the confequence? and after the lofs of two or three lives, fuppofe the affaulters had been conquerors, where muft they have carried their prize? Would not the country have been raifed? Would not they have been purfued? Befides, was not the young lady going to Dublin? A city that unhappy man was too well acquainted with. He knew it is fituated near the fea; that a wellconcerted plan laid there for carrying off the lady going home in a fedan chair from fome vifit, by bribing the chairmen, and having a boat ready on the quays, might with fome degree of probability have been executed.

But without all doubt, he made all his accomplices and affiftants believe, that his defign was only to take the young lady away, whom he declared to be his wife; but the contrary appeared on the trial. There it was fworn by one of the evidences, Mr. Afh, that this unhappy wretch had vowed long ago to murder Mr. Knox and his whole family; and this fact evidently appeared, that he had not made the leaft provifion for carrying her off that day, nor once demanded her at the coach

fide.

Agreeable to the fentence, Mr. M'Naughton, with his accomplice Dunlap, were executed on Tuesday the 15th of December 1761, near Strabane in the county of Tyrone. M'Naughton walked to the place of execution, but being weak of his wounds, was fupported between two men. He was dreffed in a white flannel waifcoat trimmed with black buttons and holes, a diaper night-cap tied with a black ribbon, white stockings, mourning buckles, and a crape tied on his arm. He defired the executioner to be fpeedy,

and the fellow pointing to the lad der, he mounted with great fpirit. The moment he was tied up, he jumped from it with fuch vehemence, as fnapped the rope, and he fell to the ground, but without dif locating his neck, or doing himself much injury. When they had raised him on his legs again, he foon recovered his fenfes; and the executioner borrowing the rope from Dunlap, and fixing it round M Naughton's neck, he went up the ladder a fecond time, and tying the rope himself to the gallows, he jumped from it again with the fame force, and appeared dead in a minute.

Thus died the once universally admired M'Naughton, in the 38th year of his age! deferted by all who knew him, in poverty and ignominy!

M'Naughton not liking, he faid, either the principles or doctrine of the clergyman who first went to prepare him for death, because it feems he made things too terrible to him, Mr. Burgoyne fucceeded. As no carpenter could be found to make the gallows, the sheriff looked out for a tree proper for the purpose, and the execution muft have been performed on it, had not the uncle of the young lady, and fome other gentlemen, made the gallows and put it up. fheriff was even obliged to take a party of foldiers and force a fmith to take off his, bolts; otherwise he must have been obliged, contrary to law, to execute him with his bolts. The fpectators, who faw him drop, when the rope broke, looked upon it as fome contrivance for his efcape, which they favoured all they could by running away from the place and leaving it open. The populace would not probably

The

have been fo well difpofed towards him, had they known of his horrid defigns of murder; but they had been perfuaded that he only meant to get poffeffion of his wife."

The foregoing account muft naturally fuggeft fome reflections on the high abfurdity of thofe fathers, who, having handfome marriageable daughters, contract friendships with agreeable young gentlemen, and invite them to be intimates, without intending they fhould be hufbands to, or withing them to fucceed with, their daughters! Are not the eyes, by fuch means, directed to their natural pleafing objects? And is not love moft likely to be the certain and natural confequence? When they meet alone in the garden or the grove, will not love be their fubject? How much more ridiculous and abfurd muft fuch fathers appear, who, when the difcovery is made, are furprized and exafperated, at what they themselves have brought about! It may be affirmed, that this very miftake has been the caufe of more real mifchiefs, than any other that can be named. It were to be wifhed therefore, that all thofe, who have been guilty of fo great an error, would not only fincerely repent of, but publickly own it, as fuch a confellion might prove a warning to others.

feveral perfons under the fpecious pretext of turning Roman Catholic. From thence he went to Zante, where he called himfelf a Swede, and contracted feveral debts. Going afterwards to Smyrna, he gave himfelf out in public for a Hanoverian; but he told fome people in pretended confidence that he was a Swede, and the natural fon of a great prince deceased. He took the name of Charles Frederick, Count de Taube; giving to underftand that he had been obliged to fly his country for an affair of state. He ftaid two years at Smyrna, Fiving on fome generous perfons, whom he likewife defrauded of fums of money. From thence paffing to Conftantinople, he acted the fame partthere for eighteen months. At lait he quitted that place all of a fudden, in the month of September 1761, after contracting many debts, and carrying away fome jewels belonging to different ladies, and fome diamond rings. He also took away a fquare gold fauff-box of English make, for rapee, which he never takes, and a gold watch made at Paris. He fpeaks Italian tolerably well, ' but French, German, and English much better, and a little Swedith. He has been fufpećted to be a Jew, because he reads and writes a little Hebrew; but he is otherwife illiterate, and very ignorant.

This man is of the middle fize, but rather under it; he is out in the right fhoulder, has a clear complexion, large features, black eyes, black hair, which he wears in a bag or a queue; he walks faft, is about 28 or 30 years of age. and enriched with every vice, except a paflion for gaming; he plays very ill at games of commerce, and doth not play much at games of hazard. G NATURAL

Of animals living in solid bodies:

N Toulon harbour, and the

fuppofed to have got into it. The egg, whence it was formed, must, by fome very fingular accident, have

and perfectly entire, containing, in different cells, fecluded, from all communication with the air, feveral living fhell-fifh, of an exquifite tafte, called Dactyli, i. e. Dates: To come at thefe fifh, the ftones are broken with mauls. Alfo, along the coaf of Ancona, in the Adriatic, are fiones, ufually weighing about fifty pounds, and fometimes even more, the outfide rugged, and easily broken, but the infide fo hard, as to require a ftrong arm, and an iron maul to break them; within them, and in feparate niches, are found fmall shell fish, quite alive, and very palatable, called Solenes, or Cappe lunghe: The facts are attefted by Gallendi, Blondel, Mayol, the learned bishop of Sulturara, and more particularly by Aldrovandi, a phyfician, of Bologna; the two latter fpeak of it as a common fact, which they themselves faw.

In the volume for 1719, of the academy of fciences at Paris, is the following paffage :

"In the foot of an elm, of the bigness of a pretty corpulent man, three or four feet above the root, and caxctly in the center, has been found a live toad, middle fized, but lean, and filling up the whole vacant fpace: no fooner was a paffage opened by fplitting the wood than it fcuttled away very haftily; a more firm and found elm never grew; fo that the toad cannot be

growth. There the creature had lived without air, feeding on the fubftance of the tree, and growing only as the tree grew. tefted by Mr. Hubert, profeffor of philofophy at Caen."

This is at

The volume for, the year 1731, has a fimilar obfervation, expreffed in thefe words:

"In 1719 we gave an account of a fact, which, though im probable, was well attefted; that a toad had been found living and growing in the ftem of a middling elm, without any way for the crea ture to come out or to have got in. Mr. Seigne, of Nantes, lays before the academy a fact juft of the very fame nature, except that, inftead of an elm, it was an oak, and larger than the elm, which ftill heightens the wonder. He judges, by the time requifite for the growth of the oak, that the toad muft have fubfifted in it, without air, or any ventitious aliment, during eighty or a hundred years. M. Seigne feems to have known nothing of the fact in 1719."

ad

fet to break fome very large and hard fione, in the middle of one we found a huge toad, full of life, and without any visible aperture by which it could get there. I began to wonder how it received birth, had grown and lived; but the labourer told me, it was not the first time he had met with a toad, and the like creatures, within huge blocks of fione, and no vifible opening or fiffure."

Obfervations of living toads, found in very hard and entire ftones, occur in feveral authors, particularly Baptift Fulgofa Doge of Genoa, the famous phyficians Agricola, and Horftius, and lord Verulam; others give very fpecious accounts of fnakes, frogs, crabs, and lobfters, being found alive, inclosed within blocks of marble, rocks, and large fiones.

Without attempting to explain facts fo very abftrufe and furprifing, yet, at the fame time, fo well authenticated, I fhall only indicate the inferences arifing from them.

1. That the teftaceous and crufiaceous fifh, the toads, fnakes, frogs, or at least the eggs, whence thefe different kinds of animals proceeded, were lodged in the trees at their first growth, or in the foft mud, of which the ftones were afterwards formed.

2. That thefe animals thus enclofed within trees or fiones, or at leaft which come from eggs hatched in them, have fubfitted there ever fince, that is, 50, 100, 150 years, or perhaps even more, as lefs could not be required for the growth of the trees, or the formation of the ftones where they were found.

3. That confequently they had

lived there much longer than animals of the fame fpecies when at liberty.

4. Yet, during all the time, their fole aliment has been the fap of the tree, or any moisture or liquor penetrating through the thickness of the stones.

5. That they lived there without any other air than what was contained within their fcanty cells, which, even with regard to the fhell fish, thefe having a kind of refpiration, deferves fome enquiry; but borders on incredibility, with refpect to frogs, toads, and fnakes, whofe fenfible refpiration feems to require much more air.

6. That to this exclusion of all external air, the animals, thus enclofed, might perhaps owe their longevity; at leaft this agrees with the idea of the celebrated Bacon, who, in his Historia vitæ et mortis, canon 18, lays down the following rule as confirmed by experience. Aer exclusus confert ad longevitatem, si aliis incommodis caveas.

7. Laftly, That inftinet taught thefe animals to provide themfelves beforehand with niches proportioned to their utmoft growth; or at leaft, as they grew, they had the fagacity to enlarge their niches, either by repelling, or gradually abrading the fides which formed them.

Thefe confequences, I am aware, may appear incredible, and I own not without fome reafon; but, incredible as they may feen, they mutt be admitted, if we admit the facts, whence they are deduced, be true; and after fuch vouchers and atteftations, they are fcarce to be queftioned.