to betray young women into a fudden attachment to perfons unworthy of their affection, and thus to hurry them into marriages terminating in unhappiness. In addition to the regular habit of ufeful reading, the cuftom of committing to the memory felect and ample portions of poetic compofitions, not for the purpose of oftentatiously quoting them in mixed company, but for the fake of private improvement, deferves, in confequence of its beneficial tendency, to be mentioned with a very high degree of praife. The mind is thus ftored with a lafting treasure of fentiments and ideas combined by writers of tranfcendent genius and vigorous imagination, clothed in appropriate, nervous, and glowing language, and impreffed by the powers of cadence and harmony. Let the poetry, however, be well chofen. Let it be fuch as elevates the heart with the ardour of devotion, adds energy and grace to precepts of morality, kindles benevolence by pathetic narrative and reflection, enters with natural and lively defcription into the varieties of character, or prefents vivid pictures of what is grand or beautiful in the fcenery of nature. Such are in general the works of Milton, of Thomson, of Gray, of Mafon, and of Cowper. It is thus that the beauty and grandeur of nature will be contemplated with new pleafure. It is thus that taste will be called forth, exercifed, and corrected. It is thus that judgment will be ftrengthened, virtuous emotions cherifhed, piety animated and exalted. At all times, and under every circumftance, the heart penetrated with religion, will delight itself in the recollection of paffages, which difplay the perfections of that Being on whom it trufts, and the glorious hopes to which it aspires. When affliction weighs down the fpirits, or fickness the strength, it is then that their cheering influence will be doubly Ed. Mag. April 1797. felt. When old age, difabling the fufferer from the frequent use of books, obliges the mind to turn inward upon itfelf; the memory, long retentive, even in its decay, of the acquifitions which it had attained and valued in its early vigour, ftill foggefts the lines which have again and again diffused rapture thro' the bofom of health, and are yet capable of overfpreading the hours of decrepitude and the couch of pain with confolation. But it is not from books alone that a confiderate young woman is to feek her gratifications. The discharge of relative duties, and the exercife of benevolence form additional fources of activity and enjoyment. To give delight in the affectionate intercourse of domeftic fociety; to relieve a parent in the fuperintendence of family affairs; to fmooth the bed of fickness, and cheer the decline of age; to examine into the wants and diftreffes of the female inhabitants of the neighbourhood; to promote ufeful inftitutions for the comfort of mothers, and for the inftruction of children; and to give to thofe inftitutions that degree of attention, which, without requiring either much time or much perfonal trouble, will facilitate their effablishment and extend their usefulnefs: thefe are employments congenial to female fympathy; employments in the precife line of female duty; employments which diffuse genuine and lafting confolation among those whom they are defigned to benefit, and never fail to improve the heart of her who is engaged in them. In pointing out what ought to be done, let juftice be rendered to what has been done. In the discharge of the domeftic offices of kindness, and in the exercife of charitable and friendly regard to the neighbouring poor, women in general are exemplary. In the latter branch of Christian virtue, an acceffion of energy has been witneffed within a few years. Many Many ladies have fhewn, and ftill continue to fhew, their earneft folicitude for the welfare of the wretch. ed and the ignorant, by fpontaneouf ly establishing schools of industry and of religious inftruction; and with a flill more beneficial warmth of bene. volence, have taken the regular in fpection of them upon themselves. May they fedfaftly perfevere, and be imitated by numbers! Among the employments of time, which, though regarded with due at tention by many young women, are more or less neglected by a confiderable number, moderate exercife in the open air claims to be noticed. Sedentary confinement in hot apart ments on the one hand, and public diversions frequented, on the other, in buildings ftill more crowded and ftifling, are often permitted fo to oc cupy the time as by degrees even to wear away the relish for the freshnefs of a pure atmosphere, for the beauties and amusements of the garden, and for thofe "rural fights and rural founds," which delight the mind uncorrupted by idlenefs, folly, or vice. Enfeebled health, a capricious temper, low and irritable spirits, and the lofs of many pure and continually recurring enjoyments, are among the confequences of fuch mifconduct. But though books obtain their reafonable proportion of the day, tho' health has been confulted, the demands of duty fulfilled, and the dictates of benevolence obeyed, there will yet be hours remaining unoccu pied; hours for which no fpecific employment has yet been provided. For fuch hours it is not the intention of thefe pages to prescribe any specific employment. What if fome space be affigned to the useful and elegant arts of female induftry? But is induftry to poffefs them all? Let the innocent amufements which home furnishes claim their fhare. It is a claim which fhall cheerfully be allowed. Do amufements abroad offer their pretenfions? Neither fhail they, on proper occafions, be unheard. A well-regulated life will never know a vacuum fufficient to require an immoderate fhare of public amusements to fill it. ANECDOTES OF ILLUSTRIOUS BRITISH CHARACTERS. OCTAVIO MAY, (The original Inventor of Watered Taf fetas.) THERE was about the beginning of the last century an English man of the name of Octavio May, who fettled at Lyons. He was a man of very good capacity, and great diligence in his trade, but, by a chain of unlucky events, was brought into embarraffing circumstances. In this melancholy ftate, ftanding one day at his shop door, brooding over his misfortunes, he happened to put a little tuft of raw filk into his mouth, and grinding it for some time between his teeth, without confider. ing what he was about, at laft fpit it As it fell immediately before him, he observed that it had a very out. unufual luftre, which ftruck him fo much that it brought him out of his fit of the vapours. He took it up and confidered it; and, being a man of reflection, he immediately traced the whole progrefs of the operation; the grinding between the teeth; the mixture of a clammy liquor, fuch as the faliva; and the performing that in a place neceffarily warm as the mouth. On these confiderations he went to work; and following nature as clofe as he could, in a little time produced thofe lustered or watered taffetas now fo univerfally used, MAY acquired an immense fortune by this incident, and established a manufacture which has been a con. tinual fource of riches to that city ever fince. SALE, SALE, (The Tranflator of the Alcoran, &c.) This man, who had both learning and general abilities for his profeffion, is, however, unfortunately to be claffed amongst those who either did not think fufficiently of the common affairs of life, or, if he did, thought his talents were an excufe for his over looking them. Having contributed pretty largely to the Volumes of Univerfal History, the work was top ped by the delay of a Preface which he had engaged to write for that work. The bookfellers concerned conftantly preffed him, but for a long time could get no fatisfaction; at last he fent them word it was finished, and an evening was appointed for the purpose of delivering it, The parties being all mèt, Sale produced a parcel of loofe Manufcripts, tied up clofe with red tape, and fealed at the edges, which he laid down on the table as the preface. Nobody doubting this, he was paid his balance, and the company fupped together in great good-humour and harmony; when, juft before parting, Sale, as if fuddenly recollecting fomething, took up the papers, faid he had a few alterations to make, which would not take up two hours, and that he would return them the next day. He accordingly carried home the papers, but did not return them for many months afterwards; and then not till he had laid the bookfellers under fresh contributions. TOPHAM BEAU CLERC. This Gentleman was nearly related to the Duke of St. Albans ; and pof. feffed a ftrength of mind and univerfality of talents that would have made a moft diftinguished figure in life, had his pleafures, or his love of learning permitted him to mingle more in the bufy haunts of men. He was deeply verfed in antient and modern learning; understood poetry, painting, and mufic; had a talte, and a liberality equal to that tafte, in the collection of books, manufcripts, &c. and was a good practical chemist; which laft he for fome years before his death indulged in confiderably, at the expence of his private fortune. He was reckoned, by a Noble Lord now living, a near relation of his, and who is in poffeffion of manyprivate traits of their common anceltor Charles the Second, to be more like that Monarch in his pleafures, his purfuits, and fome of his failings, than any of his fucceffors. He had the best library of any private Gentleman of his time, and, perhaps, as well arranged. His method was, when he began a class, either in arts or sciences, to continue buying principally in that clafs till he had completed it. By thefe means his collection was very perfect. His conduct to his booklellers, too, deferves fome notice (and we believe in this refpect not fo fimilar to the general conduct of his ancestor.) When he wanted books, he fent in a catalogue, according to the largeness of the fum they might amount to, to fuch bookfellers as he thought could beft lie out of their money: here the debt refted till either fuch time as his annuities came round, or he had a fuccefsful run at play when either of thefe happened, he punctually called upon his creditors, and discharged it with honour. He has often, in thefe inftances, paid fo large a fum as fifteen hundred pounds at a On his outfet in life he had a very fine fortune; but, ardent in the pur062 fuic fuit of elegant and expenfive pleafures, he dipt it confiderably. On a review of his affairs, he wifhed to fell his eftates for an annuity deter minable when he was forty; an age which inexperience, and the intoxication of pleafure fuggefted to him as the extreme bounds of life. The interpofition of his friends faved him from this error; and he lived, principally upon a very confiderable an. nuity, during the remainder of his Tife, which however, did not laft many years after the period of forty. Mr Beauclerc was one of the ear ly acquaintances of Dr Johnfon in the meridian of his literary fame, and one to whom he paid great confideration on account of his learning and abilities. He often lamented that his indolence and diffipation prevented him from bringing his talents to fome useful defignations, faying "What Beauclerc would write would be read with avidity: he fees moft fubjects strongly and clearly, and has great tafte in embellifhing them;" but his mode of living debarred him from any of the great purfuits of life; fcarcely ever rifing till evening, and then fitting up the best part of the night, either in literary focieties or parties of play. Soon after his death, which happened about fixteen years ago, Dr Johnfon gave the following charac ter of him at the Club:-he faid, he was the most general man in his knowledge, and poffeffed the greateft dexterity of mind in converfation, he ever knew; he hit the foonest, the hardeft, and faireft, of any antagonift; and feldom attempted to argue without fucceeding in those three points. He then continued, " he had, however, great ill-nature about him; and at times it seemed to give him the greatest pleafure to say the moft malicious things of his best friends; not that I believe he would act upon this, and do a deliberate mifchief to any one; it feemed to be the mere indulgence of a jealous or petulant moment." 66 Wyndham too," continued the Doctor," has great comprehenfion of mind, but his exercife of it is dif ferent. Beauclerc was like a greyhound, that whipped up his prey on the firft ftretch, whereas Wyndham is more like a bull-dog, who fucceeds by perfeverance." ON THE OPERATION OF MANURES. From the Monthly Magazine. IT T is well known, that vegetable and animal manures will not contribute to the growth of plants, until they become putrid; in which ftate they yield the phlogistic principle, and are more or lefs valuable and efficacious, in proportion to the quantity of phlogiston they contain. It is for this reafon, that animal fubftances, which poffefs the phlogiftic principle in greater abundance than vegetables, are better manures. All alkaline and abforbent earths are generally confidered as manures; but their action, in promoting the growth of plants, is very different from putrid vegetable and animal fubftances. Every alkaline, or abforbent, earth, attracts an acid in propor tion to its ftrength. When these earths are perfectly uncombined they are cauftic; but when faturated with fixed air, they become quite mild,Fixed air is ftrongly attracted by all abforbents, and is an acid, the qualities of which are totally different from all others; when combined with abforbents, it becomes neutral. Dr Priestley hath fhewn, that ve getables contain a large proportion of nitrous air, which is a modifica tion tion of nitrous acid: and he has alfo The quantity of nutriment which ́proved, that animal fubftances (the a plant derives from the earth, is in fat excepted,) contain none of this propertion to the number and magninitrous air; but that in them a por- tude of its leaves. The fmaller and tion of fixed and inflammable air is fewer these are, the less nourishment found. is drawn. Vegetable acid is a powerful antifeptic, and must be expelled before the fubftances that contain it, can become putrid. The effect, therefore, of an addition of alkaline fubftance, or absorbent earth, to a mass of vegetable matter, is that of uniting with this nitrous air, which counteracts the putrefcent tendency of the vegetable fubftance; and when, by this union, the acid is thus extracted by these abforbents, putrefaction immediately takes place." Pulverifed limestone, without any calcination, is found to be a good manure, though lefs quick in its operation than when calcined; and is alfo, by its weight, in proportion to its bulk, liable to be loft fooner, efpecially where they practife deep plow. ing. There is great rifque in laying much lime on fallowed lands, where there is no vegetable fubftance for it to act upon, and acquire a certain degree of faturation before the feed is fown; yet a fmall quantity will quicken and promote the growth of the feed. Pulverifation increafes fertility by increafing the furface to which nutritive principles in the air may more eafily attach themselves. The different fpecies of manure contribute to the fertilizing of land, only in proportion as they introduce into it a quantity of fpongy powder, oleaginous particles, or active falt. ་་་ The nutrition of vegetables is likewife mostly effected immediately by the leaves, which are the lungs of the plant. They not only ferve for raifing the fap, concocting it, and difcharging its fuperfluity, but are also a kind of roots, filled with delicately fine tubular veffels, that pump the juices from the air, and tranfmit then to the neighbouring parts. It is a vulgar error, to fuppofe, that moffes impoverifb land. It is true, that loving cold and moisture, it grows on poor wet lands; and be caufe fuch land, in that ftate, bears little elfe, it has been fuppofed, that mofs renders it barren :bat the reverfe is true. The roots of mofs feldom penetrate more than half an inch in depth, and therefore can draw little from the foil. Take away the mofs, and inftead of having more, there will be lefs grafs. The only way to improve fuch land, is effectually to drain it, previous to its being manured; grafs will then increafe, and the mofs difappear. Few, if any, moffes are eaten by cattle. For fuch lands as thefe, when broken up, Patney barley is preferable to any other: for it appears, by a paper in the Philofophical Tranfactions, for the year 1678, that this fpecies of barley was recommended to the Royal Society, as being moft proper for cold countries, on account of its ripening within nine or ten weeks after it was fown. only, it might eafily be conceived BY viewing the conduct of this that he was by nature cruel, like Syl man in the latter part of his life la the Roman. This, however, was not |