of princes as standards of wis dom jrr-by Legislators who barter Tl away their votes, and decide on the presumed integrity of ministers and leaders;— by Politicians who ba nish the moral feelings from their practices; — or by Economists who do not consider individual happiness •as the primary object of their calcu lations. Nor is he more sanguine -that his work will prove agreeable to those Natural Philosophers who account for phenomena by the operation of virtues or influences which have no mechanical contact; — ;or to those Metaphysicians who conceive that truth can be exhibited sonly in the sophistical subtleties of the schools displayed in the mazy labyrinths of folios and quartos; — or to those Theologians who main tain that the obligations of reason and morality are superseded by those of Faith. While, in regard to those Topograph'eRs and Antiquaries whose studies are bounded by dates of erection, catalogues of occupants, and copies of tomb-stones ; — ^to tlmse Naturalists who receive delight from enumerations of Linnaean names of herbs, shrubs, and trees, and from Wernerian descriptions of TOcks ; — to those Bibliomaniacs who value a book in the inverse ratio ofthe information it contains; t — and to those learned Philolo gists who see no beauties in modem tongues, and affect to find Cbut without anticipating any of them,) all modern discoveries of Natural Philosophy in Homer, and all im provements of mental Philosophy in the mysteries of Plato — the author deeply laments his utter inability to accommodate either his taste, his feelings, or his conclusions. Vlll In regard to the spirit, tone, and character of the author's opinions, they have necessarily emanated from the state of knowledge, in an aera when, at the termination of four cen turies after the adoption of Printing, mankind have achieved four great objects; (1,) in the revival of Literature, and regeneration of Philosophy; (2,) in the emancipa tion of Christendom from the sys tematic thraldom of Popery ; (3,) in the assertion of the rights op MAN, against overwhelming usurpa tions ; and (4,) in the establishment of A spirit op free enquiry, which constitutes the vivifying ener gy of the age in which we live, and promises the most important results in regard to the future con dition and happiness of the human race. IX The accomplishment of these circumstances has generated, in all countries, a numerous class of readers, among whom are many Professors, Philosophers, Statesmen, Politicians, Theolo gians, Antiquaries, Naturalists, and eminent Scholars; besides Amateurs of general Literature, with whose taste, feelings, and principles, the Author of this volume is anxious to identify his own, and whose favourable opinion he is am bitious to enjoy ; — these are the free and honest searchers after moral, political, and natural TRUTH,— the votaries of common SENSE,— the patients of their natu ral sjensibilities, — all, who are neither too old, too powerful, nor TOO WISE, — and, finally, all those WHO PASS THEIR LIVES IN SEARCH OF HAPPINESS, and who are not unwilling to be pleased, in what soever form, or by whomsoever the attempt may be made : TO SUCH ESTIMABLE PER^ «ONS, IN ALL COUNTRIES, AND IN ALL SITUATIONS, THE AUTHOR RESPECT FULLY DEDICATES THIS VOLUME. UoUoway, Middlesex; February 8, 1817. CONTENTS. St. James's Park 2 Beggars 3 Milk Fair 5 Regent's Palace ...... 6 Washington and Alfred 7 Public Offices ..„ 9 Military Slaves 10 Country Residents . , ... 11 St. James's Palace ............ 14 Promenade in the Mall 15 Suggested Improvements .... ...... 17 PiMLico 18 The Ty-bourn 19 Isle of St. Peter's 20 Chelsea 21 Ranelagh .. ... ... . ?2 Chelsea Buns .. . 25 Hospital 27 Villany of War 28 Invalid without Arms ...... 29 A Centenarian . . . 32 Securities of Peace .... 33 Caesar's Ford /. 34 The Botanic Garden 3? Don Saltero's 38 Sir Thomas More 39 Sir Hans Sloane ........ ............. 40 Xll CONTENTS. Battersea •-• *^ Waste of Public Wealth 41 Cupidity of Trade.. 42 Insufficient of Wealth 44 Mr. Brunei's Saw Mills 45 • Shoe Manufactory . 47 Evils of Machinery ...... ........ 48 Lord Boliugbroke's House 51 York House.. ..... 67 An Araerican Aloe 59 Reflections on Pride ..... .. — Wandsworth 63 Phenomenai of Rivers — Distilleries and Drunkenness 64 " Haunted House ... ...... 6'6 Causes of Superstition... . , ., 68 Population of Villages 74 Iron-Rail Roads ... 75 Borough of Garrat 77 Garrat Elections .. 78 Value of Popular Elections... . 82 An Oil Mill 84 An Iron Foundry .86 Inutility of Machinery , SS J)emon of War . ........ .... 89 A Country Assembly . , 90 Vice of Balloting..". 93 Plan for rendering Society social S^ Characteristics of Novels .. 98 ¦ Villages round London 100 Condition of Poverty 102 Poverty and Wealth contrasted 103 Inadequate Remuneration of Labour... 105 Visit to Wandsworth Workhouse 107 Philosophy of Roads ..120 Cruelty to- Horses ........ .121 Value of good Foot-paths '....126 Citizen's Villas ^ jo;- Axioms of Political Economy .... .Il'"l'i29 contents. sm Putney Heath ^..130 The Smokeof Londoii 131 Earl Spencer's Park ,132 Hartley's Fire-House ..13* Means of Preventing Fires in Houses, and l j^g on Female Dress ..i... . . j The Telegraph System .....l4l Suggested Extension of............ : 145 Interesting Prospect ... .... j45 " Reflections on the M etropolis ...150; Criminal Neglect of Statesmen. 155 Kempval of Misery .. .....160 Death and Character of Mr. Pitt I6"l Indifierence of Statesmen ... .. i i(S6 Fruit Trees preferable to Lumber Trees *l63 RoEH ampton . .171 Monastic Dwellings:... . ..... .. - — Inhabitants of Cottages. ................. 173 Humility of Pride.. , ..175 Pilton's Invisible Fences ...............176' House and Character of Mr. Goldsmid. .... 178 Destructive Electric Storm.. ........182 Nature of Electricity investigated........ .. 184 Secondary Causes discussed .... . 188 Security against Lightning . ......189 The District described ..........191 , Dundas and "Tooke contrasted iy2 Barnes.... IV3 Its Poor-House on a Comraon ......;,. — Wretchedness of Parish-Poor. 1 94 Geology of Barnes-Common :....,_ .IS7 .Fitness and Harmony of Things ... 200 Kit-Cat Club Rooms.. gOi Tonson-the Bookseller........ . 207 Effect of distant Bells ..209 Chiswick Church 212 Barnes Church , . 215 Enclosed Cemeteries .............. ......216 SIV CONTENTS. BenevoleHce of Mr. Morris - - ¦ - ... 2 1 8 Tragedy of the Count and Countess D Au- I ^jp traigues ...... ..>...-. --J Horticultural Speculation of the Marquis Igg de Chabannes . . J Supply of London with Vegetables 224 Shropshire and Welsh Girls... 226 Neglect of Public Cleanliness 239 Cleanliness an Incentive of Virtue 231 MORTLAKE 232 Tomb of Partridge 233 Pretensions of Astrology ..235 Doctrines of Fatality examined.. .256 Free-Will and Necessity discussed — . .241 Success of Predictiofis referable to the Doc- 1 trine of Chances . j Art of Fortune-Telling illustrated 250 Tomb and Character of Alderman Barber — 253 Union and Multiplication of the Human Race 257 Mortlake Church 263 Picture of Parochial Happiness ..... — 264 Cause of its Failure.... . ....265 Genuine Religion characterized....... 266 Vulgar Notions of Churches ..........268 Belief in Ghosts exploded .......... 270 Reflections on the Deity 271 Effiuviaof Dead Bodies 273 Impostures of Dr. Dee 275 Virtues of Sir John Barnard 276 Tomb of the Viscountess Sidmouth.. 278 False Foundation of the late War..., ..279 Lesson to Mankind 280 Patriotism of the Comraon Council of London 282 Improved Psalmody of Gardiner ..283 Religious Statistics of Mortlake 284 Uses and Abuses of Church Bells ...285 Dee's H ouse 2*0 Female Education discussed .....i .^91 CONTENTS. xy' ' General Causea of H uman Errors^ .......,„. 294 Proposed Improvement of Education. .... ..29S Manufactory of Delft Ware 299 Progress of the Arts ..301 Archicpbcopal Residence .... 302 Mercy dispensed by the Catholic Priesthood. 305 Food and Charity by the same 30.S Enormous Walnut-Trees ..31tt Box-Tree Arbour 311 Disinterment of the Dead 313 Abundant Manure of Religious Houses 3l6 Reflections on Past Ages ...... 3i7 Origin of Sjiperstition . „....,... 320 Progress of Mythology 322 Intolerance of Philosophical Schools ...323 Invocation to Philosophy .. 327 The Author's System of Physics 32d Popular Schools recommended . 330 • .Addresses of Females.. .............. ....334 Changes wrought by Rivers...... ..... 335 "Alternate Conversion of Land and Sea 338 The Primitive Earth , 340 Origin of Organization ... 34 1 Laws of Inorganic Matter . 344 , Vegetable Existences. 345 Loco-Motive Existences .. 347 iPripcipleof Vitality... ..349 Questions of the First Philosophy. ......... 350 Compatibility, Fitness, and Harmony, illus- 1^^^ trated ..J The Tides explained 354 Phenomena of Rivers .............. — 355 Causes of Sterility .. . 356 The Errors of Man in Society 357 Interview whh Gipsies .. '. — 363 Social Slavery characterized 36'5 Gipsy Fortune-telling illustrated 368 Instance of Vulgar Terror 37 5 Kew Priory described........ .,.^..376 jivi contents. • Kew 377 , Its Chapel ^-380 Tomb of Meyer 381 Church Fees 382 Tomb of Gainsborough .. 383 Comparison of Poetry and Painting 384 Tomb of Zofiany...". ...386 -< Hogarth 387 '- — Thomson ...388 The Author's Reflections and Conclusion.... 3S9 *,* To guard the work against some apparent anachronisms, it is proper to state, that fhe substance of the following Pages appeared in various Numbers, of the Monthly Magazine, be. tueen the Yea7-s 1813 and 1816. Tn reprinting, in this form, many interpolations have been made, and some subjects of a temporary nature have been omitted: but it was often impossible, in treating of local situations, to avoid some reference to temporary circumstances. A MORNING'S WALK FROM LONDON TO KEW. -?M**- We roam into unhealthy climates, and en counter difficulties and dangers, in search of curiosities and knowledge, although, if our industry were equally exerted at home, we might find in the tablets of Nature and Art, within our daily reach, inexhaus tible sources of inquiry and contemplation. We are on every side surrounded by inter esting objects; but, in nature, as in morals, we are apt to contemn self-knowledge, to look abroad rather than at home, and to study others instead of ourselves. Like the I'rench Encyclopaedists, we forget our own Paris ; or, like editors of newspapers, we seek for novelties in every quarter of the world, losing sight of the superior in terests of our immediate vicinity. B 2 A morning's WALK These observations may perhaps serve as a sufficient apology foe thp narrative which follows : — existing notions, the love of the sublime, and the predilections above described,, render it necessary for a home tourist to present himself before the public with modesty. The readers of voyages round the whole world, and of travels into umesplored regions of A&ica and America^ will, scarcely, be persuaded; to toleraite a narr^tijKe of an excursioa whiclt begao aib nine, ia th& mocning and:., ended at ws. va th&afternoon of the sama day: ! Yet such/ \xx^ ars Xh& Treusels whichjiaffisrd the materials: oi the present, narrativfi^ they were .excited by a, fine morning in the latf ter. days of April, and their scene was. the high-road, lying between London, and Kew.; o» thei banks, of the Thames. With, no guide besides a map of the country r.0 und the. metcopblifi^: andind set- tied purpose, beyaind.^ what'i the weather might govern^' I sfcrolledi towards; Sfc James's. Park. In pF0Geeding4)etween the walls from Spring GardiBBsj I found the FROM LONDON TO KEW. 3 lame and the blind taking, their periodical stations' on each side of the passage, — I paused a few- minutes to see them^approach one after another as to a regular calling ; or as' players to take their ; stations and- enact their settled pavtij in this drama. One, a /ellow, who had a withered leg, approached his post with a cheeirful air; but he hajd no sooner seated himself, and stripped it; bare, than he begian such hide ous moans as in a few< minutes attracted several donations. Another, a blind wo man, was brought to her ppst by a little boy, who carelessly leading her against the step of a door, she petulantly gave him a smart box of the ear, and exclaimed,^. "D — n yOu, you rascal, can't you mind what you're about ;"— and then, leaning heir back to the wall,: in the same breath, she. began; to chaunt a hynAn,, which soon brought contributions from many pious pas sengers* The systematic movements of these, peo ple led m€l:oiinc(uire in regard to their, con duct and policy from an adjacent shop- b2 4 A morning's walk keeper, who told me, that about a dozen of them obtained a good living in that passage ; that an attendance of about two hours per day sufficed to each of them, when, by an arrangement among them selves, they regularly succeed each other. He could not guess at the amounts thus collected, but he said, that he had once watched a noisy blind fellow for half an hour, and in that time saw thirty-four people give him at least as. many half pence; he thence, and from other observa tions, concluded that'in two or three hours each of them collects five or six shillings ! We cannot wonder then at the aversion entertained by these unhappy objects to the indiscriminate discipline of our com mon work^houses; nor can we blame the sympathy of those benevolent persons who contribute their mite to relieve the cries of distress with which they are assailed. But it excites our wonder and grief that statesmen, who have superfluous means for covering the country with barracks, should Und themselves unable to establish com- from LONDON TO KEW. 5 fortable asylums for all the poor who are incurably diseased, in which they should be so provided for, that it would be as criminal in thera to ask, as in others to afford them, eleemosynary relief. On my entrance into the Park, I was amused and interested by an assemblage of a hundred mothers, nurses, and valetudir narians, accompanied by as many children, who are drawn together at this hour every fine morning by the metropolitan luxury of milk warm from the cow. Seats are pror vided, as well as biscuits, and other con veniences, and here from sun-rise till ten o'clock continues a milk fair, distinguished by its peculiar music in the lowing oi cows, and in the discordant squaUing of the nu merous children. The privilege of keep ing these cows, and of selling their milk on this spot, belongs to the gate-keepers of the Park ; and it must be acknowledged to be a great convenience to invalids and children, to whom this wholesome beve rage and its attendant walk are often pre^ scribed. b3 6 A morning's walk On the right hand, stands the garden- wall of the puny, though costly, palace of the Regent, Prince of Wales. It is, how ever, fortunate, that it is not larger, if the expenditure of palaces, like that of private houses, were to keep pace. with their.hulk. The inside is adorned like! the palace of Aladin ; and a hetter notion of itsaplendour may be formed, by stating that it has cost the labours cof - twenty thousand, men for a year, or of one thousand for twenty yeaars, than cthat : above a million sterling has at different times been expended upon the building and furniture. Yet, it is said that it forms but the eastern wing of a palace, which the architects of this Prince haye projected, and that half the south side of PaE-Mall and considerable tracts of the Park will be appropriated to complete their jplans, if approved by their royail patron. I am aware, that the love of shew an princes, and persons in authority, is often justified by the alledged necessity of im posing on the vulgar; but I doubt whether any species of imposition really produces FWOM XdklDO'N T% ifefeW. f id»e effect which the pomp of power is so 5wiMing to ascribe to it, as an extusefor its ¦own indidgeHGes. Nor ought it ever to be forgotten, that no tinsel of gaudy trap pings, no architectural arfangements of stone or wood, no bands of liveried slaves, .(however glossed in various hues, or dis^ 'goised hy various names,) can sustain the glm^ of any power which despises puhlic opinion, foi^ets the compact between all power and the people, violates the faith of public treaties, and measures its moral ob- iigatiOHs, not hy the sense of jiistice, but by ;considerations of expediency and self^ interest! On this impoir tant, though almbst exhausted, topic, it should be known by all PWHces who covet true glory, that Washington the Great hired no airaaed men to sustain his power, that his habits were in all things those of a private leitizen, and that he kept hut one cdach, SMerely -for occasions of slate— his personal Wtues heing^ his body-guards — the justifce of his measures constituting the strength ef his'gotefnriietftj-^lihe renown of his past 8 A morning's walk deeds enshrining him with more splendour than could be conferred by the orders of all the courts in Europe — his unquestion able love of pubhc liberty endearing him to the people over whom he presided — and the pure flame of his patriotism caus ing him to appear in their eyes as a being more than mortal ! Britain might envy America her Washington, if she could not herself boast of an Alfred, worthy also of being called the GREAT—^a sove reign who voluntarily conceded liberty tq his people, and founded, it on bases which all the inglorious artifices of his succes sors have been unable to undermine — - but, alas ! such men, like Epic poets, seem destined to succeed but oncq in a thousand years ! On the left hand I beheld, in vari ous magnificent erections, the germs of in numerable associations, gratifying to the vice of national pride ; but affording little pleasure to one whose prejudices of prin ciple, and habits of thinking, have taught hin^ to estimate all human labours by their FROM LONDON TO KEW. 9 influence on the happiness of the sentient creatures to whom the earth is a common inheritance. There was the British Admiralty— the just pride of a people's defence against foreign invaders — but less worthy of admiration, if ever used as an instrument of ambition, or as a means of gratifying base passions. There was the British War-Office, ofwhich a Briton can say little, who doubts the policy of the colonial system, who feels a conviction 1;hat " Britain's best bulwarks are her wooden walls," and who thinks that the sword should never be wielded but by citi zen soldiers, nor ever be used till the con stable's staff has been exerted in vain. And there was the British Treasury, the talisman of whose power has destroyed the efficacy of title-deeds, and converted the land and houses of the empire into paper-money and stock-debts, for the pur pose of carrying on wars and performing deeds, which impartial history will justly characterize, when alas ! the truth will be useless to the suffering victims ! 1© A !kKS»ENI«G'S'WALK Just ajt this -moment I beheld seweral ibands of -armed men, disguised in showy liveries, dra.wn up in array to exercise themselves fiar' combat. But, having no taste for such jaistakes of power, and being in no degree deluded iy the gloss of their clothes, the glitter of their Mtmrderous weapons, or the. abuse of celestial har mony in the skill of their jausieiaus,- I silently invoked the energies of truth to lemove from the understandings of men, itiiat cloud, which permita such illusions to be successful. No legitimate power, like that •of the government of England, ficmnded on such bases as Magna Charta, the laws of Edward the First, the Petition of Right, the Bill of Rights, and the Act of Settlement, can, for its lawful purposes, ever stand in need, in a properly educated communily^ of the support of a single man armed with a murderous weapon. These piles of buildings, raiiged ina semi circular form, are imposing on the eye from their magnitude, and on the imagination from their fame. ' I paused to enjc^ ^ttieir FROM LONDON TO KEW. U perspective; but, is not senseless war^ I exclaimed, even now ravaging or dis turbing the four quarters of the world, and is it not from this scite that it receives its impulse and direction ? I charitably hoped that mere errors of judgment had guided the councils of the men who in habit these buildings— 'but I sickened as I thought of the consequences of their errors, perhaps at that moment displayed in distant parts of the earth in agonies of despair and in smoking ruins — and, to avoid the succession of feehngs which were so painful, yet so unavailing, I turned away from the spot. In my way towards and along the Mall, 1 remarked that few were walking in my direction ; but that ail the faces and foot steps were earnestly directed towards Lon don. The circumstance exemplified that feature of modern manners which leads thousands of those who are engaged in the active business of the metropolis to sleep, and to keep their families, in neighbouring villages. These thousands walk or ride. 12 A MORNING S WALK therefore, every day to and from London, at hours corresponding with the nature and urgency of their employments. Be fore nine o'clock the various roads are covered with clerks of the public offices, and with bankers' and merchants' clerks, Who are obliged to be at their posts at that hour, all exhibiting in their demeanor the ease of their hearts. From nine till eleven, you see shop-keepers, stock-bro kers, lawyers, and principals in various establishments, bustling along with careful and anxious countenances, indicative of their various prospects and responsibilities. At twelve, saunters forth the man of wealth and ease, going to look at his balances, orders, or remittances ; or merely to read the papers and hear the news ; yet demon strating the folly of wealth by his gouty legs, or cautious rheumatic step. Such is the routine of the Park, along which no car-^ riages are allowed to pass; but other avenues into the metropolis present, through every forenoon, besides lines of pedestrians, crowded stage-coaches, pri- 1 FROM LONDON TO KEW. IJ. vate coaches, and chariots, numerous gigs and chaises, and many equestrians. I amused myself v^'ith a calculation of the probable number of persons who ihus- every day, between eight and six, pass to and from London within a distance of seven miles. In the present route I con cluded the numbers to be something like the following, 200 from Pimlico, 300 from Chelsea, 200 from the King's Road and Sloane Street, 50 from Fulham and Put ney, and 50 from Battersea and Wands worth; making 800 per day. If then, there are twenty such avenues to the metropolis, it appears that the total ofthe regular in-- gress and egress will be 16,000 persons, of whom perhaps 8,000 walk, 2,000 arrive in pubhc conveyances, and 6,000 ride on horseback, or in open or close carriages. Such a phenomenon is presented no-where else in the world ; and it never can exist except in a city which unites the- same comhined features of population, wealth,. commerce, and the varied employments which belong to pur own vast metropolis. 14 A morning's walk , I observed with concern that this Park presents a neglected appearance. The seats are old and' without paint; and many vacancies exist in the lines of the trees. The wooden railing round the'centre is heavy and decayed, and the appearance: of every part is unworthy of a metropo litan royal domain, adjoining the constant residence of the court. I was also struck' with the aspect of St. James's Palace in ruins ! A private dwelling after a fire would' have been restored in a few weeks or months; but the nominal . palace of the four preceding sovereigns of England, the last of the Stuarts and three first of the: Guelphs, and the scene of their chief grandeur, presents even to the con temporary generation a monument of the instability of every human work. The' door at which Margaret Nicholson made her attempt on the life of George the Third, and at which the people were «sed to see that monarch enter and depart for manyyears past, is now a chaos of rnins;- as is that entire suite of apartments which FROMEONDOW TO KEW. 13 led to those drawing-rooms in wlijich the Court was accustomed to assranble^ till' wilhia these ;five years; on. blr.th andigalai d%si! — He woipld ' have been^deemed a; false and malignant prophet, who. seven years ago- might;have foretold that the puh^ lie Pa.lace of thei Kings of England: wonld sosobn. become a heap'of unrepaired cuinfej;' acd its splendid chambers: " the habitation? of', the ifowisf of the; air." Yet,, such hasi been thei fact,' in: regard bo the eastern' apartments of 'thisifemous Palace!! .My spiriits sunk, and a tear startedh intoi my eyes, ascI brought to mind' those? crowds = of^beautj^ rank;^ and; fashion;' which, tUl within these] few ;yeais; used to be^ displayed, in the. centre . MaU of this/ Pack on.Sunday evenings during thespnirigi and summer. How often in my; youtlr had I been a dehghted;; spectator 'of the' en*' chanted and enchanting assemMage; ! Here/ used toppomeaade,'; for one or two: hours- after- dinner, the whole Britishj world: o£ gaiety, beauty,- andisplendour ! IBerecouid' be seen in one moving- mass, exteiidingtha* i6 A mokning's walk whole length of the Mall, five thousand of the most lovely women, in this country of female beauty, all splendidly attired, and accompanied by as many well-dressed men ! What a change, I exclaimed, has a few years wrought in these once happy and cheerful personages ! — How many of those who on this very spot then delighted my eyes are now moulderihg in the silent grave! — And how altered are all their persons, and perhaps their fortunes and feelings! Alas, that gay and fascinating scene no longer continues, and its very existence is already forgotten by the new generation I A change of manners has put an end to this unparalleled assemblage, to this first of metropolitan pleasures, though of itself it was worth any sacrifice. The dinner hour of four and five, among the great, or wOuld-be great, having shifted to the unhealthy hours of eight or nine, the promenade after dinner, in the dinner full- dress, is consequently lost. The present walk in the Green-Park does not possess therefore the attractions of high rank; FROM LONDON TO KEW. 17 while the ¦morning assemblages in Hyde- Park and Kensington- Gardens, though gay and imposing, have little splendourof dress,; and lose the effect produced by the pre sence of rank and distinguished character, owing to the greater part of the company being shut up in carriages. The mpdern custom of abandoning the metifopolis for the sea-coast, or the country, as soon as the . fine weather sets in. Operates too as another draw-back from the fascination and agreeahleness of our Sunday promenades. Ancient manners, in the capricious whirl of fashion, may how ever again return; and, if the dinner- hour should recede back to four, I trust the luxury and splendour of this delightful Mall will be restored. These Parks may be denominated the Lungs of the metropolis, for they are essential to the healthful respiration of its inhabitants, by contributing to thejr cheap and innocent pleasures. Under a wise and benevolent administration, they might be made to add still more to the public c 18 A MORNIUfe'sWALK happinesi^, and it would be a suitable homage of the government tb the people^ to rendeir thesis' prtwiaenades as attractive as possible. The two Imnds of the Guards might be allowed to play in the Malls for two hours every evening, betvveen Lady^ day and MichaelmasV and the number and construction of fhe seats might be increased and improved. Such measures would indicate, at least, a desire in the govemofs to contribute to the happiness of the governed, and ¦ would occasion the former to appear to the latter in a more grateful- character than as mere assessors of taxes, and' as organs of legal ipdercion; At Pimlico, the name of StaflTord-Row reminded me ofthe ancient distinction of Tart-Hall; once the rival in size and splen dour of its more fortunate neighbour, Buckingham- House, and long the depo sitory of the Arundelian Tablets and Statues.' It faced tiie Park, on the pre sent scite of James^Street ; its garden- wall standing where Stafford-Row is nx>w FROM' LONDON TO KEW- 19 huilt, and the extensive live^rstablep being oace the stables of its residents. J turned a^ide on the left, to view the riye^r Tye, qt T^Z-^om^^, which runs from the top pf Oxford-rstreet, under May-Fair, across PiccadJUy, south-east of Bucking ham-House, under the- pavement of Staf- ford-B<>t^) and aipr^S? Tothill- Fields, into tbe^ Thapes. It is a fact, equally lost, that the creeks which mi^^fiFOia the Thames, in theawamps, Qpposit0 Belgrave-Place, once joined tb$:e,anal in St. Jaraes's-Park, and, passing' through < iWhite-HaU, formed, Igf their circuit, the ancient isle of St. Peteif's.. Their course has been 'filled up between the >yharf pf the water- wo^-ks and the end of tb^<:anal iu ISt. James's- Park; and the Igle of St. Peter's is no longer tP be ^r9,9§d. It is singular tbat such a marsh j^hQUld - have become , the focus of . the gpvefUiR^t, . jyjEi§§riidienee, i aad pojwer, of this great empire t Yet, so it is, the offices of Government,, the Houses of Par liament, aod the Supreme Courts of Law, «feivitb water, ahd, I may add; with smoke, of which it emits large volumes, though therie are so many contrivances ' for con suming it. It consists simply of a steam and forcing engine, not remarkable for jipvelty or ingenuity of construction. sOp- posite stands the manufactory of the inge- HipusBRAMAH, whoselocks baffle knavery, ,and . whose cpudensing = engines pronaise ^uch important: results to philosophy and the mechanic arts. Belgrave-Place, lower and upper, proves the avidity of building- speculations, which could thiis thallenge the prejudice against the opposite marshes. But I was assured by a resident of twenty -years, that he and his family had enjoyedun- , interrupted.health in Upper Belgrave-Place, and that such was the general experience. Qn entering Chelsea, I was naturally led to inqujre for thp scite of the once gay J^aujelagh! I passed up the avenue of trees, r which I remember often to have geen blockedl up with carriages. At its ex tremity, I; looked for the Rotunda .and its surrounding buildings; but, as I could not c 3. 22 A HORNtNG'iS WALK see them, I concluded, ithat I had acquired but an iraperfeot idea iof the place, in my nocturnal visits! I went forward, c«i an open' spiace,. but still crould discern no Ranelagh ! At lei^th, on a spot covered with netdes; thistles, and other rank- weeds, I met a workingmafl, ^^hP, in answer to my inquiries, told me, that he saiv I was a stranger, or I should have known that Ranelagh had been pulted down, and that I was then Striding on the seile of the Rotunda ! Reader, imagine my feelings, for I can not analyze them! This vile place, I exclaimed, the sdte of the once-enchant ing Ranela^! — It cannot be-^the same eyes were never destined to see such a ¦laetafflPrphosis ! All was desolation !-^A few inequalities appeared in the ground, indicative of some former building, and holes filled with muddy water shewed the foundation walls — but the rest of the space, iBaking about two acres, was covered ?r!th clusters of tall nettles, thistles, and docks! On a more accurate survey, I traced tbe FROM LONDON TO KEW. 23 circular foundation of the Rotunda, ^and at some distance discovered the broken arches of some cellars, once filled with the choicest wines,, but now with dirty water ! Further on were marks against a garden wall, indicating, that the water-boilers for tea^nd cofiee had once been heated there ! I traced too the scite of the orchestra, where I had; often; been ravished by t-he finest performapces of vocal and instrur- mental . music ! My imaginatiprt brpught the objects beforo me; I fancied I could still; hear an air of Mara's ; JL turned my sy©a§aie^ and wliat a contrast appeared !— r- No jittering JigtesI-r-rNo brillianti happy iEompanyl-r-No ipeals of laughter frpm thronged boxes!; — ^No; chorus pf a hun- idred . instraments ; and vpices j — • AU was death-like' stiUnesa ! Is such, I exclaimed, the end of human splendour? -^Y'es, truly, .aUis vanity — aiidhereis astrikiqg examplei-nHere arArtuins and desplatipn, even withouit antiquity ! I am pot mpurn- ing,; said 1, overi the reraains of P^jilpn ^jT Carthage— ruins sanctioned by feeun- 24 A MORNING'S WALK sparing march of time ! — But here it was all glory and splendour, even yesterday ! Here, but seven years have flown away, and I was myself one of three thousand of the gayest mortals ever assembled, in one bf the gayest scenes which the art of man could devise— aye, on this very spot — ^yet the whole is now changed into the dismal scene of desolation before me ! — Full of such reflections, I cast my eyes eastward, when Westminster Abbey and St. Paul's Church presented themselves in a con tinued linie-^Ah ! thought I, that line may at some distant epoch enable the curious antiquary to determine the scite of our British Daphne.; but I could not avoid feeling, that if the pile of Ranelagh and its glories have so totally disappeared, in so short a season, no human work, even yonder colossal specimens of Gothic and Grecian art, or the great Metropolis itself, can be deemed a standard bf locality for the guide of distant ages! I moved pensively from a spot which exciting such solemn and affecting emotions, had dimi^ FROM LONDON TO KEW. 25 nished the vigour of my frame by exhaust ing my nervous energies. - I soon 4;urned the corner of a. street which took me out of sight. of the space on which once stood- the gay Ranelagh; but it will be long ere I can remove from my heart the poignant sensations to which its sudden destruction had given rise.* - Before me appeared the shops so famed for Ckbliiea^kuns, which, for above thirty years, I have never : passed without filling my -pockets. - In the original of the§e shops, for even of Chelsea buns there are counterfeits, are preserved mementos of domestic events, in the first half of the past century. The bottle-conjuror js. ex hibited in a toy of his own age; portraits are also displayed of , Duke .WiUiapi and other noted personages; a ;model of a British soldier, in; the stiff costume of the same age; and some grptto-work^, ¦ * I afterwards learnt in Chelsea, that, latterly, Ranelagh did not pay -the jproprietars five per cenj:. .for their capital;^ and therefore tbey sold the; niate< . rials to the best bidder. S6 A morning's WALK serve to indicate the taste of a former Owner, and were perhaps intended to rival the nei^bouring exhibition at Don Saltero's. These buns have afiEbrded a competency, and even wealth, to four generations of the same family ; and it is singular, that their ddiicate flavour, light ness and dohness, have never been suc cessfully imitated. The present proprie tor told me, with exultation, that George the Second had often ;been a. customer of the shop; that the present .King, when Prince George, and often during hisreigi^ had stopped and purchased his buns,; and that the Queen, and all the Princes and Princesses, had been among his oc casional customers. A htde further to the west, is a vulgar sign of Nell Gwyn, to whose female sen- sibilityj and influtence on royalty, are as cribed the foundation of the adjoining hospital for invalid soldiers. If the. mis tresses of Princes always made a similar use of their ascendency, and were to teach their royal lovers to respect the duties of humanity, and build hospitals for the vie- FROM LONDON TO KEW. Sf tims of their idiotic ambition, the world would complain less of their extravagancies and vices. The excellent hearts of women might warrant such an , expectation ; but, unhappily, this depraved portion of the sex generally part with their feminine sensibi lities, at the same time that they part with their character and modesty. Contemn ed, .tlespised, or neglected by the world, they become haters of their species, and too commonly make use of their power, to avenge on society the personal affi-pnts which they are compelled to endure. The approach to the hospital was indi cated by the appearance of numbers of mu tilated soldiers. It afflicted me, to see young men of two or three and twenty, some of whom had lost both tbgir arms, and others both their legs ! I learnt, pn enquiry, that a few livifig objects of this description are all that now remain of regiments of their comrades! The rest had been killed in battle, or had died of fatigue, or camp dis eases ! The querulous why, andforwAat, still crossed my imagination; but I again 28 A MORNING'S WALK referred such busy doubts to ministers! I may be wrong; they cannot be wrong! No ! they must be right, or such things would not' be. I confess, notwithstanding, that it deeply afflicts me that such things are; yet how is the play of human passions to be avoided, and how are the_mischiefs^of living errors to be corrected ? Words, arguments, morality, and religion, at the commencement of a quarrel, are exerted |n vain — the storm of bad passions carries, for a season, all before it — and after mis chiefs, are irretrievably perpetrated, reason and experience produce repentance, when, -alas, it is useless ! Princes and states men are too proud and powerful to permit themselves to he instructed, or I would advise them on such occasions to douht their imaginary infallibility. Let them solemnly doubt whenever some mischief, which they cannot repair, must be the con sequence of their decision; and when that • decision may, perchance, arise from so.me .mistake ! But I fear this just maxjm pf Phi losophy will never become a practical rule FROM LONDON TO KEW. 29 of policy Strong enough to counteract the benefits of extended patronage enjoyed during wars by corrupt ministers; to allay the puerile love of glory cherished by weak princes ; or to subdue the demo niacal passions and irratipnal prejudices artfully excited by rulers, and too often cherished by infatuated nations, T accosted a young man, who had lost both arms, and was walking pensively between the trees. Afteir some expressions of heart-felt commisseration, I enquired by what mischance he had met with sP untoward a -wound ? He told , me that he was ih the act of loading his musket, when a cinnonrball, passing before him, carried off one arm above the elbow, and so shattered the other, that it was necessary to amputate it. ( ; He then named some paltry battle where this ac cident befel him ; , the issue of which to either, of thie. contending parties was, as I recollected, not worth the joint of a little finger, even if the entire object of the canipaign, or war, v/as worth so n^uch ! 1- 30 A morning's walk But, said I, you are of course well pro^ vided for in the hospital— " No, (he replir ed,) there is not room for me at present; but, owing to the severity of my wounds, I have a double allowance as an out-p^^ sioner— yet, (he i^odestly remarked,) it may easily be, supposed that even a double allowance is not enough for a man whp cannot help himself in any thing — I cannot dress myself, nor even eat or drink^ but am obliged to be fed like a child ; I have a poor old mother who does .her best for me, or" here the young man's voice faultered, and : some tears hung on his cheeks — fbr, alas, even these he could neither wipe away npr conceal ! Parched must have been the eye that would not mingle tears with those of this poor fellow, on hearing the tale of his unchangeable fate ! I found too that my own utterance sympathized with his — but, shewing: him a shilling — and indicating, by signs, the dif ficulty I felt in putting him in possession of it — " here sir," said he, "and God bless you;*^ then, stooping with his mouthy I FROM LONDON TO KEW. SI put it between his lips^!-— Ah, thought I, as I turned from this wretched object, the most hard-hearted of those who were, con cerned in breaking public; treaties, and rejecting overtures for peace, would have relented,* if with my feelings they had beheld this isingle victim of the millions that have been imolated, to the calcula- tibns of their fallible policy. 1 now enquired for veterans-r-for Fonte noy men— Culloden men — Minden men- — Quebec.; men ! To some of the two last I was introduced; but I found them blind, deaf, maimed, and childish ! What- a sickening picture of human nature, whether we consider the causes, objects, or consequences! Among these hoary and crippled heroes, I was introduced to one who is now in his hundred and first year ! His name is Ardenfair, and he' is a native of Dorsetshire. He en tered into the Marines about the year 1744 J was in Anson's action, in 1747; and in Hawke's, in 1759. This ve teran sees, talks, hears, and remembers 32 A morning's walk well; and it is remarkable, that he, per forms the daily drudgery of . sweeping the gravel-walks, and wheeling water in a bar row ! One Wonders at the ability' to per form such labour, in a Centenarian ; that- such a one should be allowed to be the. sweeper of the hospital ; ahd still more,' that his age had not recommended him to the special bounty of the officers.- It might be expected, that the- successive yaifAeirs" of these invalids would, atall times, be exempted from ordinary duties, and ' receive some' additional means- of cheering their extension of life, so long beyond the ordinary duration. On the north-east border of this hos pital, I was shewn a new erection, near-- ly of the same size, devoted to the educa tion of the children ' of soldiers. It is, I am told, a very interesting establishment to those who view with complacency the favourite system of Germanizing the Eng- .lish : people^-but how. inadequate are all such institutions, to repay the obli^tions , of any government to its invalided soldiersi from LONDON TQ KEW. 33; if; ambition, prejudice, : pr a lovei of false glory, may, on light grounds, .cover the earth , with bleeding and mangled victims ! As each of the veterans in .such hospitals is often the sphtary survivor of a thousand^ of whom .the complement have, fallen pre mature victims of the cruel accidents of war, the: authors ought not to conclude that they atone for their crimes by lodging, feeding, and cloathing the thousandth, man, when he is no longer able tp serve their purposes ! Mankind are, however, so selfish, that .nothing but the experience, or the immi nent danger of great sufferings, seems likely to correct the errors of government? and the infatuations of people. on the subject of war: The best security of peace is, conse quently, the danger that the chances of war may bring its scourges home to the fire sides pf either of;, the belligerents. Thp fears of nations have, therefore, taught th?ra the duty of doing to, each other as , they wpuld be done unto. ¦ ,It forms, how"- jever, a new epoch in ttfe history pf society, 34 A MORNINO'iS WALK that, owing to their insular situation, the passions of one great people are unchecked by this salutary feai'; and public morality, in consequence, has 'stood in need of some new stimulus,' tP relieN^ethewdrfd from the danger of sufferiB^ intermiriable' slaughters. What a TEST this new situation afforded to the powdrs of CHRiSTiAiNiTY ! But for twenty years,^alas; Christianity has total ly FAILED,"* and pretended zealots of the religion of peace and charity have been even among the most furious abettors of implacable war ! Opposite the superb terrace of the Hospital gardens, stands a tea-drinking house, called the Red House; and about fifty yards oh the western side of it is the plade^at which Caesar crossed th? Thames. The reader who has read Stuke- ley's reasons for fixing on Chertsey as the place of this celebrated passage, may star tle at the positive affirmation here made. Stukeley says that the name of Chertsey is all Csesar; so also is Chelsea, by analo gies equally natural London, or Lyn;¦. ford to the peaceful, Britons, across which the British army retreated before the Ro mans, and acros^ which they were doubt less followed by Csesar and the Roman legions. The event was pregnant with such consequences to the fortunes of these islands, that the spot deserves the record of a monument, which ought to be pre served from age to age, as long as the ve neration due to antiquity is cherished among us. Who could then have contem plated that the folly of Roman ambitipn would be the means of introducing arts among the .semi-barbarous Britons, which, in eighteiep hundred ahd forty years. Or after the lapse of nearly sixty generations, would qualify Britain to become mistress of Jilp'perial Rbmej while one country \Vbiild become so exalted, and the other be so debased, "that the event would excite little attention, and be deemed but of secondary importance? Possibly aflelr another sixty generations, the posterity of the savagfe Vribesnear Sierra Leone, or New Holland, FROW LONDON TO KEW. 37 may J^rbitrate the fate pf London, or of Britain, as an affair of equal indifference ! I, passed a few minutes in the famous Botanic Garden of the Apothecaries' Company, founded at Chelsea by Sir Hans Sloane. It was the first esr- tablishment of the kind in |lngla.nd, but has now for some years been superseded! in fame and variety by the |^pyal Gardeps at Kew, It still .howevpr merits notice, as containing specimens, of all the planjs recognized in the Materia Medica, an^ with that vievv' is maintained, at a heavy expence to the company,, for the use of medical students. The company's ^rp- iessor of Bptany annually gives , lectures at this institution to the apprentices of the ipeniber^, and accompanies them in sim- , pling excursions in the country round the fnetro|?olis^ The statue of the public spirit ed founder still adorns the garden; and thp jFamous cedars of Lebanon add ap air of solemn grandeur to the wholCj whiph could be conferred by no oti^er objects pf nature or art. Tbe conservatories are op jp3 38 A morning's walk a grand scale; and so many interesting exotics claimed my notice, that I could have passed a week or a month in con- teniplating them. In Cheyne Walk, facing the Thames, I sought for the Museum and Cofiee- house of Don Saltero, renowned in the swimm ing exploits of Franklin. Here stands the same house, and it is still a place of entertainment ; but, about ten years ago, the lease expired,* when the rarities, pre sented by so many collectors, to the spi rited Barber Salter, (nicknamed, Don Sal ter©,) were sold by public auction. A little farther stands the ancient and unostentatious palace of the Bishops o^ Winchester, and here has resided the ve nerable Brownlow North, during the thirty- three years that he has filled that wealthy see ; and, a hundred yards to the west, I sur veyed, with becoming interest, the decayed premises, now a paper-hanging manu- factpry, which once was the residence of the witty Sir Thomas More, and where, as it is recorded, he entertained Erasmus. I from LONDON TO KEW. 39 was, therefore, on classic ground ; though Faulkner, -jn. his amusing History of Chel sea, ascribes the residence of the -Chan- eellor to another situation, Tl;ie men who adorned the (era pf the revival of learning, and, as itjs' patrons, furnished us with wea pons- by which tp deprive imposition of its powers, are yvell entitled tpour esteem; but many of them were entangled in the bridle, by whose means more crafty persons had long rode on the backs of mankind. Thus the friendship and intercourseof sir Thomas ;¦. • - ' *<¦¦),(• ;¦; M ;¦' ¦ ¦ ; , •' -," ¦" ¦/ More, and Erasmus were founded on their mutual zeal in behalf of thpse ecclesiastical frauds vrhich for so many ages had sub dued every scintillation of reason. They were, in their dayis, among the adherents of Popish superstition, , what Symmachus had been to the Roman pplytheists in the age of Theodosius — what Peter the Hermit was to the fanatics of the darker ages — ' and what Burke wasVtp the bigotted poli ticians at the dawn of liberty in France. Erasmus, it is true, exposed, with great ability much priestcraft and statecraft, yet his. learning and labours were, forthe chief 40 a morning's walk part, devoted to the , support of certain ir rational points of theological faith ; and poor Sir Thomas More lost his head on the scaffold. rather than aid his less fastidious sovereign in overturning the spiritual su premacy of the bishops of RPme. We may honour the conscientious scruples (rf "such men ; but, enabled; as we now are, to view their errors at a proper focal distance, we are warranted, by their example, in drawing the inference that the highest hu man authorities are no tests of truth, and that great energies of intellect often serve hut to strengthen prejudices, and give mis chievous force to aberrations bf reason. The tomb of Sir Hans Sloane caught my eye as 1 passed the comer of the church yard, but not in so "^Pbd a condition as the improved value of his estates might warrant one to expect. It is surmounted by the mystic symbols of the egg and ser pent, in a good style of sculpture. Part of the church is precisely what it was when the 'Chancellor More regularly formed part of its Congregation. In crossing the bridge to Battersea, I FROM LONDON TO KEW. 41 was called upon to pay toll, and was .in formed, that this bridge is private property. ' — A bridge across a great river, in a chil- ized country, pmai/e property I — Is not this monstrous, thought I, in a country in which seventy miUions of taxes are col lected per annum, and which has accu mulated a debt of nine hundred millions since the accession of the house of Guelph? Yet, if bridges remain private property, FOR WHAT BENEFIT has SO much mo ney been expended? Have , bridges, or hospiitals, or schools, or houses for the poor, been built with the mpney? — It seems not ! — Have roads been made — canals cut — rivers widened-^harbours im proved ?— No, these are private and in terested speculations ! What then, I ex claimed, has been done with it? If this bridge, cost twenty thousand pounds,, one million of the nine hundred would have built fifty such bridges ! — Yet, the war in the Peninsula; for the purpose of setting up the bigotted Ferdinand in place of the liberal Joseph, costs the tbuntry three millions per month; or as 42 A morning's walk ¦ mudi . as ;; would, build a bpP^re^ ^"^ fifty , fine bridges oyer the principal ri vers of the empire! jsAnpthgr three mil- lions^would. bujjjd a hundred and fifty great publia hpspitala fpr the; -incurable poor ! A third such sum would makefifty thousand, miles of gppd roads! -j And a fourth would , construct three, thousand miles of canal, or ten or twelve such as the Grand, Junction Canal ! That is to say, all these i substantial .bei^fit^ might be producedJio the country by a few weeks' cost of the war ,in the Peninsula^ ft.war of such doubtful benefit, either to England, to Spain, or to humanity ! At tbe dktance of a hundred yards fropi Battersea Bridge, an extensive- pile , of massy brickwork, for .the manufactory of Soap, has recently, been .erected, at a cost, it is said, of sixty. thousand pounds^ I was told, it was inaccessible.. to stranger^ and therefore was obliged.to content my self with viewing it at a distance.; ; Safih vast piles are not uncommon in and near London; yet how great and certain must be the profits of a commodity to warrant FROM LONDON TO KEW. 43 / the fejt^enditure of such large capitals be fore there can be any return! It might seem too that a man possessed of sixty thousand pounds, or of as much as, at the present value of money, would pur chase for ever the constant labour of from above sixty to eighty men, would have avoided' the hazards of trade.— -Yet in England it is not so-^the avaricious spirit of commerce despises all mediocrity-^care is preferred to ehjoyment-^and the ends of life are sacrificed to the means ! It has always been the foible of man not to be contented with the good he possesses, but to look forward to happiness in the anti- pipation'^Pf somiething which he hopes to attain. Thus, few congratulate themselves on the comforts they enjoy, or consider the cbhsequences of losing them ; but, ne glectful of bleSsirigs in hand, rush forward in quest of others which they may never be able to obtain, and which, when possessed, are again as little enjoyed. Poets, divines, and moralists, have as serted thib important truth in all ages; 44 A morning's walk but have failed tot cure the delusion, though it is at once the cause of the greater part of the miseries of individuals, and of the mischievous errors of governments. Moses guarded against it by new subdivi sions of property in every year of jubilee ; but the fraternal regulations of. the family of Abraham are not conceived to be appli cable to the whole family of man, as blended in modern natipns ; and statesmen and economists now think it better that endless competitions shouM be encouraged, and indefinite accum.ulatid^s tolerajed, than that industry should be cheeked by any regard to the persanal happiness whifb • might result, from moderated and bounds ed wealth. Hence, he that has health and strength to labour for his own subsistence is not coptepted unless h^ cap accumulate enough to purchase, the labour of others^- and he who has enough-, to purchase, the labours of fifty, is niiserable if another can purchase the labours of sixty — while he who can purchase th? labours of a thousand is still wretched if some other can pur* FROM LONDON TO KEW. 45, tthase the labours of two thousand. In the wilds of Africa and America, men suffer eVery species of misery for want of the impulse treated by the reward of labour ; whereas' the suffering is little less, though tatied in kind, from the gradations created in long-festablished societies by the insa tiable cravings of avarice! I am aware that it is hazardous to discuss a subject which probes to the quick- the seng^ibility of pride; yet this is a social problem which merits the consideration of all statesmeh who are aniious to promote the happiness of communities; and it ought not to be lost sight of by any future Solon who may be called upon to ameliorate the condition of his country. At a feW yards from the toll-gate of the 'bridge, on the Western side of the road, stand the work-shops of that emi nent,* modest, and persevering miechanic, Mr. Bruistel; a gentleman of the rarest genius, who has effected as much for the Mechanic Arts as any man of his time. "The wonderful apparatus in the dock-yard 4,6 A MORNING'S WALK at Portsmouth, by which he cuts blocks for the navy, with a precision and expe dition that astonish every beholder, se cures him a monument of fame, and eclipses all rivalry. In a smaU building on the left, I was attracted by the solemn action of a steam-engine of a sixteen-horse or eighty- men power, and was ushered into a room, where it turned, by means of bands, four wheels fringed with fine saws, two of eighteen feet in diameter, and two pf them nine feet. These circular saws were used for the purpose pf separatipg veneers, and a more perfect operation was never per formed. I beheld planks, of mahogany and rose- wood; sawed into veneers the six teenth of an inch thick, with a .precision and grandeur of action which really was sublime ! The same power at once turned these tremendous saws, and drew their work upon them. A large sheet of ve neer, nine or ten feet long by two feet broad, was thus separated in about tea minutes, so even, and so uniform, that it appeared more like a perfect work of Na- FROM LONDON TO KEW. 47 ture than one bf human, art! The force of these' saws feay be corideived when it is known that the lai'ge ones revolve sixty- five tiraesiirst minute; hencfe; I8x 3, i4=s 56, 5 >!J6l5r.'gives 3672 feet, or two-thirds of a 'mile in a minute; whereas, if a saw yer's tool igive^ thirty strokes of ; three feet in a-mioote, it is but nihety ibet, or only the fortieth part of the steady force of Mr, Branirfi's csaii'S'^l In aitotheriibuJMihg," I was shewn his manufactoryof shoes, which, like thfe othef", is full of ingentfity, and, -^ in regai-d to subdivision of labour; brings this fabric on a level with the oft-admired manufafctory of pinsti* Every step in it is effected by the most ele^t and precise machinery ; while as e£^h.^oper&tion is performed by one 'band,>so 'each shoe-passes thrijugh twen^^five'haind^ who^omptete from the hidCi' as supplied by the currier^ a hundred pair of strong and %ell-finished shoes per day. Allthe'jdetails are'^pefformed' by iu- genioust af^cations of the mechanic; pow- 48 A Morning's WALK ers, and all the parts, are characteriaed; by precision, uniformity^ and accuracy. As each man performs' but one step in the process, which implies no knowledge; of what is done by those who go before, or follow him, so the persons employed are not shoemakers, but wounded soldiers^ who are able to learn their respective du ties in a.few hours. The contract at whicte these shoes are delivered to government is 6s. 6d. per pair, being at least 2s.,.less than what was paid previously for an un equal and cobbled article. While, however, we admire these tri umphs of mechanics, and congr'atulabS' society on the; prospect of enjoying more luxuries at less cost of human labour, it ought not to be: forgotten, that the general good in such cases is productive of great par tial evils, .against which a paternal governr ment ought to provide. No race of workr men being proverbially more industrious than shoemakers, it is altogether, unrea sonable, that so large a portion of valua- FROS^^IiONttON TO KEW. 49 bfeciiQembeiisi of society should be injured by improvements which; have the ultimate effect;.of benefitting the whole. ti-The low price of labour deprives these classes of the power of accumulating any private fa nd, on. which to subsist while they are, learning new trades; it seems there" fore incumbent on governments to make sufficient provision, from the public stock, for all cases of distress, which arise out of changes of this .kind. If governments were benevolent, and vigilant in their benevo lence, no members of the community would. Under any circumstances, suffer from causes which are productive, or sup posed to be productive, of general benefit. I qualify the position by the word ^Mjp- p6sed, because, owing to social monopohes, and tp the advantages taken of poverty by the habits of wealth, the mass of the peO'- ple are less benefited by the introduction of maijhinery than they ought to be. If a population have been drawn or driven from ag^icfulture to manufactures, ahd the lands wMcb maintained in humble independanc^e 50-, A MORNING'S WALK theancestprs of the manufacturers are, in consequence, united into single farms, the manufacturers should not be left without resource, if their trade fails, or their labour is superseded by machinery. Against thie ill effects of Such changes, paternal govern^ ments should provide .-mpaiis of relief, so as to render them as Httle prejudicial to ifldividuals as possible ; and no transitioi^ in the productive value of various labour, should be; allowed tp destroy the industri ous part of the population, or force them tO §efek subsistence ip foreign climes. It be-^ ing the object of all machinery tp save human labpur, of cpurse society at large ought to enjoy the benefit ; apd all who are in, danger of suffering fpr a benefit to be enjoyed by the whole, should be hbe-j rally indemnified out of the common stock. Npthing tipuld be mpre easy, than fpr a board of commissioners or arbitrators^' to assess: on the public -such ipdividu>ii lossps; and, in cases of great transition^-' imposts should be so levied pn monopoly as ; to restore thp equilibrium of grgat FROM LONDON TO KEW. 51 brihcbes. of industry. , For what but for isuch purposesiof equalizing happiness are governments constituted and;maintained? I ^ passed; rfrom the premises oij Mr, Brunei, to the nearly adjoining . ones of Mr.; Hodgson, an intelligent maltster and distiller, and, the proprietor of the^ielevated horizontal air-mill,- which serves as a land- mark for.many miles round. But his mill, its elevated shaft, its vanes, and weather or wind boards, curjious as.they would have been on any, other scite, lost their inter rest., on premises once the residence bf the illustrious Bolingbroke, and the re sort, of the philosophers of his day. In ascending the winding flights of its totter ing galleries, I coi^d not help wondering at the caprice of events which had con verted the dwelling of BPlingbroke into a maltipg-house and ancaill. This house, once, sacred to philosophy and poetry, long sanctified by the residence of the noblest genius , of his age, honoured by the frequent visits of Pope, and the birth place of the immortal Essay on Man, is E 2 ¦ ^ amorning's WAiK jaofw appropriated to tb^clow^tuses! - This house, of .BoUngbrokeibecPme a ^tpin^mill i The spot on which the -Essay "on Man .was concocted apA produced, converted iinto-a distillery.of pprnicious spirits !- Siidi are the lessons of time! Such aro- the -ffieap& by which ap -eternal agency s^ at- -bought the ephemeral importance of tmapl.ii But yesterday,- this, spot -was the jrJBSort, thehope, andcthe^eat of enjoyment of Bolingbroke, Pope, Swift, Arbutimot, Thomson, Mallet, j and ^aH the^-contempo- ¦ \iaryjgenius; of Englandr^yet- a few whirls of the earth rpundthe.sun, the change of a! figure in the date. of thefyear, and' the •groupe have vanished ; whilein their place il. behold hogSi aiud. horses, ^ maltrbags. and' -barrels, .stills and. machinery ! Alas, said I, to the occupier,, and have flheseitbings become the. representatives ef ,more ; human genius than' England may ever .witness on> one spot, again-r^have you thus isattirized .the transitory fate of hui- inanity,-r-do you thus become .a parly ; with the. bigotted enemies of that philq- FRSm' EONDON TO KEW. 63 sophy wTiich was pefePhi'ned in a Bolingi' bfbkeanida Poper'No, hexejdined, I love the'nafflb-'iand character of BoHngbroke, and? I preserve the' house as #ell as I can with religious veneration; I often smoke my pipe in Mr. Pope'^s parlbur, and think of him ^ithiduP respect as I i walk tlie part bf the terrace opposite his room. He then conducted me to this interesting par lour, which; is of brown. polished pak, with a grate and ornaments of the age ;. of George the First; and before its window Stood ; the portion ' of the terrace upon which the malt-house had not -encroached, with the Thames moving majestically under its wall. I was on ; holy grPund l^^^l ^did not take off my shoes^^but I dodbtless felt what pilgrims feel' as they approach the temples of Jerusalem, Medea; or Jagger-t naut!> Of all poems, and of all podes of wisdom,- 1 ad mire the Essay pn Man, and its doctrines, the most ; and in this room; I exclaimed, it was ' probably jpilanned, dis cussed, and written ! Mr; Hodgson assured me, this had air E 3 54 A morning's walk ways been called " Pope's rooin," and he had no doubt it was the apartment usually occupied by that great poet, in his visits to his friend Bolingbroke. Other parts of the original house remain, and are Oc cupied and kept in good order. He told me, however, that this is but a wing of the mansion, which pxtended in Lor-d, Boliugbroke's time to the church-yard, and is now appropriated to the malting-house and its warehouses. The* church itself is a new and elegant structure, but chiefly interesting to me, as containing the vault of the St. John "fa mily, in which lies the great Lord, ' at whose elegant monument, by 'Ropbilliac,' I lingered some minutes. On inquiring for an ancient inhabitant of Battersea, I was introduced. to a Mrs. Gilliard, a.pleasant and intelligent woman, who told me, she well remembered Lord Bolingbroke ; . that he used to ride out every, day ' in his chariot, and had a black patch on his cheek, with a large wart over his eye-brows, . She was then FRSSf LONDON TO KEW. SS- but a girl, • but 'Mie was taiight to look upon him with veneration as a great man. As, however, he spent httld in the plafee; and gave little away, he was not much regarded' by the people of Battersea. I mentiPnesd to her the names of several of his contemporaries, but she recollected noPej except that of Malleti who, she said, she had dften- seen walking about in the village, while- he was visiting at Bo lingbroke^ House. The unassuming dwel ling- pf this.- gentlewoman- affords anpther proof of the scattered and ^unrecorded wealth of Britain, in works of superior art. I found in- her retired parlour, a fine historical picture, by Vandyke, for which she • said she had been offered 5001. but which she refused to part with, not less from a spirit pf independence, than from a tasteful estimate of the beauties of the picture. It was in the warm alluvial plain adjoin ing this village^ the very swatop- into which the Britons retreated before Caesar, ¦ that the first asparagus was cultivated in Eng- 4f6 A MORNf NG'S WALK kndi (,^I cpuld learp no particulars Of this circumstance, but such vast quantities are still grown here, that one gardener has fifty acres epgagedin the production of this yegetable,; apd there are above two buii- dred acres qi it within a nciile of Battersp^ church. Proceeding onward between some anr cient walls which bound the grpupds^ pf various market gardeners, I was told tbat here resided the father ,pf Queen AnnS Boleyn; but I could not fix any thing with precision on the subject, though it appear* from the monument of Queen Elizabeth, in iBattersea chiircb, that the Boleyns were related to the St.. John's. A manufacturer of pitch and turpentine politely shewed me over bis works* I trembled a^ I passed among, his combusr ^ble . cauldrons, and not without cause, for the place had recently been burnt to the ground, and it experienced the same^te a, second time, but a few weeks after my visit. May yifpnot hppe that the applicable powers of heated gas will enable such ma'- FRPM ^PNDOIJ Tp KEW. 57, njaftctorjes to; be carried, pn, without the inevitable . recurrence pf such cPniagra- tjpns. ., ¦' , ;,,-, , ¦,:.ij' ,. ; , ¦ . i, This, walk, .brought me .to a largp distillery,' which stiU bears the. name of York i House,, and was a Seat pf the Arch bishops. of York, from the, year 1480 to its alienation. Here resided .Wolsjey, as Arrihbishpp pf York — here Henry VIII. $rst; saw Anno Boleyn— -and here that ^eene; tpok place which . Shakespeare le- eorda ih > hisj: play of Henry VIII ; and which be .described trujy,.because he wrote it for,, EUzabeth, the daughter of Anne Boleyn^ within fifty years .of .the event, and must himself have known living wit*- peases of its verity. Hence it becomes more than probable, that SiF.Thoimas Boleyn actually resided in the vicinity, and that his daughter was ; accidentally among the guests at that princely entertainment. I know it is contended,' that this intervieKw took place att York House, Whitehall ; but Shakespeare makes .the a King come by Water; and York House, Battersea, Bi A MORNING-'S WAtk was beyond all doubt a residence of WoI-' sey, and is provided with a creek from the Thames, for the evident purpose of facilitating intercourse by water. Besides, the owner informed me, that a few years since he had pulled down a superb roPm, called '" the ball- roora, "the pannels ofwhich were curiously painted, and the divisions silvered. He also stated that the room had a dome and a richly ornamented ceiling, and that he once saw an ancient print,^ representing the first interview of Henry VIII. with Anne Boleyn, in which the room was portrayed exactly like the one that, in modernizing his house, he had found it necessary to destroy. My polite host took me to his green house, and shewed me a fine specimen of that wonder of the second degree of. organized existence — an American aloe/ about to put forth its blossoths. Its vigor ous upright stem was twelve feet high, and its head promised a rich profusion of splendid flowers. It is indeed no fable, that this perennial plant grows about a FEOM LONDON TO KEW. 5$ hundred years (a few more or less,); before itHblPoms; and, after yielding its seed; the steim withers and dies! : L could not avoid being struck with the lesson; which this centenarian affords td the Pride of nian, when, on asking its owner, how; he knew that it was a hundred yearsold, ;he infprm- ed me that; "it had been in his possession the half of ^his life," that is, the mighty period of five-andrtsventy yearsl "That it had pfeyipusly been the property of the Hon. Mrs..——," whose name, in spite of her hanour, is now as lost to fame as she herself is iPst to that existence wliich; gave rise to any sdf-importance ! That he "had heard, that, before her time, it belonged to Lord ," a name which I have also forgotten, because it was unnecessary to re-ipember it, the common-place peer hav ing also exhausted the measure of his days since, our still-flourishing; aloe was in its dawn! . " Ah, Sir," .said I, "so the aloe' has seen out all those who vainly called it their prPperty — ^They have been swept away, . generation after generation;' yet it go A morning's walk still survives a hving commentary on their utter insignificance; and it laughs at the proud assumption of those who called themselves its proprietors, but could not maintain a property in themselves ! Just so the same creature of yesterday asserts his property in that ancient globe, which he is destined to enjoy but an hour ; and he as serts, that ailwas made for him, -though in another hour he leaves all and- becomes again, as to the planet which nurtured him, the nonentity of yesterday.. s- Pride, the bane of man— I exclaim ed, as I passed the gate — what are its Claims? Does it arise from fine clothing? *-rlet it be remembered that every part has been Stolen from the lowest of Nature's 4 wOrks^— that the. finest glitter is but a moi dification of the very surface— -and that the garments which this year deek beauty and rank, will in the next be rotting oa the dunghill ! Does Pride feed on tiie records of ancestry? — let it visit the fa-* mily tomb, and examine the bones and dust pf that ancestry on which it founds FROM LONDON' TO KEW. 61 itS(;:;self-importance ! : Is Pride derived from ti|:les of distinction? — let it inquire "who conferred them-'-for what— rand, by what intrigues — -and let it be considered,- that titles or names confer no inherent quality^ and do not, alter the' nature of any .thing to which, theyj are applied! Does an : inexperienced girl take a lesson of Pi'ide ifrom. her ) looking-glass? — she may be cured of her foible, by conceiv ing 10 to be added. to the date of the year, or bylooking on those ten years older than herself ! Is it an office of power which serves as the basis of a lofty and insulting Pride ?^et ;him who fills it remember that he is but the puppet of knaves, or fools ; and al best but a mere servant of the public! Does wealth intoxicate the weakness of man ?^ — let it never be forgot ten that the possession is distinct froni the possessor, and that the most contemptible of the human race. have been the ac cumulators pf wealth 1 Does the name of wisdom, puff up . any of its profest sors? — of such it may truly be said, that their wisdom is foolishness — for none ii'uly 62 A morning's 'WALK wise, ever felt, in the researches of man, any ground of arrogance, while.. pursuits of philosophy serve only to teach humility ! —But to what purpose tend such obser vations ? Every man is iris own micro cosm, and his case, in his own yiew, is that of no other man ! Pride will. always find food in self-love, which in: spite of exhortations, it will devour with ravenous appetite! Jf men were immortal, how intolerable would be existence from the arr rogance and perpetuity of Pride ! While this passion infects and misleads .the go vernors ; pf the world, the only consolat tion in looking on weak princes, wicked statesmen, unfeeling lawyers, and mili^. tary butchers, is that, in the course of) nature; Death will soon relieve the world from the pest of their influence ! And there are few men who would not prefer death as their own fate, and whp would not hail death as a common blessing, rather than live an eternity under the dominion of the weak, the crafty, or the cruel Proud ! : The road from York House towards from LONDON TO KEW. 63 Wandsworth, lay across a Plain of unen closed fields, which,' before the Thames had carved out the boundaries of its course, was, I have no doiibt, generally covered with its waters. After the ocean left the land, and the hills became the de positaries of the clouds, how many ages must have elapsed before the beds* of rivers were circumscribed as we now see them in En^and. , Thewater always fpU lowed the lowest level, but, being of differ ent quantities at different seasons, yegela^ tion would flourish on the sides occasion-* ally covered, and in* time vyould generate banks; while the stream itself,, by carrying off the argillaceous bottom, would add to the depth^^the two combined causes- pro ducing all the phenomena of bounded rivers,* The Thames, after heavy rains, or thaw-s of snow, still overflows its banks, thereby J adding to the Vegetable produce tions of its meadows, which, ifnotcon- * It is, difficult to assign limits to the gradiial, ef fects bf the circuit of the waters by evaporatioji and rain on the creation of land, from the decay of rege- 64 , A MORHINC'S WALK sumed, -or carried away by.man^ wouldj long ere this, have fixed unalterably, the limits of its course. The effect of, these inundations in our days,: or in past ages, has been to render, its banks the. fertile soite of all those finegarden-grounds. which supply the metropolis so abundantly witb fruits and vegetables. Some large Distilleries, on the -banks of the river, reminded me of the bad policy of governments^ which, sacrificing the end to the means; that is, the health and, morals of the people to purposes of reve nue, tolerates and even encourages manu factories so pernicious. I am aware I may be answered, that th& working classes. table organizations. All the rain which falls on such a country as England, from two to three feet deep per annam, tends to raise the surface of tbe soil with the substances generated by it, which we call solids. How small a portion reaches the rivulets^ and how little returns l^o tbe sea.! . Tl^e (piisjdei^t tion seems at least to justify the notion, that the tv^tei-s desiccate in spite of the encroachments of currents, and thiat all things have proceeded froiii the siletit.agehcybf water. FROM LONDON TO KEW. 6$ love this poison, and must be gratified; and that in 1813 the duty on British spirits produced £1,636,504. But I re ply, first, that it is oWigatory on good governments to-protect the people against the effects of their vices ; and second," that, jf the pieople were not indulged in the ruinous habit of gvP-drinkjiig, and de stroyed by it in body and tnirid; ¦ they would be able to pay a greater sum t6 the revenue from prpductions of a salu-> tary nature. Such are the piernicious ef fects of drunkenness, and the numerous miseries Created by drinking fermented and spirituous liquors, that I have often been tempted to consider it as an atone ment for the impostures of Mahomet,' that he so forcibly prohibited the practice, and so far succeeded, that a rigid forbearance ia observed by his followers,' and a Mus- selman rendered beastly vicious and dis^' eased by habits of drunkenness is never seen. The doctrines of the New Testa ment and the example of the Founder of our religion inculcate an equal degree of F ^j A M0RNIN4S'S WAt.K abstemiousness, yet how contrary are the pactices of Christians ! There seema indeed, in regard to this -vice, to be no middle course. Spirituous, and, perhaps also fermented, liquors, will be abused, or they must be wholly prohibited; bei cause the stimulus wliich tbey creatp at one time, is sought at anather, aaad. the oftener it is repeated, the oftener it is desired and required ; till at length it be-' comes necessary to the sense of wellrbein^' or appai%ntly essential to the power of sustaining the fatigue of life. t In the middle of these fields I passed a handsome house, which appeared to ham been empty for a considerable time. On eaiquiring the cause of a young ivoman^i who passed at the moment ; she told me,. with an artless ;countenanGe, that ".«* washmnted.", I smiled, and asked howi she knew it "Ah, Sir," said she, "ite nothing to laugh at^-.every body here^ abouts knows it well enough---T-such strange ppisfis are heard in it, and such lights flit about it at midnight"— Have ypm seen* FROM JWNtl@N TO KEW. 6f- %ein? "NOj Sir, but I knows those that iaiv^, •ahd;!r.m,sure its true." Seeing a taibiiuring man at a distanbe; I enquired what he knew, ofthe haunted house, whea hetoldsme, with a face full of fakh, that " he knew sgentLefolks laughed* at such things, but seeing was believing'-^that, pass-t irig the house one night, he was quite' sar- tain he' hiad; seen a light in one of the rooms/ aistd had heard; groans — that he got home aa wdJ as his could, but all the world shipiicld' not induce him to pass the house again at that time of the night;" "And others," said I, "have perhaps seen the the same?"— -^" Aye, by goles, hate they, -f pXidaimiedithe. fellow with terror in his countenance. -^I then told him, I.wouM ^th; pleasure sit up in the' house to sed these ghosts— "Rather you than 1, Sir,'' said . he.— "Nay, nay," said I, " I dare say now for five shillings yot| would sit up with me I " " Na^gh, dang me if I wouldjf nor for the bess five pounds in the wPrlc^ Biuch as 1 wants money ! I don't -fear man? bu* I ainnaugh match v for the deviU F 2 6s A morning's walk '—I believes in GPd, ahd does nobody any harm ; and therefore don't ; think he'd let the old-one hurt me : but some main wicked ones lived, as I've hard, in that there house, so I'll have naught to do with it ; and dang me if any pf 'em shall catch me in it after night." The poor fellow uttered these sentiments with such earnestness, that my risible emo tions were converted into pity. I forebore, however, to argue the ppint with him, for many instances of superstition equally gross had lohg convinced me that the un taught and half-taught of my countrymen are, in this respect, little superior to the savage tribes, whom we pity, in Tartary, Africa, and America : yet in this instance the man's inference was a consequence, of his pretnises, ^and his error in these it might have been deemed heretical to expose. : The nursery becomes the means of fixing similar impressions in the families of the most enlightened, and the unformed minds of children propagate in public schools the stories of their nurses. The lowest from LONDON TO KEW. 69 superstition pervades therefore all ranks, «ven. of a pppulation so comparatively enlightened«as that of England ; and, being imbibed in infancy and confirmed, through the entire period of youth, no im pressions are more strong, or more univer sally operative. The poet and the priest either encourage the feeling, or do not take any pains to remove it. The agency of spirits and abstract principles, is coun tenanced by some of the records of re ligion, and by philosophers and physicians in their reasonings about occult causes, sympathies, cpincidencies, and destinies. It is urged in vain, that ghosts and super natural effects are never seen, except by the weakest or most ignorant of mankind, in ages or states of society when the people Plight be made to believe any thing ; or at times so distant, or places sp remote, that the narrators run no risk of detection or exposure. The love ofthe marvellous, the force of early impressions, the craft of ipany persons, and the folly of others, will hpwever Occasion every village to have its bapnte4 F 3 YO A MORNING'S WALK house for ages to come, in spite of thepr esff, and of those discoveries of philpsoplrf whieh are eVery day narrowing th^ sphere of miracles and prodigies. In considering this subject with the at^ tention that is due ta it, Jt has appeared TO me that all the stories of gh^ts and •super, oi", un-natural appeai^aPces, may be referred to some ofthe follo^^ing caases: 1 . To the augmentation^ produced hf fear in any effect on the senses — *hH«' th# ear of a terrified man wilt convert the smallest Poise into fhe report of thundeffj' or his eye will change the stump of a ttfee Into a monster twenty feet high. As the senses are fornished for protection, their irritability, under the impresi^on of feai; is part of thdr economy, as the means of preserving our being; but it is absurd to refer back the effects thus aiagmentod', tP iexternal causes whith might bfe capable'^ of Jjroducing the augmentation. To such an error of the Senses and of reasoningi, is, however, to be referred half the ghosts and ^upematurals* of which we hear in village ale-houses, in nurseriigs and schools. FROM LOfNKON' TO Kaw. Jl Ei Tbf diseased organs of sensation ] a$ aft iniamed eye- producing the effect Pf flashes of light in the dark, or fulness of blood producing a ringing oV singing ift the ears. Sometimes diseases of the' vi^ sual organs are accompanied by^ -halluoi^ nations of mind; and persons ill in fevetS often see successions of figures and ob^ jects flitl before their eyes till the disease haS been removed. The workings of con'^ Science or nervous affections, will also prQ-i duce diseases of the senses, and such hal lucinations of mind as to occasion a per^ son to fancy he sees another, Pr to hi haunted by him. But there is nothing supernatural in all this; it is sometimes a local disease, sometimes an effect of fever; Sometimes a nervous affection, and some times partial insanity. ¦ 3. To natural causes not imderstood b^ the parties. Thus, anciently the north* ern tights were mistaken for armies fight-* Ing; meteors and comets for flaming swords, portending destruction or pesti lence; the electrified points of sWords to th© favour of heaven ; the'riiotJdhi^of th^ 72 A morning's walk planets to attractive effluvia; and all the effects pf the comixture of the gases to benign or diabolical agency, as they hap^ pened to produce on the parties gopd or e;vil. So- in the like manner old houses are generally said to be haunted, owing to the noises which arise from the cracking and yielding of their walls and timbers, and from the protection and easy passage which in the course of time they- afford to rats, mice, weasels, &c. whose activity in the nightrtime affords the foundation of numerous apprehensions apd fancies pf the credulous. 4. To spontaneous combustions or de tonations, which produce occasional lights apd noises, or, under; unchanged circum stances, recprring lights and noises, chiefly claiming attention in the night. Thus bouses shpt up and unaired are apt, from the putrefaction of animal and vegetable matter, to generate hydrogen gas, the acr cidental combustion of which by contact with phosphoric matter, naturally gene- i^ted in the same situation, will produce those effiects of lights and noises heard in from LONDON TO KEW. 73 empty houses. .. So Church-yards, Churches in which the' dead are buried, Gemete^ ries, and- Ruin's of old buildings, mustfre-^ quenty give but large quantities of these gases ; and consequently, from exacdy si milar causes, they are likely to produce the very effects which we witness in the will- o'-the-wisp, or in hydrogen gas when inflamed during calm weather in marshy ¦situations. ' 5. To the prevailing belief that effects, which cannot readily be accounted for, or 'Which are caused by the contact of the invisible fluids or media always in action ip the great laboratory of nature, are pro duced by the agency of spirits or demons; which belief^ concurring with the unknown causes of the effects, and affording a ready ^olutioQ of difficulties, prevents further inquiry, silences reasoning, and teiids in fconsequence to sustain the prevailing er rors apd superstitioPs. Such are the general causes of ghosts, spirits, charms, miracles, ; and supeniatu-s ral appearances. .They all arise, either from hallucipations of the mind or senses ; 74 A MORNING S WALK from the mutual action of. the natural^ though invisible, powers of gaseom and ethereal fluids ; from the delnsions of ig-r norance, implicit faith, or the absence (^ all reasoning. While occupied in these speculations; I arrived at the entrance ofthe popukwisj industrious,, and opulent viUage of Wands worth. A reader in the -highlands of Scotland, in the mountains of Wales, or the wilds of Connaagbt, will startle when be hears of a village contaii&t^ 5^644 in habitants, and 2,020 booses, in which 620 families are returned as engaged in trade and manufactures. Yet, snch are the overgrown villages round our overgrown metropolis. Even in this vicinity, Chelsea contains 1 8,262 inhabitants; Falham 5,903? Glapham 5,083; Hammersmith 7,393; Kensington 10,886; Breatford, New and Old, 7,094 ; and Richmond 5,219, This village of Wandsworth, in truths is of the size of most second-rate towns in distant counties, its main street, of compact and well-built houses, being hadf a mile in length, with several collateral onesa-quar* TV£OM LONDOT* TO KEW. J75 tei" of.a"mile. It also contains, .or has in its vicinity, many considerable manufac tories, which flourished exceedingly be* fore the silly vanity of ambition and mill* tary parade led a nation of merchanta to endeavour to dictate to their foreign cus tomers; and forced them to subsist without their commodities! The manufactories of Wandsworth are created or greatly aid^ ed by the pure stream of the Wandle, and by the Surry iron railway, which runs fifom Croydon to a spacious apd busy wharf,, on the Thames at this place. They consist of dyers, calico-printers, oil-mills; iron-fouhderies, vinegar-works, breweries; and distilleries. I found leisure to inspect tbe two or three which were employed; and I felt renewed delight on witnessing at this place the economy bf horse-^labour oP the iron rail-way. Yet a heavy sigh escaped me, as I thought of the incon' eeivable millions which have been spent about Malta, four or five of which might have been the raeans of extemhngdouble lines of iron rnU-ways from Lortdon to Edinbtiifgh, Glasgow- Holyhead, Milford, 76 A morning's walk Falmouth, Yarmouth, Dover and Ports mouth! A reward of a single thousand would have supplied coaches, and other vehicles of various degrees of speed, with the best tackle for readily turning out; and we might, ere this, have witnessed our mail coaches running at the rate of ten miles an hour, drawn by a single horse, or impelled fifteen miles by Blen- kinsop's steami«ngine ! Such would have been a legitimate motive for overstep-^ ping the income of a nation, and the completion of so great and useful a work would have afforded rational grounds for pubhc triumph in general jubilees ! Wandsworth having been the once- famed scene of those humorous popular elections of a mayor, or member for Garrat; and the subject serving to iU lustrate the manners of the times, and abounding in original features of cha racter, I collected among some of its elder inhabitants a variety of amusing facts and documents, relative to the eccentric can didates and their elections. Southward of Wandsworth, a road ex- FSdM LONDON TO KEW. 77; tends nearly, two miles to the village of Lower Tooting, and nearly midway, are a few houses, or hamlet, by the side of a small common, called Garrat, from which the road itself is called Garrat Lane* Various encroachments on this common led to an association of the neighbours abput three-score years since, when they chose a president, or mayor, to protect their rights ; and the time of their first plection, being the period of a new par liament, it was agreed that the mayor should be re-chosen after every: general election. Some facetious members of the club gave, in a few years, local notoriety tp .this election ; and, wben party spiritran high in the days of Wilkes and Liberty, it was 'easy to create an appetite for a burlesque election among the lower or ders of, the metropolis. The publicans at Wandsworth, Tooting,. Battersea, Clap- ham, and ,Vauxhall, made a purse to give i^t character ; and Mr. Foote rendered its interest universal, by calling one of his inimitable farces, " the Mayor of Garrqt,". fS, A morning's walk . I have ipdeed been told, that Foote, Gar-* rick, and Wilkes, wrote some of the can* didates' addresses, for the purpose: of in structing the, people in the corruptioni which attend elections to the legislatia'e^ and of producing those reforms by mean* of ridicule and shame, which are vainlji expected from solemn appeals oi argu-* ment and patriotism. > Not bffli^able to find the members fo# Garrat in Beatson's Political Index, or in any of the Court Calendars, I am obliged, to depend on tradition for information in regard to the early history of this, famou* boroughi The first mayor bf whom 1 could hear was called Sir John Harperj lie filled the seat during two parliaments^ and was, it appears, a man of wit,-^ for, on a.dead pat being thrown at him on th<» bu^in^, and a bye-stander exclaiming ths^ it stuihk worse than a fox, Sir John voci* ferated, ."f^ibhiat's no wonder, for you se0 it's a.poU-c^t" This hoted baronfet wa^' in the' metropolis, a retailer of brick-dust^ and, his Garrat honours being supposed to FROM LONDON TO KEW. f^ be a means of improving his trade and the condition of his ass, many- characters in similar occupations were led to aspire to tiie same distinctions. • He was succeeded by Sir Jeffrey Dun- Stan, "who was returned for three parlia ments, and was the most popular candid date that ever appeared on the Garrat hustings. His occupation was that of buying OLD wios, once an article of trade U4ie that in old clothes, but become obso»- tete since the. full-bottomed and fuU-dres-. sed w%s©f haxh sexes went out of fashion. Sir Jeffrey osuaHj carried his wig^bag over his 'Shofflldter, and,; to avoid the charge of vagrafKiy, vocifeialed, as he passed along thestreets, "old wigs;" but, having a per son like Esbpy and a countenance and man ner marked hy irresistible humour, he never appeared widiout a train of , boys, and curious persons, whom he entertained by hiso sallies of wit, , shrewd saying, and smart repartees; and froni whom, without llBe^og,; he collected suflScient to maintain his dtignity :«(f ;mayor and knight He was 8Q A morning's WALK no respecter of persons, and was so se vere in his jokes on the corruptions .and compromises of .ppwer, tPat, under the iron regime of Pitt and Dundas, when freedom was treason, and truth was blas phemy, this political punch, or street- jester, was prosecuted for using what were then called seditious expressions ; and, as a caricature on the times, which ought never to be forgotten, he was in 1793 tried, convicted, and imprisoned ! In consequence of this affair, and some charges of dishonesty, he lost his popu larity, and, at the general election for 1796, was ousted by Sir Harry Dimsdale, muffin-seller, a man as much deformed as himself. Sir Jeffrey could not long sur vive his fall ; but, in death as in life, he proved a satire on the vices of the proud,; for in 1797 he died, like Alexander the. Great, and many other heroes renowned in the historic page— of suffocation from ex cessive drinking ! Sir Harry Dimsdale . dying also before the next general election, and no can-; FROM LONDON TO KEW. 81 didate starting of sufficient originality of character, and, what was still more/atal, the victuallers having failed to .raise- a jp^BLic PURSE, which was as stimulating a bait to the independent candidates for Garrat, as it is to the independent candi dates for a certain assembly; the borough of Gar rat has since repiained vacant, and the populace have been without a jJro/ew- €d pohtical .buffoon, . None but those who have seen a Lon- dop mob on apy great holiday can forpi a just idea of -these elections. ; On seve ral; occasions, , a hundred -thpusand; perT son^, half of thpra in carts, in hackney- cpaches, an^ on horse and assrback, -co- yerpd; the .various, roads from London, apd choaked up all the approaches to the ^aqpof electiop:, .Atthe two last elec- tiops, I was tol4,?! that .the rpad within a jnile of Wandsworth w,a8 so; blocked up by yehicles,, that npne, could raoyje backward pr. forward during many, hours j and that the candidates, dressed hke chip^ney- gvreepersi on May-day, or .in. the mock- S2 A morning's walk fashion of the period, were brought to the hustings in the carriages of peer?, drawn by six horses, the owners them selves condescending to become their drivers I Whether the effect of inculcating use ful principles by means of these mock poli ticians, was compensated by the ridicule thrown on the sacred exertions of patriot*. ism, raay perhaps be doubted. ' These elections served, however, to keep alive the feelings of the people on public ques tions, and tended to increase those dis cussions and enquiries which support the arterial circulation of the body politic. The deadly plague of despotism, and the equ'dlly fatal disease Pf ministerial cor ruption, find victims of their influence only araong people who are devoid of moral energies and public spirit, and whose stagnant and torpid condition gene rates morbid dispositions that invite,- rather than resist, the attacks of any public enemy. I am a friend> therefore, on principle, from LONDON to KEW. 83 to the bustle and tumult of popular elec tions. They are the flint and steel, the animating friction, the galvanic energy, of society.' Virtue alone can face them. Vice dreads thera as it dreads the light With uncourtly hands, they tear the mask from Hypocrisy ; they arraign at the bar of public opinion, political Culprits, amenable to no other tribunal ; and they probe to the quick, the seared consciences of Peculators and Oppressors. If the sycophants of courts, and the sophistical apologists of arbitrary power, "^should craf tily urge that the people are sometimes misled by fraud and falsehood, and there fore unable to distinguish between patriots and plunderers,' we should not forget that occasional errors are misfortunes which do not abrogate general rights ; and that po pular elections are never adopted in well- trained despotisms, as part of the ma chinery of the state, calculated to subjugate the bodies and minds of their slaves. Do we hear of the suffrages of the people among the Turks, the Russians, the Moors, 62 64 A morning's walk or the Algerines r Rather, as the means of eliciting the public voice, and of ex citing enquiry, are they not of all despo tisms, the bane ; and of all usurpations and abuses of power, the terror; while, j by generating that public spirit which is the apimating soul , of freedom, they serve as tests of dauntless pubhc. virtue, afford the last and the>. best hope of patriotism, and constitute national schools, in whieh impressive Lessons of Liberty, are taught to the whole people. . In my walk towards Garrat, my atten- tipn was attracted by a prietty mansion, which pleased my eye, though the mono- tpnpus blows of its a-djpining oil-mill an- poyed my ear. The pwner, Mr. Were, politely exlubited its details; ,and mpre mechanical ingenuity than is here display ed coyld not \yell be applied; to aid the simple operation of extracting oil from linseed. A magnificent; water-wheel, of thirty feet, turns a main shaft, which gives jpQtion to a pair of vertical stones, raises the driving^beams, and turns a band FROM London to kew. 85 which carrieis! "the seed, in; sraall buckets,* from the floor to the hopper. The- shock on the entire nervous system, produced by the PpiSe Of the driving-beams as they fall on the wedges, is not to be described. The 'sense of hearing for the time "is wholly destroyed, and the pPwers of voice, and a!rticulation are vainly exerted. The noise is oppressive, though a reboUnd, comparatively tuneful, takes place, till the wedge is driven home; but afterwards, the blows fall dead, and produce a painful jarr on the nerves, \vhieh affected me for sevei-iil hours with a sense of general las situde. ' The gardiens of this sensible ma-* nufacfiirter evince ' considerable taste, and produce that agreeable effect ivhich alwajrs results from the, combination' of^ comfort, rural beauty, and useful industry. A manufactory in a picturesque situation,^ surrounded by the uisual characters of opulence, is one of the mOSt pleasing features of an English landscape, com bining whatever we most admire in nature and artj with moral associations, that pro- g3 86 A morning's walk duce in the mind a sentiment of perfect E^isfaction. Nearer to Wandsworth, Homer would. have found imagery by which to improve his description of the abode of Vulcan; for how feeble must haye been the ob jects of' this nature, which a poet could view on the shores of the Mediterranean, compared with the gigantic machinery of an English iron-foundry. The applica tion of the expansive powers of nature, as a moving agent in the steam-engine; the means of generating and concentrating heat in our furnaces ; the melting of iron ; the casting of the fluid; the colossal powers of the welding hammer, the head of which, though a ton in weight, gives a stroke per second ; the power of shears, which cut thick bars of iron like threads ; the drawing out of iron hoops by means of rollers, and the boring of cannon, are the every-day business of one of these manufactories, all of which I saw going on at the same instant, without busde or effort Iron, the most universal, the most FROM LONDON TO KEW. 87 durable, and most economical of the metals, is thus made subservient to- the wants of man, at a time when his im pro vidence in the use of timber has rendered some substitute necessary. New appli cations are daily made of it, and. a new face is, by its means, promised to society. Used as sleepers and bond-pieces in the brick-work-of houses, it will extend their ¦duratiPn through many ages ; - and, as joists, rafters, and plates for roofs, it will defy the assaults of storms and the ravages of fire. As railipg- for gardens, parks, and other enclosures, it combines elegance -with security. As pipes for gas, or fpr water, it is justly preferred to -lead or wood. As frames for windows, it unites lightness with durability. As bedsteads, it excludes vermin ; and, as square framies for bpdge-pieces, it presepts the triumph of human art Yet these- are only a fpw -of its modern applications, for, they are illimitable, and a description of the manu- ifaetories of Birmingham and Sheffield,, of which iron is i;he staple, would.; fill a 88' A mP«ni:ng'&Walk volume. i'On my remarking to the pro-> prietor pf'ithis foundry, that the men" mingled themselves with the fire like sa lamanders; he told me, that, to supply the excessive evEtporation, some of thent found' it necessary to drink ei^t or ten pots of porter per day. Many offtheBa presented in their brawny arms, . whrch wCTe rendered so by the cdnstatit JexCTtiod • of those hmbs ; apd in their bronzed couh»- tenfances, caused by the action i of th« heat' and the effluvia, striking pictures of true sons of Vulcan ; and, except in oc* casional accidents," they enjoyed, I was told; general good health, and often' at^ tained a hearty old age. >-*In regard'/ to these mai!Mi^tories;o I learnt, that the application of machinery in them saves two-thirds of the tnanuai labour; or, in- other words, that, a triple effect is produced--by- are a' means of setting a mark op a .family, and placing it at issue with a considera,ble portion pf the neighbourhood ! What ; a pernicious fpgine for the gratification of pride, scan dal, envy, and malice! What an inqui- sitipnof thefew bad by which to torment the many good! iWhat a .dagger in the bands pf tplerated assassins! ! In short, what a perversion of reasPn, what a diS' 54 A morning's walk ease in the very bosom of society, what a lurking demon stationed at the threshold of every happy family, to blast and thwart tbe modest ambitipn of its amiable mem bers I Doubtless, in and near Wands worth, a mistaken constitution in the systera of ballot renders a hundred fami lies uncomfortable, while the thirty-two elect are not benefitted. The principle, therefore, is erroneous, and exclusion should result only from a majority of black-balls. For the honour of our na ture we may presume, that a majority of men are not governed by bad passions; at least, our only security consists in its not being so : it may, therefore, be pre sumed, that a majority of black-balls would be fair evidence of a fault in the candidate rather t?han in the electors. Perhaps, a siniple majority ought to be decisive ; but, to guard against the intrigues of bad pas sions, the decision would be more just if two-thirds were required tP be black-balls; for it may be safely trusted, that no third of a respectable assembly will ever vote FROM LONDON TO KEW. 95 for the admission of a character truly ob jectionable. " But am I to mix," exclaims one of my starch female readers, "with members xvhom I do not Hke, or- give up my sub scription to the assembly." " Unques tionably, Madam; your dislikes ought pot to be gratified — your hatred and prejudice are odious vices, which you ought to keep at home, where you can invite whomso ever you like, and reject those whora you dislike; but a pubhc assembly is the pro perty of society, whose happiness ought to be consulted in its arrangements, and which oughts to be governed by general rules of raorals and justice, and not by the bad passions of the unworthy few." After all, is it not raatter of wonder^ that only once a month, during the win ter, any congregation .of part of the inha bitants of Wandsworth takes place for pur poses of amusement ? Yet, is not this the general characteristic of English so ciety, from the Orkneys to the Land's- End? The inhabitants of populous dis- 96 A morning's walk tricts or towns ip Britaip might a§ jyell, in regard to their intercourse with the cpm- munity, live in the wilds of America or Siberia ! 'Tis true, they assemble on Sun days at churohor chapel when their devo tions forbid the gaiety which ought to vary the grave pursuits of hfe — and they meet also in the cpramop receptacle of mor tality ipthe parish cemetery — but, they sel dom or never mpet to cheer life'S: dull round,! to soften asperities, to remove fprmal distances, tp cultivate friendships, and ^o perform social and neighbourly offices of courtesy and; kindness..^ , -j'^'^by is there not, in every populous vicips^ge or, adjoining to every town, a public gra velled, pr payed. Walk, provided with co- ypred and. open seats, tp which, from spring to autumn, the iphabitaptsmiglit resort, ; and promenade between the hours of six and eigbt or nine. Might- not spcji walk be rendered attractive, during ^thpse hours, by Ipeing provided with^ t"'o, three, or. four Musicians to; play marches, apd lively airs, and increase the hilarity of FROM LONDON TO KEW. 97 the scene ? A district would thus become social, and the inhabitants would know each other; though the proud need not mix with the humble more thap would be agreeable. Such an arrangement would ren der less necessary those costly and vitia ting excursions to watering-places, which are made in quest of similar gratifications; and they: would render two hpurs of every twenty-four a period of enjoyment to tens of thousands, who now enjoy no relief from gloomy cares, except at the public- house, the card-table, or the backgam mon-board. It would,' moreover, be a cheap pleasure, supported by a rate of half-a-guinea per house per annum, while it would afford at least 1000 hours of innocent and healthful gratification to their families. To enumerate all the di rect and collateral advantages must be unnecessary, because it would be difficult to imagine a single objection that could weigh against the obvious benefits. So ciety would then become a social state; and it would no longer be problematical, H 98 A morning's walk whether a man in a wilderness, separated from the bad passions of his fellow-men, were not happier than he who is surround ed by them, but who has no counterpoise in their intercourse ahd affections ? May these considerations sink deep into the Blinds pf " Men of RPss, ' ' wherever they are to be found ; and, if acted upon as they merit, I may perhaps live to form one of many happy groupes of village or parish promenades, which owe their origin to these observations. As an infallible test of the intellectual cultivation and social dispositions of any town, I enquired of two dealers in books, whether there existed any Book-club, but was answered in the nega tive. A small collection of those beguilers of time, or cordials for ennui, called No vels, constitute a circulating libraiy ; and^ ' judging from the condition of the volumes, this degree of literary taste is general among the females of this village. Far be it from me to depreciate the negative merits of hovel-reading, because the ma* FROM LONDON TO -KEW. S9 jority tend to imprpjve . the heart, to flireet' the; sensibilities and sympathies of the mind, and to create many liberal and ratiPnal reflections, towbich without Novels their readers might have been total stran gers*' .This is no small praise of any pur suit ; yet the same and still higher purposes would be attained, if real, rather than fic titious, life were the object of study ; if we enquired after man as he was, is, and ever will be,' instead of satisfying ourselves with the contemplation of him in the false co lourings, distorted positions, and carica ture resemblances, of taany wPrks of fiction. There can, however, exist no' moral agent more effective than a good novel, wherein Attention is rivetted by theauthor's fancy. Taste is fascinated by his style, and ErrorSi Prejudices, and Follies of the hour are corrected by his pow ers- of ridicule or argument. To instruct as well as to amuse' — to speak great truths in epigrams-^to exhibit the substance of sermons without sermonizing — to be wisp without appearing so-^to make philosoi' ^ n2 100 A morning's walk fphers trifle, and triflers philo8ophize*^to exhibit precept in action — and to surprise the judgmient through the medium of the passions and the love of the marvellous, — ought to be the purposes of those who -cultivate this interesting branch of literary composition. - Yet, unsociable as is Wandsworth, it is in that respect like all the villages round London. Gay and splendid as they ap pear to the summer visitor, nothing can be more dull' and monotonous than the lives of their constant residents. Made up of the mushroom aristocracy of trade, whose rank, in its first generation, affords no palpable ground of introduction— =-of pride, whose importance, founded on the chances of yesterday, is fed on its self- sufficiency-^— of individuals whose conse quence grows neither out of manners, in tellectual endowments, superior taste, nor polished connections — and of inhabitants of a metropolis, among whom shyness oft in tercourse is necessary as a security against imposture — it is not to be wondered that from LONDON TO KEW. 101 most of the sho'fvy mansions in these vil lages are points of repulsion rather than of attraction. It must, hpwever, be cpn- cpded, that many pf these famiUes are hospitably, cbaritable, : spciabjle, and anxi ous to be agreeable— qualities which would serve as the basis of systemsof more liberal intercourse, if properly directed, and if cherished in suph estabhshmiepts as bpok- clubs, periodical assemblies, audi evening promenades. Nor should it be forgptten that many of the proprietors' of these, mansions copsider them as mere retreats from the craft apd selfish jargon of the world, in which, to enjoy the contrast afforded by thp simplicity pf nature, they court SoHtiide, for its own sake, during their temporary residence from evening till- morning, and from Saturday till Monday. In a Village once famous for its manufac-, tories, which, as the effect of the wicked: Policy that involved the country in twen ty years' warfare, have lost their powers of giving employment to the population whom . tbey had drawn together, I wa£> h3 IOS A MPRmNG's WAL& naturally led to inquire the condition 'of these helpless victims of deluded and de luding statesmen. What an affecting topid for the contemplation of Sensibility ! How painful the condition of Poverty, con trasted with that of Wealth; yet how closely are they allied, and how adven» titiously separated ! The Rich solace themselves in a fancied exemption from the miseries and ignominy which attach" to the Poor, though their daily experi-* ence of the caprice of fortune ought to teach them, that, while they have the power, itwould be wiser to diminish the contrast by ameliorating the condition of' Poverty I How glorious is the spectacle afforded. by the contrast of civilized so ciety, with the wretched condition of sa vages, thpugh that justly admired civiliza tion is often but a result of artifices that create the distinctions of rich and poor ! ^hat a gulph between the ancient Britons- in the social equality of their woods and' caverns, and the favoured English in their luxurious cities and magnificent palaces !' FROM LONDON TO KEW. lOj Yet, alas ! wealth and splendour and great ness are such only by contrast ! — Wherever there are rich there must be poor — wherever there is splendour there mustbe misery — and wherever there are masters there must be servants. These conditions of men ip society are like the electrical power in nature, which never indicates itS' positive qualities without creating Gorresponding negations; and which, when equally di^- fcised,> exhibits no phenomena. If then men are rich merely because they have ab>* stracted or absorbed the wealth of others,- their obiigationB, as moral and sympathe* tic creatures towards those by wbose abase ment they are exalted, can require no formal proof. The laws may allow, anJ the arrangements of society may require, as a condition of civilization, that the ricli? diDuld enjoy their ascendency; but it is neither just, nor wise, nor decent, nor humane, nor necessary, that the poor should be deprived of benefits which. oughts to.result to the whole family of man,, frops the triumphs of Art over Nature. All are 104 A MORNINO'S WALK bound cheerfully to concede to superiority in virtue and intellect, those advantages which are the result of virtuous and intel lectual exertions ; but, as common descend ants of the once-equal Briions, the lowest are warranted in claiming, a.s matter of right, to be as well fed and as comfortably provided for, on performing, or on evinc-- ing a willingness to perform, the duties* of their Stations, as their equal ancestors among the Britons, or society at large'can- not be said to have profitted by Our boasted civilization. To adjust these intricate re lations, so that all virtue may partake in its sphere of the gifts of nature, augment ed by the ingenuity of man, is the arduous, but interesting, task of wise legislation.' It would not be reasonable to expect, that every case should be met, and every exigen cy anticipated, by adequate arrangements ) but it is the duty of power, in whomsoever it is placed, to exert itself with unremitting anxiety, so as in the arrangements of man to approximate to the dispositions of na ture, which are always marked by inex- FROM LONDON TO KEW. 105 , haustible abundance, by appropriate be nevolence, and by means commensurate to suitable and desirable ends. Under the influence of such reasoning, I made a variety of enquiries between Battersea and Wandsworth, relative to the condition of the poor. I learnt with grief that the payment of day-labourers varies from Qs. 6d. to 1*. 6d. per day, or on an average is not more than 12*. per week ; of women from l*. 3d, to Is. or about 6j. per week ; and of children from Qd. tp 6d. or 4*. per week ; though, for the two last classes there is sufficient employment for only half the year. A poor man, who had a wife and three children to maintain on 14*. per week, tPld me, that for many months he and his family had been stran gers to meat, cheese, butter, or beer — that bread, potatoes, netties, turnips, carrots, and onions, with a littie salt, constituted the whole of their food — that during the winter months he was obliged to rely on the parish — ^thatin case of sickness he and his children had no resource besides the lOS A morning's walk. workhouse— and that, though it had pleased God to take two of his children, it was better they should go to .heaven than con tinue in this wicked and troublesome world " ButI don't think, " said he, " the gentiefPlk saves much by running down we poor so nation hard, for we are obli gated to get it on the parish, which they pay; so it's all one; though it grieves a poor man, as one may say, to apply to them overseers, and to have no hope but the workhouse at last" I agree with this humble Economist that it seeras to be as ungenerous as im politic to throw on the poor's rates a bur then which ought to be borne by those who profit from the labour thus inade quately remunerated. It could not, and ought not, to be difficult to fix a minimum (not a maximum) on twelve hours' labouff per day, such as should be sufficient to support an average-sized family. Suppose for bread and flour 6s. were allowed ; for meat,cheese, butter, milk, and beer, 4*.; for potatoes, &c. 2*. candles, soap, and coals, I FROM LONPON TO KEW. 107 2*. cloathing 3s. 6d. house-rent 2*. 6d. sun dries 1*.— total 21*. Here is nothing superfluous, nothing but what appertains to the earliest stages of civilization, and what every well-arranged society ought to be able to give in return for manual labour of the lowest kind. With inferior means thd labourer must suffer the obloquy of being remunerated from the parish rates, to Vvhich all are forced to contribute as fully as though the employer paid the fail- value of the labour in the first in- i^tance, and the amount were assessed on the price of his coramodity, instead bf being assessed in the form of poor's rates. It being, however, the favourite system to pay the difference between what the labourer receives; and what he ought to receive, through the medium bf the work house or parish officers, I anxiously di rected my way to Wandsworth Work house, to examine whether it was an asy lum of comfort or a place of punishment ? On my entrance I found the hall filled with a crowd of poor persons, then ap- 108 A morning's walk plying to receive a weekly stipend from the overseers, who, with other parish- officers, were assembled in an adjoining apartment. Many women with infants at their breasts, and other children clinging round their Isnees, presented interesting subjects for poets and painters. Every feeling of the human heart, though in the garb of rags, and bearing the aspect of misery, evidently filled the various indi* viduals composing this groupe. I pressed forward to the room, where I found the overseers were sitting at a table, covered with bank-tokens and other silver for dis tribution. They received me politely, an«^ on learning my wish to view the interior, directed the matron to accompany me. The manners and countenances of these overseers flatly contradicted the prejudices which are usually entertained against per sons fining the office ; and it gratified me •to hear several of the poor, whose cha racteristic is said to be discontent, exclaim, "God bless 'em, they're noble gentlemen." The matron conducted me into a spa cious yard, round which are suites of rooms, FROM LONDON TO KEW. 109 built in the manner pf alms-houses, ^a plan which cannot be too much commended, because it sufficiently detaches the tenants of each, secures to every set their peculiar comforts, and may be rendered the means of separating, virtue from vice. In the middle of the area stand the offices and kitchen, dividing it into two yards, one for the men, and the other for the women. The whole had been recently white-washed, and, but for the name of work-house, and certain restraints on their habits and liberty, it seemed calculated to secure the comfort of its inmates. The matron took me into several of the men's rooms, and here I found tottering grey hairs, crippled youth, inveterately diseased of all ages, and artizans destitute of employinent Six pr eight were in a room, though I was informed they slept for the most part but one in a bed. A fine young girl about twelve years old, who had shpped out of the women's yard, was seated by the side of her father, an interesting looking artizan, whose trade ixp a japRNiNGis walk had ceased to afford hira employment. This, I found, was contrary to the disci-, pline of the house, and the matron chid the girl for coming there; "however," said she to me ip an under-tpne, with great good nature — "one can't blame a child for .getting to her father, nor the father for encouraging his child to come. over to him."^ — "No, madam," said I, "and no one can blame you for granting such an indulgence, while all must £idmire the goodness of heart which dictates that sentiment" Would to God, thought I, that all workhouses were governed by ma-. trons as capable of sympathizing with the feelings of the unfortunate inmates ; and that all those who embitter poverty by directing the separation of parents from their children, and husbands from their wives, may themselves become the object of their own law ! My guide now led me to a room where lived a man, his wife, and children, a saw-- yer put of work, whose eyes were so af fected by the dust that falls into the pit^ FROM LONDON TO KEW. Ill as to render him incapable of following his employment His pride, as well as that of his wife, seemed to be piqued at being exhibited to view in the workhouse, and they took much pains to convince me that it was their misfortune, not their fault or their wish. Two fine children, one of them a chubby happy creature, playing on the. floor, added to the groupe an interest that was deeply affecting. Doubt- leiss, : thougbt I, these simple people once entertained many projects of humble am bition; which, if explained, might draw a smile from the great— bnt here, alas! they seem to be entombed for ever! I now took a cursory view of the wo men's yard, in which I found the same appearances of cleanliness and comfort as on the men's side. But the most interest ing scene was the nursery, where sixteen litde cherubs, the oldest about five years, were engaged in their innocent div^ersions, regardless whether they were in a work^ house or a palace, and unsuspicious of the ills that await them in a world governed 112 A morning's walk by selfishness, where the greatest of all crimes, and the forerunner of all calami ties,^ is poverty ! I was pleased tP find that the mother of three of them was al lowed to fill the office of nurse, and the tears trickled down the poor woman's face, as I particularly admired one fin^ boy, who, it happened, was her child. "Ah ! Sir, (said she,) he's so hke his poor father I— my poor husband littie thought^ when he died, that his dear children would so soon be in a workhouse"— here her tears and loud sobs stopt her utterance; but, recovering herself — "if I can't main tain 'em with the labour of my hands, (said she,) I will do what I can for 'em here ; there is no other happiness for me in this world, and I will continue to do for them till God shall please to take me also." A woman's and mother's tears are so contagious, and the scene before me formed so deep a drama of real life* that I hurried from the room ! The good matron now showed her cleanly kitchen, her well-arranged laun- FROM LONDON TO KEW. 11^ dry, pantiy, bakehouse, &c. &c.- with which riiy feelings were not at that mo ment in unison ; I saw, however, muclt to admire and nothing to condemn. On inquiry, I found that these excellent re gulations were the effect of a late revolu tion in the establishment Till a very recent period, it had been the criminal practice of the overseers, and the negli gent sufferance of the parish, to farm or LET OUT the poor to some grim tyrant or task-master, at the average rate' of 5s. 6d. per head ! This man was to pro vide for these wretched victims of the pub lic neglect, and of his miscalculation, out of 5s. 6d. per week, rent exclusive ; and his remuneration consisted in the differ ence between their cost and that pitiful allowance. The cries of the poor at length forced their way to the ears ofthe opulent, the contractor was turned out, and it was then humanely determined that the overseers, aided by a master and ma tron, should in future superintend the work house as trustees for the parish. J 114 A MORNING S WALK . I understood that they had hithertcn performed ' this duty with great attention and r humanity, giving meat-dinnefrg four days ip the week, and soup-dinners op tb§ pther days,, the cost proving- abpuf 6s. 9d. per headj on the one liundred poor ip ;tbe hpuse, of whom forty wpr^ children. In the petty labours with whi<^ the aged,. crippled, and ipfant poor are too $ften harassed in these receptacles, theyhad| as yet, made no essays, The stipends opt of the bouse am.oupted,; I learped, to nearly atS much as the cost within,; or to. about 2Ql. per week, which, at 2*. 6d. per head, assists two hupdred and forty o^ec$$l making a total i charge on the parish of from 3 to 4000/, per annum. , How mapy parishes in the metropolis Still, however, persist in the. negligspt practice of farming their wretched, poor p,t. only 4*. or even 3*. 6d. per weekl And how few ofthe opulent, idle,, and well-intentioned of the parishioneES,. con cern themselves about their condition or sufferings I, Wljen the overseer calls for FROSf.fLlBWaolf/TO KE'W. II* t|(«v?.reiftep;otheyvpjerhaps complain SO hea-> vilyi of Ithe afiiounf, that he fears to in-) <^eas^ the allovvance, however sensible he; i8iayr;be;of its .necessity ; or,; perhaps, wheni ajecctstedj'by a'beggat in the street, they esscpse- themselves by quoting their large- QOnt^ibPjtionS to the rates, and refer the) de^pi^iring wretch to the frorkhouse I How*. incujnbehti'then to see what that work-. house is !— Whether its arrangements aro riot more 'fitted for dogs or pigs, than fon ratioml andheartTbroken fellow-creatures,; howiever-' unequal in fortune, or however differing ; even in virtue ! : '. Let : us thei» neiibl^r'! wonder ' rior complain, that oui* i^eetS'or ;high#ays are filled with objects of misery, preferring the cold ground, thP wrasparing stOrm;f and this inclemency of spasoris, to the provisions legallyiprovided for them ; if vve have not had the industry t -ascertain, the courage to reform, and the benevolence to improve, the conditions of itheir parochial asylums ! The readeri of sensibility will riot, I trusi^ complain of the length of details IS lid A Morning's walk on an object which interests every son and daughter of Britain. The otiiet de mands on my time allowed me to spend but twenty minutes in this receptacle of the helpless and unfortunate; yet what a volume of feelings and reflections were excited in that short period ! We have had a Howard, I exclaimed, who visited our gaols and alleviated tbe condition of those who are forced to drink the dregs ofthe cup of misery, from the iron-hearted and unsparing hands of lawyers, whose' practices are sometimes countenanced by the incorrigible character of criminals!^ We have a Webb, who vainly assaults the giant Penury on the King's highway,: but whose frightful strides outstrip hi* generous speed ! — We want then some ANGEL, in the form of man, who, uniting the courage and perseverance of a How ard with the liberality of a Webb, will visit and report on the pondition of our Workhouses. But, if, as every parish contains its workhouse, and every coimty but one gaol, the task in consequence is from LONDON to KEW. Ilf too great for one, life, though actuated by the gpdlike zeal of a Wesley ; then it is a. task worthy pf, parish cPmmittees,- com posed; of groupes of Apgels, in the form .of bi^pignant Wpmen, vi^hp will fipd, that the. best-spent and the happiest, morning of .every .month would be passed in a visit to the, workhopse; where, with slender alms, kind, advice, apd,fosteripg care, they .would be able tp spothe the sorrows of the aged widow,— to coipfort the sick and helpless,— to, pour balm ipto the meptal wounds of those who, are reduced from affiuepce by, misfortune, — to raise from hopeless ipdigepce modest merit, , which never foupd a, friend,— and tp.prp tect or phan children, whp need advice and pilpt- ,age in their outset in life. No pampered minion of fortupe need, complain oi ennui, or be anxious for npw amusemepts^t in .whose parish there , exists a workhops^, Jt is a Stage op whiph Dramas, serious or tragical, are pvery day performed ; the interest of ^^hichas created by np tricks . strpam of running water ; and he wilt find, that it possessed a hard smooth f bptr tpm, and stands less in need of repair thap any road in the same vicinity. Let tm then take a lesson frpni pature pn this subject, as we do on all jOthers when w© f vipc^ opr ipodesty and wisdom. The objection -tp this form of roads, fpund^ on the ipcr^ase pf draught. re quired ip ascending ppe sidp of the in clined plane, has no vali(Jity. An incli- pation of tvvo degreps rises one yard in thirty; consequently, such a power as would draw thirj;y tons pn level ground, must, other circumstances alike, be equai to thirty-owe tons on a road so inclined. The resistance of friction in rpads which permit the wheels to sink into them, ri^es^ FROM LONDON TO KEW. 121 however in a much higher proportion. It may be assumed, that wheels which sink but half an inch, would require an in creased draught of an eighth, or, in the above instance, of Q-~ tons;p,if an inch, they would require a fourth more, or 7-j tons ;.^ if two- inches, a half increase, or fifteen tons ; and at three inches, the power would be required to be double. Different soils, and different wheels, would indicate different proportions, but the above may be taken as averages; and, when contrasted with the small increase pf power, rendered neCessary by the, ascent of an inclined plane, the latter, on the ascending half Pf any road, will appear to be unimportant The Emperor Napoleon, who endea voured to apply philosophy to all the arts of life, decreed, that no public road in France should exceed an inclination of 4° A6r, pr rise more than one metre in twelve. This proportion, it was esti mated, wpuld combine the maxima and fflinima of the powers;- and, in spite of Ii2' A morning's WALK those malignant Confederacies,' which he^ was so often called Upon to overthrow, the labour of reducing many steep roads of France to this practicable inclination. was accomplished, and hence the praises of the roads df that country which we read in the narratives ofi our tourists. England, which set the first example:: td Europe; in this branch of economy, ought, riot to allow itself to be outdone by the measures of a reign which, it-asserted was iricompatibfe with regal dignity ; but, pro ceeding OH correct . principles, it ought in this case to imitate even a bad example,' and to correct its system of patching up its roads under the direction of surveyors,' ignorant of general principles, and at the expence of local commissioners, who are interested in making their iraprovements o"n the narrowest scale. The rapid ad-> vancement of Great Britain in sociafl com forts,- w'ithrn the last sixty years; maybe ascribed to the turnpike system, which fook the jurisdiction of the public. roads; out of the hands of parish-officers, and 1 vmm EOlitD'ON TOKEW. 12S trari^fsmd it to commissioners of more estbPsive ' districts. .A still further im- prPV€fmentis'now called for by superadding the controur of a istatiostal ROAD-i?o-' tiGE, which should equalize the tolls/ 6»*^ apply tfee whole to the unequal Wants 6f various districts ;¦ so ¦ that roads of riearlyec[ual goodness might characterize alli'pattfe Pf an empire Which ought to be ^#ndered Pne greatmetropolis, and to be liriited in I means * and fraternity by all the iicilities'Pf human art A* stage-coach toiling against this road of «ix' degrees inclinationj and a flour-^ waggon'! traversing from side to side ta tegthen^ the hj'potheneuse, jet stopping at every hundred yards to enable 'the herses to recover their ordinary tone of breathing, proved the good policy of that law in France, which would have lowered tliis road at the top full thirty yards, and have •extended the hypotheneuse three' htiridred iarid sixty yards under the, level' i^d at the summit- If the barbarity o;& t^fe- practice of tight-reining the heads of Ii4) A morning's walk wretched horses needed any exaggeration, its superlative absurdity was evidenced in the horses which I saw labouring up this hill. Nature, which does nothing in vain, had a final purpose in giying motion to tho vertebrae that join the head of an animal to the trunk. The moving heati is, in truth, one of the extremities, of that compound animal lever, whose fulcrum, is the centre of gravity. The latter point is disturbed in its inertia, and acquires progressive motion by the action of the extremities of the lever, which are them selves moved by volition, whose. seat is in the cranium ; and the head, in conse quence, is in all instances the first mover. Tlie propplsion or vibration of the head puts the entire muscular system in motion, disturbs the balance on the centre of gra vity, and so effects the sublime purposes of loco- motion in all animals. Yet it is this prime mover which the greater brutes, who profess themselves knowing in the «,conomy of horses, so tie up that it can i« no way exert itself; and then they whi^ FROiH tONDON TO KEW. 125 «ind Spur the animal to forCe it to make new and Unnatural, exertions! Let any inan, himself an erect animal, the powers of whose priinum mobile are divided be tween his head and his hands, cause his head ' tP be so tied back and fastened behind as to force out his chest In that position let him try his comparative pow ers in walking or running with speed and safety, or in carrying, or drawing a load-, ^ and 'he will soon be convinced Pf the cruelty ofthe practice of tying up the head of a horse for no other purpose than that he may hok bold and noble! Weslet and Bak EWELL, who rode more than any men of their time, told me that they had suffered from frequent falls, till, by attending to the evident designs of nature, they .suffered the bridle of their horses to festoon in a semicircle ; and since then, in riding thousands of miles, they had never endured even the anxiety of a stumble. ^ A pedestrian like the writer could not avoid fedin'g grateful to the constructor of this piece of road, for its beautiful and jaft A morning's VjALHI r, ,f spacious causcjway,, which extends. froBir the village pf Wapdswiprth to ; Ppt^^ey, Heath. It is. in most , part^ seypp feet wide, and it doubtless pwes, much of, i^s, hardness, smoothness, and drypesjs, to itS) declining position, which causps,tbejw;ateF; tp run pff, carrying with it in splp^iQi^ thcs argiUaGeous: earth,, and leaving a basis of pure, but well pulverised, silex. AU wh(% reside in the country, ladies .parjtjcplarly^ knpWi.how to .estimate, the worth of as broad, smooth, and dry walk, bythe' mi-> series, so generally suffered .from those o? a Contrary description. For thp sake,. therefore, of the example and thS, pre cept, they will candidly excuse thie.eplpgy, extorted from a wandering pedestrian on meeting with so agreeable an accompip-: dation in a district, which, in mapyre-i speptg,. seems appropriated to the capncP of ;Wiealih. To supply the deficiency, of our Rpad Bills, one sweeping law ought to :epaGt : that all turnpike roads should be provided with a raised causeway for foot passepgers, at least! five feet wide, FRpJ^I LpN-pON TO K,EW. l^ with, cross posts at every furlong to prp-! vpnt eque§triaps.;frpm abpsipg it, and with cppveniept seats at th^ end , of every ffijlew Jt is too mpch to expect in thpsp tjmestp, see realized the writer's fayppr- ite plaU/Of MILE-SXPNE^pd; MARI^J^S* cpTTApEs, among a people . who - baye passiopately mortgaged all their estates, and Mindly encumbered all their industry, ip., paying the -ipterest of money raised tp cairy pn warst made for thp purpose of rfcgulating the independant governments of other cototries ! , ^j The sides of this road apd the opening^ of thodistant landscape, excite the admjtt jreition of the eye of taste by the archi- t^tural and horticqltural beauties pf man sions, which have sprung out of theiprpfits or artifises. of trade. The multiplication of ¦ these ; dormitories of avarice is con sidered by too many as. the sign of pub- lie prosperity. Fallacious, ;delusive, and mischievous notion ! Was the; world piadp for the many, or the iew ? Gap any one become rich from domestic, trade without 128 A morning's WALK making others poor ; or can another bring wealth from foreign countries except by adding to the circulating medium, and thereby diminishing the value of money? In eitiier case, what is the benefit to the public or the community 7 Yet a benefit is rendered visible— a fine house has arisen where there stood before but a wretched hovel — and a paradise has been created out of a sheep pasture! — The benefit, however, is merely to the individual ! His pride and taste have been gratified, and this gratification is called a benefit — yet with hira the benefit, if to him it really be so, begins and ends*, But he employs the neighbourhood, patronizes the arts, and encourages trade ? Granted, — but whence come his means ? His wealth is not mi raculous. It has no exclusive or origi* pal properties. If he spend it at Put ney, he must draw it from other places; either from rents of land or houses, or from interest of money, both the fruit of other's industry, and the sign of corres ponding privations in those who pay them I from LONDON TO KEW. 129 For the sake of the elegant arts; which derive their encouragement frbm the su perfluities of the few, I ara no enemy to any' iribderate inequalities of means which enable men to become exaraples of the good effects of industry ; I merely object to the vulgar inference that splen did mansions serve as signs of the increas ing wealth of a country. Better criterions would be the diffusion of plenty and com- fort'rr-.abundance of smoking farm-houses and well-stored barns— cheap provi sions and DEAR LABOUR— enough with moderate exertions for home consumption, and soraething to exchange for the luxuries of different Climates. But it is no index of national prosperity that elegant villas rise like sUn-flowers, as gaudy as unprofitable, while gaols are crammed with insolvents or needy culprits, and poor-houses are filled with wretchedness ! Poland as tonishes travellers by the splendour of its palaces; while in the same prospect they are shocked at the huts of the people, exhibiting the characteristics of English K 130 A morning's walk hog-sties ! Let the increase of splendour, therefore, be considered rather as a proof of the derangement of social order, than as any sign of its triumph ; and let us not forget that, however much fine houses raay benefit and gratify the blameless and often meritorious occupants, they do not as such, serve as any signs of increased opu lence in the comraunity at leu-ge.. On arriving near the top of this road, I obtained a distinct view of a pheno menon, which can be seen no where in the world but at this distance from Lon don. The Smoke of nearly a million of coal fires, issuing from the two hundred thousand houses which Compose London and its vicinit}^, had been carried in a compact mass in the direction which lay ina right angle from my station. Half a million of chimneys, each vomiting a bushel of smoke per second, had been disgorging themselves for at least six hours of the passing day, apd they now produced a sombre tinge, which filled an angle of the horizon equal to 70*, or in bulk twenty-five FROM LONDON TO KEW. 131 miles long, by two iriiles high. As this cloud goes forward it diverges like a fan, becoming constantly rarer;' hence it is seldom per ceived at.its extremity, though it has been distinguished near Windsor. As the wind changes, it fills by turns the whole country within t«ferity.or thirty miles pf .Lpndpn; and over this area it deposits the volatilized products of three thousand chaldrons^, or riine millions of pounds of coals per day,. producing: peculiar effects on the country. In London this smoke is found to blight or destroy all vegetation ; but,; as the' yi- cinity is highly prolific, a sraaller quantity of the same residua may be salutary, or the effect may be counteracted by the extra supplies of manure which are afforded by the metropolis. Other phenomena are produced by its union with fogs, rendering them nearly opaque, and shutting out the ii^ht of the suri ; it: blackens the mud of the streets by its deposit of tar, while the unctuous mixture renders the fpot-pave- ment slippery; and it: produces a solemn gloom whenever a sudden change of wind K 2 132 A morning's walk returns over the town the volume that was previously on its passage into the country. One of the improvements of this age, by which the next is likely to benefit, has been its contrivances for more perfect combus tion; and for the condensation andsubUma- tion of sraoke. The general adoption of a system ofconsuming the smoke would ren der the London air as pure as that of the country, and dimiriish many of the nui sances and inconveniences of a town re sidence. It must in a. future age be as difficult to believe that the Londoners could have resided in the dense: atmoisr phere of coal-smoke above described, as it is now hard to conceive that our an cestors endured houses without the con trivance of chimneys, from which conse quentiy the smoke of fires had no means of escape but by the open doors, arid windows, or through a hole in the roof ! ¦ On the left I passed the entrance into the tastefuUy planned, but very useless, park ofthe justly esteemed Earl Spen cer. It contains about seven hundred from LONDON TO KEW. 133 acres, disposed so as to please the eye of a stranger, but which, like all home-spots, soon lose, from their faraiharity, the power of delighting a constant occupant Why then appropriate so fine a piece of ground tP so barren a purpose ? Does the gra tification of strangers, and the first week's pleasure to the owner, cpunterpoise the consideration that the same spot, vyould afford the substaintialornamentof ten farms, or subsistence to three hundred and; forty cottages, with two acres of garden: and pasture? The sUperb mansion of Lord Spencer, with .all necessary garden-ground and pasturage,' would not less ornament the landscape, nor be less 'ornamented by such an assemblage of humbler happiness. Though a Repton might exhaust his magic art in arranging the still beauties of a park, yet how' certainly would they pall on the eye after the daily survey of, a month! Why then sacrifice to the pride of custom that which in other diapo- ¦sitions might add so much to the sum of happiness? Let the pieans of pro- K 3 13-4 A morning's WALK moting the felicity of others constitute part pf our own ; and, with the aid of the ornamental gardener, both objects might be combined. He would so dispose of his white-washed cottages, so groupe his farm yards, and so cluster his trees, that from every window of the feudal mansion the hitherto solitary occupant might behold incessant variety, accompanied by the pleasing associations growing out of pros perous industry and smiling plenty. Does Claude ever revel in solitudes? Does Poussin fascinate in exhibitions of me chanical nature ? And when does WooUet enchant us but in those rich landscapes in which the v\foods are filled with peeping habitations, and scope given for the imagi nation by the curling smoke of others rising behind the trees ? On entering Putney Heath, my atten tion was drawn towards an obehsk which stands by the road-side, recording a won der of the last age ; and the: liberal atten tion of the pubhc authorities to a dis covery which promised ulterior advantages from LONDON TO KEW. 135 to the community. Several recent Fires had led ingenious men to consider of the means of preventing similar catastrophes. One person improved water-engines, ano ther suggested floors of stucco, and others contrived means of escape; but David Hartiey, esq. a son of the illustrious writer who '' traced to their sources the associa tions of Ideas, and .then a member of par liament, contrived tp build a house which no ordinary application of ignited combus tibles could be inade to consume. This house, still standing at the distance pf a hundred yards frora the obelisk, serves as a' monument of the inventor's plans; but, like every thing besides, it recently excited . the avarice of speculation, and; whep 1 saw it was filled with workmen, who where converting it into a tasteful mansion, adding wings to it, throwing out verandas, and destroying every vestige of its original , purpose. One of the work men shewed, me the chamber in which, in -1774, - the King and Queen took their breakfast; while, in the room beneath. J36 A mornings walk fires were lighted on the floor, and: various inflammable materials were ignited, -. to prove that the rooms above were fire proof. Marks of thpsp experiments were still visible on the charred boards. Ip like manner > there still remained charred spr- feces on the landings of rthe staircase, whereon fires ba.d been ineffectually light ed for: the purpose of consuming them, though the stairs apd all the, floorings were of ordinary dpal ! The fires in the rooras had been so strong that parts of the joists in the floor above were charred, though the boards which lay upon them were in no degree affected. The alterations making at the iabment enabled me to coriiprehend the whole of Mr. Hartley's system. Parts of the floors having been taken up, it appeared that they were double, and that his contrivance consisted in interposing between the two boards, sheets of laminated iron or cop per. This metallic lining served to render the floor air-tight, and thereby to inter cept the ascent of the heated air ; so that. FROM LONDON TO KEW. 1'37 although: the inferior boards were actually charred, tbe less inflammable material of metal, prevented the process of combustion from- taking place in the superior boards. These sheets of .iron or copper, fpr I found both, metals in different places^, were not thicker, than tinfpil Or stout paper ; yet, when interposed between the double set of boards, and, deprived of air, they eis fectuaUy stopt, the progress of the fire. The House of Compions voted 2500/. to Mr. Hartley to defray the expepces of this building ;- the sovereign considered it a popular act to give him countenance; and a patriotic lord-mayor and the cor poration of Lopdon, to impress the public with deeper convictions of its importance, witnessed the indestructible property of the structure on the 110th anniversary of the commencement of the great fire of London!. Yet tjie invention sunk into obscurity, , and few records remain of it except .the pompous obelisk and the wreck of this house. . , It merits observation, that in modern- 138 A morning's walk built Houses taste or accident has eflfect-: ied sufficient security against fires without any special preventives. Flame is only ungovernable when, in its ascent it meets with combustible materials. Heat, as the principle of expansion, rarefies and vola-; tilizes all bpdies ; and then, as the heavier give place to the lighter, so bodies subject to its action ascend, and carry up with thera the principle, matter, pr action of heat A chief object therefore of man's policy in economizing fire, in subduing it to his use, and in governing its decompo sing and destructive powers, should be to prevent its finding fuel in the ascent No connected timbers ought therefore to join an inferior floor with a superior, so that, if one floor were on fire, its feeble lateral combustion might easily be extin'^ guished with a mop and a pail of water, provided no train of combustibles were extended to the floor above. Such is the language of philosophy, and such the slight process of reason, by attending to which the habitations of men may at all from LONDON TO KEW. 139 times be secured against the calamity of fire. How absurd however was the con struction of our houses till within the last twenty or thirty years ! Wooden stair cases, exposed wooden balusters, and wainscotted walls, coated with paints Com posed of oil and turpentine, and put toge ther more like a train of combustibles, than the habitations of beings calling them selves rational ! The taste of modern ar chitecture has, however, corrected the evil ; and stone staircases, iron balusters^ plas tered walls, and lofty rooms, contribute to cut off the communication, though a fire may have seized on a flooring, or on any ar ticles of furniture. This security might how ever be further increased by more strictiy regarding the principle ; by cutting off all contact between floor and floor, made, by wooden pilasters, window-shut ters, &c. ; by the more liberal introduction of iron ; and by the occasional use of Hartley's iron or copper sheets. By analogous reasoning it is suggested to us,. that, if those females whose clothes 140 A morning's walk have taken firC, and whose head, throat, breasts, and arm-pits, are consequently exposed to the increasing intensity of an ascending flame, were instantiy;to throw themselves into an horizontal position,. their vital parts would not only not be affected, but the lateral flame would be so trifling as to be easily and sately ex tinguished. What in huraan life can ex ceed in horror, the circumstance of a woman in full health, often in the middle of her friends and family, being roasted alive by combustibles fastened to her per son, frora which it is impossible to escape till her most sensitive parts haye besen re duced to a cinder ! What crime everperr petrated by huraan turpitude could have warranted a more dreadful fate ! What demons, contriving mischief and torments, could have invented a combination of miseries so terrible and heart-rending? The decorations of beauty — the gratifica tion of pride — even the humble means of health and comfort, are thus rendered the unmerciful instruments of the keenest FROM LONDON TO KEW. 141 sufferings, the most frightful sudden deaths, and the most dismal doraestic tragedies! Yet the entire evil arises from the prin ciple of the ascent of aU heat; from the flame meeting in that ascent with fresh fuel to feed on, by which its intensity is progresssively augriiented ; and then act ing at its summit ori the head, throatj and sensitive vital parts of the agonized victira. The remedy^ therefore is siraply to lie down, when the roaring flame of several feet high will be so reduced that it riaay he put out with the hands, with the other partsof the garments, or by any extraneous covering. About a hundred yards, from this fire proof house, stands the Telegraph: which comraUnicates with Chelsea, /and forms part of the chain from the Admiralty to Portsmouth and Plymouth. I learnt that there, are twelve stations between London and Portsmouth, and thirty-one between London and Plymouth, of which, dgbt are part of the Portsmouth line till they separate in the New Forest Another 2 14.2 A morning's walk chain, extending from London to Yar mouth, contains nineteen stations; and another from London to Deal contains ten stations; making in the whole system sixty- four, telegraphs. The distances average about eight miles, yet some of them are twelve or fourteen miles; and the lines are often increased by circuits, for want of commanding' heights. In the Yarmouth line particularly, the chain makes a con siderable detour to the northward. After about twenty years' experience, they calculate on about two hundred days on which signals can be transmitted throughout the day; about sixty others on which they can pass only part of the day, or at particular stations ; and about one hundred days in which few of the sta-, tions can see the others. The powers of the stations in this respect are exceedingly various. The statiori in question is ge nerally repdered useless during easterly winds by the smoke of London, which fills the valley of the Thames between this spot and Chelsea hospital ; or more com- from LONDON TO KEW. 143 monly between the shorter distance of the Adrairalty and Chelsea. Dead flats are found to be universally unfavourable; and generally stations are useless pea,rly in the proportion of the miles of dead Aat looked over. On the contrary, stations ¦between hill and hill, looking across a val ley, or series of valleys, are mostly clear; and water surfaces are found to produce fewer obscure days than land in any si tuation. The period least; favourable . of the same day is an hour or two before and after the sun's passage of the meridian, particularly on dead levels, where thepliy of the sun's rays on the rising exhalations renders distant vision exceedingly obscure. The tranquiUity of the morning and even ing are ascertained to be the most favour able hours for observatioP. -. A. message frpm London to Portsmouth is usually transmitted in about fifteen .minutes; but, by an experiment tried for the purpose, a single signal has been trans mitted to Plymouth and back again in three minutes, which by the Telegraph route is at 144 A morning's WALK at least five hundred miles. In this instance, h'owever, notice had been given to make ready, and every captain was at his post to receive and return the signals. : The pro gress was at the rate of one hundred and seventy miles in a minute, or three mileS per second, or three seconds at each sta tion ; a rapidity truly wonderful ! The number of signals produced.by the EngUsh telegraph is sixtyrthree — by which theyTC- present the ten digits, the letters; of the alphabet, many generic words,; and all the numbers which can be expressed by sixtyr three variations of the digits. The signals are sufficiently various to express any three or four words in twice as many changes of the shutters. The observers at these telegraphs are not expected to keep their eye constautiy at the glass, but look only every five mi nutes for the signal to make ready. The telescopes are DoUand's Achromatics, at which one would wonder, if every thing done for governments were not converted Into a job. The intention should have FBOM liONDON T0 1C2W. 14S 'been to enable tlie observer to isee the giieatest number of hours ; consequently the light should be intercepted by the smallest quantity of glass. Dollond's achro-i matics contain, however, six lenses, and possess no recommendation but their en larged field, and their fireedom from pris matic colours in that field; points of no consequence in looking through a fixed glass at a fixed and circumscribed object The field of the Galilean telescope is quite large enough, and, having huit two lenses, one of which is a thin concave, it exhibits the object with greater brighttfess, ahd therefore ought to have been preferred fcjT this purpose. It seems strange also, that, to ease the operator, it has never been contrivied to oxhibit tbe fixed spectrum onUhe principle of a portable camera, sP that without wearying theoye, the changes of the distant telegraph- might have beep exhibited on a plain surface, and seen with both eyes like the leaf of a booki, The application of optical instruments, between a i^xed .statiori and fixed phjiSct, L 146 A morning's walk ought to have been made in an appro- psriftte manner, and not influenced by the practices which prevail in regard to move able telescopes for various objects, I have long thought that a system of tctegrapfas for domestic purposes would constitute one perfection of civiliaatioH in any country. Multifia/rious are the occa sions in which individual interests require that events should be communicated with telegraphic celerity. ^ Shipping concerns alone would keep telegraphs constantly at \vork, between all tbe ports, of the king' dom and* Lloyd's coffee-house ; and com merce would be essentially served, i^ during 'Change-hours at London, Bristol Liverpool, Hull, and Glasgow, comrau- nications could be interchanged relativ« to tbe statC; of markets, purchases, sales, and other transactions of business. How convenient too wpuld be such a rapid -intercourse between London and country bankers, in regard to balances, advances, aiid money transactions; how desirable in law business between London and FROM tONDON TO KEW. 7^ ¦country practitioners.; and how im'portarit in cases of bankruptcy or insolvency ?' In family concerns, notices of deaths, birthfly' accidents, progressive sickriess, &c. it would often be deeply interesting. 1!^ «tate of elections, the issues of' lawsuits, determinations of the legi'Slataire, questions for answers, and nUmberless< events of more or less importance, would occur 9nf- fident to keep telegraphs in constant requi sition, and abundantly repay the cost Pf tPaintaining them. A guinea might be' paid per hundred mUes, for every five or six words, which, in matters Pf private Con J cern, might, by pre-concert, be trans mitted in cypher. Instead of sixty-four telegraphs, we might then require five hundred, and an establishment costing ] 00,000/. per annum ^ yet five hundred messages and replies per day, between di^erents parts of the kingdom, taken at Sl. each, -would in two hundred and -fifty days produce , 250,000/.' or a net revenue of 150,000/. But to achieve so vast a purpose, and to confer on men a Species l2 14$ A MORNINGS WALK of -ubiquity, even if ;50,000/. per annum werelost-to the government, would it not be worth the sacrifice, thus to give to the peo ple of England an advantage not possessed,; and never likely to be possessed, by apy other people on searth ? What a triumph of civilization, would be afforded by such an extension of the telegraphic .system i The combinations of the telescope be gan what those of the telegraph would complete. United, they wopld produce &kiad oi fnite ubiquity, repdering the in tercourse pf ap industrious community in dependent of time and distapce, and bipd' ing the whple in ties of 'self-ipterest, by means which could be achieved opiy in a bigh state of civilization through fortunate combinations of human, art As I looked arpund me from, this emir nepce, a ,multitude of ideas, sympathi^ and affections, vibrated within, me, which it would be impossible or tedious .to analyse, , The- Organ of the Eye was here played upon Uke that of. the Ear in a musical .concert Noi- was it the sense FROM LONDON TO KEW. 149 alone which was touched by this visual harmony ; but every chord and tone found a separate concord or 'discord, in innu'- meraMe associations and reminiscences. It wks, in truth, a chorus to the eye, un attended by the noisp and distraction pro duced- by the laboured compositions of Handel ; while it filled the whole of its peculiar sense with an effect like one- of the tender symphonies of' Haydn. ¦ It was a Panofama, better adapted, hbweyer, to a poet than a painter; for it had' no foreground^ no tangible objects for light and shade, nor any eminences which raise the landscape above an angle of six or eight degrees; yet, to a pPet, how rich it was in associations — how endless in pictures for the imagination ! The north and north-east were still ob scured by the dingy, irregular, and dfense sraoke issuing from the volcano of the Me- tropbUS; and, in lookingupon it,, how difficult it was to avoid tracing the nPw mingled masses back to- their several sources, con sidering the happiness or misery which. they L a .150 A MOANING S WALK TCsfiected from .their respective fire-sides^ jftnd ga^ng the aspirations of hope, or the fiighs of wrptchednesp,. which a fertile imagination might, conceive to bp com- hined with this social atmosphere ! Con venient alike to every condition of huma- nityj it might be considered as flowing «t opee from the -dungeons of despairing convicts, the cellars apd garrets of squajid poverty, the. busy haunts of avarice, the waste of luxury, and the wantonness of /^wealth, Straight before me, the metropolis, like -a devouring monster, exhibited its equivo cal ^apd meretricious hpauties, its extensive ipani^ac]tories, its ajspiring churches and tqvi&s, a^d other innuiperable edifices., Westminster Abbey stood promi nent at once reviving the recollection of i.ls superstitious origin, and exciting deep veneration as the depository of the relics- of sp much renown. What topics for coajr ^pentary, if they had not been recently ex hausted in the classical stanzas of a Mau- uice! St. Paul's^ the monument of , FROM LONDON TO KE'W. 151 Wren, was but just visible through the haze, though the man at the Telegraph as serted, that be couM sometimes tell the hour by its dial vvithout the aid of a teles cope ! How characteristic is this structure become of the British metropolis, and how flat the mass of common spires and smoky chimneys would now seem without it ! The Monuraent, recording the delusiPns of fac tion, and the Tower, with all its -gloomy associations, were- visible in the reach of the river. Of Churches there appeared a monotonous groupe; while the houses presented a dingy and misshapen mass, as uninteresting at the distance of seven miles as an ant-hill at the distance of seven feet. Indeed, any wretch capable of set- tipg his foot upon an ant-hill, and of de stroying it, because it made no palpable appeals to his syippathy, might at this distance, by parity of feeUng, let fall a ioill-stone on this great city, and extinguish in an instant the hopes dnd cares of its inhabitants. On tbis spot then, I behold an assemblage of \h^ greatest wonders of 458 . A morningIs walk man's creation, at a focal distance, whieb reduces them to the measure of an ant hill ; and still further off they would be diminished even to a point! Such is the estimate of the eye, nor is it heightened. by that of the ear ; for I was assured that during tranquil nights, particularly by Us- tenjpg near the ground, the confused hum of the vast British metropolis could here be: compared only to the buz of a beb* ttiVE, or the sound of a conch I What a 'lesson do these considerations ,^fford to the- pride of man, whose egotism repre sents him to himself as the most important pbject of the infinite creation ; for whose use, he asserts, aU things were made, and to whoin all things are subservient ! It us, hoM'ever,. natural that the nearest object should fill the largest angle, whether view ed by the mind or the eye ; though it is the business of wisdom and philosophy to cor rect such illusions of our intellectual or Sensitive powers. Of the -moral condition,- apd feelings,^ concentrated within a spot thus embraced FROM LONDON TO KSW. ]sS^ by a glance of the eye, how impossiblp to form an estiniate I Supposing 900,000= human beings are thus- huddled together,, i.n J50iOOQ. hpuses, we may conclude, that 100,000 , will always be. lying on thp bed pf ;sickppss, and that 3QyOOO are con standy afflicted by mortal diseases, eighty of whom expire every day,i or three in every hour! Of the- 150,000 house keepers, above 50,000 are racked by po verty, or by the dread of its approach ; pther 50,000 maintain a precarious inde- pi^udence ;, whilp . the remaining 5Qj<300i enjoy comfort and. happiness, chequered, however, by care and theppnflictpf human, passions. The greater part of the first class are either already plunged,, or pre disposed to plunge, into vices and crimes unknown except in such a city;, thpse of the. second class maintain a virtuous struggle, but more frequently sink into the lower, .than rise into the higher class,; while,: among the third- class, there, are found, all degrees of virtue and worth, although, mixed with an. envious spirit o£ 154 A morning's WALK rivalry, and an indulgence in expense and luxury that greatly reduce the number of truly happy families. On the north, north-west, ' and east, I still beheld the signs of this overgrown metropolis in villages, which branch, like luxuriant shoots, on every side. And it was only on the south and south-west, in the swelling downs and in the charms of Box-hill, Leith-hill, and Dorking, that I couM discover the unsophisticated beauties of nature, which seemed to mock the toils of man, in the contrast they afforded to the scene in the opposite direction. Yet men, who never receive instruction ex cept through their own experience, flock in tens of thousands to share in the "lot tery presented to their ambition in great cities, where thousands perish while in pur suit of the prize, where other thousands obtain nothing but blanks and disappoint ments, and whence the tens who achieve their object, gladly escape to enjoy' their wealtb, free from the disturbance of city passions, araid the placid and unchange able beauties of nature. from LONDON TO KEW. J55 In looking around me from the windows of Hartley's Fire- house, it was impossible to avoid reflecting on the wretchedness of Want existing in tbe sooty metropolis, and the waste of Means in the uncultivated countiy imraediately around me. I had just been sympathizing with the foriorn in habitants of the workhouse at Wandsworth, at the distance of only a mile; and half a dozen other such reeeplaetes of misery in vited commiseration within equal distances, in other directions ; yet a radius of a fe# hundred yards round this spot would have included as much unappropriated and use less land as might have sufficed tp con fer independence and plenty on their hopp- kss inmates 1 lathe north-eastern direc tion, within a distajnce of ten miles, at l^st twenty thousand families might be discovered pining in squalid misery ; though here I found myself irt an unpeopled and uncultivated tract, nearly, four miles square, and containii^ above fifteen thousand acres of good soil,, capable of affording indepen dent subsistence to half as many families ! fc56 A MORNtNG's WATiir I could not help exclaiming against tiie perversity of reason — 'the indifference of power — the complication of folly — and the ascendancy of turpitude, which, sepa rately or conjointly, continue to- produce circumstances so cruel and preposterous ! Let it be recorded, said I, to the eternal disgrace of all modern statesriien, of many hundreds of ambitious legislators,, and of our scientific economists, that in this luxuriant county of Surrey, there still exist; without prPductive cultivation, no less than 25,000 acres of open commons ; 30,000 acres of useless parks, 48,000' acres of heaths, and 30,.000 acres of chalk hills', .serving but to subsist a few herds of deer and cattle, and to grow sorae unpro ductive trees, though- at the very instant 10,000 families in, the same- county, are dependent on the bounty of their respec tive parishes ! Is this, ' said I, the vaunt ed age of reason ? Are these the genuine fruits of civilization? Do such circum stances indicate the ascendency of bePe- vblence ? Do they not rather demonstrate TROTH LONDON TO KF>W. 137 tliat the . principle of doing to others as we would be done unto, has littie influ ence OH the practices of our Statesmen and Legislators? I may be tpld, that the principile of enclosing waste lands has long been recog nised in the prevailing systera of economy, and that the Legislature is incessantly active in passing Bills, for new enclosures. But, I ask,; for whom, and for whose benefit, are these bills passed ? Do they^ provide for the poor? Do they help those who require help:? -Do they, by augmenting the supply, raake provisions-cheaper? Do they ipCrease the number of independent fire sides? — Rather, do they not wantonly add to the means of monopolists? Dp they not give where nQthing is wanted, however rauch may be coveted ? Do they npt add to the nuraber of vassals, apd dirainish the nuraber of freemen? D® they not abridge the scanty means df the ppor in the free use of their bare-'Oropt commons ? And dp they nol: transfer those means to others who do not want thetp, 138 A Morning's walk and who, without the qid pf new laws; could never have enjoyed them?^ Yet does reason afford no alternative? Is benevolence forced to prefer barren heaths from which cottagers raay derive scanty meals, merdy because, those who have the power fail to reconcile the rights of others who want, with the benefit of the whole community? Is our wisdom coht fined in so narrow a circle? Has nature provided abundance, and. do w« create in* superable bars to its enjoyment ? Is such the line of demarcation between tbe selfish ordinances of man, and the wise dispensat tions of Providence? Let me recommend our lej^islatorS for once to put their greedy, covetous, and inordinate Selves out of consideration. The poor may not be quaUfied to plead their rights, except by acts of rioting; but let them find clamorous advocates iu the consciences of some of their law-makers. In spite, then, of the fees of parliament, I ex hort the L^islature to pass a geneoai. j:ts^olosure jbilx, not such a one, ho«> from LONDON TO KEW. 1^9 ever, as would be recommended by the illustrious Board of Agriculture, but found ed on such principles as might appropri ately confer on it the title of a bill FOR THE EXTINCTION OF WANT ! In discussing and enacting its provisions, let it bei borne in mind, that the suirfkce of the earth, like the atmosphere in whieh we breathe, and the light in which we see, is the natural and common patrimony of man. Let it be considered, that by nature we are tillers of the soil, and that aU the artifices of society, and the employ ments of towns, are good and desirable in the degree only in \yhich tbey promote the comforts of the country. Let it be felt,, that the 10,0©0 destitute families in this county .of Surrey, and the half mdlUon in England and Wales, are so, merely because servitude or mauufae* tapes have. failed to sustain tbem; and that they require, in con^eqiuence, the free use of the means presented' by nature for theii' subsistence. In^fine, let it be ¦considere'd;' that the unappuopriated wastes are a na- ^60 A MOKNING'S WAIK ' •tional stock, fortunately in reserve as a provision for the increasing numbers of destitute; and that no more is required of the law than to arrange and economize the distribution, consistently with the wants of some, and the rights of all. I indulged myself in a pleasing reverie on this subject, while I rambled from the spot where lit -originated towards an ad^- jacent house, in which died the late Mr. PiTT, aman who had the opportunity of executing that which I have the power •only to speculate upon, and who, though resident 'in tbis tract was blind to its capa bilities. Afh ! thought I, perhaps in a less selfish age, this very heath, and all the adjoining heaths, waste tracts, and com mons, .from Bushy to Wimbledon,.; and frora Barnes to Kingston, may be covered with cottages, £ach surrounded by its two or tbree acnes of pioductivie garden, or chard, and paddock ! The healthful and happy inhabitants, emerged from the workT houses, the gaols, the cellars, the stews, tiie 3t Giles's, the loathsome courat^ .3 FRBM vEOlfDON'TO KEW. l6l alleysi.*^apd3lane^-»f theGmetropPlisi pould have reason to return thainksgityirigs to the Wise , Legislatunf,'-!. who hadii thus restored tiiiem to the:condition of men, tand enabled them to (exhibit the mttrali effects ofrihe change.; Such, in the opinion of« tbe writer, would be a radical cure for^several of the. comipUcated apd deep-rooted dis eases which now afiiict British society; atleast, it is a remedy , without cost or sacrifice-; and, as such,; an homage due frDm.dafBaence and power to indigence and misfortune-. Such a plan would dfaw from the over-peopled towns; that destitute portion, of the population; , whose means of living have been reduced. ror superseded byishoals of adventurers from the country. It would render workhouses useless, except forthe vicious or; incorrigibly idle ;> would diminish the poor-rates, and deprive:. the inmates: of, gaols of the. powerful excuse afforded to cisirtiecby the? hopeless ap4 galling condition of poverty. The house Jn which.) that .-dacliiBg) of JFame., the .late Mr. PiTiy lived' a few ,M I6i A MeSNIHe*« WALK l^ears, aod terminated his career, is a mo- di@st and irregularly-buUt mansion, sur^ rounded by a few acres of pleasure-grouod, and situated about a quarter of a oule from the paling of Ridimond Park. My curiosity. Led me to visit the chamber jn Ivhich this minister died, to indulge in the vivid associations produced by the content* platioo of remarkable localities. I seated myself in a ohah* near tl^ ^ot where stood the couch on which he t'ook his eternal slumber. I l&ncied, at the inr stant, that I still saw the severe visage and gaunt figure of tlie minister standing between the Trea^ry-bepc^and the tshh ofthe House <:€£/ommons, taming around to his admiring ipartisans, and fiUing the car of his auditory with the deep fuU tones of a voice that bespoke a colossal staturo. Certain phrases which he used to parrot still vibrated on ray .brain : " Bo naparte, the child and champion of .J.acO' binism," — " the preservation of so(*b1 order in Europe," — " the destiructioB of it^teveris dear to our feeUngs as £p^ li^mcB,''^" tbe aecpri^y pf o»r fsjigkwj, libBrto, and property,'* — '¦ lodemni^ for ti*e pgst and security for the future,'' ^jtJi which he used to bewilder or terrify tbe I^in copptfy jgentlemen, or the yootbs from Eton, Oxford, or Carobridgp, who cohstitajte a majority of that House. His success in exciting tbe passions of such senators in favour of discord and war, bis kvisb expenditure of the public money in corrupting others, and his insincerity in whatever he professed for the public be- tiefit, rendered hka through Ufe the subt ject of my aversion : but, in this chamber, reduced to the level of ordinary men, and sifting under the common infirmitip^ of humanity, his person, character, apd pre mature decease became objects of interest ing sympathy. Perhaps he did what be thought best; or, rather, committed tiie least possible eyil amidst the contrariety of interests and passions in which he asiA all public men are placed. This, hoW" pver, is but a poor apology for one who lent his powerful talents to waj^ wars that 164, A MORNtNG's WATK involved the happiness of millions,'^ wh© beicanie a willing firebrapd among nations, and whp, as a 4ool or a principal, was foremost in every work of contemporary inischief. The love of office, and -a pas sion for public 'sneaking, were, doubtless, the predominaht feeling of his soul. To gratify the former, fie became the instru ment of others, and thence the sophistry of his eloquence and the insincerity of his character ; while, in the proud rdisplay: of his ackiioyvledged powers as -an orator, ihe was- stimulated not less by vanity, than" by the virtuous rivalry of J'ox. /As a -finan cier, he played the » part of .a -Pobleiiian who; ' having estates worth l2I3, WO/, .per annum, 'mortgages' them to snable him to spend 1 6Of0O0V. and then plumes him self on his .power, -with tho same free holds, to make a greater figure them- his predecessors. But, except for tbe ;lesson -which he afforded to nations never to ¦trust their fortunes in the hands of in- «experienced statesmen, why do I grawely vdiscuss the measures and errors of one FRTOM LONDON. TO iKEW. , l6S who did not '• Uve • long enough *to prove his genuine Qharacter? No, Iprecpcity^of talents,, nPtnecljaniGal splejadpuil- of ;elpr quence,'- can stapdim ihsiplace/of jiid^ept founded on Experience... At ;fori:y-six; .Pitt wouldi have .begun, . like: all other mdp. of the samp age, to correct tjhexrror^ of his past' life-; but, being then cut off— hj^ STORY IS INCOMPLETE 1. He bad within him theelements of ac great. map,, yet- they were called- into- action before their powers were adjusted and matured ; and the^ world suffered, by experiments made ^ni teaching himself, instead of profiting. by the upion of his experience withtbis inteUectual ener gies. He was an actor pn the stage, ;while he ought to have been in the closet study ing his part; his errors,, therefore,^ merit pity, and those alone are to be blamed for them who made a dishonest use .pf his pre cocious powers. I learnti.inHthe: immediate. vicinity, 'that he was much, respected, and, was a kind master to his domestics. A persQn,,J who- ai little beforeihis death was in this room,. M 3; i66 A MORHIife'S WALK told me that it was heated to a veiy high and oppressive temperature ; aad that th^ deep voice of tbe dying minister, as he asked his valet a question, startied this visitor, who had been unused to it He died calmly, and apparently under none of those political perturbations whic^ at the peciodf were mistakenly ascribed to his last mtmientB. The Bishop of Lincoln, who acted the part of his friend and confessor, pubUshed an interesting account of bis de cease, the accuracy ef whidi has never been qiiestioiiied. Il being my intention, on leaving this Spo^ to descend the hill to Barnes-Elms, and tp proceed by that once classical re- SPtrt through Barnes and Mortlake to Kew, I left Mr. Pitt's house on the right, and crossed the common to the retired village »f 'Roehamptop. Opposite tp me were , tbe boundaries of Richmond Park ; and, Uttie more than half la mile from the house Pf Pitt in one of the most picturesque situations of that liteQiatifdl demesne^ stands the ele^t vTi&M tommtt ¦¥& xsw. t$1 ffittrifti^ ivhich was presfinied, rt is sm&^ to thP then favourite minister, Mr. Al»^ ©iNPtPN. Thus it appears, that iyvo succeeding ministers of Epglia^c^ in an age reputed' enlightened^ Uved in a distnct possessing the described capabiUties for' re^ moving the canker- wor n* of poverty, yet neiither of them' displayed sufficient enspgy or wisdom to apply the tevae^ td th» disease. I am riot, however, airogant ePPugh to adduce my plans as tests of the patriotism of statesmen ; but I venture to appeal from the jadgmenii of tbis age to that of the next, whether any mimster could dteserve the reputation of sagacity, who, in an over-peopled country, in lyhich large portions of the inhabitants of tbe towns were destitute of subsistence,, Uved • themselves in the midst of waste tracts capable of feeding the whole, and yet took no measures nor mads a slngte effort to apply the waste to their wants. If the same facts were related of a- ruler Bj-any foreign Country, or in any remote age^, what woutd bc the infigrence of a^ {Aod@iti!i 188 A morning's WAlr EhgUsh reader in regard to his genuine- bedevolehce, wisdom^ Or patriotism ? I am:! desirous of advancing no opinions which can' be questioned, yet Icjuinot refrain from mentioning, ,in: connexion with, "this/ wooded horizon, my surprise that peculiar species of trees- have not yet found a Une of distinction, between inha bited and civilized,, and uninhabited, and ibarbarous countries. Does not the prin ciple which converts aheath into pasturage and corn-fields, or a collection, of furze- hushes or'bilambles into a fruit-garden, de mand that all unproductive tree*should give way as fast as. possible j in a civilized country, to otiier trees, which afford food to the. in habitants? Are therenot desolate countries enough in which ' to grow trees for the mere purposes of tiPiber ? Are thtere not soils and situations even in England, where none but timber- trees can grow? Andis not the timber of many fruit-trees as use fol as the timber of many of the lumber- trees which now encumber our soil? It is true, that, when wood constitutod the fuel FROM LONDON TO KEW. l09« of theacfflUnti^ 'die growth of lumber-trees* was.esstentialito' the'icomforts of the inha- bitaritSfj^ (hut! that Hs no longer our "condi tion.) il ! conceive; therefore; ithatva iwise- and provident government,; which, above all other considerations,'. shonld endeavour- to ifeed; the people at thcleast cost and labour; ought to allow no- lumber-trees to encumber the , soil untir fruit-trees were pla'uted sufficient to supply the inhabitants with as rauch fruit as their wants or luxu ries might require.. The primary object of all public economy should be to saturate a piviliized country with food. Why should not pear: and. walnut-trees supply, the place; of oaks, elms, and ash;, the apple, plum, cherry,, damspn, and mulberry, that of the birch, yew, and all pollards? It would be difficult I conceive, to- adduce; a reason to the contrary; and none which. could weigh against the incalculable ad vantages of an abundant supply of whole some provisions in this cheap form... Nor does; ray plan terminate with jthe ' orna- Hients of foEpats,; parksj and hedge-rows.;. 170 A morning's WALK but I ask, why many hedges themselves might not, in like manner, consist of goes®^ berry and currant trees in their most luxu riant varieties, intermingled with rasp berries, nuts, filberts, ballaces, &c. ? Not to give this useful and productive face to a country, appears to me to be shutting our eyes to the Ught; to prefer the useless to tb© useful ; to be so inconsistent as to expect plenty where we take no means to create it ; or, in other words, to sow tares and desire to gather wheat, or expect grapes where we have planted only thorns. Let us, even in this point, condescend to bor row a lesson from an illustrious, though oft deppised, neighbour, who, it appears by tbe evidence of aU travellers, has taken Giire that the roads and hedges of France should be covered with productive fruit trees. If such ako were the eondition of Britain, how insignificant would become the anxious questions about a Corn Bill, or the price of any single article' of food. We should then partake of the aJnple stoi^es provided, and perhaps contemplated. from LONDON TO KEW. I?! by our forefathers, when tbey remtered tfidigBnous the fruit-trees of warmer cli mates; and, feeling less solicitude in regard to tiie gross wants of anip)al subsistence, we should be enabled to employ our facwlr des more generally in improving our moral and social condition. We should thus extend the principle, and reduce the gene ral puipose of all productive cultivation to an analogous economy, enjoying the fullest triumph which our climate would admit of the fortunate combinations of human art over the inaptitude and priaii- tiye barbarity of nature. Th© sequestered village of Roel^mpton coijsists* of abojftt thirty or forty small hpMses, IB conitfl'ei; and of a dozen mo nastic mansions, iphabited by noblemep and wellriaoerfidited traders. Each of the latter being surrounded by twenty or thirty acres of garden and ptes'Wre^grpUnds, aoc^ bounded by high brick wails, which in . every direction lifle the roads, Rpehamp- ton presents to a stiapger a most cbeerlf«i» ,asipect M thi? plantatiofis are pid» the r72' A xMORNING'S WALK full-grown oaks, elms, and chesnuts^ with in the walls, add to the gloom; and: call to mind those- ages- bf mental paralysis when Druids and- Monks gave effect to their impostures bysimilar arraPgemehtst'' Tbey serve to prove how slavishlyJmen are the creatures of imitation; how seldom; in how few things, and by what smaU gradations genius gives a novel direction to their practices ! When this island was overrun with beasts of prey, irt'the shapp of quadrupeds, and lawless- bipeds, the ba.'on and the"^an of wealth found it necCssary to shut themselves within cas tellated mansions and circuravallated do mains; and hence the vulgar association. between such establishments and: a pre sumed high rank in their occupiers. The- state of the country and of modem Society renders them nplonger essential to secu rity; yet they are maintained as the effect of a false association ; and half the stimu lus of avarice would be lost without the anticipated grandeur of a monastic esta bUshment; burled in the centre of a wood,, FROM LONDON TO KBW. -178 and cut off from the cheerful vvorld, and ?the healthful ^/circulation of the atmo sphere, by damp and .mouldering waUs! It ! dpes\not signify ,ho w . apparently dull, how unappropriate to rfixed habits, how unvarying ithe inaniraate scene, :hpw much the ininates may be visited by Ipjv, fevers, agues, rheumatisms,! and pulmonary<. af fections ;the.manpr7house, orjthp ancient monastery,; which has for ages been the resideiice of nobiUty, becomes, in conse quence, the meed of wealth, and the.goal of vulgar hppe, to be patiently endured, howiever: littie it ,may be .enjoyed I Pride will feed ppon the possession; and, if that masterr-passion he gratified, minor in conveniences will .have .Uttle .weight in ^making- the election. 1, confess it--and I make the declara tion in the ^humble form of a, confession, in the hope .that those who think 1. have sinned,. wiU be^ed to forgive my errpr-^ that! could not, help thiplung that the inhabitants of the humble, cpttages by the way-side, whose dPors stood wide opep. 174 A MOBNIN4}*4l WAt/K w^hose children were inbermin^iBg and playing before them, whose society is r&f stricted by no formal reserve, whose means depend on their industry, who HAVE NOT LEISURE TO BE UNHAPPY^ I who cannot afford to stimulate their appe tites so as to enfeeble themselves by tiie languor of repletion, or disease themselves by the corruptions of pieiiiora, and who would have no wants if the bounties of na ture were not crueUy intercepted — I could not help feeUng, that such unsophisticated beipgs experience less care, less setf- oppression, less tUseas^ more gaiety of heart, more, grateful sympathy, and more oven of tlie sense of vpelUheing, than the artificial and oonarained personages w'h.i, however amiable, and however free from the common vices of rank and wealth, in habit the adjacent mansions, with all their -decorations of art, and ail their luxuries of hot-houses, graperies, pineries, ice houses, temples, grottoes, hermitages, and .other fancies, vrith which power hopes to FROM LON BOW T© KRW. 175 cheat itself into enjoyment, as an apology fac its ksatiable monopolies. The inefficaey of wealth to raise map above his cares «Mnd' mortal feeUngs has, however, of late years been so honestiy conceded, that the rich have begun, at least in external appearance, to assume the con- <^ti0H of the poor. Hepce, few of those mansions are built, or even restored, on whose gloomy character I have been re- Bvarkipg; aod oar proudest nobility now condescend to inhabit the cheerful, itoofagK hpifiibie, Cottage. They find, or by their pajactiees they seera to prove th^ haye found, that the nearest approach to hap piness, is the nearest approach to the humility of poverty 1 The thatched roof — the tiny flower-garden— the modest wicket r— the honeys-suckle bower — the cleanly ^iry— Jthe poultry yard— the dove-cote— the piggery — and the rabbit-pen,— compre hended under the names of the Ferme OrnSe, or Cmage Orn^e, now constittrtP the favourite estabUshments of those wha Ibuad so few comfoitsin marble porticoes 17® A MQPNIMO'S WALK in walls hung, with the works of ihe Go- 'belins or the Italian school, in retinues of servants, and extensive parks. Wh^ a concession of pride — what a homage -ren dered to .nature-r-what a consolation to discontented poverty— what a 'warning to inconsid.erate ambition J Yet our taste ought to be governed by our reason and our wants. Large' families require large houses ; it is therefore the business of good taste to .combine: capacity with cheerfulness. Nothing, at the same time, within the sphere of human enjoy ment, equals, the delight afforded by well- planned garden-grounds ; and it is conse quently the duty of the artist to unite -these with the cheerfol family mansion. Here, then, begin the obtrusion, and tlie alledged necessity of those boundary waUs, against which I have been protesting. No .such thing — such walls, thanks to the ge nius and good taste of a Pil.ton;, are be come unnecessary. We may now, with out walls, have secure boundaries — we isaay keep out trespassers without excludiqg FBdM LPNIJON -fP KEW. l^f the fresh aff— and «rie hiay circumscribe our Umits vrithtitit diminishing Pur e*tern£a prospects. Til that case, h6# different in appearance t^PUtd be this village of Roe- hamptoP — how much more tolerable to its residents— how far morfe healthy — and how enchanting to strangers,— if, instead of monotonous brick-Walls; fhe boundaries were fptmed by the magical fenc^ Pf Pilton, allowing the free passage of the solar rays and the vital air, reciprocating dejiightful prospects from plantatiPn to plantation, and addiiigthe essential charms df variety tP the pleasures of pPssessioP. The first house in the laue is the dassicfil seat of tbe Earl ol' Besbdrouah, enriched with specimens pf ancient star ttery firom Italy aad Greece, "and with exquisite pictures of the Italian, Flemish, aliid Dutch schpols. Adjoining, is the highly fltiished residence of the Mar chioness of Downshire; and farther on, are' the superb mansions of Mr. Gosling, a banker ; and of Mr. Dyer. In the lane iPading to Richmond Park, across which" 178. A morning's WALK there is a delightful drive to the Star-and-. Garter, is the charming residence of Mr., Temple; and, farther porth, is the splendid; mansion of the late Mr. l^enjamin Goldr. smid, since become the property of Lord^ Chief Justice EUenborough. Various associations in regard to its first and its present proprietor, drew my attention to the site last mentioned. I had not leisure to examine its interior, but the exterior is in the best style of such edifices. The bouse looks to the north west, and, being the last in the descent of the hill, commands an uninterrupted pros pect over the country towards Harrow and Elstree. The front consists of a superb poi-tico of white marble columns, in the Corinthiap prder; but jn other respects the house is not very striking, and its dimensions are inconsiderable. The lawn fallsplegsingly towards a piece of water, and on its eastern side is a fascinating , drive of half-a-mile, terminated by a pair of cast-iron gates of singular beauty. But the object which more particularly called FROM LONDON TO KEW. l79 to mind the unbounded wealth of its former proprietor, is a subterraneous way to the kitchen-garden and lawns on the opposite side the road. It is finished with gates resembling those of a fortified castle, with recesses and various ornaments, all of Port land-stone ; and on the near side is a spa cious hermitage. In this house the late Mr. B. Gold smid resided,, while he balanced the finances of the British empire, and raised for the Pitt Adrainistration those vast sums which enabled it to retard the progress Of Uberal Opinions during the quarter of a century! After the instance of a Gold smid, the reputed weaUb of a Croesus sinks into insignificance. The Jew, broker, year after year, raised for the British gPvern- iiient sums of twenty and thirty millions, while the Lydian monarch, with all his boasted treasures, would have been un able to make good even the first instal- , ment! Such, however, is the talisman of credit in a commercial and banking coun try ! In addition to their own funds, and N 2 18& A morning's WALK to the funds permanently confided to their prudence from foreign correspondents, amounting to three or four millions, the brothers, Benjamin and Abraham Gold smid, coramanded for many years, from day to day, the floating balances of the principal London bankers ; and they were among bankers, what bankers are among private traders. It was their daily prac tice to visit most of the bankers' counting- houses, and address them briefly — " Will you borrow or lend fifty thousand to day?"— According to the answer, the sum required was deposited on the spot, or carried away — no memorandum passed, and a simple entry in their respective books served merely to record the hour when the sum was to be repaid, with its interest With such credit, and such ready means, it is not to be wondered that the Goldsmids coramanded the wealth of the world ; nor that their services were courted by an adrainistration which never suffered its projects to languish while these brokers could raise money ou exchequer- FROM LONDON TO KEW. 181 bills ! A paper circulation is, however, a vortex, out of which neither individuals nor governments ever escaped without ca lamity, and from whose fatal effects the pru dence and integrity of these worthy men served as no adequate protection. A whisper that they had omitted to repay a banker's loan at the very hour agreed, first shook their credit; while some changes in the financial arrangeraents of govern ment and the malignity of some envious persons, (for rivals they could have none,) led to a fatal catastrophe in regard to one brother in this house ; afterwards to a similar tragedy in regard to the other, at Merton ; and finally to the breaking-up of their vast establishment Whether their exertions were beneficial to the country may be doubted; this, however, is certain, that the Goldsmids were men of a princely spirit, who possessed a command of wealth, during the twelve or fifteen years of their career, beyond any example in the do mestic history of nations. In this house Benjamin repeatedly gave banquets, wor- N 3 182 A morning's walk thy of his means, to the chief branches of the royal faraily, and raost of the nobility and gentry of the realra ; and it deserves to be mentioned, to his honour, that he was the constant patron of literature and of distressed men of letters. Abraham, in like manner, gave royal entertainments, and was the unshaken friend of Lord Nelson, and of the interesting widow of Sir William Hamilton, whose premature death in a state of poverty, was a con sequence of the misfortunes of her gene rous protector. Adjoining the splendid iron gates which lead into these grounds, stands a house memorable for the violent effects of a thunder storm. The records of the year 1780 probably describe the details of these phenomena; but, happening to meet, on the premises, with a man who had wit nessed the whole, I collected from hira the foHowing particulars : — He related, that after a pleasant day in September, a' sud den storm of thunder and lightning," ac companied by rain and wind, took place, FROM LONDON TO KEW. 183 which lasted not more than ten or fifteen minutes.' That/ believing " the world a an end, his master and faraily went tr prayers;" but on the noise abating, they found that their extensive barn, with va rious out-buildings, had been entirely car ried away. Parts of thera were found, on the followipg morning, on Barnes Com mon, at the distance of a mile, while ofher parts were scattered around the fields. He related also, that two horses which were feeding in a shed, were driven, with their manger, into the ditch on the opposite side of the lane; and that a loaded cart was torn from the shafts and wheels, and wafted into an adjoining field. A crop of turnips were mowed down as with a scythe, and a double row of twenty or thirty full-grown elms, which stood on the sides of the lane,, were torn up by the roots. One man was killed in the ham, and six others were wounded, or so severely shocked as to require relief in an hospital. Having never before met with a case of such total destruction from the action of 184 electricity, I considered these facts as too interesting to be lost. . It may be worth while tp add, in elucidation, that the mis chief was doubtless occasioned by an ascendipg ball; or rafher, as the action extended over a surface of three or four acres, by a succession of ascending balls.* The cpnducting substances were dry or irapprfect, and thence the violence of tbe explosions. This is neither the time not' place to ^peak of the erroneous views still entertained of a power which is only knpwP to us by experiments made within a pop-conducting atmosphere, whose anta gonist propprties, or peculiar relations to it, affpr^ results which are mistakenly ascribed to the power itself, as properties per se. A,xe we warranted in calling in an inde- * \ use the \vDr(i hall, becai(sie 1 consider th^ power called electric, vvbich shews itself betv^een four containing and contained surfaces, as a phyr sical point bearing geometrical relations to those surfaces ; which point, by the rapidity of ils motion to restore some disturbed equibbrituii, generates a vqntinuous fir?, s^nd de^t^ives the eye by tlie s.em- ]i)li)i;^;e of q stream. FROM LONDON TO KEW. lS5 pendent agent to account for phenomena which are governed jn their appearances by every different surface in connexion with which they are exhibited, and which can be produced only in certain classes of surfaces in fixed relations to other sur faces? Can the cause of phenomena, of which vve have no knowledge but in the antagonist relations of surfaces called con ducting and non-conducting, be philoso phically considered but as the mere effect of those nicely-adjusted relations? Can that power be said to be distinct from the inherent properties of various matter, which can never be exhibited ex cept in contrast as plus on one surface, and minus in another, or, if positive on A, necessarily and stiraultaneously nega» tive op B. ? Are the phenoraena called LIGHT, HEAT, GRAVITATION, . COHE-^_ S10?r, ELECTRICITY, GALVANISM, and MAGNETISM, produced by different powers ©f natuce, or by the action of one power on different bodies, or by the action of different bodies on one active power? ISO A MORNING S WALK Do not the phenomena appear constantly to accompany , the same- bodies, and are they not therefore occasioned by the qua lities of tbe bodies r May not the different qualities of bodies be sufficient to explain the phenomena on the hypothesis of one active power? Is it necessary that the phenomena should be confined to parti cular bodies, if there are as mapy active fluids as phenoraena? Is not the exact limitation pf each set of phenomena to particular bodies conclusive evidence that the phenomena grow out of some anta gonist qualities of those bodies? In fine, do not the varying powers calculated to produce the phenomena, consist of the varying qualities of bodies, and the vary ing circumstances in which they are placed in regard to each pther ; and may not the active power be fixed and always the same ? Does not this conclusion best ac cord with the simplicity of nature ? Is it probable that two active powers could be co-existent? May not the elasticity of a universal medium account for most of the FROM LONDON TO KEW. 187 intricate phenoriiena of bodies ? May not motion grow out of the vacuum between the atoms of that universal medium ? May there not be set within set,^ each necessary to the motion of the other, till we ap proximate a plenum? May not certain varieties of these involved series of atoms constitute the several media which pro duce the several phenomena of matter ? Prudence forbids me to extend these queries on subjects which will ever in terest the speculative part of mankind, but on which it will be difficult if not im possible, to arrive at certain and indubi table conclusions : as, however, I have been led into this digression by existing errors relative to Electricity, I may remark, in conclusion, that the phenomena produced by, this power arise frora the action of opposing surfaces through intervening media ; that the excitement impels the sui^- faces towards each other; and that all the phenomena grow out of the raotive quality of intervening bodies, whose surfaces are alternately attracted by the comprehend- i?S A morning's walk ing excited surfaces, or out of the want of perfect smoothness in the opposing or excited surfaces. Electricity is in fact the phenomena of surfaces, growing out of the sole property of their mutual me chanical attractions, which attractions are governed by soihe necessary relations of the surfaces of the intervening media to the surfaces, of tbe opposing conductors. At any rate, it is irrational to suppose that the CAUSE of causes operates in the production of natural phenomena by the aid of such complicated machinery,- and such involved powers, as men have forced into nature, for the purpose of accounting for affections on their senses, or effects of raatter on matter; in the measure of which they have no standard but their sensitive powers and the undiscovered re lations of the agent and patient. Would it not on the contrary, be more con sistent with the proper views of philosophy to dismiss all occult powers, which are so many signs of our ignorance or supersti tion, and to search for tbe seoondah^t FROM LONDON TO KEW. 189 iCAUSES of all phenomena, as well be tween the smallest as -the largest masses, in the undeviating laws of auithmettc, OEOMETRY, and mechanics; whose simplicity, sublimity, perfection, and ira- mutabiUty, accord with our deductions in regard to the attributes of an omni scient ARCHITECT and OMNIPOTENT director of the universe? This, however, is certain, that such ca tastrophes as those described could never occur, if the imperfect conductors ofwhich our buUdings are generally composed, were encompassed by more perfect con- -ductors. The ridge of the roof of every house should be of raetal ; and, if that metallic ridge were connected with 4he leaden water-pipes, and by them continued into the ground, all buildings would be protected. A descending or an ascending ball would then find a conduit, by which to pass, or freely propagate its powers, without the violent effects that accompany its transition through air and other non-conductors, Therods ofEranklia 190 A morning's walk are toys, which were ingeniously con trived in tiie infancy of this branch of science, but they ought now to be for gotten. Before I dismiss this interesting topi(^ I would ask whether the transmission of the power called electric, to a particular spot does not always afford evidence, that at that spot there exists, beneath the surface of the earth, either a vein of metallic ore, a spring, or some other competent conductor, which the, power called electric is seeking to reach, when the antagonist non-conductors exhibit their destructive phenomena? Does not the power or vacuum created by the change of volume in the aqueous \'apour of the cloud, regard only the perfect con ductors prepared to receive it, however , deeply they may be concealed beneath the surface of the non-conducting or im perfectly-conducting soil and vegetable- surface ? If it were not so, would not the stroke always affect the higher objects, or prefer palpable conductors in moderately - from LONDON TO KEW. T§i elevated sitCs? In this instance 200 de grees of the horizon were raore elevated than the place attacked, while the destruc tion proves that the superficies invited no acci|mulation here. Must not then the predisposing : and operative cause have existed beneath the surface ; and, hence, may not the selection of lightning, in most cases where it prefers lower sites, afford evidence of the existence of metallic strata, of springs, or other conducting surfaces, the discovery of which, by such natural test, may sometimes be important to the owner of the soU ? The bottom of Roehampton-lane joins the, road which leads from Putney and Wandsworth to Richmond. Here I camie again upon the same alluvial Flat which I left when I ascended from Wandsworth to Putney-heath, having, since passed a corner of the undulating high land on which stand Wimbledon, its common, Roehamptop, Richmond-park, and its lovely hill. A more interesting site of the same extent, is not perhaps to be found: 192 A morning's walk in the world. Its picturesque beauty, and its general advantages as a place of resi dence, are attested by the preference' giverr to it by ministers and pubUc men, who select it as a retreat from the cares of ambition.- On this ridge Pitt, Tooke, Addington, Burdett, Goldsmid, aiid Dan- das, were recent contemporary resideflfs. Here, amid the orgies of tbe latter, wpr« probably concerted many of those poli tical projects which have unfortunately desolated the finest portions of Europe, for the wicked,, yet vain, purpose of de stroying Truth by the sword ! In an ad joining domain, Tooke broiled, in phi lological pastime, the evemng of a Ufe whose meridian, had been employed in disputing, inch by inch, the overwhelming march of corrupt influence; while, as though it were for effect of light and shade, the: spacious, plain of Wimbledon .served to display tbe ostentatious manoeu-' vres of those servile agents of equivocal justice, whose; permanent organization by an anti-human policy has been engrafted from LONDON TO KEW. 19S On modern society, but whose aid would seldom or never be necessary, if the purposes of their employers' accorded with the omnipotent influence of truth, reason, and justice. I was now on the border of Barnes Common, consisting of 500 acres of waste; and at a few paces eastward stands Barnes poor-hppse! Yes! — in this enUghtened country — in the vicinage of the residence of raany boasted statesmen— , stands a parish poor-house on a Waste! The unappropriated means of plenty, and independence surroupding a mansion of hopeless poyerty, maintained by collections of nearly 4000/. per annum froin the industrious parishioners! Lest readers in future ages should doubt the fact, the. antiquary of the year 2500 is hereby assured,T-tbat it stood at the angle of the Wandsworth and Fulhara roads, at the perpendicular distance of a mile from the Thames, and by the side of the fashionable, ride from London to Rich- jpond !— rDid so monstrous an incongruity o 194 A morning's walk never penetrate the heads or hearts of any of the high personages who daily pa^s it ? Did it never occur to any of them that it would be more rational tp convert thp materials of this -building intp cottages, surrounded by two or three acres of the wasjte, by which the happiness of the poor and the interests of the public ;wppld be blended? Can any antiquated feudal right to this useless tract properly super sede tbe paramount claims of the poor and the pubUc?— Erpm respect to any such right, ought so grpat a libel on our pditical economy to be suffered to exist, as a rer ceptacle for the poor in the middle of an uncultivatedand unappropriated waste? To dwell further on so mortifying a proof of the fallibility of human wisdom may, how ever, pique the pride of tbose who enjoy the power to organize a better system: — I therefore forbear ! . These and other considerations prompt ed me to visit the interior. I found it clean and >airy, but the best rooms were npt appropriated to the poor, The roaS"- I FROM LONDON TO KEW. 1B3 ter and matron were plain honest people, who, I have rio doubt, do aU the justice that is possible with a wretched pittance vii 6s. 6d.i per head per week. Should 4*. 6d. remain to provide each with twenty- one meals; this is but twoi-pence half penny per meal! Think of this, ye pam pered minions of wealth; who gorge turtie at a guinea a pound, who beastialize yourr selves witii' wine at a shUling a glass, and who wantonly devour a guinea's wprth of fruit after finishing a sumptuous dinner ! — The guardians have judiciously annexed to the house an acre or two of ground for a garden; vvhich is cultivated by thepau- pers, and supplies them with sufficient vegetables. This, though a faint approach to my plan, is ypt sufficient to prove what ,the whole common would effect, if pro perly applied to the wants and natural claims of the poor. It is too often pre tended that these wastes are incapable of cultivation-4}at the fertUe appearance of enclosed patches constantly falsifies such selfish and malignant assertions. o S 196 A morning's watek* I visited the comraunity of these patP' pers, consisting in this small parish of only thirty raen, women, and' children, in one large room. Among them were some dis gusting-looking idiots, a class of objects who seem to be the constant nuisance of every poor-house.* How painful it must be to honest poverty to be brought into contact with such wretched creatures; who are often vicious, and, in their tricks and habits, always offensive and dirty. Sure ly,, for the sake of these degraded speci mens of our kind, as well as out of respect to the parish-poor, who have no choice but to live with, them, every county ought to be provided I with a special Asylum for idiots; whose purpose should be to smoothen their passage through life, and to render it as. littie noisome to others, and to one another, as possible. On leaving this poor-house, I crossed Barnes Common in a north-eastern direc-^ * Since these observations were first published, a new law has provided for the separate maintenance of these wretched objects, nearly on tbe plan su^ gested. TROM LONDON TO KEW. lt)7 ffiion, with a view to visit at Barnes-Elms the former residence of Jacob Tonson, the bookseller, and once the place of meeting of the famous Kit-Cat Club. On this CoHimon, nature stiU appeared to be in a primeval and unfinished state. The entire Flat from the liigh ground to the Thames, is evidently a raere fresh- Water formation, of comparatively modern date, created out of the rocky ruins which tbe rains, in a series of ages, have washed from the high grounds, and further augmented by the decay oi local vege tation. The adjacent high lands, : being elevated above the action of the fresh water, were no doubt maiine formations, created by the flowing of the sea during the four thousand years when the earth was last in its perihelion during our sum mer months ; which was between twelve and seven thousand years since. The Flat or fresh-water formation, on which I was walking, still only approaches its com pletion ; and ihe desiccated soU has not yet fiilly defined the boundaries of thp 03 i'98 A MORNING'S WALK river. At spring-tides, particularly when the line of the moon's apsides coincides with the syzygies, or when the ascending node is in the vernal equipox, or after heavy rains, the river still overflows its bwks) and indicates its originally extended scite under ordinary circumstances. , The state of transition also appears in marshes, bogs, and ponds, which, but for the interference of man, would ma»y ages ago have been filled up with decayed forests and the remains of undisturbed vegetation. Rivers thus become agents of the never- ceasing CREATION, and a means of giving greater equaUty to the face of the land. The sea, as it retired, either ab ruptly from some situations, or gradually from others, left dry land, consisting of downs and swelling hills, disposed in all the variety which would be consequential on a succession of floods and ebbs during several thousand years. These downsj acted upon by rain, were mecbanicaUy, or in solution, carried off by the water to the lowest levels, the elevations being FROM LONDON to KBW. 199 thereby depressed, and' the valleys pro portionally raised. The low lands became' of course the channels through which the r&ins returned to the sea, and the suc cessive deposits on their sides, hardened* by the wind and sun, have in five or six thousand years created such tracts of allu vial soil, as those which now present themselves in' contiguity with most rivers. The soil, thus assembled' and compounded; is similar in its nature to> the rOcks and' hills whence it was washed ; but, having' been so pplverized and' so' divided' by so-' lutipn, it forms the finest ratedium for the- secretion of all vegetable pri'nciples, and" hence the bank§ of rivers are the favouriljff residences of man. Shotild the channel^ constantly narrow itself more and more, till it becomes choaked in itS' course, or at its outleti then, fbr a tlihP,' lakes wohld' be formed, which in like' manner w'oMd' ilarrOvvr theth^elves and disappear. New^ channels would- then b6 formedj or> the* rain would- so diffusis it&dlf Pvfei^ the Sur-' face, that the fall aiid' the=^ eva|f6ratlbii' wPuld balarice eeich other. 200 A MbRNING'S WALK Such are the unceasing works of crea tion, constantly taking place on (his ex terior surface of the earth ; where, though less evident to the senses and experience of man, matter apparently inert is in as progressive a state of change from the operation or unceasing and immutable causes, as in the visible generations 'of the animal and vegetable kingdoms. Thus water, wind, and heat, the energies of which NEVER CEASE to be exerted, are constantly producing new combinations, changes, and creations; which, if they accord with the harmony of the whole, are fit and " good ;" but, if discordant, are speedily re-organized or extinguished by contrary and opposing powers. In a word, WHATEVER IS, IS FIT; AND WHATEVER IS NOT FIT, IS NOT, OR soojj CEASES TO BE ! — Such seems to hfe the governing principle of Nature — the key of all her mysteries — the primary law of creation I All things are the proximate effects of a balance of iniinutable powers-^ those powers are results of a primor- piAL PAUSE, — ^while that cause is ip- FROM LON^DON TO "KEW. fiOt scrutable and incomprehensible to crea tures possessing but a relative being, who Uve only in time and si?ACE, and who feel and act merely by the impulse of limited senses and powers. A lane, in the north-west corner of the Common, brought rae to Barnes' Elras, where now resides a Mr. Hoare, a banker of London* The family were not at home ; but, on asking the servants if that was the house of Mr. Tonson, they as sured me, with great simpUcity, that no such gentleman lived there. 1 naraed the Kit- Cat Club, as accustomed to assemble herp ; ; but the oddity of the narae excited ^heir ridicule ; and I was told that no such ' Club was held there; but, ' perhaps, said one to the other, the gentlenian means the Club that assembles at the public- house on the Cpmmon. Knowing, how ever, that I was at the right place, I could not avoid expressing my vexation, that the periodical assemblage of the first men of their age, should be so entirely forgotten by those who now reside pn thp 202 A morning's walk spot-^wben one of them exclaimed, " I should not wonder if the gentleman means tbe philosopher's room." — " Aye," re joined his comrade, " I remeraber some body coming once before to see something of this sort, and my master sent him there." I requested then to be shewn to this roora ; when I was conducted across a detached garden, and brought to a handsome structure in the architectural style ofthe early part of the last century-^ evidentiy the estabUshment of the Kit- Cat Club ! A walk covered with docks', thisfles, netties, and high grass, led from the re mains of a gate-way in the garden-wall, to the door which opened into the build ing. Ah ! thought I, along this desolate avenue the finest geniuses in England gaUy proceeded to meet their friend^; — ^yet within a century, how Changed^— ho>S? deserted-r' how revoltiilg ! A cold chiU seized me^ as the man unfastened tbe decayed door of the building, and as I beheld the once- elegant hall, fiUed with cobwebs, a Men FROM LONDON TO KEW. 208 ceiling, and accumulating rubbish. On the right, the present proprietor had erected a copper, and converted one of the par lours into a wash-house ! The door on the left led to a spacious and once su perb staircase, now in ruins, filled with dense cobwebs, which hung from the lofty ceiling, and seemed to be deserted even by the spiders ! The entire building, for want of ventilation, having become food for the fungus, caUed dry-rot,, the timber had lost its cohesive powers. I ascended the staircase, therefore, with a feeUng of danger, to which the man would not expose himself; — but I was well re quited for my pains. Here I found the Kit-Cat Club-room, nearly as it existed in the days of its glory. It is eighteen feet high, and forty feet long, by twenty •wide. The mouldings and: ornaments were in the most superb fashion of its age ; but the whole was falling to pieces, from the effects of the dry-rot. ¦ My attention was chiefly attracted by the faded cloth-banging, of the roomi B04 A morning's WALK whose red colour once set off the fa mous porlraits of the Club, that bung around it. Their marks and sizes were Btill visible, and the nurabers and names remained as written in chalk for the guidance of the hdeger '. Thus was I, as it were, by these still legible names, brought into personal contact with Addison, and Steele, and Congreve, and Garth, and Dryden, and with many hereditary nobte, remembered, only because tbey were pa trons of those natural nobles ! — I read their names aloud i — I invpked their de parted spirits' — I was appalled by the echo of my own voice ! — The holes in the Hoor, the forests of cobwebs in the win dows, and a swallow's nest in the corner of the ceiling, proclaimed that I was viewing a vision of the dreamers of a past age, — that I saw realized before me the speak ing vanities of the anxious career of nian ! The blood of the reader of sensi bility will thrill as mine thrilled ! It was &elii)g without volition, and therefore in capable of analysis! PROM LONDON TO KKW. 205 I could not help lingering in a place so copsecrated by the religion of Nature ; and, sitting, down for a few minutes on some broken boards, I involuntarily shed a tear of sympathy for the departed great —^for times gone by, — here brought be fore my eyes in so tangible a shape ! I yielded to the unsophisticated sentiments which I could not avoid reading ia this VOLUME of ruins ; and felt, by irresistible association, that every "object of our af fections — that our affections themselves — and that all things that delight us, must soon pass away like this place and ita former inhabitants! Beginning yes-- TERDAY FLOURISHING TO-BAY P.EASIN.G, TiO-M,QRRO W ! Spch is the pura of the history of all organized being \ Certain, combinations excite, and the cre ative powers proceed with success, tiU balanced by the inertia of the materials-* a contest of maturity arises, measured in length by the activity of the antagonist powers ; — but the unceasing inertia finally prevails over the original excitement ap4 206 A morning's walk its accessary stimuli, and ultimately pro duces disorganization and dissolution ! Such is the abstract view pf the physical laws which, in the peculiar career of intellec tual man, successively give rise to hope in youth — pride in manhood— reflec tion in decay — and humility in old age. He knows his fate to be inevitable ¦—but every day's care is an epitome" of his course, and every night's sleep affords an anticipation of* its end 1-^-He is thus taught to die — and, if in spite of his vices or foUies be should Uve till his world has passed away before bim, he will then contentedly await the termina- ' tion of that vital action which, creating no passion, affords no enjoyment. Such, said I, is the scheme of Benevolence, whiph, by depriving the prospect of death of its terrors, makes room, without suf- fering, for a succession of new genera tions, to whose perceptions the world is ever young. The only wise use therefore which men can make of scenes like that before me, is to deduce from them a TROM LONDON TO KEW. 207 lesson of moderation apd hpmiUty ;-^for, such as are these dumb, thou^ .visible cares of that generation— such wiU our own soon be ! On rejoining ^Ir. Hoare's man in the hall belpw, and expressing my grief that so interesting a building should be suffered to go to decay for want of attention j he told me th.at his master intended to pull it down and unite it to an. adjoining barn, 50 as to form of the two a riding- house ; and I learn that this design has since been executed! The Kit-Cat pictures were painted, early in the eighteenth century, end, about the year 1710, were brought to, this spot; bpt the room I have been describing was not built till ten or fifteen years afterwards. . They, were forty- two jn number, and were presented by the members to the .elder Tonson, who died ip 1736. He left them to his great nephew, also an pminent bookseller, -who ^ied in 1767. They were then removed from this buUding to the house of his brother, at Water-iOakley, near Windsor; 20» A MORNING'S WALK and, on his death, to the house of MVr_ Baker, of Hertingfordbury, where they now remain, and wiiere I lately saw- them splendidly lodged and in fine prot servation, It may be proper to ob serve, that the house of Mr. Hoare was not the house of Mr. Tonson, and thatt Mr. Tonson's house stood nearer to the Kit-Cat Club-rooms, having a few years since been taken down. The situation is certainly not a happy one, being on a level with the Thames, and the adjacent grounds being deeply flooded at high tides. It is, however, completely se questered, from vulgar approach, and on that account was, perhaps, preferred as the retreat of a man of business. At Barnes' Exms lived the virtuous, minister of Elizabeth, Sir Francis Wal singham, and here he once entertained that chivalrous queen. Cowley, the poet, afterwards resided here ; and, in a later age Heydegger, the. buffoon, who gave an eccentric entertainment tp the second Guelph, and contrived to gra- FROM LONDON TO K few. 209 tify fiis listless mind by an ingenious sur prize, in at first hiaking him beUeve that he was not prepared to receive him, and then contriving a sudden burst of lights, music, and gaiety. in returning through the lane which led from the Kit-Cat : Club- room to Barnes Coramon,: the 'keenest emotions of the human mind were excited by an unfore seen cause. I was ad;miring the luxuri ance and grandeur of the vegetation, in trees which from the very ground ex panded in iraraense double trunks, , and in the profusion of weeds and shrubs, which db\^ered every part of the untrodden sur- iace— when, on a sudden, I caught thedis- tant sound of a ring of village 'bells. Nothing could be ;raore_ in accordance with the predispositions of ray .raind. i-AW the melancholy which is created by the -recurrence Of tbe samesuccession of tones, instantly controlled and Oppressed my feel ings. I becamethe raere patient of these sounds; and I sank; as it were, under the force of gloomy impressions^ whi.ch so p 210 A morning's walk completely lulled:and seduced mP, thati suffered! without bpirig able to ' exert an effort to escape from- their magic spell. Seldom, = had the power ' of sound, ac quired a .similar ascendency over me.^designed'for a merrypeaMo -c^ebittteisome village festival ; or, perhaps, thought I, they may be profaning a sanc tuary"; of thffiireligion of peacei, and .out- iraging a 'land of rfreiedom^i to ;antK%!2^ee, sPme ' bloody :^vicioEyi' i gained ¦ by leglofls of trained slaves; o ver . patriots whp hav« -been asserting, the, i liberties, and deiead* ing the independence of their countny. Whichever might? bp.i tbe purpose, .(.for, -alas ! the latter, sH^ong; my degenerated from LONDON TO KEW. 211 6ftUi4itByna^n,bis; as likely .as the former,) thejr4curring tonles: produced correspond- itignvibratioins im^my nerves, .and I felt myadfiplajgecboppopntike atconCordant mur sidJal finstEojnenti!) Presently^ hpwever, it ocoiipredsto; me;;, that I wasi not an entire stcaiiiigBitj to the itonps: of thosfe bells; and thallpafai of thfeir fesCiriation. arose from aJii associatbn bettveen > them and some dfctheKieariiefet'ancf- dfearest objects in my temeinibrf^ce. .-"Surely,*'' I csclaimed, •' f tiiey\are -C h i«^?Ddk^ B e l l^- ! --^the very belfe undep thet soutid'' of which I re- ce'i»ed;-part''©f my 'early education, and. «b aischpol-bby/!j^assbd~the happiest days 06 n5y'rJife!i*t7 Well' may their tpnes vi brate tflimyj^ijiiaofpstpsoul-i^and' kindle un- conimon sympathies i"v;(i now recollected that;the!iiwindip| of ifhpf rivpr must have brought nme 'nearer'; to- that -simple and priimM^e<- viMagP- • than- -the^- profusion of woPd'hadi-periwitted-me to perceive, and ipiy-upr^es ^adcbeei* UPcbnSCiously acted ¦tip^-' by tones .which ^served- as keys tb-'all' 'thp* 'associations -5 connected with p 2 SI2 A morning's walk these beUs, their church, and. the village of Chiswick ! I listened again, and now discriminated the identical sounds which I had not heard during a period of more than thirty years. \ I distinguished the very words, in the successive tones, which the school-boys and puerile imaginations at Chiswick used to combine with them. In fancy, I became again a school boy-—" Yes," said I, " the six bells repeat the village-legend, and telL me that " my dun cow has just caWd," ex actiy as they did above thirty years since!" — Did the reader ever encounter a similar key-note, leading to a multitude of early and vivid impressions ; for in like manner these sympathetic tones brought before my imagination number less incidents and persofiages, no longer important, or no longer in existence. My scattered ahd once-loved school-mates, their characters, and their various fortunes, passed in rapid review before me; — my school-master, his wife, and all the gen try, and heads of families, \vhose orderly FROM LONDON TO KEW. 213 aftendaneeat, Divine service on Sundays, while, those weUrr^membered ; bells were "chiming for church," (but now departed and; mouldering ia the adjoining graves!), were rapidly presented to my recollection. With what pomp and form they used to enter: and ! dq)art from thpjr house of God!— I saw with the mind's eye the widow Hogarth and her maiden relative,. Richardson, walking up the aisle, dressed in their, silken sacks, their raised head-: dresses, their black calashes, their lace ruffles, and their high crOok'd canes, pre ceded by their aged servant, Samuel ; who, after he had wheeled, his mistress to church in her Bath-chair, carried thp prayer-books; up the aisle, and opened- and shut the pew I There too was the portly Dr. Griffiths, of the Monthly Re view, with his Uterary wife in her neat and; elevated wire-winged cap ! And oft- times; the vivacious and angelic Duchess of Devonshire, whose bloom had not then suffered from the canker-worm of pequ--, niary distress, created by the luxpry of 21* A morning's WALK i charity ! Nor. could 1 forget the humble distinction of the ' aged': sexton Mbrtelfe^' whose, ^kiU in psalmody, enabled him' tP lead that rwretched i^roiipe of singers;. whom Hogarl;h sp happily pourtrayed; whose performance * with the tuningifoVk excited so much' wbndfer in littie boys? and whose gesticulatioi^ "and contortions of bead, '^^hand,' and bpdy, in- beating' tiih'e,- were not outdone,o even by Joab Bates in the commemorations of HandeM Yes; simple and happy villagers ! I temembeb scores of ypii ;— how fortunately ye toad escaped the contagion of the>metrpp6Utan vices, though ' distant' but ifive mUes; and how many of yPU haVe I Conversed with, who, at an adult agfe; had never behel4 the degrading asSdmblagP Of ite knaveries; and miseries ! I revelled in the melancholy pleasure of these reCPllectidns, yielding my whole soul tP' that witchery of sensibility, which magnifies the perce|)tiPP of being, till one of the bells was oVPrset; when, the peal Stopping, I had leisure to reflect pn. the FROM LONDON TO KEW. 215 rapid advapcp of J the ! day, and op the consequent! necessity of quickening my speeds At ther end .irf this lane I crossed a road, which I found led to Chiswick Ferry;: : The opening .gave increased efn feet to the renewed, peal, and I regretted! that I (sduld:, not then indulge in.k nearer approach to that beloved spot. I passed a farm-house :and.some neat villas, .audi presently :camei4o the unostentatious, . but interestiiiglyrsmcient. : structure 6f rBarns^ Church,, situaited. on the CotamPp^ :at the distance :Pfal quarter ; of a mile: fi;om. the village, itvlsessayeduo enter thechurchH yard tai read sdme; ofthe jclp-pnicles .of mortahty, -partioularjly as" it invited, at-? tenticMiiUy the JiunPsnal object, of alMiss play of shut - out /' the Uving fromiall comniunion^witb' the :dead,- -aud from all the sympathies-and IpsBonSiikda drPssed to the heartand uhderstanding'itelp tbeirunrestricted. intercourse. -<'Babnes consists of a few stragglteg houses opposite -the; Common,; of a flieaMj street leading to the -water-side, andpf a row of elegant bouses faofflgi tbe .Thitafeg,' on a broad terfecp. nearly half a mile long. ¦ On the opposite' side erf thP* river is a tract of new-made sWampy'.'groPnd; shaped circularly by the^' winding -of the river. The chord of this' circle^ eitten'ds from Chiswick to Strand-on-the-Greep ; and upon it is seen the exquisitely beau tiful villa of the Duke of Devonsbirej vi^here Charles James Fox' latdy .termii hated his patriotic career; and Pn the left are the housie *'an& extensive ^ grodndfl long PcCupied by the amiable ^ValentiiSi M orris, *• esq. who, on hia dcath-^bed- in Italy, in 1786, bequeathed these^iJS|&* raises and a competept'ahBinty ad a pto'- visipn for abopt thirty aged horses -and FROM L0ND0N:T0 KAW. Slg dogs, — and hei» some of theih sui-vived till within these seven years, dying, from the gradual decay of their vital powers', at the ages of forty and fifty. The beauty and seclusion of this ter- ra'de have long invited the' residence of persons bf wP^aUh and distSttCtipn.'- Many bf thbse Frenchmen who, from interested (fonneiioiis, or the- prejudices of Pda- feitioP,T'preferi^d exile = and cbmparative |>§verty ih foreign' lands,' to the reign of ^liberty aiid' reafedn 'at home, came to reside on' M& s);lot.'i' HferP was acted the terrible ¦.tragedj" of rtbP Couitt and Cou-ntEss D'ATsi^ii'A'tGOEs;- These fa mous intriguants, 'after traversing Europe to enUst' the S^ain prejudices of kings, and 4he' sy^hant' Spirit of courtier§, against the'iiniitei^hle'priPciples'af 'the rights of map, settled ¦ thisniselves in a SECiair house neiar the'upper end Of this terraCe. Here their "(gstaMishihent CdflSisted'- 6hly ' of a single Italian .lo^ttSah; dnd tivp maid- flPri^ants. ' One day in every VCek they #ent to London, in a bfrM coach/ to 320 A morning's walk confer with their partizans ; and it was on the mornipg . of one of these excursions that these unhappy persons were suddenly butchered by their Italian footman. The coach stood at the door, and the Count and Countess had descended the stairs, when the servant, rushing from the par lour, fired a pistol at the, Count; the ball of which struck, but did pot injure him. It, however, so rauch surprised him as to throw him off his guard, when the wretcli struck him with a stUetto between the shpulders. The Count at first reeled pn the step, pf the door, but instantly rushed up stairs, as is supposed; to gpt ^rms from his bed-chamber, which he rpaphed,; but only to fall dead op the floor. In the mean time, the Countpss, who was two or three paces in advance, and had reached the carriage-door, not aware of Ihe cause of the report, of the pistol, and of the Count'? precipitate retreat^ jsked the map, peevishly, why" he did lot open the dqor? He advanced as if o do it; but instantly stabbed her ip FRtrti LONDON TO KEW. 221 the breast to the hUt of his weapon ; she shrieked,. reeled a few yards, and feU dead beside the post which adjoins the house to the West, on the paveraent near which her -blood was lately visible. The villain himself fled .iip-stairs to the room where his master lay weltering in his blood,' and then, with a razor, cut his own throat l:-Sikw;the coachman, who told me that scarcely ifivp minutes elapsed between the time when he heard them approach the car riage and beheld them corpses ! The several acts were begun and over in an instant. At; first he -could not conceive what was passing; and, thPugh he leaped from the box: to tiajs aid ;of the dying lady, he had then no suspicion of the fate of, the Count, X took pains to ascertain the assassin^s mo tive for committing such horrid deeds; but none can be .traced beyond a feeling of revenge, excited by a supposed intention ¦of his master to discard him, and send him out of the kingdom ; a design which, it is said, he discovered by listening on the stairs to the conversation of the Count 222 A morning's walk arid Countess, while they were enjoyic^ the water- scene by. moon-light, on the preceding evening, from their projects^ Windows^ < It: was impossible to view the 6pbt wher'e such airagedy had been acted. Without- horror, and without de^ sympadby for the victims; yet itigratified me to 'find the house already ^-inhabited by; a respect-^ able family, because it > thus appeared that there- are how dispersed tbroPgh\6ocii^ many whosP minds are raiked above thfe artifices of superstition,-— which, in ao-dis- tant age,' would have filled: these premises Witii -ghosts and hobgobUns, till tbey had become a bye-word and a bea(>^of ruins! ' -Nearly: adjpinijig and behind the nesi'^ dePee- of Count d'AntraiguPs, stand the premises and grounds -long 'occupied- by a,nbther'distingPifehed emigrant, the Mar quis dP GhabaPes, a relation- of the notpfe rioiis and -versatile TaUeyraiid. 'iThis mwp- ¦quis here pursued -two <4s^Pculation&,' by which, at the time,''^e attracted attention and applause, ' In the first he .PPdertook to give usefhl bodyand'cOPsistency-to the FROM LONDON TO KEW. 223 duSt'.ofrcoafe, of which thousands of tons, bdforej theiri alpplieation to. gas-lights, were amiuallyjwiasted. in the shipping and coal- whaEfei;:and!jfdF' this, purpose he' erected a/imaniilaGldry;r but,. after much loss of ladiDfflnaliftl pMperty; found/ it necessary t^jii^'bapdpp,- the 'projectj :iiln the second »pe6ulia^iiWJ,vhe proposted-to.'hitroduce va- jsitp^oErenchi improvements into JEngUsh iiiiirtiieiiHaicejoandcupdbctopki to supply the IrUilereESfsofoth.^ metropolis with tender ancbiflaaiseaqoiiiablei-fruits apd vegetyiiles, in g|Deat@rdper^ti0n, csindiiat a lower rate; thaii (aheyr had .beiretofprei) beeii- supplied byi the' < English. gardeners^'' For this pur- 'pos»'' heads, to meet thp demands of good house-wives, who, at ten or^eleven, buy: their garden-stuff fpr the day. This rapid routine creates a prodigious quantity of labour for men, woraen, and horses. Every gardener has his market-cart or carts, which ; he . loads af sun-set ; and, they depart at ten, eleven, twelve, or one o'clock, according to the distance from, London, Each cart is accompanied by a driver, and also by a person to sell, gene rally the gardener's wife; who, having Q. ¦ a6 A morning's walk sold the load, returns with the team by nine or ten o'clock in the morning; and has thus finished the business of tiie day, before half tbe inhabitants of London have risen from their beds. Such is the economy of every gardener's family within ten miles of London, — of sdrae every night, and of others every other Pighf, during at least six months in tbe year. The high yegetable season in sum-^ mer, as well as peculiar crops at other tiflies, call for exertions of labour, or rather Of slavery, scarcely paralleled hy any other dlass of people. Thus, in the strawberry season, hundreds of women are employed to carry that- deUeate fruit to market on their heads ; and their industry in per-^ forming this task is as wonderful, as- their remuneration is unwortl^ of the opulent classes who derive enjoyment from their labour. They Consist, fbr the most part, of Shropshire and Welsh girls, who wdk to London at this season in droves, to jferform this drudgery, just as the Irish peasantry come to assist in the bay and FROM LONBON to kew. ±2f corn harvgsits. I learnt that these women carry -u^n theit heads baskets of straw berries-, or raspberries, weighing from forty to fifty ppwads, and makp twP turns iP tSieday, from Isleworth to toarbet, adis^, tance of thirteen miles each way; three turns from BrenlfOtd, a distance cf PinP miles ; and four turns from Hammersmith; a idiBtanCe of six niiles. For the Piost part, they find some cPn^eyancP back; but even th^n these indu'strious creatures carry loads ft-om twenty-four to thirty mites a»'d'ay, besides Wdlkipg back uPiaden some part of each turpi Their remunera* tion for this unparalleled slavery is from 8s. to ^s. per day ; eadh ttttrn frPm the distance of Isleworth being 4*. or 4*. €d. ; atid frbPi iftiat -of Hammersmith 2s. or ^S. Si/. Their diet is coarse and simple, their drink, tea and israaU-beer; costing iiot above i*. or 1*. 6^. aPd their baCk- cOPVeyantP abPiit- 9,S. or ^». 6d. ; ^o that their net ^ins are about 5s. per day, Which, in the strawberiy season, of forty days, amounts to Wl. After this period Q S 228 A morning's walk the same women find employment in gathering and marketing vegetables, at lower wages, for other sixty days, netting about 5/. more. With this poor pittance they retum to their native county, and it adds either to their humble comforts, or , creates a jsmall dowry towards a rustic establishment for life. Can a raore in teresting picture be drawn of virtuous exertion ? Why have our poets failed to colour and finish it.'' More virtue never existed in their favourite Shepherdesses than in these Welsh and Shropshire girls ! For beauty, symmetry, and complexion, they are not infefior to the nymphs of Arcadia, and they far outvie the palUd specimens of Circassia ! Their morals too are exemplary; and they often perform ^his labour to support aged parents, or to ieep their own chUdren from the work house ! Ip keen suffering, they endure all that the imagination of a poet could desire; they live hard, they sleep oa straw ' in hovels and barns, and they often burst an artery, or drop down dead from. FROM tONDON TO KEW. 229 the effect of heat and Pver-exertion ! Yet, such is the state Pf one portion of our female population, at a tirae when We are calling ourselves the most polished nation on earth, and pretending to be so wealthy that M'e give away millions a-year to fo reigners unsoUcited, and for no intelligible purpose! And such too is their' dire ne cessity, that it would be most cruel to Suggest or recommend any invention that might serve as a substitute for their sla very, and thereby deprive thera of its wretched annual produce ! The transit from Barnes to Mortiake is but a few paces ; a small elbow in the road forming their point of separation. Both of them contain some handsome Villas, and they are pleasantly situated on the banks of the Thames; yet they are less beaiutiful than they might be rendered, by very slender attentions. There is no public taste, no love bf natal soil, no pride of emulation apparent, though the scite is one of the finest in England.' A few mansions of the opulent adorn as 23Q AMORNIN-G'SWALK both villages, and the country fascinates ip spite of thp inhabitants; but th^ third and fourth rate houses have a slovenly, apd often a-kindpf. pig-sty character, dis gusting to thpse, who, in the beautiful towns and villages of Essex, have seen what may be done, to improve thp babi-: tations even of humblp life. Lovely Witham, and Kelve.don, and Cogger i^hall ! what examples you set to all other towns in your neatiy painted and whitened houses — unostentatious, though cheerful^-r and inviting, though chaste and modest ! What a contrast do youi present to the towps and villages in Middlesex and Surrey, and even in Kent ! If poverty forbids a stuccoed or plastered wall, the cleanly and oft-repeated whitpvpa^h proves the generous public spirit of the occupant, while the, outside seldom has occasion to blush for the inside. A spirit of haripony runs through the whole, and a pure ha bitation is indicative of pure inhabitants ; thus, cleanliness in the house leads to neat ness of apparel— both require order, and FROM LONDON TO KEW. 231 out of order grow moral habits, domestic happiness, and the social virtues. Nor is tbis theory fanciful ; Witham, Kelve- don, and -Coggeshall, form a district which is at once the most beautiful, the least vicious, and the happiest, in the kingdom. One virtue is doubtless con sequent on another, and one good habit generates another; the result is the harmonious triumph -of virtue ! If it be doubted whether the white- washed exte rior is more tiian " an outward and visible sign" of the purity within, I reply-^that virtue is so much the effect of habit, that whatever improves the habits improves the character ; and that, if a house were frequently white-washed within and with- t>ut, it could scarcely faU to banish per sonal filth from the inmates j while habits of cleanliness, which caU for habits of in dustry, would produce the rest. I have, indeed, often thought that it would be an ^efficacious means of bettering the morals, arS well as the health, of the London poor, if St. Giles's, Hockly-in-the-bole,^ Fleet- 232 A morning's WALK lane. Saffron-hill, and other dens of vice and misery, were by law lime- washed inside and outside twice in every year. But, in whatever degree this doctrine may be just, let me hope these observations wiU meet the eye of some active phUan- thropists, who, being thus taught to con sider cleanliness as an auxUiary of morals and happiness, will be induced so to paint and whiten pur dusky-coloured viUages and dirty towns, as to render them wor thy of virtuous residents, in the hope that, by reciprocation, they may render them selves worthy of their purified habitations. • I do npt charge on Barnes and Mortlake Exclusively the characteristics of filth — they are not inferior to other villages within ten miles ; but the whole require improve ment, and I recommend Witham, Kel- vedon, and other places in that district of Essex, to their imitation. Mortlake church-yard and its ancient church stand pleasantly on the north side of a large field, across which is a pic turesque fpot-pa,th tp East Sheen. I in- FROM LONDON TO KEW. 233 quired eagerly for the tomb of Partridge, the almanack-maker and astrologer, and found it in the south-east corner, in a tot tering condition. Relics so faraous would, it might have been supposed, have ex torted from the Parish Vestry a single hod of mortar, and an hour's labour of a mason, to sustain it: yet thus it is, not Only at Mortiake, but every where. No thing is conceded to public feeling; and the most venerable monuraents are suf fered to fall to decay for want of the most trifling repairs. The following in scription is StiU legible on the slab of the tomb : — Johannes Partridge, Astrologus et Medicinae Dpctor, natus est apud East.Sheen, in coniitatu Surrey, 8^ die Januarii, anno 1644, et mortuus est Londini 24" die Junii, anno 1715. Medicinam fecit duobus Regibus unique Reginas; Carole Scilicet Secundb, Willielino Tertio, Reginaeque Marias. ,Creatus Medicinae Doctor Lugduni Batavoruni. How many are the associations which ^row out of this name of Partridge 1 He was one of the last of the learned votaries of Astrology, the mother of the 534 A morning's WALK sciences, though herself the daughter of superstition. His works on genitures, and on the errors of bis favourite science, are specimens of acute reasoning, not ex ceeded by the ablest disquisitions on more worthy subjects^ Yet he was held up by Swift as an impostor, though Swift him self lived by a show of faith in other mys teries, fbr which his reverence is very doubtful. Not so Parti'idge; he evi dently beUeved sincerely that the stars were indices of fate, and he wrote and acted in that belief, however much he may have been deceived by appearances. He found, as all students in astrology find, tliat every horoscope enabled him to foretel with precision a certain number of events; and, if his prognostics faUed in some cases, he a-scribed the faUure to no defect of his celestial intelligencers, but to the errors or short-sightedness of his art. Good, and even wise men have, in all ages, been deceived by the same appear ances. They found that the planets fore told some events; they thence infeiEred from ^.qndon to kew. 235 that the planpts ruled those apd all events ; and, if the sciepce oftep disappoipted them, they found an apology for it in their own mistaken judgments, or in the errors introduped into it by different authors, "Astrologers were therefore not impostors, as they are often described by the oyerr righteous, the hasty, or tbe igno ¦ rant. They fpupd a science reared on the observations and experience of the remotest antiquity, and their prognostic cations were deduced from its established laws. Its, practices were directed by the unerring motions pf the earth, moon, aod planets,; and it ppssessed characteristics of grandeur and sublimity, arising frpm the magnitude and solempity pf its sources, apd from the pterpal laws which regulated them. The errors on which this science was reared, were not, hpwever, peculiar to astraliogers. Tbey were engendered by ignorance, and nurtured by superstition and priestcraft. Every event happens ip 236 A morning's walk its own way, and cannot happen iii any other way than that in which it has actually happened ; or, in other words, an event cannot happen and not happen, or a thing cannot be and not be. This ne cessary determination of every event in a single manner, the consequence of com mensurate proximate causes, which it is often difficult to analyse, served as a fruitful source of superstitious feeling, and as a handle for the priests araong the early nations of antiquity. In whatever way an event happened, that was said to be its Fate, notwithstanding a slight ex ercise of reason would have shewn that what has happened in one way could not, at the same tirae, happen in another way. But, as it did happen in one way rather than another, the way in which it did happen was said to be predeterrained ; the kind of cause was not examined which determined it to happen as it did happen ; the effect was even said to rule the causes; and all the causes, remote FROM LONDON TO KEW. ^f and proximate, were said tp be operative merely for the sake of producing, the ulti mate effect ! As every event must happen in the way in which it has happened, a description of it, is but an expression of the certainty, that it has happened in such or such a particular manner. If this result be fortu nate, then all the circumstances which led to it, however remote, are deemed to have been lucky ; thpugh, if it prove unfortu nate, the sarae train of causes are then called tinlucky. There was, however, neither luck nor ill-luck in thesp trains, because the remote or necessary physical causes did not determine the proximate and fluctuat ing mental ones. There existed no neces sary connexion between these trains, be sides the necessity or certainty that some result must be consequent on every train of events growing out of huraan Ufe and ac tion. These trains raust, in all cases, pro duce some result, that is to say, a result of some kind, and not necessarily any parti^^, cular result, 53S A morning's walk In considering the curious enigma in regard to fatality, men err in con ceiving that all the remote causes which lead to an event, operate and combine for the sake of some particular result, in stead of considering every persPnal or social event as the necessary single eflfect of the proximate causes; and they also confound the species of causes which pro duce events. There are iWo distinct sets of causes, the one physical and the other mental The physical are determined by fixed, and often by known laws, and hence we are enabled to fhrttel the places of the planets and the moment when ecUpses of the Sun and Moon will happen for a thousand years to come. The men tal are governed by the varying expe rience, caprice, and self-love, generated within animal hiinds ; and, being therefore measured by no fixed laws, produce re sults which cannot be anticipated, except in their proximate Operation. These mental causes, so to speak, cross eat^ other in every direction, and at one time 1 FROM LONDON TO KEW. 239 may accelerate,, though at another time they may ret£trd, or give novel directions to physical causes ; and, as they are generated in every Successive moment by the errors and passions of fallible beings, - and often have an extensive influence on the affairs pf mankind, so they constitute an infinite variety of Original causes, which, as no law creates them, no law leads to their effifcts; of course, therefore^ their effects atP not necessary, and no knowledge can exist, enabUng men to anticipate that which is generated by uo fixed laws, and which therefore is not necessary. I latply met a Mend, who justly passes for a philosopher. He. mentioned the distress of a family which he had just been relieving.^ ." and, would you believe it," said he — '"if I had not passed alpng a street where I seldom go, and met a child of the faraily, I should have known nPthing of their situation? Was it not ^evidently pre-ordained, therefore, that I shPuld walk along that street, at that time, for the purpose of relieving that fa- 240 A morning's walk mily.?" " So, then," said I,, "you maketh?^, consequence deterraine the cause, rather than take the trouble to examine whether the causes were not equal to the effect,. without being themselves necessary or irre sistible. " " But then," he replied, " there was such an aptness, such a coincidence, Such a final purpose !" — "Ah !" I rejoined^ *' you cheat yourself by not extending your vocabulary— why not say there was suffi cient affluence, guided by a benevolept heart - — and such distress, that they were called into prompt exertion? Ts it to be re garded as a miracle, that a benevplent heart proved the sufficient cause of a good action, and that distress was an ex citement equivalent to the effect which you describe? The street was a medium or stage of action, as capable of leading to evil as to good. You could not be in two places at the sarae time; nor could, the result be and not be. Had you been in another place, some other family might, have been relieved from the colUsion of the same causes; and each event would, FROM LONDON TO KEW. MV in Uke manner, have appeared to have determined the causes, instead of being a single consequence of the causes. Nor were these causes more necessary than the result. Your feelings were spontaneous, but you may in future change the result by hardening your heart, Uke other rich men." " I will ,do neither, "^ said he, quickly. — " No,'* said I, "I know youwon't^ — ^you will not violate your habitual inclinations. In future, however, do them justice; and, when you perform a kind action, do not make the consequence the cause."* I sat On the tomb of Partridge, and * As doctrines about fate and- necessity involve a numerous- class of mischievous superstitions, and are tbe bases of the success of endless impostures, it seems w-orth while tu turn aside for a moment from the high road of my narrative to examine- ihem. Some philosophers assert, tnat we are the inert patients of necessary causes: others, that we do what we, list, without any cause, on the sponta. neous impulse of our will : while nine-tenths of the human race maintain that we are governed by an unalterable fate, which is predestined, and that all the events of life take place for the sake of accom plishing some end ! What is our real condition ? Mi A morning's walk thought it a fit place in which to rumi nate on these involved points. Do the We exist on a globe which, by a balance of me- ehanical powers, moves round a centre of gravity between it and the centre of the sun; and also I'ound its own centre of gravity, communicating its aggregate motions to all the particles that compose it, and thereby exciting them into various modes of action, producing and sustaining all the phenomena which we witness. The entire mass then is the patient of these arrangeraents, and every thing oa the earth is physically subservient to them. But, in animal organizations, we find a set of powers dif> ferent from those which characterize inert minerals «r plants. An animal has his own powers of loco. motion — he moves on his own centre of gravHy— and, though the earth is his stage and the place of his origin, yet he is an independent Microcosm. T» assist his loco-motion, to enable him to determine his course, to preserve his being, and to choose between what is good for hira, and what is evil t» liim ; he is provided with senses, with which he sees, hears, smells, tastes, and feels; with memory; and with powers of reasoning by analogy, or his senses and bis experience would be useless: and yet men say, that such a creature is as much the patient of physical causes, as a stone or a plant ! On the contrary, is it not evident, that an animal possesses- peculiar powers of sense and reason, in order that lie may not b6 the patient and victim of physical circun;- from LOliDON TO KEW. 243 aStrolPgers (said I) consider the stars as mere indices of pretended fates, or as the causes of the events which they are eri' stances ? But, say th^y, hk acfidns are determined by his ntotives, and these are governed by causes over which he has no control; those causes are neces sary, and', therefore, his actions are necessary. ¦f rue — but these exterior causes , (granting that they are always necessary links of a chain,) operate en ai ilian only accoiding to his estimate of them, which varies in diffeir^nt men, and in the same men' iCt ditferent times. The caused, at least aS far as rfegai'ds beings which arS really their patients, liiay be regarded as necessary, and they may govern passive existences wiih absolute doiiiinion ; but in sill dnimal^ they haVe tb encounter the principle bf radividnality, the feeling of independence, the de-' sire of well-being, afnd the energies of self-love. These, so to spealt, Writer into an argument with the causes — a process of reasoning takes place — a decision of judgment is formed — and that judgment it is which directs the will and the action. In other' Words, an erroneous and varying judgment inter poses between the causes and. the action ; conse-' quently, however absolute and necessary may be' the causes, the action governed by an intervening iiJiperfect judgment, and a varying estimate of these- causes, is not equally absolute and necessary. Place ten men, or animals, in the same critical situation,, R 3 2^4- A morning's walk ^led to anticipate by the anticipated mpr- ¦ tionsof the stars? In nativities, they seem- to consider them as indices ; but, in horary questions, as causes. They are treated as indices in aU cases wherein arbitrary numbers or measures, or ima ginary points, are introduced; but deemed material causes- when particular events are and their judgment, of the circumstances will lead each of them to act diiFerently; though the neces sary causes which ought to have governed their actions were the same; but their judgments, theif knowledge, or their experience, were different, and, therefore,, their actions. If animals were omni scient, they would have perfect, judgments, whick. vyould exactly accord with the exterior or necessary circumstances, by which they might then be said to be governed;, or,, if they were stones and plants, they might be inert patients. But theirs is a mixed. species of existence^ they are neither plants nor gods. They have powers which plants have not, by which., they can freely jjidge of the means of. averting many palpable dangers,- though their powers of judging, are too limited to enable them to estimate all circumstances correctly, and therefcie to move in necessary. unison w-ith the immutable physical laws that govern the changes and. tke, motions of. inert matter, . -, FROM LONDON TO KEW. 2'45 "said to be coincident \i/ith actual posi- •tions. Both hypotheses cannot, however, "be weU founded ; and- his reason will call on the astrologer to give up the doctrine 'of indices of fate, and prefer that of secondary causes. Here then a stiU greater difficulty presents itself; the causes are general, and they must operate on the whole earth and all its inhabitants alike. A n of t? and '$, or a A of T? and '%, (that is, a square aspect of Mars and Mercury, or a trine Of Saturn and Jupiter, ) whenever they happen,' are alike appli cable to all fhe inhabitants and regions of the earth: It was plausible to talk of a planetary aspect as productive of rain or wind, when the geography of the astro loger did not extend beyond the plains of *Chaldea, or the immediate banks of the Nile; biit our better knowledge of cos- mpgraphy now teaches us, that, at the lime of every aspect, every variety of season and of weather is prevalent in dif ferent parts of tfie world; and every con- Jtrariety of fortune is happening to ipdi- c*6 A mornin-g's walk , viduals in all pountries. ^he doctrine that the planets are secondary causes, is, Ith^refore, not suppprled by the circum- st^nces^of the phenomena. Bnt the astrologers are not content with natural positions, but, like the eastern priests with their gods, they assign dif ferent parts pf the heavens, and different countries, to each planet ; apd thep found progpostics on thpse local positions of thp planets. It is evidept, however, that the apparent position of a planet depends on the varying position of the earth, and that an inferior planet may be in exactly the same ppint of space, and yet be seen from the earth in every sign of the zodiac ; thpugh, according tp the astrologers, it ¦would in that same place have very dif ferent powers! This dpctfine was ad- niissible when the earth was cpnsidered as the centre of the universe ; when the geocentric phenomena vvere considered as absolute; and when the apparentiy quick and slow motions, the retrpgradations, and ihe stationary positions, were ascribed to -FROM LON^DON TO KEW. 947 caprices of the planets themselves, or to motives of their prime mover, and there fore were received as signs of corres ponding events and fates ! But the radical error of the art of pre diction is more deeply seated than we are commonly aware of. There is a chance„ however difficult it may be in all cases to reduce it to arithmetical precision, that any possible event may happen to a par ticular person. No possible event can indeed be conceived, that, with regard to «. particular person, is not within the. range pf arithmetical probability; while all the prpbable events,, such as pre dictors announce, are within very narrow Umits. As an example, I assume, that, of any hundred ordinary events of human life, it may be an even chance that sixty of them wUl happen, or not happen ; and, of the other forty, it may be as 20 to 1 that ] 0 of them will happen ; as 10 to 1 that pther 10 will happen; as 1 to 10 that other 10 wiU happen; and as 1 to 20 that tbe other 10 will happen.. Then, by ^8 A morning's walk averaging all these chances, it will be found that it is an even chance that the whole will happei^ or wiU not happen; or, in other words, - that half will happen; and that half will not happen. If, there fore, a dextrous person foretel one hun-r dred events, by means of any prognos ticating key, or any index whose powers are previously settied, — whether stars, cards,, sediments of tea, lines of the hand or forehead, entrails of animals, or dreams, signs or omens, — by the doctrine of chances it is an even, or some other fixed chance, that half, or sorae other portion, of such events will come to pass. Su perstition wiU triuraph if only, 1 in 5, or 1 in 10, happen as foretold; but, if I in 2 or 3 should happen by neutralizing or generalizing the predictions, then the pro phet is accounted a favourite of Heaven, or a familiar of Satan 1 For this purpose it signifies not what it is that constitutes the key of fate ; it will sufficiently deceive the practitioner, if it reUeve him from the responsibUity of his announcements; and, TROM LONDtJN TOKEW. -'249 4f he prudently announce none but events highly probable, he wiU himself- be asto nished at the apparent verity of his art ! -In truth, he is all the while but the dppe t)f arithmetic; and a cool examination would shew him that, for the most part, it is an even chance that any predicted ;^eventwiU happen, which has been fore told: by any kiey,. or sign, or token. The •planets, ^the signs of the zodiac, &c. serve as one set of these keys,' or indices — dreams -serve as another — the entrails of animals have been used as, another — rsigns, ^noises, omens, tokens, sympathies. Sec. are a fruitful sourie — lines of the hand, forehead, wrist, &c. are others — moles, marks, &e. furnish others — cards afford a rich variety — and the sedimei^ts of tea cups, and I know not what besides, , serve as means of announcing events by pre-arranged laws of association. Tiie half, or more than half, of such events, must however necessarily happen by the averages of chances,; and this unascertained S(,ad unsuspjBpted coincidence has from age •S3Q A morning's walk to age countenanced and confirmed the delusion. All, that a prophet or fortune-teller re quires, therefore, is some set oiindices, to each of which he can assign particular powers and significations, and then be able so to vary their order as to give them new and endless coipbinations, representing the fortunes of all mankind. When va ried for a particular individual, be has merely to apply to that person the pro bable events indicated bv the new com- binations; and, according to the law of chances, he mu«t necessarily succeed in a certain proportion of his prognostics, be cause it is within a certain numerical chance that any possible event will happen to any individual. The prognosticator in these ca.ses is deceived, because he is solely directed by the order of his indices. As he finds that he has been enabled to foretel by their means a certain number of events,- he conceives either that these indices must govern the fates; that the finger of Providence or the agency of the from LONDON TO KEW. 2Sl PevU governed his indicps ; or, with many gra,ve writers, that tberp is a sPul of thp wp,rl4 vyhipb harmopizes all thing?, pro- dqpijng ap accordance between the for- Tui^ES, pf the uujiAN RACE and the sedw.pnts pf te?|,-ci3ps, the arrangements !p|^ cards, the aspect^ and positions pf the planets, the lines in the. hand or fprehpad, thp indications pf dreams, an4 the ep- .tt;^,i.ls of apimals ! On the othpr hand, the dupes of these progpostiqs,, wben fortunate, .often direct their best exertions to fulfil them; or, when upfprtunate, they sink into a feeling of despondency, which leads to their fulfilment And, should one in ten of the predicted evppts takp, place, t^ey be- jqome firm believers in- the doctrines pf fatality, necessity, apd other superstiti.pns ; '¦for," say they, "how could an event be iforetpld^ if it had npt been irrevocably de creed that.it must happen?" What a power ful handle for priest-craft, state-craft, ancj all the crafts by which mankind have been abused in evei'y age of the world ! That this exposition ofthe true cause of 3 552 A -morning's waxk *he popular errors, in regard to any sup;- posed connexion hetween certain acci- -dents of matter, and unconnected future events, will not be without its uses, must be evident from the known influence which sorae of the raeans of prognostication pos- -sess over every rank of society. Such scenes as that described in the Spectator, -where so much unhappiness was created hy spilling the salt, are still realized every day in nearly -every faraily in G reat Bri tain. All phenomena which cannot easily he accounted for, and hundreds of trivial incidents, are considered by the gravest as portentous signs of events to come. The coincidence of any event and its prognostic, though it might have been ten ito one that it would happen, is received as evidence of their connexion, which it would be impiety to laugh at ! But need I quote a more striking instance than the still prodigious annual sale of 300,000 of Partridge's and Moore's Almanacks, whose recommendations are their prognostica- ktions, and which a few years sines lost FROM EONDON TO KBW. 253^ most- of their patrons, because the Sta tioners' Company, in the edition of the year, left out the predictions as an ex periment oti the pubUc wisdom ! In returning from the tomb of Par tridge, I beheld another, dear to patriot ism and civic glory, that of Alderman. Barber, Lord-mayor of London in. 1733. His memory is stiU cherished among aged- citizens, and the cause is recorded in the follovving inscription : — " Under this stone were laid the remains- of J^ohn- Barber, esq. alderman of London,, a constant benefactor to ^the poor, true to his principles in church and slate. He preserved his integrity, and^ discharged the duty of an upright magistrate. Zea lous for the rights of his fellow citizens, he opposed. all. attempts against them ; and,, being lord mayo«. in the year \7.33, he defeated a scheme of a general Excise,, which, had it succeeded, would have put an. end to the liberties o£his-country."' Virtuous- citizen ! Happy was it that thou didst not live to suffer the mortifi cation of seeing thy degraded country. devoured by swarms of excisemen, and* tb& third. o(. its papulation, fattening., on-i tSi A M0RNING*S WAtK the taxes collected from the other twor- thirds. Too justly didst thou anticipate that the terrors and tiorruptions growing out of such an inquisition as the excise,- would destroy that sturdy spirit of inde pendence, which in thy day constituted the chief glory of the English country- gentieraan and London merchant Till it was broken or undermined by the evil genius pf Taxation, that spirit served as' the basis of Britain's prosperity; but now, ala.s ! it seems to be extinguished fbr ever. — ^Patriotic Lord-mayor of London f In thy day to watch wifh jGalousy the never-ceasing encroachments of the regal prerogatives, and to render the . ministera of the crown accountable at the bar of public opinion, were paths of honour leading to the highest civic distinctions ! Many of the race that conducted to a wise end the glorious revolution of 1688 then survived — the genius of Uberty con tinued to inspire the sons of Britain — the holy (lame that punished two kings for trespassing on the rights of their people,' rKOM LONDON TO KEW. H&S' was not entirely estin^ui&hed — tbe deadly. ]>aralysis of tbe Septennial Act had nol then produced its bUghting efiects on the whole body politic. But London ceased ¦ to be infliienced by tbe lost voice of Barber, and the Excise system tri-^ umphed — the barriers of freedom were passed— trial by jury was, in certain cases, either dispensed with, or nullified by well- trained special juries- — the public -judg- iiient was misled by venal conductors of the pubUc press — patriotism was. deemed taction — liberty was held up as another' name for rebellion — and, in consequence,; JrOKTV-FIVE YKARS OF FOREIGN WAR have disgraced SEVEXxy-FivE years of our annals, though thirty years of foreign war served in tbe preceding three. hundred years to vindicate every British interest ! — Venerated name of Barbeii ! Where is the raonumput to.be found in-. the public buildings of London, to record ihy virtues for . the example, of others ?• Would it not be a worthy companion ta the statues, of Beckford and Ghathatn.!; S5ff' A hotsning's walk And would it not keep in countenance- the honest exertions of the Wailhmans — ' Woods — and Goodbeberes — who in our' days have trod in thy steps, and who, it raay be hoped, will have a long line of suc cessors in the same honourable career ? Being anxious to view the inside of Mortlake church, a boy undertook to fetch the key from the house of the sex ton. In the mean time I examined around me the humble monumeirts raised by af fection to the memory of the dead. Here were the pyramid,, the obelisk, and the tumulus, in their most dirainutive forms. Here lay decomposed the mineral parts of those ancestors from whom the contem porary generation have sprung. Yes,, said I, we truly are all of one nature, and- ©ne family; and we suffer a common fate ! We burst as germs into organization, we swell by a common progress into maturity, and wc learn to measure by motion what we call Time, till, our motions and our time eeasing, we are thus laid side by side, ge- Beration after generation, serving, as exr PROM LONDON TO KEW. ^ 257 amples of a sigiilfir futurity to those who spring from us, and succeed us. I reflected that, as it iS'Po\y more than four hundred years. since .this ground be came, the depository, of thp dead, some of its earliest occupants might, without an hyperbole, have been ancestors of the whole cotemporary EngUsh nation. . If we suppose that a raan was buried in this church-yard 420 years ago, who left six children, each of whom had three children; who again had, on an average, the , same number in every generation of thirty years; then, in -^SO years, or fourteen generations, his descendants might be mul tiplied as under : 1st generation . . . .6 Slid J 8 3rd . . . . . . .54 4th 162 5th . 486 6th 1M8 7th 4374 8th . . . . . . 13122 9th 39366 s 25S A morning's WALK 1 Oth generation . / 118098 nth - 354274, 12th: 1062812 13th 3188436 14th 9565308' That is tP say, ^niNe jftifcLiows An& A HALF of persons; or, as neariy as- pos sible, the exact population of South Bri* tain, tmigbtat- this- day be descehdfedi 4n a direct line frpm any ipdividual- bpitedin this or any other church-yard in -the year 1395, who left six children, each of whose desdendants hsive'^had op thP average three children ! i::>Apd, .by the same law, - everf individual who .has: six children may -be the root of as many descendants witlpn 420 years, provided theyincr.pa3ei^on the low average of only, three in every branch. His descendants would represent: an in verted triangle, of which he- would con stitute the lower angle. . . . - TP pilace the same position in another point, of view, I calculated also that every individiiarnow living must have had for his ancestpr evpry parent in Britain Uving FBOM LONDON TO KEW. 859 in the year 1125,' the age of Henry the First, .taking the popplatiop pf that period at 8,000,000. . Thus, as pvpry individual must haVe, had 3, fath^ and a ippther, or two iprogfiDiitors, each of w,hom had a father- and a mother; or. fpur. progenitors, each, generation wbtild double, its spro- genitqrs eveary thirty years. . Evpry; person living may, therefore, be .cojisidered as the apejg of a triangle; ; of . which the' ibase would.; jepresent the whole . population of, a remote age. T815, Living individual .-.1 1785,, His father and. mother ' -2 1755; :Theii! fathers and mothers 4 :1725,. ¦ ii ..¦:1;.;dittt3r,,';. ,.£-.. .;8 1695, . . ,1. 'ditto ; . . 16 1.665, . . . ditto . . ;iii32 1635, .; . . dittd ., . . ¦ 64 1605; , ., . . ditto . . 128 1575,/. ¦. . . ditto , . . 256 .1545, . , . iditto , . .51-2 1515, ;. . . ditto . . ¦ 1024 1485, . . . ditto; . . 2048 1455) . . . ditto- , s 2 . 409^ 260 A morning's walk 1 4-25, Their fathers & mothers 8 1 9^ 1395, . . . ditto . . 16384 1365, . . . ditto . . 32768 1335, . . . ditto . . ^65536 1305, . . . ditto . 131072 1275, . . ditto . 262144 1245, . . . ditto . 524288 1215, . . ditto . 1048576 1185, . . . ditto . 2097152 1 155, - . . . ditto . 419430'^ 1 1 25, . , . . ditto . 8388608 That is to sa; f, if there have been a regu co-mixture of marriages, every individual of the living race must of necessity be descended from parents who lived in Bri tain in 11 25. Sorae districts or clans may requjre a. longer period for the co-mixture, and different circumstances may cut off sorae families, and expand others ; but, in general, the fines of families would cross eacb. other, and become interwoven like the lines of lattice-work.- A single inter mixture, however remote, would unite all the subsequent branches in common an cestry, rendering the coteraporaries of FROM LONDON TO KEW. 261 every nation merabers of one expanded faraily^ after the lapse of an ascertainable nuraber of generations ! This principle is curious ; and, though in one view it has been applied to calcu lations of increasing population, yet I am not aware that it has previously received the moral application which I draw from it, in regard to the commixture of the hu man race. My ideas raay be better con ceived, if any person draw two parallel lines to represent the respective contem- por^iry populations of two distinct epochs ; and then set up on the lower Une an indefinite number of triangles. In this scherae we shall have a just picture ofthe progressive generations of every nation, and we may observe how necessarily, in spite of artifice and pride, they raust) by ihterraarriages, be blended as one family and one flesh, pwing to the individuals pf each pair springing from a, different apex, and to every side being necessarily crossed by the sides of other triangles. By a converse reasoning; or by tracing the lines s 3 262 . A morning'* WALK from the apex to the base; we may trace the descent as well as the ascent; and, by a glance of the !eye, ascertana notionly that every mdividiial of a living genera tion must be descended fi-om : the whtde of the parents of some generation sufficiently remote, but that pvery parPntio such re mote /generation must, necessarily have been the' ancestor of every individual bf a contemporary generatiotn. If, dui'iPg the Grasades, any of the English intermarried with Greeks, or Sy rians, or Italians, all ' of whom m ust, by intecroiogling,: have been descendants of the great men of a-ntiquity, so all the Eng*- lish of this age 'must be connected in blood with those intermarriages;' and be descended from the heroes of the classic ages. But let not pride triumph iff this consideration ; iJ for every malefactor in every age, who left children, was equally an ancestor of the living racp! The ancient union - pf France and England; ^ and of Belgium and ''Germany withr' England, must have rendered those people near of FROM LQNDON TO KEW. 263 kip; .whil'e«each adjoining nation, mixing with' its nei^bbui^s, must ^havecblerided the whole humap. race in one; great family of remote cbmrabn origin. ^ This ieason-t ing; explains the. cause of national phyr siognomy . and character, the ca-faiixture of -foreign i nations j being inconsiderable, and not sufficient ta effept 'general xiha-f racteristicc' changes;; 'while each :nation becohies, in the coUrseiof ages;: one com-t mon and ' blended family, in physiognomy, character,'* and I genius. ;, May so plain a denionstration of this great truth be the nieans o£ prompting th'eir/concordj their lovej • the ,interchaflige:'^of mutual good offices, and their common happiness I h The'messenger;havihg brought the key; I was admitted into Mortlake church, Jthe first iglance of whose ; venerable strpcturp carried hiy imagihatipn.'back through many distant ages; arid geperated a. multitude, of Siteres4ing ass6ciations. Every part pf the "building bore an air of antique simplicity;, and it.seerafed truly worthy of being the 264 A morning's walk place where the inhabitants of a village ought to meet periodically to receive les sons of raoral instruction, and pour forth their thanksgivings to ithe First Cause of the effects whichdaily operate on them as so many blessings. Happy system ! — so well adapted to the actual condition of society, and so capable, when well directed,, of pro ducing the most salutary effects on the temper and habits of the people. Thrice happy man, that parish- priest, who feels the exlerit and importance of his duties, and performs thera for their own reward, not as acts of drudgerj', or to gratify selfish feelings ! Enviable seat, that pul pit, where power is conferred by law and by custom, of teaching useful truths, and of conveying happiness, through the force of principles, to the fire - sides of so many families 1 Delightful picture ! — rwhat more, or what better, could wisdom con trive ? — A day of rest — a place sanctified for instruction-^habits of attendance — a teacher of worth and zeal — his precepts FROM LONDON TO KEW. 265 carried from the church to the fire-side — and there regulating and governing all the actions and relations of life ! Such, however, is the composition of the picture, only as seen on a sunny: day ! Alas [ the passions and weaknesses of men deny its frequent realization ! Authorised instructors cannot enjoy the reputation of superior wisdom without being excited by vanity, and led to play the fool— they can- nbt understand two or three dialects with out becoming coxcorabs— they cannot wear ^ robe of office without being uplifted by pride-^— and they canhot be appointed ex pounders of the simple elements of mo rals, without fancying themselves in^pos- sessio'n of a second sight, and discovering z.douile sense in every text of Scripture ! Eroni.tbis weakness ofhuman nature arisp most of the. mysteries which discredit reli gion, T-rhehce the incomprehensible jargon ofsects^^-hehce the^uhstitutiPnpf the sha dow of !faith for thp substance of good worksr-^hence the distraction of the peo ple on -theological jsubjects-^and hence, 266 A morning's walk in fine,- its too comraon inefficaey and in* sufficiency in' preserving pubUc morals, evinced, amo6g other :;bad. effects, in its tolerance of vindictive Christian wars. : I appeal, therefore, to conscientious teachers of th^ people, r whether itr is- not their duty tbr avoid; di^ous^iohs : in- the pulpit on mysteries whkh' never 'ediify,h because never uhderstpbd ; ahdto confine their discourses :tP such topics as -those indicated- in tke Sermon'bfiJesmon the Mount. Such, at-leastyappears to be the proper duty of a' patipPal esi^blisbmlsnt I Empirics may raise the fury of fanaticism about mysteries with inipunityK-eveiy, ab-t surdity may, fbr its season, b&,embo(iied in particular congregations^— and infidelity, of all kindfe, may be proclaimed at the cor* ners of the streets withoait dangeir, prOr vided the national CHUitcHbe^.fband.* ed on the- broad principles of virtii% and on the practice' pf those morals- which are so bealitifuUy expounded -in thP:NPw Tdsl-^ tament ;: and provided /thei^airochifat^iei^ do not mix -lbemselv«siwrth'those vision- FROM LONDON TO KEW. 267 ary topics whibh depend for success more on. zeal and credulity, than: on argument or reasonj Sueh' a 'church must flourish, as long as comraon sense, anda respect for;virtde, govern 'the majority. In this view, I Ikmeht,; howev'er,'; that a reyision has 'not taken place of those articles of faith which were promplgated In thesiX- tisenth century,' by meh newly, qonverted, and perhaps but half converted, '. from the Romish . faith, ahd ' taught to a peiople then unprepared, to !receiye all the changes ¦which reaison deraanded. i'l As a friend, therefore, to that religiohwhich :preserve3 the pubUc":! moralSj I hope to:" Uve^ to see many of those! articles qualified which treat of mysteries conceived in the dark ages bf monkish superstition, and coun tenanced by scholastic' logic ;Gonfeideriiig that such qualification would probably lead to greater concord in matters of the highest importance to society, and serve to establish; the' Anglican Church on the immbvekble" bases of reason and' truth; It seems, indeed, to be high time that S6& A morning's walk Protestant churches, of all denominations, should come to some agreement in regard to the full extent of .the errors which, during twelve centuries, were introduced into the Christian religion by the craft or ignorance of the Church of Rome. Did the early reformers detect the whole of them ? And, if: in the . opinion of discreet persons they did not, or, as is reasonable to suppose, they could not, is it not important to examine con scientious doubts, and to restore the re ligion of Christ, which we profess, to its original purity, and to the only STANDARD OF TRUTH, wWch God haS given to man, the light qf his ex perience and reason. Such were the considerations that forced themselves upon me, as I paced the aisles of this sanctuary of religion.- Nor could I avoid refiecting on the false associations which early prejudices attach to such en closures of four walls. By day, they are an object of veneration ; by night, an object of terrPr. Perhaps no person in FEOM LONDON TO KEW. 2^9 Mortlake would singly pass a long night in this soleran structure, for "the fee-simple of half the town ! The objects of their fears none could, or would, justify; yet the anticipated horrors of passing a night in a church seems universal ! Perhaps some expect, that the common elemen tary, principles which once composed the bodies of the decomposed dead, would, for the occasion, be collected again from the general storehouse of the atmosphere and earth, and would exhibit themselves, - on their re-organizatipn, raore hurtfiiL than at first. , Perhaps others expect that sorae of those unembodied spirits, with which mythology and priestcraft have in all ages deluded the vulgar,— though no credible evidence or natural probability was ever adduced of the existence or ap pearance of any such spirits, — -would without bpdies appear to their visual or-^ gans, and torment Or injure thera ! — Yes —-monstrous and absurd though it be — such are the prevalent weaknesses created by superstition, and wickedly instilled into 270 . A morning's walk. infant minds in the nursery, so as to go vern the' feelings and.jconduct of ninety- nine of every hundred persons in our cbmy paratively enlightened^society* , It.shopld now be well unders(;ood, that what is cointrary to uniform experience ought to be no object of faithr^conse- quently ,(;what. no man ever saw, ( none need expect to see — and what never did harm, hone need fear!' In tbis"view our poets plight aid the work of public educa tion,- ;by dispensing with their machlneiy of ideal personages, as tenditig to keep alive that superstition,, which a "Words worth . has recently proved' to be ^''un- necessary, in a popm that rivals the ef&rts of the Rosic^upian school.- Ought not the ghosts ,of Shakespeare to be supposed mer-ely as the effects of diseased vision, or a guilty imagination ? : Qught- an enlight ened 'audience to tolerate the mischievous! impressions 'produced on the minds ' of ignorance or youth by the gross exhibi- tipnrwhich now disgrace pur stage' in Hamletj -JRich^rd, ' and Macbeth ? •> We aU 1 FROM LONDON TO KBW. S7l know thati 1 fever ,of ,the brain, produces successions;. of spectres oi5 images^, the.re- iiult';ofiIdiseasedvorgans,; but , no oneevec conPeivted that guch iHelancholy.ieffects of disease aodld^' be::)seen mby healthy byri standersj^ tili- our stage-managerSv availed tiiieiB8ietvbS'ibfc.vulgar credulity, , and .dared to ^g^iyevshbHtasnce - to -diseased; ideas, as. a meansi 'fof fcgiiatifyihg their avarioe?; If Shaifep^JBatej! intended; to give visible Sub- kance-to dlis numenous ghostsi,(, he.merdy ctffliformed himself: to the; state. of know-* ledge- 'in !hisrday;, icdoidars atj jthe* assizes ..were.; filled with ¦¦ vif tims :of sppprstitioi^ .under charges of witehe»aft>rjlt .is; .however, ;'timpi Jhat we banish- such: /Credulity from. the -minds even ' erf the .lowest, vulgar;": as disgrace ful .to ; ireligion,: .education,; mprals, ., and reaiSOn i ' Humanly- speaking, I exclaimed-r-Am I flpt in the iHouSe of .God?;i Is, not this puny 'Structure a tribute of raan to the Architect of the 'Universe ? .What .a lesson 2/2 A morning's walk for man's pride !^-^lobk at this building, and behold the Universe ! Man is but a point of infinite space, with intellectual powers, bound in their sphese of action to his body, and subject with: it to the laws of motion and gravitation ! For such a being this may properly be the house of God; but it ought never to be forgotten, that the only house of God is a universe as boundless as his powers, and as eternal as his existence ! In relation to man and man's pride, what a sublime and over whelming contrast is presented by the everlasting now, and the universal here ! Yet how can the creature of mere rela tions, who exists by generating time, space, and other sensations, conceive of the immutable cause of causes, to whora his past and future, and his above and bplow, are as a single totality,! Wisest of men is he who knows the raost of such a Being; but, chained to a point, and. governed in all our reasonings by mere relative powers, vi'e can only conceive of ubiquity hy the contrast of FROM LONDON TO KEW. 273 our locality-^oi infinity by our dimen sions— oi eternity by our duration — and oi' omniscience hy our reason! Creatures of ' yiesterday, surrounded by blessings, it is natural we should inquire in regard to the origin and cause of the novel state in which we find ourselves; but the finite cannot reason on the infinite- — the tran sient on the eternal — or the local on the universal; and on such subjects all we can ascertain, is ;the , utter inadequacy of our powers to peirceive thera clearly. It seems, therefore, to be our duty to, en joy, to wonder, and to worship. On, every side of jne I beheld records of the wrecks of man, deposited here merely to increase the sympathy of the living for the place. Perhaps I was even breathing sorae of the gaseous effluvia which once corapPsed their living bodies : but, the gas of a huraan body/ differing in no respect from the gas generated in the great laboratory of the earth's surface, which I breathe hourly; and being in itself innojjious in quantity, if not in T 274 A morning's WALK quality, I felt no qualms from my consci ousness of its, source; The putrefactive process decPmposes the bodies of all ani mals, and returns their generic principles to. the common reservoirs pf carbon, hy drogen, nitrogen, and oxygen: through Ufe, the same process, varied in its pro portions, is going forvvard; jand the body is constantly resolving itself into tbe ge neric principles of nature, which generic principles again serve the purposes of respiration in other animals, apd renew other existences as suitably as though they had never before been employed fot the same purposes. ^ Hence it is probable that tbe identicalr atoms composing any of the elements of nature, may have existed in hundreds of different animals in different- ages of the world; and hence we arrive at a principle of metempsy chosis, without entangling ourselves in the absurdities with which priestcraft among the Eastern natiPns has clpthed and disguised it. Various tablets placed around the walls 3 FROM LONDON TO KEW. 275 record departed worth in many persons bf distinction. I could find no memo rials of the impostor Dee, vyhose aged remains were deposited :bere. He was bne of the last of the race of those men of science who liiade use of his knowledge to induce the vulgar to beUeye him a con- jiifor, or one possessed of the power of conversing with spirits. : His journals of this pretended intercourse w^re pub lished after his death, by one of the Ca- saiibons,^ in two folio volumes. Lilly's Memoirs record many of hia impostures, and there ia no doubt but in his time the public mind was much agitated by his ex travagancies. The mob more than once destroyed his house, for being familiar with their devil; and, what is more ejs- traordinary, he was often consulted, and even employed in negoeiatipns, by Queen Efeabeth. He pretended to see spirits in a small stone, lately preserved with his pap.eES in the British Museum. His spirits appear to have had bodies and garments thick enoP^tS) reflectcays of light, though T 2 276 A morning's walk they passed freely in and out of his stone, and through the walls of his roora ; and organs for articulation, which they exercised within the glass ! How slight an advance in knowledge exposes all such impostures ! In his spiritual visions, Dee had a con federate of the name of Kelly, who, of Course, confirmed all the oracles of bis master. Both, however, in spite of their spiritual friends, died miserably — tbe man by leaping out of a window, and the master in great poverty. Dee is the less excusable, because he was a man of fa mily and considerable learning, a fellow of Trinity-college, Cambridge, and a good mathematician. But, in an age in which, one Queen- imprisoned him for practising by enchantment against her Ufe, and her successor required him to name a lucky day for her coronation, is it to be won dered that a mere man, like tens of thou sands of our modern religious fanatics, persuaded himself that he was possessed of supernatural powers ? Beneath the same pavement, resolved from LONDON TO KEW. ?77 into kindred elements, though when in chemical union so different a totality, lie the remains of that Ulustrious patriot, Sir John Barnard, who passed a long life in opposing the' encroachments on liberty of the ministers of the first and second pf the Guelphs. His statue in the Royal Ex change, London, would attest his worth, if the same area was not disgra,ced by another, of the infemous Charles the Se cond, thereby confounding virtue and vice. Sir John, like Alderman Barber, acquired fame by his opposition to the Excise Laws, and by other exertions in defence of public liberty. I have beeh told by one who stiU remembers him, that he was an active littie raan, adored by the Coramon Hall, and much respected by various political parties for his long- tried worth. On the south side of the Communion table, I was so well pleased with some verses lately placed on a marble tablet, to record the virtues of the "V^iscountess Sidmouth, who died June 23, 1811, that T 3 27S. A morning's walk I could not refrain from copying them. The Viscount and his family have a pew in the church, and, I am told, are cpnstant attendants at the piprning-service op Sundays.. ¦ Not that to mortal eyes thy. spotless life Shew'd the best form of parent, child, aiid wife ; Not that thy vital current seem'd to glide, Clear -and immix'd, through the world's troublous tide ; That grace and beauty, form'd each beaft to win, Seeni'd but the casket to the gem within : Not- hence the fond presumption of our love, Wbicii, lift^ the spirit to the Saints above; Rijt that pure Piety's consqling pow'r Thy life illum'd, and cheer'd tby parting hour ; That each best gift bf charity was thine. The liberal feeling and the grace divine ; And e'en thy virtues humbled in the dust. In Heav'w's sure promise was thine only trust : Soolh'd by that hope. Affection checks the sigh. And hails the day-spring of eternity. Whenever the remains of the lord of this amiable woman are deposited oa the same spot, 1 venture humbly and respectfully to suggest, that the tablet to his memory should include a copy of the FROM LONDON TO KEW. SfS most eventful document of his Ufe and times. He was prirae-rainister when, in March" 1803* the ever-to-be-lamented message charging the French with making extensive military preparations in the ports of France and Holland, was ad vised by the ministry to be sent to both Houses of Parliament. During the past year he had obtained the gloi^ of con* clpding a treaty which restored tranquillity to a suffering world ; and yet the viru lence of a contemptible Opposition, and the empirical pretensions of an Ex-mi nister, led hira and his colleagues tardily to execute tlie article which was to re* store Malta to its Knights. A demand that this article should bp executed, led to discussions since made public, but which, in ray opinion, have not justified the character given of them in the message. Nor does it appear that the English am bassador at Paris had inquired or re monstrated with the French Government on the subject of the pretended mUitary preparations^ The flame, however, was 280 A MORNING'S WALK thus kindled, which spread in due time from kingdom to kingdom ; covering the whole earth with blood and desolation, M'asting millions of lives in battie, siege, imprisonment, or massacre ; and trans ferring all the rentals and industry of the people of England to the public creditors, to pay the interest of loans and other consequent obligations of the state ! Unhappily the genius of truth was hoodwinked at the time, by the general corruption of the press; and the spirit of PATRIOTISM was ovcrawcd by the passionate clamours of a whole people to be avenged for various alledged af fronts ! But at this distance of time these are inerely topics for the lamentation of history ! It is now, I fear, too late to in» stitute legislative inquiries; but the case wUl remain as a beacon to all people, who should be taught by it to consider minis ters of the Crown, though as amiable in private hfe as an Addington, as fallible pien, liable to be misled by intrigue or pas- siouj and therefore, in a public sense, not FROM LONDON TO KEW. 2Sl to he credited without other evidence than their own assertions. Let an exemplary INSCRIPTION on the torab' of the rai nister of that day serve therefore to teach all rainisters, never wilfully to depart in the most indifferent act of pubUc policy from THE truth; and warn them to pause be fore they commit the extensive interests of nations, while they or the people are under the influence of passion. Alas ! what frightful mischiefs plight have been averted if these considerations had govern ed the English people, or the English mi nistry, during the fatal discussions of Lord Whitw-prth at Paris ! In charity, I hope the Ministry believed that this dispute might have ended with a mere demonstration ; and I admit that no raan can foresee all the consequences of an action: yet, as the feelings which excited that message and directed those dehberations, continued to influence the Ministry during twelve years warfare, and led to the rejection of seven overtures for peace, made at difierent times by Napoleon; the character of the aae 28^ A morning's walk and the future security of the world against wars of aggression, seem to re quire that the origin of the late w^ar should even yet become an object of so lemn parliaraentary inquiry. The Crown may have the constitutional power of de~ daring war, but the ministers of the. Crown are responsible for the abuse of that power; and let it be reraerabered, that the origin of eveiy war is easily tried by tests to be found in Grotius, Puffen- DORF, Vattel, or other authorities on tbe laws of nations ; and that, without the eorabination of justice and necessity in its origin, no true glory can be acquired in its progress or in its results.* I learnt with regret that the improved * While these pages were printing, the Common CouncU of London, the second deliberative assembly in the empire, have presented an address to the Throne, in which they describe the late devastating Wars as " RASH AND RUINOUS, UNJUSTLY COMMENCED, AND PERTINACIOUSLY PERSISTED IN, WHEN NO RATIONAL OB JECT WAS TO BE OBTAINED;" and they add, llhat "IMMENSE SUBSIDIES WERE GRANTED TO FOREIGN POWERS TO DEFEND THEIR FROM LONDON to KEW. 283 Psalmody of Gardiner had not yet been introduced into the service of this OWN 'TERRITORIES, OR TO COMMIT AGGRESSIONS ON THOSE OF THEIR NEIGHBOURS." No friend of Truth could wish to see a more correct historical record of these melancholy exeats; and, whether the authors of them are allowed to drop intp the grave by the course of iiature, or should expiate their offences on a scaffold, there is not likely to be much difference of opinion about them in the year three thou sand EIGHT HUNDRED aud SIXTEEN. Per haps FIVE MILLIONS of men, and' a^ many women and children, have fallen victims, in the space of twenty-five years, to attempts, as visionary as wicked^ to ' destroy by the sword the assertion of Principles of Political justice, which necessarily grew out of the cultivation of reason, and which were corollaries of that INTELLECTUAL PHILOSOPHY of whichBACON laid the foundation, -apd which has been matured BySELDEN, Coke,' Milton, Sidney, Locke, Bolingbroke, Montesquieu, Blackstone, RoussBAu, D'Alembert, Hume, De Lolme, MiRA^AU, and Fox. Rights of social man de rived from such sources cannot be Overvyhelrtied, (though a divided people may have been overpowered, though hated dynasties may have been restored, and though Popery, the order of Jesuits, and the Holy Inquisition, may for a season have resumed their ascendency. 284 A morning's walk church, and that the drawling monkish tunes are preferred to those sublime pas sages of Haydn, Mozart, and Beet hoven, which that gentieman has so in geniously adapted to the Psalms of David. It raight have been expected that every church in the enlightened vicinage of the metropolis would, ere this, have adopted a raeans of exalting the spirit of devotion, which has received the high sanction of the Regent and the Archbishop of Can terbury, and which exhibits among its patrons nearly the whole bench of bishops. I suspect, indeed, that the shops of the mere trading Methodists attract as many auditors by their singing as by their preaching; consequently, enlarged churches and improved psalmody would serve to protect many of the people from becoming the dupes of that cant and craft of fanaticism, which is so disgraceful to the age, so dangerous to religion, and so inimical to the progress of truth and knowledge. Viewing this church in a statistical point of view, I counted 85 pews, capable from LONDON TO KEW. 285 of holding about 550 persons, and I learnt that about 100 charity-school and other children sit in the aisles. Hence, per haps, 600 attend each service; and, if 300 attend in the afternoon who, do not in the morning, then we may calculate the attendants on the churchrservice, in Ithis parish, at about gOO. The popula tion is, however, about 2100; frora which, deducting 300 children, it will appear that half the inhabitants are dissenters, me- thodists, or indifferents. Of these, about 200 belong to a chapel for the Indepen dents; and perhaps others attend favourite preachers in the vicinity. Such are the religious divisions of this parish; yet, as there are no manufactories, and the clergy man is well respected, thp attendants on the, Church may be considered as above even the general average of the Establish ment in other parishes. Iwas induced to ascend into the belfry, where I found ropes for eight bells-7-, tbose musical tones, which extend the" ,8phere of the Church's influence, by asso- S86 A MORNING'S WALK ciations of pleasure, devotion, or tfelaP- dbPly, through the- surrounding cOurtfry. What an effectivfe means of increaaiilg the sympathies of reUgion, and expiting them by the fire-sides, and on the Tery piUows of the people ! Who that, as bride or bridegroom, has heard them, in conjunction with the first joys of wedded love, does not feel the pleasurable asso* ciations of their lively peal on other si mUar events? Who; that through a series of years has obeyed their calUng chime on the Sabbath morning, as the signal of placid feelings towards his God, apd his assembled neigbbpurs, does not hear their weekly raonotony with devotion? And who is there that has performed the last rites of friendship, or the melancholy du ties of son, daughter, husband, wife, father, mother, brother, or sister, under the recurring tones of the awful Tenor, or more awful Dumb-peal, and does not feel, at every recurrence of the same ceremony, a revival of his keen, but un availing, regrets for the mouldering dead? FROM LONDON TO KEW. 28.7 Thus does , art play with our ingenuous feelings ; .and thus is an hnportance given tP the established Church in the con cords of man's nervous system, which ren ders it utinecessary for its prlesthpod to be jealous or ipVidious towards those who dissent from its docttines for consciPhce sake. . In truth, such is the imposing at titude of the national Church, that^ if the members leave the C]hurch to sit under strange pulpits, the incumbent should suspect his doctrines, his zeal, his talents, > or bis charity in the eollee-i tion of his dues and tithes. What but gross misconduct in tine priest^— vvhat but doctrines incompatible with the intel- Kgeace of an enlightened age^or what bat the odious impost of titbes-in-kiud, can separate the people from the building where tbey first beard the name of God, and which contains the bonejst of their aincestors ? In conceding to the influence of bells so many services to tbe establishment *?hich monppoliges thpra, I mpst,. how- 288 A morning's walk ever, not forget that the power they pos sess over the nerves, however agreeable or interesting in health, is pernicious, and often fatal, when the excitability is in creased by disease ? What medicine can allay the fever which is often exasperated by their clangor? What consohng hope can he feel who, while gasping for breath, or fainting froin debility, hears a knell, in vwhich "he cannot but anticipate bis own? — Hundreds are thus murdered in great cities every year by noisy peals or unseasonable knells. Sleep, the antidote of diseased action, is destroyed by the one; and Hope, the first of cordials, is extin guished by the other. The interesting sympathies and services of bells appear to be, therefore, too dearly purchased. In all countries, death-knells and funeral-tolUngs ought to be entirely abolished ; and even the ringing of peals should be liable to be interdicted, at the request of any medical practitioner. Nor ought the sanctuaries of the professed religion of peace and charity to.be disgraced at any time, by' from LONDON TO KEW. 2^9 Celebrations pf those murderous conflicts between raan and man, which too often take place, to gratify tb^ niaUce apd pride ofwFAK PRiNpES, or sustaiu the avarice and false calculations of their wickeij ministers. Erven in justifiable wars of 8elf:defence, such as the resistance to the unprincipled invasion of William the Nor man, :0r of tbe EngUsh people against the tyrannical Charles, the church of Chrisj: p.u,ght pnly to mourn at the unhappy price ofthe most decisive victory, , The solemn tick of the parish-clock re minding me of the progress of the day, I hj^steped down the worn stairs, which indi cated the busy steps of generations long returned to their gazeous elements, into the church-yard. The all-glorious sup, mpcking the fate of mortals, still shed a fascinating lustre on the' southern fields, apd reminded me, that the viUage on my left was the eastern Sheen, so called frpm, the very effect which I witnessed. Several pretty mansions skirted the fields, and thp horizon was beautifully filled by 490 A morning's walk 'the well-grown woods of Richmond Park, the walls ¦oi which were but half a mile -distant. The path across the meadow would have tempted nie to enjoy its rare beauty; but my course lay westward, and I turned from this brilliant scenery of Nature to the homely creations of man in the village street. -^ Contemptibly as I think of the motah of Dee, yet, as an able mathematician and ah exti-aordinary character, I could not resist my curiosity to view the house in which he resided. It is now a Ladies* boarding-school; and, on explaining the purpose of my visit, I was politely shown thi"ough the principal roOms. In two hundred years, it has of course under gone considerable alterations: yet parts 'of it stiU exhibit the architecture of the sixteenth century. From the front win dows I was shown Dee's garden, on the other side of the road, stiU attached to the house ; down the central path of which, through iron gates, yet standing. Queen EUzabeth- Psed to walk ffom her Par- FROM LONDON TO KEW. '.gQl flriiagfe in the Sheen road, to consult the wily conjurer On affairs of love and vvar. -' I found the-igouvernante of this' esta'- blishment. penfectly intelligent .on the sub ject of .her' proper, business, n^ Her un affected ¦politeness inducedl me to take a chai? iand recruit r. my isitrength. witU-a glass of water and a crust of bread. We talked on Education, andpartieuttrly on that .ol females. ;, She:: agreed that a Je» male ' pedant is at best, a ridiculous cha^ racter, oand that retired graces,' personal eiccomplisbmentSj v and/, useful , . doraestic acquirements^' vare best oadapted^ to, the destiny .r of ;.. woman. > We approved ; 6f dancing,- because it^affprds social recreat- •tion and iwholespme exercisei; and of music,,; for its. own sake, and as' a means of reUevipg .the- raonotony.. of the do- mdstip.' circle in long evenings, and bad weather, i . She icpinsidered the study- of a fijreign ..language; to be partly nepesi sary, -as. a means of->aCqpiring exact, ideas of the science -of -language' generaUy; and we agreed in preferring the ErePch, •U-.2 Sfl2 A MORNINGS WALK for its conversational powers and its universality as a living tongue. Nor did we differ in our views of the ne cessity of making the future companions of well-educated men intimately acquaint ed with the leading facts of geography and history, and with the general prin ciples of natural philosophy, and chemis try. I ventured to suggest, that the great objection to female boarding-schools, the neglect of the arts of housewifery might be obviated, by causing two of the pupils, of a certain age, to assist in the ma nagement of the store-room and kitchen for a week in rotation, during which they should fill up the items of the house keeper's account-book, and make pur chases of the family tradesmen. At this the good lady smiled-^Ah, sir, (said she,) yours is a plausible theory, but not one mother in ten would tolerate a practice which they would consider as a degradation of their daughters. — But, (said I,) is not household economy the chief pursuit of nine of ^very ten of the sex ; and is not the .system of education FROM LONDON to KEW. 293 incomplete, if not a waste of tirae, which does not embrace that pursuit as part of the plan? And just for that reason, (said she, ) that one in every ten may not have occasion to concern herself in household affairs, the whole avoid them as degrading — each looks for the prize in the lottery of fortune, and therefore all pitch themselves too high-^and it would be offensive to the pride and vanity of parents, to suppose that their daughter miglit haive occasion to know any thing of the vulgar employments of the house and the kitchen. — It is the parents, then, (said I, in conclusion,) who require instruction as much as their children. — We agreed, however, in our estimate of the superior advantages which children of both sexes enjoy in the present day, from the im proved and extended views of the authors of school-books. She was warm in her ¦praises of the Interrogative System of some recent authors ; and I found she was no stranger to the merits of the Uni versal Preceptor, and of the elementary V 3 254 'a morning's WALK Grammars of Geography, Histoiy, and Natural PhilPsophyj : -' As • I continued my '<;ourse towards the site of the ancient residence 'of the ArchbrshOpS Pf Canterbury, which lies at the' western ' extremity of the village, I could -PPt avoid 'asking' myself; how, in a country abounding in SUch means' of in struction, political fratud has cPntinupd so successful? Has education yPt' eflfected nothing for marikittd,' 6wiftg to' itssertility to power? la the freSs but a more effec tive engine for promulgetting sophistry, owing to its ready c^rrAption? Is reli gion in the pulpit but a plausible means of palliating the crinies pf statesmen, bwing to the dnibitidn of its prof eisors? WPuld it how be poSsiblis td poison SoCrates; banish Aristides,' and crucify Jesus, fpt teaching^truth and pra'ctising virtue? Alasl a respect for that same truth compelled me to say, Yes 1— Yes, said 1, thPre never was a country," nor an age^ in which artful misrepresentation could be more success'- fully praPtised thanat this day -in Britainl Can the press efffcctually sustain truth. FROM LONDON TO KEW. 29^^ while no;ppnal law prevents the purse and patronage of ministers and magistrates frotp poisoping its channels of pommuni-! catiqpwith the people? Can the pulpii be. expected to advocate , political truth,< whUe the patronage of the Church is in thp hands ! of the Adrainistration of the day? Can education, itseli be frfee from the in fluence of corrupt patronage, or the force of. numerous prejudices, while an abject conformity to the opinions of each previous age is the. passport to all Scholastic digni ties?. Does any established or endowed school, and do any number even of private schools, make it part of their professed course to teach their'i pupils the value of freedom, the duties of freemen, and the free principles of the British constitution ? Is .the system of the pubUc schools, , wherp our .statesmen and legislators are educated, addressed to thP heart as weU as the HEAD? Is poverty any where more de^ graded; cruelty to the helpless animal creation any where more remorselessly practised; or the pride of pedantry, and the vain-glory of human learning, any where 296 A morning's WALK more vaunted ? In short, are the vices of gluttony, drunkenness, pugilism, and pro digality, any where more indulged ? Yet, may we not say, as in the days of William of Wykeham, that " Manners make the man!" — and, on the subject of pubhc du ties, might we not derive a lesson even from the ancient institutions of Lycurgus? The best hopes of society are the pro gressive improvement of succeeding gene rations, and the prospect that each will add something to the stock of knowledge to that which went before it. But gloomy is the perspective, if the science of educa tion be rendered stationary or retrograde by the iron hand of power and bigotry, and if errors by these means are propagated from age to age with a species of acce lerated force. Yet, what signs of improve ment are visible in our pubhc schools, wherein are educated those youths who are destined to direct the fortunes of Bri tain in each succeeding age? Most of these schools were endowed at the epoch of the revival of learning; yet the exact from LONDON TO KEW. SQY course of instruction which was prescribed by the narrow policy of that comparatively dark age, is -slavishly followed even to Ibis hour ! Instead of knowledge, moral and physical, being taught in them, as the true end ofaUeducaition, — thosedead languages, which in the 15tb and l6th centuries were justly considered as the fountains of wis dom, are still exclusively taught ; as though the English language, now, as then, con tained no works of taste and information on a par with those of the ancients ; and as though such writers as BacPn, Shake speare, Milton, Newtpn, Locke, Addison, Pope, Johnson, Blackstone, Hume, Rot bertson, and Blair, had never lived ! Is it not to mistake the raeans for the end, to teach any language, except as the medium of superior philosophy ? And is it not a false inference, to ascribe exclusively to the study of languages, those habits of indus trious appUcation, which would grow with equal certainty out of the study of the useful sciences, if pursued with the same .system, and for a similar period of time ? 298 A morning's walk ' Reason! demandsj, however, on thi&sufe ject,- those, conbessions from the, jrijde of PEDANTRy. which tbat pride wiU never yield. : We!,seem,:-'liierefoEe, to be desf tined, by the force of circumstances, tp make slow :or -inconsiderable ladvances in civilization ; and it remains, for other na-' tions, 'the; bases- of .whose institutions are less entangled in prejudices, to raise the condition of. man higher in the scale of improvement; thartc can be expectedi in Britain.' We may,- ^& a reaultof gpogra-- phical' position, attain a certain idegree of national -distinction; but,, if our system of public education cannot bei made to keep pace with knowledge, and is not calculated to generate a succession .of patriots,> who are qualified to sustaJn.Uberty at home and justice abroad, we cannot f^iil to sink in our turn • to the level of '¦ modern lEgypt, Greece, and Italy, i i Those • hotbeds of human genius were ultimately ' degraded by the triuraph- bf prejudiceiSi over princi ples,; byjthe extinction of public :spipit,'b7 the preference pf despotism^ over liberty, FROM LONDON TO KEW. 299 and by the glare of foreign conquests. The countries, the soil, and even the cities remain; cbut;. as their youth are no longer trained ; in the love 6f truth and Uberty, they CKistibut as beacons to warn, other people of thfirfeU and its causes. - Iturned aside to view a manufactory of DelftandiStone ware, , for which;, among potters; Mortlake is, famous. : A silly air bf.-anystery '^veiled ;these vvork-shpps sfrom public view;; and,( as I professed mine to be;af visit of,' mere curiosity, the , conduc- tc^'s taciturnity increased with thee variety of imj^tunsatisfied questions, sit;, was in vainilLassured him that J was no; potter— r thatc experimental philosophy :and chemis- tcy^.had stript empiricism of its garb-^and thatano secret,! ;, worth -presemngi could long be kept ina manufactory which em ployed a' dozen workmen, at 20*. a. week; The principall articles.; made here are those brown stone jugs, .of which; the song telisius, one was made of ;the clay of Toby Pilpot;iaAd;I.'GO.aldn'othelp=femarkjng, that the giroup&^on these JE^s are precisely; thpsie 300 A morning's walk on the" common pottery of the Romans. I learnt, however, that the patterns em- plpyed here are not copied from the antique, but from those used at Delft, of which this manufactory is a successful imitation in every particular : and perhaps the Delft manufactory itself is but a continua tion of a regular series of stone or earthen ware manufactories, from the age of the Romans. Each may have continued to imitate the approved ornaments of its predecessors, till we trace in the produc tions of this contemporary pottery, the patterns used by the nations of anti quity when just emerging from barbarism. Hunting, the most necessary of arts to the vagrant and carnivorous savage, is the em ployment celebrated on all these vessels. A stag, followed by ferocious quadrupeds and hpngry bipeds, forms their general ornament I have picked up the same groups among Roman ruins, have often contemplated them in the cabinets of the curious, and here I was amused at view ing them in creations but a week old. FROM LONDON TO Kpw. 301 To, take off ornamental irapressions on plastic clay, was a contrivance which Would present itself to the first potters — but perhaps it was the foundation of all our proud arts of sculpture, painting, hieroglyphic design, writing, seal-engrav ing, and, finally, of printing and copper plate engraving ! What an interesting series! — But I soleranly put the question, Have we arrived at the last of its terms ? Is the series capable of no further applica tion, extension, or variation ? Have we Cpnceived the utraost liraits of its abstrac tions ? Have we exarained the powers of all its terms with equal care ? In one sense, we .may never get beyond a Phidias or a Cfinova — in another, beyond a WooUet or a Bartolozzi — or, in a third, beyond a Corregio or a David ; — but have we suffi ciently examined and husbanded the ab stractions of Thoth or Cadmus ?— -Ought not the signs of ideas, ere this, to have become abstract representations, as univer sal in their signification as ideas them selves ?'— -Ought we to be obliged to study 302 A MOBBUNa's WALK r all languages and many . character^ ;' in order to comprehend the ideas, which are comraon to the whole human ra.ce? Are ideas more numerous; than musical soupds^ and tones, and tupes?. Do pot the powers of musical characters apd of the telegraph prove the facility apd capacity of , very simr pie combinations ? , Dbe^ not the jCk-ist- masgame of Tssyew^j/ipdicsttp.. the narrow range of all our ideas ? And i§ npt a .feict thereby ^ascertained^ , from whiph WP.imay copcpive the practicabiUty of so cpmbipipg biei;oglyphic with arbitrary (^^r9jetp^,;,@,s to beable to readimen's ideas withopt.'ibhp intervention of a hundred .tongues ?i s-i ii,. On leaving this jpanufaptorj^v I. pro ceeded about a hundred yards,- -through the main, street ; apd, turning a corner on the right, beheld the ancient gateway; .novr bricked pp, and .the ruined, walls of an enclosure, sanctifiBdi Peter, and be- iieiifed that, '.'ifi welcoraed at the one, they should be eqeally welcomed, at the other! Poor souls-^they and their, spiritual pro- Jtectors have ;1alike passed away--and we •can now look with the eye Pf PhUosophy, son thp impotentimpostures of pne party, •j^ind on. the unsuspfecting credulity of the ' pther ! ¦ -;T was in haste'^yet I could pot avoid stopping five minutes'-T>yes, reader, and it is a lesson r to; human pomp — -I could v^ait but five minutes to contemplate the gate through which had passed thirtyrfour suc- •iileSsi^'e Archbishops of Canteribury; from 'Anselm, in the' tiipe of WilUsimi tiie Nor- 304. A morning's walk man, to Warhara and Cranraer, the plianf tool* of the tyrant Tudor. As leaders of tbe Catholic Church, we may now, in this Protestant country, speak, without of fence, of their errors and vices. Ambi tion and the exercise of power were doubt less the ruling passions of the raajority, who have shown theraselves little scrupu lous as to the means by which those pas- siops might be gratified; — yet it would be upcandid not to adrait that many men, like the present amiable Protestant archbishop, have filled this See, whose eminent virtue, liberality, and piety, were their principal recommendations — and who doubtless be lieved all those articles of the Church's faith which they taught to others. They were, in truth, wheels of a machine whicU existed before their time ; and they honest ly performed the part assigned them, with out disputing its origin or the sources of its powers ; prudently considering that, if they endeavoured to pull it in pieces, they were likely themselves to become the first victims of their temerity. Thus.doubtless. it from LONDON TO KEW. 305 was with Cicero and the philosophers of antiquity; they found theological macninery powerful enough to govern society; and though, on the subject of the Gods, they prudently cohfprmed, or were silent, yet we are not at this day warranted in sup posing that they obsequiously reverenced the absurd theology of the romance of Homer. Of the archbishops who have passed this gate, St. Thomas a Becket was perhaps the greatest bigot; but the exaltation of the ecclesiastical over the temporal power was the fashion of his day ; and obedience and allegiance could scarcely be expected of a clergy who, owing aU their dignities to the Pope, owned no authority superior to that of the keeper of Peter's Keys to the Gates of Heaven ! I could not, even in thus transiently glancing at these meagre remains, avoid the interesting recollection, that this por tico once served as a sanctuary forthe con trition of guilt against the unsparing ma lignity of law. In those days, when bi- 306 A morning's walk gotry courted martyrdom as a passport to eternal glory, and when, in consequence, the best principle of religion was enabled to triumph over the malice of weak princes and the tyranny of despots, this gate (said I) served as one of many avenues to the emblem of that Divinity to whom the in terior was devoted. It justly asserted the authority of the religion of charity, whose Founder ordered his disciples to pardon offences, though multiplied seventy tiraes seven times. Yet, alas ! in our days, how much is this divine precept forgotten ! Is not the sanguinary power of law suffered to devour its victiras iov first relapses from virtue, as unsparingly as for any nuraber of repetitions ? Do not its sordid agents exult in the youth or inexperience of of fenders, and often receive contrition and confession as aggravating proofs of more deliberate turpitude ? Has not the modern sanctuary of Mercy long been shut, by forras of state, against the personal sup plications of repentance, and against hum ble representations of venial errors of cri- FROM LONDON TO KEW. 307 minal courts? If sinners wOiild approach that gate, are they not stopped at the very threshold, and obliged to rely on the in tercession of sprae practised minister, or seek the good offices of illiberal clerks ? Is this Christendom, the volume of whose faith tells its votaries to knock without fear at the gate of Mercy, and it shall be opened by an Heavenly Father ?r— or Eng land, where a solemn law enacts, that it is the right of the subject to petition the King, and that all commitments and pro secutions for such petitioning are illegal ?— or civiUzed Europe, where it has so often been asserted that the receiving of peti tions, and granting their prayer, is the most enviable branch of royal preroga tive ? Alas 1 will the golden mean of rea son never govern the practices of men? Must we for ever be the dupes of super stition, or the slaves of upstart authority ? Are we doomed never to enjoy, in the ascendancy of our benevolent sympathies, a medium between the bigotry of the Crqzier, the pride ofthe Sceptre, and the cruelty of the Sword ? ' 308 A morning's walk Nor ought it to be forgotten, that the benevolence which flowed from this por tico, served as a substitute for the poor's- rates, throughout the adjoining district. Thus Food, as well as Merct, appear ed to flow from Heaven, through the agency of- the Romish priesthood ! Thus they softened the effects of the monopolies of wealth, and assuaged the severities of power ! And thus, duration was conferred on a system which violated comraon sense in its tenets ; but, in its practices, exhibit ed every claim on the affections and gra titude of the people ! At this gate, and at a thousand others spread over the land, no poor man sougnt to satisfy his hungei in vain. He was not received by any grira- visaged overseer; not called on for equivo cal proofs of legal clairas ; not required to sell his liberty in the workhouse as the price of a single meal ; not terrified by the capricious justice of a vulgar consta ble ; nor in fear of the infernal machine, called a pass- cart — but it was sufficient that he was an hungered, and they gavp *ROM LONDON TO KEW. 309 him to eat — or that he was sick, aiid they gave him medicine ) Such was the systera of those times ; not more perfect for being ancient, but worthy of being remember- fed, because justified by long experience. Thrice the relative wealth, and as much active benevolence, are at this day exerted to relieve the still unsatisfied wants of the poor, simply because our workhouses are not regularly provided with an hospitable monastic portico, where temporary wants might be supplied with a wholesome meal, Without the formality of regular admission, without proofs of settlement, without the terrors of the House of Correction, or the horrors of a middle-passage in the pass- cart ! The tenderest sympathy would then be able to excuse itself from the obligation of granting eleemosynary aid — the act of begging might be justly punished as a crime — and crimes themselves could never be palliated by pleas of urgent want. This entire site was too much consecrated by historical associations to be passed without further examination. A slight X 3 310 a MORNlNG^S WALK expression of my feelings procured every attention from Penley, the gardener, who told me that his family bad occupied it since the revolution, and that he remem bered every part above fifty years. He took me to a summer-house, on the wall next the water, the ruins of which were of the architecture of the tirae of the Plan tagenets; and, indeed, the entire wall, above half a mile in circuit, was of that age. Of the ancient palace no vestige re mained; and he could guess its precise site only by means of the masses of brick work which he discovered by dicing in certain parts of the garden. If I -was, however, littie gratified by remains of the labours of man, I was filled with astonishment at certain speciraens of vegetation, unquestionably as ancient as the last Catholic archbishops. Among these were two enormous walnut-trees, twelve feet round the trunk, the boughs of which were themselves considerable trees, spreading above twenty-six yards across. FROM LONDON TO KEW. 311 Each tree covered above a rood of ground ; and so mas«y were the lower branches, that it has been found necessary to support them "^If props. Their height is equal to their breadth, or about seventy feet; and I was surprised to find, that, notwith^ standing their undoubted age, they stUl bear abundance of fine fruit Mr. Penley assured me, that in his time he had seen no variation in thera; they had doubtiess attained their fuU growth in his boyhood, but since then they had maintained a steady maturity. At present they must be considered as in a state of slow decay ; but I have no doubt that in the year 1916 they will coptinue grand and productive .trees. I was equally struck with some box- trees, probably of far greater antiquity. They were originally planted in a ^emicir- ple to sprve as an arbout" ; but in the pro gress of centuries tbey have grown to the prodigious height of thirty feet, and their trunks are from six to nine inches in dia- X 4 3i2 A morning's walk meter.* And what was strikingly curious, in the area which they enclose is seen the oval table of the arbour, evidently of the same age. It is of the species -Ql Stone. called Plymouth marble, — massy, and so well-wrought as to prove that it was not placed there at the cost of private reve nues. It was interesting, and even affect ing, to behold these signs of comfort and good cheer stUl remaining, so raany ages after those who enjoyed them have passed away like exhalations or transient meteors ! I would have sat down, and, with a better conscience than Don Juan, have invoked « * The box-wood used in England by the engravers on wood is often twelve inches iu diameter ; this, how ever, is not of Euglish growth, but comes from Turkey, where it is held in slight estimation. .Of course, when engravinj;s on wood are larger than twelve inches ia diameter, two blocks are joined together, for it is only the transverse section that can be wrought for this purpose. The most famous plantations of box in England are on the White-hill, near Dorking ; but tbe trees there are mere sticks and shrubs compared with those at Mortiake; yet many of them are known to be two hundred years old. TROU LONP0H TO JtEW- 31^ their ghosts over a bottie of the honest gardener's currant-wine ; but he had filled up the eUiptical area of the trees with a pile of fagots, of which the old table serves as a dry basement. What was less wonderful, though to the full as interesting — was the circumstance that the gardener has, at different times, in digging up the roots of his old fruit-trees, found them imbedded in skeletons of per' sons whp were interred in or near the chapel of the archbishops. He told me, that a short time before my visit, in remov ing a pear-tree, he had taken up three perfect skeletons ; and that one of them was pronounced by a surgeon in the neigh-' bourhood to be the frame-work of a man full seven feet high. This probably was an accidental circumstance ; for it is not to be supposed that any of the interments on this spot took place in those rude ages when bulk and stature led to rank and distinction, and, by Consequence, to cost ly funerals and encasements of stone, which often surprize us with specimens of 314 a morning's walk an apparently gigantic race. Doubtless, however, here were interred hundreds of pious persons, who calculated, in their last moments, on the protection of this consecrated ground till " the Earth should be caUed to give up its Dead;" and now, owing to the unsatisfied passion which the first " Defender of the Faith" felt for Anna Boleyn, this cpnsecrated spot, and a thou sand sirailar ones, have been converted into cabbage-gardens ! Perhaps more than one archbishop, many bishops, and scores of deans, ange lic doctors, and other reverend person ages, lie in this now profaned and disho noured spot ! So great an outrage might, one would have supposed, have led them« according to ordinary notions, again to walk the earth, to despoil the garden, and disturb the gardener's rest ! I expressed my fears on this point to the worthy man ; but he assured me, these good gentlefolks ¦lie very quiet ; and that, if they produced any visible effect, it was as manure, in rendering the part where theyUe a little FROM LONDON TO KEW. 315 more productive than the other parts. I shuddered at this lesson of humility — Alas ! thought I, is'it for such ends that we pam per ourselves^ — that some of ns boast of being better than others — that we seek splendid houses and superfine clothing — and render our little lives wretched by hunting after rank, and titles, and riches I After aU, we receive a sumptuous funeral, and are affectionately laid in what is called -consecrated ground, which some political revolution, or change of religion, con verting into a market-garden, our bodies then serve but as substitutes for vulgar manure! If such an end of the iiiustrious and proud men, whose reraains now fer-' tUize this garden, had been contemplated by them, how truly would they have be come disciples of the humble Jesus — ^and how horror-struck would they have been at the fantastic airs which, in their lives, they were giving themselves ! — Yet, is there a reader of these pages, the end of whose mortal career may not be sirailar to theirs ? --^and ought he not to apply to him- 316 A morning's WALK self the lesson thus taught by the known fate of the former inhabitants of the archi episcopal palace of Mortlake? I shook my head at Penley, and told him, that hewas a terrible " leveller," and that, in making manure of archbishops and bishops, he was one ofthe most effec tive moralists I had ever conversed with ! In walking round this garden, every part proved that its soil had been enriched from all the neighbouring lands. Whether, according to Dr. Creighton, there are classes of organic particles adapted to form vegetables and animals over and over again; or whether, according to the mo dern chemistry, all organized bodies consist of carbonaceous, metallic, and gaseous substances in varied combinations; it is certain, that the well-fed priesthood, who formerly dwelt within these walls, drew together for ages such a supply of the pabulum of vegetation, as will require ages to exhaust. All the trees of this garden are of the raost luxuriant size : gooseberries and currants in other gardens from LONDON TP KEW. 317 grow as shrubs ; but here they forra trees of four or five feet in height, and a cir cumference of five or six yards. In short, a luxuriance approaching to rank- ness, and a soil remarkable for its depth of colour and fatness, characterize every part The abundant produce, as is usual through all this neighbourhood, is Conveyed to Covent- Garden market in the night, -and there disposed of by salesmen that attend on behalf of the gardeners. I took my departure from this inclosure with emotions that can only be felt. I. looked again and again across the space which, during successive ages, had given birth to so many feelings, and nurtured so many anxious passions; but which now, for many ages, has, among bustling gene rations, lost all claim to sympathy or no tice; and displays, at this day, nothing but the still mechanism of vegetable life. There might be little in the past to rouse the af fections; but in the difference bf manners, there was much to amuse the imagination. It had been the focus, if not of real 318 A morning's walk piety, at least of ostensible religion; and, dead as the spot now appeared, its tpoulderipg wg,Us, some of those gigantic trees, apd, above all, the box-free arbour, had, in remote ages, echopd frpm hour to hour the melodious chaunts and -ipipp^ng ceremonials of the Romish Church. Here moral habits sapctified the routine of life, and conferred happiness as a necessary result of restraint and decorum — and here Vice never disgraced Reason by public ex hibitions; but, if lurking in any breast, confessed its own deformity by its disguises and its secresy. In surveying such a spot, the hand Of Tirae softens down even t.'ie asperities of superstition, and the shade of this glooray site, contrasted with the bright days of its prosperity, inclined me to forget the intolerant policy which was wont to emanate frora its spiritual coun cils. Under those fruit-trees, I exclaimed, lie all that remains of the follies, hopes, and superstitions ofthe former occupants; for, of them, I cannot remark as of the torpid remains in Mortiake church-yard. FROM LONDON TO KEW. 319 that they live in the present generation. — ^0 ! these dupes of clerical fraud devoted themselves Ao celibacy as a service to the prpcreative Cause of causes, and be carae withered limbs of their faraily trees. We can, however, now look on their re mains, and presume to scan their errors: — but let us recollect, that, though we are gazers to-day, we shall be gazed upon tOr morrow— and that, though we think our selves wise, we are, perhaps, fated to be coraraiserated in pur turn by the age which follows. Alas ! said I, when will the ger neration arrive that will not merit as much pity from succeeding generations as those poor monks ? Yet how wise, how infalli ble, and how intolerant, is every sect of reUgion — every school of phUosophy— every party of temporary politicians — and every nation in regard to every other nation! Do not- these objects, and all exertions of reasoning, prove, that the climax of human wisdom is humility? Commending the bones of the monks to the respect of the gardener, ,whose fieelings, 3 320 A morning's walk todo him justice, were in unison with my own, I proceeded, by the side of the wall, towards the banks of the Thames. The relics of exploded priestcraft which I had just contemplated in the adjoining garden, led me into an amusing ¦ train of thought on the origin and progress of superstition. I felt that the various mytho logies which the world has witnessed, grow out of mistakes in regard to the phenomena of SECONDARY CAUSES ; aU natural phe noraena, accordingly as they were fit or unfit to the welfare or caprices of men, being ascribed, by the barbarous tribes who subsequently becarae illustrious na tions, to the agency oigooaand, ew27 spirits. However absurd might be the follies of these superstitions, they became in grafted on Society, and were implanted in the opening minds of every successive gene ration. Of course, the age never arrived which did not inherit the greater part of the prejudices of the preceding age. Rea son and philosophy might in due time Ulumine a few individuals ; yet even these. FROM LONDON TO KEW. 321 influenced by early prejudices, and a pru^ dent regard for their fortunes and personal safety, would rather support, or give a beiieficial direction to, mythological super stitions, than venture to expose and oppose thera. Hence it was that the Egyptians, Greeks, and Roraans, continued polytheist? through the raost briUiant epochs of thei? history; and hence their philosophers, as Pythagoras, Plato, and others, gave to the whole the plausibUity of system, by affecting to demonstrate that tbe first CAUSE nPfcessarily and proximately gene rates iraraortal gods ! Hence too it is that philosophers have, in different past ages, , undertaken to demonstrate the verity of all eeligions, and according to the religion ofthe government under which they lived, they have either supported Polytheisra, Theism, Sabinisni, Judaism, Popery, or Mahomedan- ism. The fate of Soe RATES has never been ^rgotten by any philosopher who pos sessed the chief attribute of wisdom — prudence; and no benevolent raan wiU ever seek to disturb a public faith which Y 322 A morning's walk promotes public virtue, because the me morials of history prove that no discords have been so bloody as those which have been generated by attempts to change reli gious faith. This class of huraan errors can indeed be corrected only by establishing in civihzed countries practical and unequi vocal systems of toleration; because, in that case, truth and reason are sure, in due tirae, to establish themselves, while falsehood and fraud must sink into merited contempt. The fleeting, wild, and crude notions of savages, constituted therefore the first stage in the progress of mythological super stition. Their invisible agencies would however soon have forms conferred upon them by weak or fertile imaginations, and be personified as men or animals, according to the nature of their deeds. To pray to them for benefits, and to deprecate their wrath, would constitute the second stage. In the mean time, individuals who might, by chance or design, become connected with some of tliese supernatural agencies, would trom LONDON TO KEW. 323 be led, by vivid or gloomy iraaginations, to deceive even themselves by notions of election or inspiration ; and, then super adding ceremonials to worship, they would. form a select class, living, without manual labour, on the tributes offered by the peo ple to satisfy or appease the unseen agen« cies. This would constitute a third stage. Each priest would then endeavour to extol the importance of the god, of whom he believed hiraself to be the minister; and he would give to his deity a visible form, cause a temple to be buUt for him, deliv^er from it his oracles or prophecies, and affect to work miracles in his name. This would constitute the fourth stage. The terror of unseen powers would now be found to be a convenient engine of usurped huraan authority, and hence an association would be forraed between the teraporal and invi sible powers, the latter being exalted by the forraer in having its teraples enlarged and its priests better provided for. This would constitute the fifth stage; or the Ponsummation of the system as it has lY 2 324 A morning's walk been witnessed in India, Persia, Egypt," Greece, and Italy. — Hence among the Hindoos, those personified agencies have been systematized under the titles of Brah ma, Vishnu, Siva, Crishna, &c. Among the Egyptians, they were worshipped in the forms of living animals, and caUed Osiris, Araraon, Oris, Typhon, Isis, &c. Araong the Chaldeans, and, after them, among the Jews, they were classed in principalities, powers, and dorainions of angels and devils, under chiefs, who bore the names of Raphael, Gabriel, Michael, Moloch, Legion, Satan, Beelzebub, &c. Among the Greeks, the accommodating Plato flattered the priests and the vulgar, by pretending to demonstrate that their per sonifications were necessary eraanations from THE one; and he, and others, arranged the worship of thera under the names of Jupiter, Neptune, Minerva, Ve nus, Pluto, Mars, &c. Among the nor thern NATIONS, they assumed the names of Woden, Sleepner, Hela, Fola, &c. Every town and viUage had, more- 3 from LONDON TO KEW. 325 ever, its protecting divinity, or guardian saint, under some fantastical name, or the narae of some fantastical fanatic ; and, even Pvery man, every house, every plant, every brook, every day, and every hour, according to most of those systems, had their accompanying genius! In a word, the remains of these superstitions are still so mixed with our habits and language, that, although we pity the hundreds of ¦wretched victims of legal wisdom, who under Elizabeth and the Stuarts were burnt to death for witchcraft ; and abhoi the ghosts of Shakespeare, his fairies, and his enchantments; yet we still countenance the system in most of the personifications of language, and practise it when we speak even of the spirit of PhUosophy and the genius of Truth. Nor have philosophers themselves, either in their independent systems, or in the systems of the schools, steered clear of the vulgar errors of mythologists. They have in every age introduced into nature active causes without contact, continuity, or proxi-^ y 3 32S A morning's walk mity; and, even in our days, continue tp, extort worship towai'ds the. unseen and occult powers of attraction or syrapathy, and of repulsion or antipathy ! It is true, they say that such words only express re sults or phenomena, and others equivocate by saying there is in no case any contact : — but I reply, that to give names to proxi mate causes does not correspond with my notions of the proper business of phi losophy; and that, ih thousands of in stances, there is sensible contact, and in all nature some contact of intermediate media, in the affections of which, may be traced the laws governing the pheno mena of distant bpdies, At the hour in which I write, the recognized philosophical divinities are called Space, Matter, Inertia, Caloric, Expansion,, Mp- tion. Impulse, Clustering Power, Elasticity, Atomic Forms, Ato mic Proportions, Oxygen, Hydro gen, Nitrogen, Chlorine, Iodine, Electricity, Light, Excitabili ty, Irritability, &c. AU these have FROM LONDON TO KEW. 327 their priests, worshippers, propagandists, and votaries, among some of vvhom may be found as intolerant a spirit of bigotry as ever disgraced any falling church. As governments do npt, however, ally them selves to PhUosophy, there is happily no danger that an heretical or reforming Philosopher will, as such, ever incur the hazard of martyrdom ; and, as reason de cides aU disputes in the court of Philoso^ phy, there can be no doubt, but, in this court at least, Truth wiU finally prevaU. HaU, Genius of Philosophy ! HaU, thou poetical personification of wisdora ! HaU, thou logical abstraction of all experiraental knowledge ! I hail thee, as thou art rer presented in the geniuses of Pythagoras, Thales, Aristotle, Archimedes, Ptolemy; Columbus, Bacon, Galileo, Descartes, Newton, Boyle, Euler, Buffon, Franklin, Beccaria, Priestiey, Lavoisier, Cavendish, Condorcet, Laplace, Herschel, BerzeUus, Jenner, Dalton, Cuvier, and Davy;, and J haU thee, as thou excitest the ambition Y 4 328 A MORNING S WALK of the soUtary student of an obscure vU lage, to raise himself among those gods of the human race ! How raany privations must thy votaries suffer in a sordid world; and how raany human passions raust they subdue, before they can penetrate thy mazy walte, or approach the hidden sanc tuaries of thy teinple of Truth ! Littie thinks the babbhng poHtician, the pedantic linguist, or the equivocating metaphysician, of the watchful hours which thy wor shippers must pass, — of the never-ending patience which they must exert, — of the concurring circurastances which raustfavour their enthusiasra ! Whether we gonsider the necessary raagnitude of the library, the ascending intricacy of the books, the multitude of the instruments, or the variety of the experimental apparatus in the use of which the searchers into thy mysteries must be familiar; we are compelled to re verence the courage of him who seeks pre eminence through thee, and to yield to those mortals who have attained thy fa» FROM LONDON TO KEW. 329 vours, our wonder, admiration, and gra titude!* * The system of Physics which I have for raany years inculcated, in the hope of removing froui Phi losophy the equivocal word attraction, supposes that space is filled with an elastic medium, — that this medium permeates bodies in proportion to their quantities of matter, — that resistance or re-actioa takes place between the universal medium of space and the novel arrangements of matter in bodies, — that this action and re-action diverge in the medium of space from the surfaces of bodies,- — and that, like all diverging forces, they act inversely as the squares of the distances. That, if there were but one body in the universe, it would remain stationary by the uniform action of the surrounding medium, — that the creation of another body would produce phenomena between them, owing to each intercept ing the action of the medium of space on the other, in proportion to the angles mutually presented by their bulks, — that two such bodies so acted upon by an universal medium must necessarily fall together, owing to the difference between the finite pressure pn their near sides, and the infinite pressure on their outsides, — that a stone falls to the earth, because, with rpgard to it, the earth intercepts an angle of 180° of the medium of space on its near or under side ; while, with regard to the earth, the stone in tercepts but 3 sqiall proportion of a setond, — that 330 A morning's walk Overtaking three or four indigent chil dren, whose darned stockings and carefuUy- patched clothes bespoke some strong mo- " these actual centripetal forces are very slight, be tween such distant bodies as the planets, — and, that the law of the forces is necessarily as their bulks directly, and as the squares of their distances in versely. That the centrifugal forces result from the sarae pressure or impulse, — that the varied densities of the opposite sides of the masses, as land and water, occasion a uniform external pressure to pro duce rotation on an axis, — that the action or oscil lation of the fluid surfaces, a consequence of the rotation, constantly changes the mechanical centre of the raass, so as thereby to drive forward the ma thematical centre in an orbit, — and that this is. the purpose and effect of the tides, increased by the action and re-action of the fluid and solid parts. That centripetal and centrifugal forces so created, are necessarily varied by the diverse arrangements of the solid and fluid parts of planetary bodies, as we see in the northern and southern hemispheres of the earth, — and that hence arise the varied motions, the elliptical orbits, and all the peculiar phenomena. Attached as the moderns are to the terms attraction and repulsion, I produce this theory with due de ference to their prejudices ; and I venture to pre. sume, that, on examination, it will be found to t)e FROM LONDON TO KEW. 331 tive for attention in their parents, I was induced to ask them sorae questions. They said they had been to Mortiake School; and I collected frora them, that they were part of two or three hundred who attend a fair induction from the phenomena, and also in perfect accordance with all the laws of motion. It accounts for the uniform direction and moderate exertion of the centripetal force towards the largest body of a system ; for the mutual actions of a system of bodies, or of many systems, on each other ; and for the constantly varying direction of the centrifugal force,, by shewing that it is generated within the mass. • The term repulsion is even more disgraceful to Philosophy than that of attraction; all repulsion being in truth but a relative phenomenou between at least three bodies ; and its most palpable appearance in electricity being bui; a stronger mechanical action towards opposite surfaces. The local impulses of magnets, and of bodies going into chemical union, are not better explained by Kepler's gravitating sympathy, than by this doctrine of mechanical inter ception ; but, I have no doubt that the former of these will, in due time, be traced to the difference between the rotary motion of the Equatorial and Polar regions ; and the latter to some laws of the - atomic theory, arising out of the shape and arrange ment of the component partieles, with reference to those of surrounding bodies. 335 A MORNING S WALK one of Dr. Bell's schools, which had lately been established for the instruction of poor children in this vicinity. I found that, until this establishraent had been formed, these children attended no school regularly — and, in reply to a question, one of them said, "Our father could not afford to pay Mr. sixpence a week for us, so we could not go at all ; but now we go to this school, and it costs father nothing." This was as it should be ; the social state ought to supply a preparatory education of its merabers — or, how can a governraent ex pect to find moral agents in an ignorant population — how can it presume to inflict punishments on those who have not been enabled to read the laws which they are bound to respect — and how can the professors of religion consider themselves as performing their duty, if they have not enabled all children to peruse the volume of Christian Revelation? We are assured by Mr. Lancaster, that George THE Third expressed the benevolent wish that every. one of his subjects should be enabled to read the Bible; and his sue- ^PROM LONDON TO KEW. 338 cessors will, it is to be hoped, not lose sight of so admirable a principle. But a few ages ago, to be able to read conferred , the privileges ofthe clerical character, and exempted men from capital punishments — how improved, therefore, is the present state of society, and how different raay it yet becorae, as prejudices are dispelled, and as liberal feelings acquire their just ascendancy araong the rulers of nations'! These boys spoke of their school with evi dent satisfaction ; and one of thera, who proved to be a monitor, seemed not a little proud of the distinction. Whether the system of Mr. Lancaster or of Dr. Bell enjoy the local ascendancy; or whether these public seminaries be " schools fpr all," or schools in which the dogmas of some particular faith are taught, I am indifferent, provided there are some such schools, and that all children are enabled to read the Bible, and " the Catechism of their Social Rights and Duties." Seeing several respectable houses facing the meadow which led to the Thames, I inquired of a passing female the names of 334 A MORNINGS WALK their owners, and learnt that they were chiefly occupied by widow ladies, to whom she gave the emphatic title of Madam— ^ though she called one of tbem Mistress. It appeared that those who were denomi' nated Madams were widows of gentlemen who, in their lives, bore the title of Esquires ; but that the Mistress was an old maid, whom her neighbours were ashamed longer to call by the juvenile appellation of Miss. Madam , whose name I ought not to have forgotten, has devoted a paddock of four or five acres to the corafortable provision of two super annuated coach-horses. One of thera, I was assured, was thirty-five years old, and thp other nearly thirty; and their venerable appearance and pleasant pasture excited a strong interest in favour of their kind- hearted raistress. Such is the influence of good example, that I found her paddock was opposite the residence of the equally amiable Valentine Morris, who so liberally provided for aU his live-stock about thirty years ago, and whose oldest FROM LONDON TO KEW. 335 horse died lately^' after enjoying his master's legacy above twenty-four years. I now descended towards a rude space near the Thames, which appeared to be in the state in which the occasional overflow ings and gradual retrocession of the river had left it. It was one of those wastes which the lord ofthe manor had not yet enabled sorae indpstrious cultivator to dis guise; and in large tracts of which Great Britain still exhibits the surface of the eatith'in the pristine state in which it was left by the secondary causes that have given it forra.. The Thames, doubtless, ina remote age, covered the entire site ; buC it is the tendency of rivers to narrow themselves, by promoting prolific vegetable creations on their consequently increasing and encroat;hing banks, though the vari ous degrees of fall produce every variety of currents, and consequently every variety of banksj in their devious course. In due tirae, the course of the river becomes choaked where a flat succeeds a rapid, and the detained waters then form lakes in the interior. These lakes Ukewise generate 336 A morning's WALK encroaching banks, which finally fill up their basins, when new rivers are formed on higher levels. These, in their turn, become interrupted, and repetitions of the former circle of causes produce one class of those elevations of land above the level of the sea, which have so rauch puzzled geologists. The only condition which a surface of dry land requires to increase and raise itself, is the absence of salt wa ter, consequent on which is an accumula tion of vegetable and animal remains. The Thames has not latterly been allowed to produce its natural effects, because for two thousand years the banks have been inhabited by man, who, unable to appre ciate the general laws by which the phe noraena of the earth are produced, has sedulously kept open the course of the river, and prevented the formation of interior lakes. The Caspian Sea, and all similar inland seas and lakes, were, for the most part, formed from the choaking up of rivers, which once constituted their out lets. If the course of nature be not inter rupted bythe misdirected ind ustry of man, FROM LONDON TO KEW. 337 -the gfadaal desiccation of all such collec tions of water will, in due time, produce land of higher levels on their sites. In like manner, the great lakes of North America, if the St. Lawrence be not sedu lously kept open, wUl, in the course of ages, be filled up by the gradual encroach ment of their banks, and the raising of their bottoms with strata of vegetable and aniraal remains. New rivers would then flow over these increased elevations, and the ultimate effect would be to raise that part of the continent of North America several hundred fPet above its present level. Even the "very place on which I stand was, according to Webster, once a vast basin, extending from the Nore to near Reading, but now filled up with ve getable and animal remains ; and the illus trious Cuvier has •discovered a similar basin round the site of Paris. These once were Caspians, created by the choak ing and final disappearance of some mighty rivers — they have been filled up by gra*- , dual encroachments, and now tlje Thamss i 338 A MORNING*S WALK and the Seine flow over them;— but thespj if left to themselves, will, in their turn^ generate new lakes or basins-^and the successive recurrence of a simUar series of causes will continue to produce similar effects, till interrupted by superior causes. This situation was so sequestered, and therefore so favourable to contemplation, that I could not avoid indulging myself. What then are those superior causes, I exclaimed-, which will interrupt this series of natural operations to which man is indebted for the enchanting visions of hill and dale, and for the elysium of beauty and plenty in which he finds himself? Alas ! facts prove, however) that all things are transitory, and that change of condition is the constant and necessary result of that motion which is the chief instrument of eternal causation, but which, in causing all phenomena, wears out existing organi zations while it is generating new ones*^ In the motions of the earth as a planet^ doubtless are to be discovered the supe rior causes which convert seas into conti- FROM LONDON TO KEW. 339 nents, and continents into seas. These sublime changes are occasioned by the progress of the perihelion point of the earth's orbit through the ecliptic, which passes from extreme northern to extreme southern declination, and vice versa, every 10,450 years; and the maxima of, the central forces in the periheUon occasion the waters to accumulate alternatively upon either hemisphere. DuriPg 10,450 years, the sea is therefore gradually re tiring and encroaching in both hemi^ spheres: — hence all the varieties pf ma rine appearances and accumulations of marine remains in particular situations; and hence the succession of layers or strata, one upon another, of marine and earthy remains. It is evident, frora obser vation of those strata, that the periodical changes have occurred at least three times ; or, in other words, it appears that the .site on which I now stand has been three tiraes covered by the ocean, and three tiraes has afforded an asylum for vegeta bles and animals! How subUme — hpw z a 340 A morning's WALK interesting — how ia.ffe'cting is such a con templation 1 How transitory, therefore, must be the lockl arrangements of man, and how puerile the study of the science mis called Antiquities 1 How fooUsh the pride which vaunts itself on splendid buildings and costly mausoleums! How vain the ostentation of large estates, of extensive boundaries, and of great empires 1— All- all — wiU, in due time, be swept away and -effaced by the unsparing ocean; and, if recorded ih the frail memorials of human science, will be spoken of like the lost Atalantis, and remembered only as a phi losophical dream ! Yet, bow different, thought I, is the rich scene of organized existence within jpy view, from that which presented itself on this spot when our planet ffrst took its Station in the solar system. The sur face, judging froth its present materials, was then probably of the same inorganic fo'rifi and structure as the primitive rocks which still compose the Alps and Andes ; ¦or like those indurated coral islands, '2 FRPM LONDON TO KEW. ^:^| ijhich are daily raising their sterile heads above the, level of \he grpat oceap, and tpaching by analogy the process of fertili zation. At that period, sp remote and so obscure, all must have been silent, barren, and relatively motionless I But, the atmo sphere and the rains having, by decapi-r positioP and solution, pulverizpd the rocks, and reduced thera into the various earths. which now fertilize the surface, from the inorganic soon sprung the vegetable, and from the vegetable, in dpe tirae, sprung the animal ; tUl thp whole was jresolvecj intp the interesting assprablage of organized existences, which now present theipselves to pur endless wonder and gratification. I looked around rae on this book of na ture, which so elocjuently ppeaks all lan guages, and which, fpr every ireful purpose, niay be read without translation or com mentary, by the learned apd unlearned ip every age and clime. But my imagipatiop was humbled op cQUsidpring niy relatiyp and Uniited po^vers, when I desired tp proceed froni pheppmena to canseS» and tp 23 342 A morning's walk penetrate the secrets of nature below the surfaces of things. I desire, said I, to know more than ray intellectual vision enables me to isee -in this volume of un erring truth. I can discover but tbe mere surfaces of things by the accidents of light. I can feel but the sarae surfaces in the contact of my body, and ray conclu sions are governed by their reciprocal relations. In like raanner, I can hear, taste, and sraell, pnly through the acci dents of other media, all distinct frora the nature of the substances which produce those accidents. In truth, I am the raere patient of certain illusions of my senses, and I can know nothing beyond what I derive from ray capacity of receiving im pressions from those illusions ! Alas ! thought I, I am sensible how little I know ; yet how much is there which I do not, and can never, know ? How much more am I, incapable of knowing, with mylirait- ed organs of sense, than I might know if their capacity or their number were en-r Jarged ? Hpw can a being, then, of such, FROM. LONDON TO KEW. 313 imited powers presume to examine nature beyond the raere surface? How can he measure unseen powers, of which hp has no perception, but in the phenoraena visible to his senses ? How can he reason on the causes of effects by means of im plements which reach no deeper than the accidents produced by the surfaces of things on the raedia which affeqt his sepses, and which come not into contact with the powers that produce the phenomena? iTltiraate causation is, therefore, hidden forever from man ; and his knowledge can reach no deeper or higher than to register mechanical phenoraena, and deterraine their mutual relations. But there is yet enough for man to learn, and to gratify thp researches of his curiosity ; for, bound* ed as are his powers, he has always found that art is too long and life- too ghort. He may nevertheless feel that his raind, in a certain sense, is- within a species of in tellectual prison; but, Uke the tefrestrial prison which confines his body to one pla- ppt, no raan ever lived long enpugh to 344: A MOENlNG*^S WALK exhaust the variety of subjects presented tp his conteraplation and curiosity by the intellectual and natural world. We seem, however, said I, to be better qualified tp investigate the external laws which govern inorganic siatter^ than the subtle and local powers which govern organized bodies. We appear (so to speak) to be capable of looking dowrj upon mere matter as matter; but incapa ble, like the eye in viewing itself, of re tiring to such a focal distance as to be able accurately to examine ourselves. Lfe is not difficult to conceive that planetary bodies, and other masses of inorganic piatter, may appear to act on each other by mutually intercepting the pressure of |he elastic raedium which fills space ; and the pressure intercepted by each on the: inner surface of the other, may, by theun- intercepted external pressure pn each, produce the phenomena of mutual gravi-« tation: nor is it improbable that the curvilinear and rotatory motions of sueb piasses may be governed by the arrange- FROM LONDON TO KEW. 34& ment and mutual: action of their fixed and their fluid parts ; nor impracticable for the geometrician, when the phenoraena are determined, to measure the mechanical rela,tions of the powers that produce those phenomena ; nor wonderful that a system of bodies so governed by general laws, should move and act in a dependent, con sequent, and necessary harmony. Thus far the intellect of an organized being raay reason safely on the mechanical relations of inorganic masses, because an unequal balance of forces produces their motions, and frora combined motions re-? suit the phenomena; but, in the prinqiple of organic life, and in the duration and linal purpose pf the powers of vegetables pnd apimals, there are m^'steries which bafiie the penetration of limited observa tion and reason. I behold vegetables with roots fixed in the ground, and through them raising fluids mechanically; but my understanding is bverpowered, with' un-r sa^sfied wonder, when I consider tiie aniinating principle pf the meanest vegeta,- 31,6 A morning's waltc ble, which constitutes a selfish individu ality, and enables it to give new qualities to those fluids by peculiar secretions, and to appropriate them to its own nourish ment and growth. My ambition after wisdom is humbled in the dust, whenever I inquire how the first germ of every species came into existence; whenever I consider the details of the varied powers in the energizing agency which originates each successive germ ; and the independent, but coincident, passive receptacle which nurtures those germs, and, correcting aberrations, secures the continuity of every species — both acting as joint secondary causes; and whenever I reflect on the growth, maturity, beauty, and variety, of ' the vegetable kingdom ! On these several subjects, my mind renders the profoundest homage to the mysterious power which created and continues such mira cles; and, being unable to reason upon them from the analogy of other experience, J am forced to refer such sublime results- to agency not mechanical; or, if in any from LONDON TO KEW. S47 sense mechanical, so arranged and so raoved as to exceed my means of conception. Looking once more upon the volume of nature which lay before me, I behold a superior class of organized beings; each individual of which, constituting an inde pendent raicrocosra,' is qualified to move from place to place, by bodily adaptation and nervous sensibility. This kingdom of ' Loco-MOTIVE BEINGS asccnds, in grada tions of power and intellect, fromthe hydatid to the sympathetic and benevolent philp- isopher ; and rises in the scale of being as much above the organization of vegetables, as vegetables themselves are superior to the inorganic particles in which they flou rish. That they raay subsist while they move, fheU roots, instead of being fixed in the soil, are turned within a cavity, or re ceptacle, caUed the stomach, into which, -appropriate, soil, or aliraent, is introduced by the industry of tiie creature; and, that their powers of loco-raption may be exerted with safety and advantage, they are provided fyithsenses fpr smelling,-tasting, feeling, and S48 A morning's walk seeing their food ; and with a power of hear ing dangers which they cannot see. They are, forthe same purpose, enabled to profit by experience in powers of association, of reasoning by analogy, and of wUling accord ing to their judgments;- and they are go verned by an habitual desire to associate in species, accompanied by moral feelings, resulting frora obligations of mutual de-r ference and convenience. Here again, huraanly speaking, we have a series of na tural miracles-^ a permanent connexion between external objects and the sensa tions, reasoning, and conduct of the or ganised being. We trace the animal frame to two constituent parts — the one mechanical, the other sensitive; the me chanical consisting of bones, skin, stomach,. blood-vessels, glands, and intestines, pro vided with muscles and sinews for volun tary motion ; and the sensitive, consisting; of nerves and brain, which direct the motions by the feelings of the organs of sense — the results of the union constituting creatures whose essence is perceptioiv from LONDON TO KEW. 349 ispringing from a system of brain and herVes, which, being nourished by the energies of circulating fluids, raoved by a contrivance of muscles, and strengthened by an apparatus of bones, produce all those varieties of feeling, durable, raoving, and powerful beings, whose functions con tinue as long as the original' expansive powers balance the unceasing inertia of their materials. But, of that subtle PRINCIPLE which distinguishes orgahic ,lfe from inert matter — of that princi ple of individuality which generates the passion of self-love, and leads each indi vidual to preserve and sustain its own exist- -ence — of that principle which gives pecu liar powers of growth, and maturity, to germs of vegetables and animals— and of that principle which, being stopped, sus pended, or destroyed, in the meanest or greatest of tbem, produces the awful dif ference between the living and the dead —we have no knowledge, and we seem incapable of acquiring any, by the limited powers of ou-r senses. ' Whether this prin- idple of vitality is a principle of its -own 350 A morning's walk kind, imparted frora parent plants and animals to their germs ; or whether it is the result of the totality of the being, like the centre of a sphere, — are questions which must perhaps for ever remain un determined by the reasoning powers of man. The creature of an hour, whose chief care it is to live and indulge his self-love, who cannot see without light, nor distinctly above a few inches from the eye, is wholly' incompetent to determine those questions which have so long agitated philosophy; as. Whether the phenomena of the crea tion could be made to exist without action and re-action, and without space ? — Whe ther, consequently, there are three Eter nals, or ONE Eternal? — Whether the SUPREME intelligence, MATTER void of form, and space containing it, were all eternal — or whether the suprerae intelligence alone was eternal, and matter and space created ? — Whether the suprerae inteUigence has only been exerted proxi mately or remotely on inorganic matter; from LONDON TO KEW. 35 1 space being the necessary medium of crea tion, and organization being the result ? — Whether the globe ofthe earth, in form, is eternal, or, according to Herschel, the effect of "a clustering power" in the mat ter of space, beginning and ending, accor ding to the general analogy of organized beings ?— Whether the earth was a comet, tiie ellipticality of whose orbit has been re duced; and, if so, what, was the origin of the comet? — How the secondary moun tains were liquefied — -whether by fire or by water — and what were the then rela tions of the earth to the sun? — How and when that Uquefaction ceased ; and how, and when, and in what order of time, the several organizations arose upon them ? — How those organizations, at least those now existing, received the powers of se condary causes for continuing their kind ? — How every species now Uves, and grows, and maintains an eternal succession of personal identities?— How these things were before we were, and how they now are on every side of us— are topics lyhich '352 A MORNINGIS WALK have raade so rauch learning ridiculous, that, if I were to discuss them, in the best forras prescribed by the schools, I might but imitate in folly the crawling myriads, who luxuriate for an hour on a ripening peach; and who, like ourselves, may be led by their vanity to discuss questions in regard to the eternity, and other attributes, of tbe prodigious globe, which they have inherited frora their remote ancestry, and of which the early history is lost in the obscure traditions of their countiess gene rations ! Without presuming, however, to argue on premises which finite creatures cannot justly estimate, we may safely infer, in re gard to the world in which we are placed, that all things which do exist, owe their ¦existence to their compatibility with -other existences; to the necessary fit ness of all existing things; and to the harmony which is essential to the exist ence of any thing in the forra and mode in which it does exist : for, without reci procal x;ompati£ility, whhout indivi- FROM LONDON TO KEW. 353 dual FITNESS, and without universal HARMONY, nothing could continue TO EXIST' which does exist; and, therefore, what does exist, is for the time necessarily compatible with other existences, fit or not incompatible, and in harmony with the whole of co existent being. Every organized ex istence affords, therefore, indubitable evidence of final causes or pur poses, competent to produce and sustain it; of certain relations of fitness to other beings; of compatibility with other existences; and of 'harmony in regard to the whole: And every case of de struction affords evidence, that cer tain FINAL causes liavo become un equal to their usual oflSce ; that the being is UNFIT to exist simultaneously with some other beings; -that its existence is incompatible with certain circuni- stances, or that it is contrary to the gene ral harmo N Y of co-existent being. May not the fifty thousand spiecies of beings now discoverable, be all the species whose A a 554, A morning's walk existences have continued to be fit. Com patible, and harmonious? May not the known extinction of many species be re ceived as evidence, therefore, of the gra dual decay of the powers which sustaip organized being on our planet? May not the extinction of one species render the existence of others more unfit, by diminish ing the number of final causes? And, may not the successive breaking or wearing out of these links of final causes ultimately •lead to the end of all organized, being, or to what is commonly called, the end of OUR WORLD ? As I approached a sequestered mansion- house, and some other buildings, which -together bear the name of Brick- ¦stables, I crossed a corner ofthe mea dow towards an angle formed by a rude inlet of the Thame;s, which was running -smoothly toM'ards the sea at the pace pf •four miles an hour. The tide unites here with the ordinary current, and, running a few miles above this place, exhibits twice a day the finely-reduced edge of that phy- ical balance-wheel or oscillating fluid- .FROM LONDON TO KEW. 355 pendulum which creates the earth's cen trifugal power, varies the centre of its forces, and holds in equilibrium that deli cately adjusted pressure of the mediura of spage, which pressure, without such ba lance, Would, by its clustering power, drive together the isolated masses of suns and planets. — In viewing -the beautiful process of Nature, presented by a majestic river, we cease to wonder that ' priestcraft has often succeeded in teaching nations to consider rivers as of divine ori gin, and as living emblems of Om^nipotence. Ignorance, whose constant error it is to look only to the last terra of every series of causes, and which charges Irapiety on all who venture tp ascend one term higher, and Atheism on all who dare to explore several terras (though every series irapUes a first term), would easily be persuaded by a crafty priesthood to consider a bene ficent river as a tangible branch of the Godhead. But we now know that the. waters which flow down a river, tire but a portion of the rains and snows which, A a2 356 A morning's walk having fallen near its source, are return ing to the ocean, there to rise again and re-perform the same circle of vapours, clouds, rains, and rivers. What a pro cess of fertilization, and how still more luxuriant would have been this vicinity, if man had not levelled the trees and carried away the crops of vegetation ! What a place of shelter would thus have been afforded to tribes of amphibiae, whose ac cu raulated remains often surprise geolo gists, though necessarily consequent on the fall of crops of vegetation on each other, near undisturbed banks of rivers. Happily, in Britain, our coal-pits, or mi neralized forests, have supplied the place of our living woods ; or man, regardless of the fitness of all the parts to the perfection of every natural result, might here, as in other long-peopled countries, ignorantly have thwarted the course of Nature by cutting down the timber, which, acting on the electricity of the clouds, affects their density, and causes thera to faU in fertUi- zing showers. Such has been the fate of from LONDON TO KEW. 357 all the countries famous in antiquity. Persia, Syria, Arabia, parts of Turkey, and the Barbary coast, have been rendered arid deserts by this inadvertency. The clouds from the Western Ocean would long since have passed over England without disturbance from the conducting powers of leaves of trees, or blades of grass, if our coal-works had not saved our natural con ductors ; while this Thames, the .agent of so much abundance and so much wealth, might, in that case, have becorae a shallow brook, like the once equally famed Jordan, Granicus, or Ilyssus. The dingy atmosphere of London smoke, which- 1 had measured so accu rately on Putney Heath, presented itself again over the woods of Chiswick Grove, reminding me of the cares of the busy world, and producing a painful contrast to the tranquUlity of nature, to the silently gliding Thames, and to the unimpassioned simplicity ofthe vegetable creation. Man", 1 reflected, brings upon himself a thousand calamities as consequences of his artifices A a 3 358 A morning's walk and pride, and then, overlooking his own follies, gravely investigates the origin of what he calls evil: — He compromises every natural pleasure, to acquire fame araong transient beings, who forget hira nightly in sleep, and eternally in death ; and seeks to render his name celebrated among posterity, though it has no identity with his person, and though posterity and himself can have no contemporaneous feel ing — HE deprives himself, and all around him,, of every passing enjoyment, to accu mulate wealth, that he may purchase other men's labour, in the vain hope of adding their happiness to his own — he omits to make effective laws to protect the poor against the oppressions of the rich, and then wears out his existence under the fear of becoming poor, and being the viptim of his own neglect and injustice — he arms himself with murderous weapons, and on the lightest instigations practises murder as a science, follows this science as a regular profession, and honours its chiefs above benefactors 9,nd philosophers, in proporr from LONDON TO KEW. 359 tion to the quantity of blood they have shed, or the raischiefs they have perpetrated — HE difiguises the most worthless of the people in showy liveries, teaches thera the use of destructive weapons, and then ex cites them to murder men whom they never saw, by the fear of being killed if they will not kill, or of being shot for cowardice — HE revels in luxury and gluttony, and then complains of the diseases which result from repletion — he trips in all things to counteract, or improve, the pro visions of nature, and then afiiicts himself at his disappointments — he multiplies the chances against his_pwn health and life, by his numerous artifices, and then wonders at the frequency of their fatal results — he shuts his eyes against the volume of truth, presented by nature, and, vainly consi dering that aU was made for him, founds on this false assumption various doubts in regard to the justice of eternal causation— HE interdicts the enjoyments of all other creatures, and, regarding the world as his property, in mere wantonness destroys myf 350 A morning's walk riads on whom have been lavished beauties and perfections — he is the selfish and merciless tyrant of all animated nature, no considerations of pity or sympathy restrain ing, or even qualifying, his antipathies, his caprices, or his gluttonies; while, more unhappy than his victiras, he is constantly arraigning that systera in which he is the chief cause of raore misery than all other causes joined together— HE forgets, that to live and let live, is a maxim of univer sal justice, extending not only to all raan's relations with his fellow-raen, but to infe rior creatures, to whora his moral obliga tions are the greater, because their lives and happiness are often within his power — HE is the patient ofthe unalterable pro gress of universal causation, yet makes a difficulty of submitting to the impartial distribution of the provisions which sustain all other beings — he afflicts himself that he cannot live for ever, though he sees all organized being decay around him, and though his forefathers have successively died to make room for him — he repines from LONDON TO KEW, 361 at the thought of losing that Ufe, the use of which he so often perverts; and, though he began to exist but yesterday, thinks the world was made for him, and tbat he ought to continue to enjoy it for ever — he sees no benevolence in the scherae of Nature which provides eternal youth to partake of the pleasures of existence ; and which, destroying those pleasures by satiety of enjoyment, produces the blunted feel ings of disease and old age — he mars all his perceptions of well-being by anticipa ting the cessation of his vital functions, though, before that event, he necessarily ceases to be conscious or to suffer — he seeks indulgences unprovided for by tlie course of Nature, and then anxiously em ploys himself in endeavouring to cheat others of the labour requisite to procure them — HE desires to govern others, but, regardless of their dependence on his bp- nevolence, is commonly gratified in dis playing the power entrusted to him, by a tyrannical abuse of it— he professes tq love wisdom; yet in aU his establishments 362 A MORNINGS WALK for promoting it he sets up false standards of truth; and persecutes, even with reli gious intolerance, all attempts to swerve from them — he makes laws, which, in the hands of mercenary lawyers, serve as snares to unwary poverty, but as' shields to crafty wealth — he renders justice unat tainable by its costiiness; and personal rights uncertain by the intricacy and fic kleness of legal decisions — he possesses means of diffusing knowledge, in the sub lime art of Printing; but, by suffering wealth and power to corrupt its agents, he has allowed it to become subservient to the gratification of personal malignity and political turpitude — he acknowledges the importance of educating youth, yet teaches them any thing rather than their social du ties in the political state in which they live — HE adopts the customs of barbarous ages as precedents of practice, and founds on them codes for the governraent of en hghtened nations — in a word, he raakes false and imperfect estiraates of his own being, of his duties tp his fellow-beings, FROM LONDON TO KEW. 363 and of his relations to all being; and then passes his days in questioning tbe provi dence of Nature, in ascribing Evil to supernatural causes, and in feverish expec tations of results contrary to the necessary harmony ofthe world! I was thus employed in drawing a spe cies of Indictment against the errors, fol lies, selfishness, and vices of my fellow-men, while I passed along a pleasant foot-path, which conducted me fi-ora Brick-stables to the carriage-road frora Mortiake to Kew. On arriving at the stile, I saw a colony of the people called Gipsies, and, gratified at falling in with them, I seated myself upon it, and, hailing the eldest of the men in terms of civility, he approached me courteously; and I promised myself, from the interview, a fund of information rela- - tive to the economy of those people. Policy so singular, manners so different, and passions so varied, have for so many ages characterized the race of Gipsies, that the incident of raeeting with one of their littie camps agreeably roused me 364 A morning's WALK from that reverie on Matter and its modi fications, into which I had fallen. What can be more strongly marked than the gipsy physiognomy? Their lively jet-black eyes. — their small features — their tawny gkins — their small bones — and their shrill voices, bespeak thera to be a distinct tribe of the huraan race, as different frora the English nation as the Chinese, the North- American Indians, or the woolly-headed Africans. They seem, in truth, as dif-^ ferent in their bodies, and in their instincts, from the inhabitants of England and other countries in which they live, as the spaniel from the greyhound, or as the cart-horse from the Arabian. Our instincts, propen sities, or fit and necessary habits, seem to lead us, like the ant, to lay up stores ; theirs, like the grasshopper, to depend on the daily bounties of nature; — we, with the habits of the beaver, build fixed habi tations; and they, like the deer, range from pasture to pasture; — we, with an instinct all our own, cultivate arts; they (Content themselves * with picking up our FROM LONDON TO KEW. 3G5 superfluities; — we raake laws and arrange governments ; they know no laws but those of personal convenience, and no govern ment beyond that of muscular force grow ing out ofthe habits of seniority; — and we cherish passions of ambition and domina tion, consequent on our other arrange ments, to which they are utter strangers. Thus, we indulge our propensities, and they indulge theirs. Which are the hap piest beings, might be made a question — but I am led to decide in favour of the arts and comforts of civilized life. These people appear to possess tbe natural fee bleness and delicacy of man, without the power of shielding themselves from the accidents of nature. Their darling object appears to be, to enjoy practical personal hberty. They possess less, and they en joy fewer, luxuries than others; but they escape slavery in all the Protean shapes by which it ensnares the rest of mankind. They do not act as menial servants, and obey the caprice of a master; nor do they work as labourers for a tythe of the advan- 365 A morning's WALK tages of their industry. They do not, as tenants of land, pay half the produce in rentals; nor do they, as anxious traders, pay half their profits to usurers or capitalists. They are not liable to the conscriptions of a militia-ballot; nor to be draped from their families by the frightful tyranny of the impress. And, in fine, they are not compelled to contribute a large portion of their earnings in taxes to support folly or prodigality ; nor are they condemned to pay, through their successive genera tions, the interest of money lent for the hire of destroyers of men, who were, like thera selves, guilty only of resolving to be free. Yot, if they-are exempt from the torture of civilized man, of having the comforts he enjoys torn from him by the sophistry of law, or the tyranny of governments ; they suffer from hour to hour the torments of want, and the apprehension of not meet ing with renewed supplies. If they are g:iyer than civilized man. it is because their wants are fewer, and therefore fewer of thein are unsatisfied ; and probably the 2 from LONDON TO KEW. 36? gaiety which tbey assume before strangers may result from their constitution, which, under the same circumstances, may render them gayer than others, just as a French man is gayer than an Englishman, or au EngUsbraan than a North- American Indian. In a word, in looking upon this race, and upon the other recorded varieties of our species, from the woolly-headed Afri can to the long-haired Asiatic, from the blue-eyed and white-haired Gpth to the black-eyed and black-haired North Ame rican, and from the gigantic Patagonian to the dwarfish Laplander; we are led to believe, that the human species roust radi cally have been as various as any other species of animated beings ; and it seems as unphilosophical as impious, to limit the powers of creation to pairs of one kind, and to ascribe their actual varieties to the operations joi chance. ' As I proceeded from the stile towards their tents,, the apparent chief of the gang advanced with a firm step, holding a large knife in one hand, and some eatables ia 358 A morning's WALK the other; and he made many flourishes with his knife, seemingly in the hope of intimidating me, if I proved an enemy. I civilly begged his pardon for intruding upon their camp, and assured him that mine was a mere visit of curiosity ; that I was not a justice of the peace, and had no desire to disturb thera. He then told me I was very welpome, and I advanced to their chief tent. "^But," said I to this man, "you have not the gipsy colour and features?" "O, no," be replied, "-lam no gipsy — the people call us all gipsies — but I am by trade a tinker — I live in Court, Shoreditch, in the winter ; and during the summer I travel the country, and get my livelihood by my trade." Looking at others of the group, who were sittina; at the entrance of two tents, I traced two sets of features among them, one plainly EngUsh, and the other evidently Gipsy; and, mentioning this circumstance, he replied, "O J'es — though I am not a gipsy, my wife is, and so is her old mo ther there — they are true gipsies, every FROM LONDON TO KEW. 36^ inch of 'em. This man, my wife's brother, is a gipsy — we are useful to one another in this way of life— and the old woman there is as knowing a gipsy as any in the country, and can tell your fortune, sir, if you like to hear it." — His character of the elder gipsy, who resembled Mundep's witch in Macbeth, produced considerable mirth in the whole party ; and the old wo man, who was engaged in smoking her pipe, took it from her mouth, and said : "I ayn't told so many gen tiefolks- their fortunes tq no purpose, and I'll tell your's, sir, if you'U give rae soraething to fill my pipe.'- I smiled, and told her I thanked her; but, as I was not in love, I felt no anxiety to hear my fortune. — "Aye, sir," said she, " many's the lover I've made happy, and many's the couple that I've brought toge ther. " — Recollecting Farquhar's incident in the Recruiting Ofllicer, I remarked : — • " You teU the ladies what their lovers hire you to tell them, I suppose — and the gentlemen what the ladies request you to teU them?"-7"Why, yes," said she, Bb 370 A morning's WALK "something like it;" and laughing — "aye, sir, Isee you're in the secret!" — "And then you touch golden fees, I suppose?" —"Yes," interrupted the first man, "I've known her get five or six guineas on a wedding-day, part from the lady, and part from the gentieraan ; and she never wants a shilling, and a meal's victuals, when she passes raany houses that I could name." — "True, "exclaimed the old beldame, "that's all true; and I've made raany fine folks happy in my time, and so did my mother before me — she was known far and near !" I had no occasion to remark on the silly dupes on whora they practised these impo sitions, for the whole party expressed their sentiments, by bursts of laughter while the old woman was speaking : hut I could not help exclaiming, that I thought she ought to make the fools pay well who gave cre dit to her prophecies. — "Aye," said she, "I see you don't believe in our art— but we tell all by the hand!" — I felt of course that the hand was as good a key to deter mine the order of probable events as pla- FROM LONDON TO KEW. 37I llets, cards, or tea-sediments ; and there-* fore, concluding that gipsies, like astrolo- ,gers and other prophets, are imposed on by the doctrine of chances, I drPpped the tppvergation ; but felt it my duty to give the old woman a shilUng to buy somp tobacco for her pipe. I now surveyed the entire party, and in three tents found there were three men, two women, besides the old woman, four girls, and two boys. One of the tents was placed at a little distance from the others, and in that resided a young married cou ple. — "And pray," said I, "where and how do you marry?" — "Why," said the iirst man, "we marry like other folks — they were married at Shoreditch Church f— I was married to my old woman here at Haramersraith Church-^and my brother- in-law here was married at Acton Church. " — "Then," said I, " you call yourselves Christians ?"-— At this question they aU laughed ; and the first man said, that, " If jt depends on our- going to church, we fiah't say much about it; but, as we do B b 2 572 A morning's walk nobody any harm, and work for our living, sorae in one way, and sorae in another, we suppose we are as good Christians as mapy other folks." While this conversation passed, I heard them speaking to each other in a language somewhat resembling Irish, but it had tones more shrill ; and the first man, not withstanding his English physiognomy, as well as the others, spoke with a foreign accent, not unlike that of half-anglicized Hindoos. I mentioned this peculiarity; but he assured me that neither he nor any of the party had been out of England. I now inquired about their own language, when one of thera said it was Maltese ; but the other said it was their cant language. I asked their naraes for various objects which I pointed out ; but, after half a do zen words, the first man inquired, if I had "ever heard of one Sir Joseph Banks — for," said he, "that gentleman once paid me a guinea for telling him twenty words in Pur language." Perceiving, therefbre^^ that he rated this species of information from LONDON TO KEW. 373 very high, and aware that the subject has been treated at large by many authors, I forbore to press him further. The ground served them for a table, and the grass for a table-cloth. TheTnixture of their viands with dirty rags, and other disgusting objects, proved that they pos sess no sentiment, in regard to cleanliness, superipr to lower animals. Like philoso phical chemists, they evidently admitted the elementary analogy of what the delicate sense of society classes under contrasted beads of dirty and clean. Necessity, in this respect, has generated fixed habits; and they are, consequently, as great strangers to the refined feeling which.actu- ates cleanly housewives, as lawyers are to a spirit of benevolence, or Piinisters of state to a passion for reform. Their furniture consisted, merely of some dirty rags and blankets, and of two or three bags, baskets, and boxes; while their tents were formed of a pole at each end, with a ridge pole, co vered with blanketing, whieh was stretch ed obliquely to the ground by wopden B b 3 374 A morning's walk pegs. Such rudeness, and such simplicity, afforded a striking contrast to the gorgeous array of oriental splendour in the palaces of Royalty ; and to the. varied raagnifi cence displayed in those warehouses whence aP Oakley, or a Bullock, supplies the raansions of wealth and grandeur. Indeed, as I stood conversing with these people, how could I help marvelling that, in the most polished district of the most ci vilized of nations, with the grand pagoda of Kew-Gardens in full view on one hand, and the towers of the new Bastile Palace in sight on the other, I shoxild thus have presented under my eyes a family of eleven persons in no better condition than the Hottentots in their kraals, the Americans in their wig wams, or the Tartars in their equally rude tents. 1 sighed, however, to think that difference of natural constitution and varied propensities were in England far frora being the only causes of the proxi mity of squalid misery to ostentatious pomp. I felt too that the manners of -these gipsies were assimilated to. those" of ' from xondon to kew. 375 the shepherd tribes of the remotest anti quity, and that in truth I saw before me a faraily flf the pastoral ages, as described in the Book of Genesi.s. They wanted their blocks and herds ; but the possession of these neither accorded with their own po licy, nor with tiiat of the country in which they reside. Four dogs attached to their tents, and two asses grazing at a short dis tance, completed such a grouping as a painter would, I have no doubt, have found in the days of Abraham in every part of Western Asia, and as is now to be found among the sarae people, at this day, in every country in Europe. They exhi bit that state of man in which thousands >of years raight pass away without record •or improvement : , and, whether they are Egyptians, Arabs, Hindoos, Tartars, or a peculiar variety of our species; whether they exhibit raan in the rude state which, according tp Lord Montboddo, most nearly approximates to the ourang-outang of the oriental forests ; or whether they are consi dered in their separated qharacter-rtbey 37b A morning's walk form an interesting study for the phUoso pher, the econoraist, and the antiquary. In a few minutes after I had left the gipsy camp, I was overtaken by a girl of fifteen, the quickness of whose breathing indicated excessive alarm. " O, sir," said she, "I'm so glad to come up with you — I'ra so frightened — I've been standing this quarter of an hour on the other side of the stile, waiting for soraebody to dPrae by."— -"And what has so frightened you?" said I.— ^"O, sir," said the still terrified giri, looking behind her, and increasing her pace, " those gipsies and witches — they frighten every body; and I wo'dn't have come this way for all the world if I'd known they'd been there." — "But," said I, "what are you frightened at? have you heard that they have done harm to any one?" — "O dear! yes, sir, I've heard my mother say they bewitches people ; and, one summer, two of' them beat my father dreadfully." — "But what did he do to them ?" — " Why, he was a littie tipsy, to be sure ; but he says he only caUed 'era a FROM LONDON TO KEW. S77 pack of fortune-teUers. " — "And are all the children in this neighbourhood as much frightened at them as ypu ?" — " O yes, sir; but some of the boys throw stones over the hedge at them, but we girls are afraid they'll bewitch us. Did you see the old hag, sir?" The poor girl asked this ques tion with such simplicity, and with a faith so confirmed, that I had reason once raore to feel astonishment at the superstition which infests and disgraces the common people of this generally enlightened na tion ! Let rae hope that the tutors in the, schools of BeU and Lancaster wiU consi- ¦ der it as part of their duties, to destroy the vulgar faith in ghosts, omenS, fortune- telling, fatality, and witchcraft. • On my right, my attention was attracted by the battlements of a new Gothic build ing, which I learnt, from the keeper of an adjoining turnpike, was called Kew ;PaiORY, ¦ and is a summer retreat of a wealthy Catholic maiden lady, Miss Doughty, of Richraond-Hill; after whom a street has recently been named in LoP- 378 A morning's WALK don. Learning that the lady was not there, I tumed aside to take a nearer view ; and, ringing at tbe gate, in the hope of seeing the, interior, a female, who opened it, told me that it was a rule of the place, that no man could be admitted be sides the Rev. Mr. , the Catholic priest. I learnt that the Priory, a beauti ful structure on a lawn, consisted merely of a chapel, a room for refi-eshments, and a library; and that the lady used it for a change of scene in tbe long afternoons of the summer season. The enclosed space contained about 24 acres, on the banks of the Thames, and is subdivided by Pilton's invisible fences. Behind the priory, there ,ii a house for the bailiff and his wife, a ca pacious pheasantry, an aviary, and exten sive stables. Nothing can be more taste ful as a place of indulgence for the luxury of wealth ; but it is exposed to the incon venience of floods from the river, which sometimes cover the entire site to a con siderable tiepth. Another quarter of a raUe, along a dead FROM LONDON TO KEW. 379 •flat, brought me upon Kew-Green. As I approached it, the woods of Kew aiid Richmond Gardens presented a varied ana magnificent foliage, and, the pagoda of ten stories rose in splendour out ofthe woods. Richmond-hill bounded the hori zon on the left, and the smoky atmosphere of Brentford obscured the air beyond the houses on Kew-Green. As I quitted the lane, I beheld, on.myleft, the long boundary-waU of Kew-Gardens ; on which a disabled sailor has drawn in chalk the effigies of the whole British navy, and over each representation appears the name ofthe vessel, and the number of her guns. He has in this way depicted about 800- vessels, each five or six feet long, and •extending, with intervening distances, above a mile and a half. As the labour of one man, the whole is an extraordinary per formance; and I was told the decrepit draughtsman derives a competency from passing travellers. Kew-Green is a triangular area of about thirty acres. Nearly in the cPntiie 380 A morning's walk is the chapel of St. Anne. On the eastern side is a row of family houses ; on the north-western side a better row, the backs of which look to tiie Thames ; and on the south side stand the boundary-wall of Kew-Gardens, some buildings for soldiery, and the plain honse of Ernest, duke of Cumberiand. Among other persons of note and interest who reside here, are the two respectable daughters of Stephen Duck, the poet, who deserve to be men tioned as relics of a forraer age. In the western corner stand the buildings called Kew Palace, in which George III. passed many of the early years of his reign, and near which he began a new structure a iew years before his confirmed malady — which I call the Bastile Palace, from its resem blance to that building, so obnoxious to freedom and freemen. Ona former occa sion, I have viewed its interior, and I am at loss to conceive the motive for pre ferring an external, form, which rendered it impracticable to construct within it more than a series of large closets, boudoirs. FROM LONDON TO KEW. 381 and rooms like oratories. The works have, however, been suspended since the unhappy seclusion of the Royal Architect ; and it is improbable, at least in this gene ration, that they will be resumed. The foundation is in a bog close to the Thames, and the principal object within its view is the dirty town of Brentford, on the oppo- ,site side of the river. I had intended to prolong my route to the western corner of the Green; but, in passing St. Anne's Chapel, I found the pew-Ppeners engaged in' wiping the pews and washing the aisles. I knew that that child of Genius, Gainsborough, the painter, lay interred here; and, desirous of paying my homage to his grave, I in quired for the spot. As is usual in regard to this class of people, they could give me no information ; yet one of thera fancied she had heard such a narae before. I was therefore obliged to wait while the sexton or clerk was fetched, and in the interim 1 walked into the chapel. I was, in truth, weU re-paid for the time it cost 382 A morning's walk me ; for I never saw any thing prettier, ex cept Lord Le Despencer's exquisite struc-* ture at West Wycombe. As the royal family usually attend here when they re side at Kew, it is superbly fitted up, and the architecture is in the best taste. The seats for the family fill the gaUery, and on the ground-floor there are forty-eight pews of brown oak, adapted for four and six persons each. Several raa'rble monuments of singular ;beauty adorn the walls; but the record of>a,'raan of genius absorbed every attraction of ordinary rank and title. It was a raarble , slab, to the meraory of Meyer, the painter,— with lines by the amiable poet, Hayley; and Iwas led, by respect for painter and poet, to copy the whole: — Jeremiah Meyer, R.A. Paiuter in Miniature and Enamel to his Majesty Geo. III. pied January I9, 1789. Meyer ! in thy works, the world will ever see How great the loss of Art in losing thee ; But Love and Sorrow find the words too weak, Kature's keen sufferings ou thy death to speak: ^ROM LONDON TO KEW. 383 Through all her duties, what a heart was thine ; In thy cold dust what spirit used to shine! Fancy, and truth, and gaiety, and zeal. What most we love in life, and, losing, feel ; ^ge after age may not one artist yield Equal to thee, iu Painting's ample field; Andne'er shall sorrowing Earth to Heaven commend A fonder parent, or a firmer friend. William Hayley, 1789. Froni hence I strolled into the vestry, where I found a table of fees, drawn with^ a degree of precision which merits imita tion. It appears, that the fees for mar riages with a licence are IOs. 6d., and by banns 5s. That those for burials, to the minister, if the prayers are said in the church, are 5s. ; if only at the grave,. 2*. 6d. The graves are six feet deep ; and, in the church, the coffin must be of lead. The clerk is entitled to half, and the sexton to about a third more. A vault in -the church is charged 21/., and in the church-yard 10/. 10*. ; with 51. 5s. and Qt. Qs. respectively for each time of opening. To non-residents they are dou-r ble. — I had scarcely finished this extract, SSi A morning's walk when the clerk's or sexton's assistant made his appearance ; and on the south side of the church-yard he brought me to the torab of GAINSBOROUiiH. "Ah! friend," said I, " this is a hal- Ipwed spot — here Ues one .of Britain's fafvoured sons, whose genius has assisted in exalting her among the nations of the earth." — "Perhaps it was so," said the man, "but we know nothing about tlie people buried, except to keep up their mo numents, if the faipily pay ; and, perhaps. Sir, you belong to this family; if so, I'll tell you how much is due." — "Yes, truly, IViend," said I, "I am one of the great family bound to preserve the monument of Gainsborough; but, if you take me for one of his relatives, you are mistaken." — "Perhaps, Sir, you may be ofthe family, but were not included in the Will, there fore are not obligated." I could not now avoid looking with scorn at the fellow ; but, as the spot claimed better feelings, I gave him a trifle for his trouble, pnd mildly told him I would not detain him. from LONDON TO KEW. 385 The monument being a plain one, and making no palpable appeal to vulgar ad- "miration, was disregarded by these people,; for it is in death as in life, if you would excite the notice of the multitude, you raust in the grave have a splendid mauso leum, or in walking the streets you must wear fine clothes. It did not fall in the way of the untaught, on this otherwise polite spot, to know that they have araong them the remains of the first painter OF OUR national SCHOOL, in fancy- pictures, and one of the first in the classes of landscape and portrait ; — a man who recomraended hiraself as much by his superiority, as by his genius ; as much by the mode in which his genius was deve loped, as by the perfection of his works; and as rauch by his amiable private charac ter as by his eminence in the chief of Fancy's Arts. There is this difference between a. poet and a painter — that thp poet only ex hibits the types of ideas in words, limited in their sense by his views, or his powers of expression; but the painter is called c c 386 A morning's walk upon to exhibit the ideas theraselves in a tangible shape, and made out in all their parts and most beautiful forras. The poet may write with a limited knowledge of his subject, and he may produce any partial view of it which his powers enable hira to exhibit in a striking manner ; but the suc cessful painter must do all this, and he must execute with his hand as well as con ceive with his mind. The poet, too, hag the advantage of exhibiting his ideas in succession, and he avails himself of stops and pauses ; but the great painter is obliged to set his entire subject before the eye at once, and all the parts of his composi tion, his imagination, and his execution, challenge the judgment as a whole, A great poet is nevertheless a just object of admiration among ordinary persons' — but far raore so a great painter, who assuraes the power of creation, and of improving on the ordinary combinations of the Crea tor. Yet such a man was Thomas Gainsboroxtgh, before whose modest tomb I stood ! FROM LONDON TO KEW. 387 The following are the words engraven on the stone: — Thomas Gainsborough, esq. died August 2, 1788. Also the body of Gainsborough Dupont, esq. who died Jan. 20, 1797, aged 42 years. Also, Mrs. Margaret Gainsborough, wife of the above Thomas Gainsborough, esq. who died Dec. 17, 1798, in the 72d year of her age. A little to the eastward lie the reraains oi another illustrious son of art, the mo dest Zoffany, whose Florence Gallery, Portraits of the Royal Family, and other pictures, wUl always raise him araong the highest class of painters. He long resided on this Green, and, like Michael Angelo, Titian, and our own West, produced master-pieces at four-score. The words on the monument aret Sacred to the Memory of John Zoffany, R.A. who died Nov. 11, ISIO, aged 87 years. peg 388 A morning's walk It M'as a remarkable coincidence, that the bones of Gainsborough and Zof fany should thus, without premeditation, have been laid side by side ; and that, but a few weeks before I paid my visit to this spot, delighted crowds had been daily drawn together to view their principal works, combined with those of Wilson and Hogarth, in forming an attractive metropolitan exhibition. On that occa sion every Englishman felt proud of the native genius of our Gainsborough. It was ably opposed in one line by a W^iLsoN, and in another by a Zoffany ; yet the works of the untutored Gains borough and Hogarth served to prove that every great artist must be born such ; - and that superiority in human works is the result of original aptitude, and cannot be produced by any servile routine of educa tion, however specious, imposi sedu lous, or costly. This valley of the Thames is, however, sanctified every-whPre by relics which call for equal reverence. But a mile distant on ray right, in Chiswick Church-yard, Ue FROIm' LONDON TO KEW. 38g the remains of the painting moralist .Ho garth; who ipveritqd a upiversal charac ter, or species of moral revelation, intelligi ble to every degree of, inteUect, in all ages and countries ; who opened a path to the kindred genius of a Burnett and a Wilkie; and who conferred a deathless fame on the manners, habits, and chief characters of his time. And, but a mile on my left, in Richmond Church, lie the remains of Thomson, the poet of nature, of liberty, and of man — who displayed his powers only for noble .purposes ; who scorn ed, like the vile herd of modern rhyme sters, to ascribe glory to injustice, heroism to the assassins of the champions of li berty!', or wisdom to the mischievous preju dices of weak princes; and who, by assert ing in every line the moral dignity of his art, became an example of poetical re nown, which has been ably followed by Glover, Akenside, Cowper, Ro binson, Burns, Barlow, Barbauld, Wolcot, Moore, and Byron. The fast-declinipg Sun, and my wearied cg3 390 A morning's walk limbs here reminded me that I was thft slave 0^ nature, and of nature's laws; and that I had neither time, nor power, to ex- curse or go farther. My course, there fore, necessarily terminated on this spot; and here I must take leave of the reader, who bas been patient, or liberal enough, to accompany me. For my own part, I had been highly gratified with the great volume, ten or twelve miles long, by two or three broad, in tbe study of which I had employed the lengthened morning ; though this volurae of my brief analysis the reader will doubtiess find marked by the short-sightedness and imperfections which attend every attempt of human art to compress an infi nite variety into a finite compass. In looking back at the incidents of the day, which the language of custom has, with reference to our repasts, denominated the morning, I could not avoid feeling the strong analogy which exists between such an excursion as that which I have here described and the life of man. Like that, and all things measured by time and FROM London to kew. 391 SPACE, it had had its beginning — its eventful course^ — and its end deter mined by physical causes. On emerging in the morning, I foresaw as little as the child foresees his future life, what were to be the incidents of my jour- . ney. I proceeded in each successive hour even as he proceeds in each year. I jos tled no one, and no one disturbed me. My feelings were those of peace, and I suffered from no hostUity. My inclina tions were virtuous, and I have experi enced the rewards of virtue. Every step had therefore been productive of satisfac tion, and I had no-where had cause to look behind me with regret. In this faithful journal, I have ven tured to smile at folly; I have honestly reprehended bad passions, and I have sin cerely sympathized with their victims. May all ray readers be led to smile, repre* bend, and sympathize with me ; and I soli cit this result— for their sakes — for the sake of truth — and in the hope that, if our feelings have been reciprocal, our mutual labours wUl not have been wasted ! At the 392 A morning's walk , end of my short career, I conscientiously looked back on tbe incidents of my course with the complacency with which all raay look back in old-age on the incidents of weU-spent lives. Let no one sneer at the comparison, for, when human life has passed away, in what degree are its multiplied cares and chequered scenes more important than the simple events which attend a morning's walk ? Look on the graves of that church-yard, and see in them the representations of hundreds of anxious lives ! Are not those graves, then, said I, the end of thousands of busy cares and ambitious projects ? Was not life the mere dream of their now senseless te nants — like the trackless path of a bird in the air, or of a fish in the waters ? Were they not the Phantasmagoria which, in their day, filled up the shifting scene of the world, — and are we not, in our several days, simUar shadows, which mo dify the -light for a season, and then disappear to make room for others like ourselves ? May not the events of a FROM LONDON TO KEW. 3C)3 morning which slides away, and leaves no traces behind it, be correctiy likened there fore to the entire course of human Ufe ? The one, like the other, may be well or ill spent — idly dissipated or ^ beneficially employed ; — and the chequered incidents will be found to be similar to those which mark the periods of the longest life. In conclusion, I cannot avoid wishing that my example may be followed, in other situations, by minds variously stored and directed by different inquiries. Like the day which has just been recorded, the inci dents of every situation, and the thoughts which pass without intermission through every mind, would, in a similar portion of time, fiU simUar volumes, which, as indices of man's inteUectual machinery, might serve the purpose of the dial of a clock, or the gnomon of a sun-dial, and prove agree able sources of amusement, as well as efficacious means of disseminating valuable principles and useful instruction. MAP OF THE AUTHOR'S ROUTE. INDEX. A' Accumulation of property, its misery to all, 44. Admiralty, British, itis characteristics, 9. Addition, Mr. his residence, 167. • , political character, 280. Almanacks of prognostication, their prodigious sale, 25^ Alfred the Great, his rare merits, 8. American Aloe, reflections on, 59. Anne Boleyn, her interview with Henry the Eighth, 68. Animal motion, economy of, 124. Ancestors, their number ascertained, 259. Ancestry, no ground of pride, 262. Anglican Church, its true foundation, 266. Ant-hill, like the British inetropolis, 151. Antiqnities, folly of the science so called, 340. Archbishops of Canterbury, their ancient rcsideace, 303- Argumeut in behalf of poverty, 106. Aristocracy of trade characterized, 101. Arithmetic, its connexion with nature, 189. Articles of Faith, necessity of revising, 267. Asparagus, its extensive cultivation, 55. Assembly, a subscription one described, 91. Astrology, its pretensions investigated, 234, 241. Author, his feelings Ou concluding his Walk, 3S9., E. Barber, Aldertnap, his tomb and merit, 25!}. Battersea-bridge, reflections on its toll, 41. Eallot, choice by, its pernicious effect and erroneous ' principle, 91. JBak»well,l\ir. his mode of riding, 12$. INDEX. Barnes Poor-house, libel on political economy, 193. Common, its geological phenomena, 197. Church-yard, reflections on,'215. Bastile Palace, at Kew, 379. Beggars, their habits and gains, 3 and 4. Bee-hive, its buzz that of a distant town, 152. Besborough, Lrord, his seal, 177. Bells, abuse of them, 210, 282. . Blenkinsop's steam-engine, its convenient powers, 76. Black balls, a majority of, how produced, 93. Blair's Universal Preceptor, its merits, 294. Box-trees, ancient ones, 311. Botanic Garden, at Chelsea, 37. Bolingbroke, Lord, his house at Battersea, 51. , , recollections of, 54. Book-clubs, a test of intellectual improvement, 98. Book of Nature, described, 341. British society, its radical