maniacal; of whom 2 have died, 6 remain, 21 have been discharged perfectly recovered, 2 so much improved as not to require further confinement. The remainder, 30 recent cases, have been those of melancholy madness; of whom 5 have died, 4 remain, 19 have been discharged cured, and 2 so much improved as not to require further confinement. The old cases, or, as they are commonly termed, incurable cases, are divided into 61 cases of mania, 21 of melancholia, and 6 of dementia; affording the following tables :

"MANIA.

The following statement shows the ages of patients at present in the house :

:

4 from hereditary disposition to madness.

66

66 12 went mad from disappointed affections. 2 from epilepsy.

49 from constitutional causes.

8 from failure in business.

2 from injury of the skull.

1 from mercury.

1 from parturitio n."

The following case is extremely curious; and we wish it had been authenticated by name, place, and signature.

"A young woman who was employed as a domestic servant by the father of the relater, when he was a boy, became insane, and at length sunk into a state of perfect idiotcy. In this condition she remained for many years, when she was attacked by a typhus fever: and my friend, having then practised some time, attended her. He was surprised to observe, as the fever advanced, a development of the mental powers. During that period of the fever, when others were delirious, this patient was entirely rational. She recognised in the face of her medical attendant the son of her old master, whom she had known so many years before; and she related many circumstances respecting his family, and others which had happened to herself in her earlier days. But, alas! it was only the gleam of reason. As the fever abated, clouds again enveloped the mind: she sunk into her former deplorable state, and remained in it until her death, which happened a few years afterwards. I leave to the metaphysical reader further speculation on this certainly very curious case."(P. 137.)

Upon the whole, we have little doubt that this is the best managed asylum for the insane that has ever yet been established; and a part of the explanation no doubt is, that the Quakers take more pains than other people with their madmen. A mad Quaker belongs to a small and rich sect; and is, therefore, of greater importance than any other mad person of the same degree in life. After every allowance, however, which can be made for the feelings of sectaries, exercised towards their own disciples, the Quakers, it must be allowed, are a very charitable and humane people. They are always ready with their money, and, what is of far more importance, with their time and

attention for every variety of human misfortune. They seem to set themselves down systematically before the difficulty, with the wise conviction that it is to be lessened or subdued only by great labour and thought; and that it is always increased by indolence and neglect. In this instance, they have set an example of courage, patience, and kindness, which cannot be too highly commended, or too widely diffused; and which, we are convinced, will gradually bring into repute a milder and better method of treating the insane. For the aversion to inspect places of this sort is so great, and the temptation to neglect and oppress the insane so strong, both from the love of power and the improbability of detection, that we have no doubt of the existence of great abuses in the interior of many madhouses. A great deal has been done for prisons; but the order of benevolence has been broken through by this preference; for the voice of misery may sooner come up from a dungeon, than the oppression of a madman be healed by the hand of justice.*

TRAVELLERS IN AMERICA. (E. REVIEW, December, 1818.)

1. Travels in Canada and the United States, in 1816 and 1817. By Lieutenant FRANCIS HALL, 14th Light Dragoons, H.P. 8vo. London: Longman and Co. 1818.

2. Journal of Travels in the United States of North America, and in Lower Canada, performed in the Year 1817, &c. &c. By JOHN PALMER. 8vo. London: Sherwood, Neely, and Jones. 1818.

3. A Narrative of a Journey of Five Thousand Miles through the Eastern and Western States of America: contained in Eight Reports, addressed to the Thirty-nine English Families by whom the Author was deputed, in June 1817, to ascertain whether any, and what Part of the United States would be suitable for their Residence. With Remarks on Mr. Birkbeck's "Notes" and "Letters." By HENRY Bradshaw FeARON. 8vo. London: Longman and Co. 1818.

4. Travels in the Interior of America, in the Years 1809, 1810, and 1811, &c. By JOHN BRADBURY, F.L.S. London. 8vo. London: Sherwood, Neely, and Jones. 1817. THESE four books are all very well worth reading to any person who feels, as we do, the importance and interest of the subject of which they treat. They contain a great deal of information and amusement; and will probably decide the fate, and direct the footsteps, of many human beings, seeking a better lot than the Old World can afford them. Mr. Hall is a clever, lively man, very much above the common race of writers; with very liberal and reasonable opinions, which he expresses with great boldness,—and an inexhaustible fund of good humour. He has the elements of wit in him; but sometimes is trite and flat when he means to be amusing. He writes verses, too, and is occasionally long and metaphysical. But, upon the whole, we think highly of Mr. Hall, and deem him, if he is not more than twenty-five years of age, an extraordinary young man. He is not the less extraordinary for being a Lieutenant of Light Dragoons-as it is certainly somewhat rare to meet with an original thinker, an indulgent judge of manners, and a man tolerant of neglect and familiarity, in a youth covered with tags, feathers, and martial foolery.

Mr. Palmer is a plain man, of good sense and slow judgment—Mr. Bradbury is a botanist, who lived a good deal among the savages, but worth attending to Mr. Fearon is a much abler writer than either of the two last, but no lover of America-and a little given to exaggeration in his views of vices and prejudices.

*The Society of Friends have been extremely fortunate in the choice of their male and female superintendents at the asylum, Mr. and Mrs. Jephson. It is not easy to find a greater combination of good sense and good feeling than these two persons possess:-but then the merit of selecting them rests with their employers.

R

Among other faults with which our government is chargeable, the vice of impertinence has lately crept into our cabinet; and the Americans have been treated with ridicule and contempt. But they are becoming a little too powerful, we take it, for this cavalier sort of management; and are increasing with a rapidity which is really no matter of jocularity to us, or the other powers of the Old World. In 1791, Baltimore contained 13,000 inhabitants; in 1810, 46,000; in 1817, 60,000. In 1790, it possessed 13,000 tons of shipping; in 1798, 59,000; in 1805, 72,000; in 1810, 103,444. The progress of Philadelphia is as follows:Houses. Inhab.

"Now, it is computed there are at least 120,000 inhabitants in the city and suburbs, of which 10,000 are free coloured people."-Palmer, pp. 254, 255.

The population of New York (the city), in 1805, was 60,000; it is now 120,000. Their shipping, at present, amounts to 300,000 tons. The population of the state of New York was, at the accession of his present Majesty, 97,000, and is now near 1,000,000. Kentucky, first settled in 1773, had, in 1792, a population of 100,000; and in 1810, 406,000. Morse reckons the whole population of the western territory, in 1790, at 6,000; in 1810 it was near half a million; and will probably exceed a million in 1820. These, and a thousand other equally strong proofs of their increasing strength, tend to extinguish pleasantry, and provoke thought.

We were surprised and pleased to find, from these accounts, that the Americans on the Red River and the Arkansas River have begun to make sugar and wine. Their importation of wool into this country is becoming also an object of some consequence; and they have inexhaustible supplies of salt and coal. But one of the great sources of wealth in America is and will be an astonishing command of inland navigation. The Mississippi, flowing from the north to the Gulf of Mexico, through seventeen degrees of latitude; the Ohio and the Alleghany almost connecting it with the Northern Lakes; the Wabash, the Illinois, the Missouri, the Arkansas, the Red River, flowing from the confines of New Mexico;-these rivers, all navigable, and most of them already frequented by steam-boats, constitute a facility of internal communication not, we believe, to be paralleled in the whole world.

One of the great advantages of the American government is its cheapness. The American king has about £5,000 per annum, the vice-king £1,000. They hire their Lord Liverpool at about a thousand per annum, and their Lord Sidmouth (a good bargain) at the same sum. Their Mr. Crokers are inexpressibly reasonable,—somewhere about the price of an English doorkeeper, or bearer of a mace. Life, however, seems to go on very well, in spite of these low salaries; and the purposes of government to be very fairly answered. Whatever may be the evils of universal suffrage in other countries, they have not yet been felt in America; and one thing at least is established by her experience, that this institution is not necessarily followed by those tumults, the dread of which excites so much apprehension in this country. In the most democratic states, where the payment of direct taxes is the only qualification of a voter, the elections are carried on with the utmost tranquillity; and

the whole business, by taking votes in each parish or section, concluded all over the state in a single day. A great deal is said by Fearon about Caucus, the cant word of the Americans for the committees and party meetings in which the business of the elections is prepared-the influence of which he seems to consider as prejudicial. To us, however, it appears to be nothing more than the natural, fair, and unavoidable influence which talent, popularity, and activity always must have upon such occasions. What other influence can the leading characters of the democratic party in Congress possibly possess? Bribery is entirely out of the question-equally so is the influence of family and fortune. What then can they do, with their Caucus or without it, but recommend? And what charge is it against the American government to say, that those members of whom the people have the highest opinion meet together to consult whom they shall recommend for President, and that their recommendation is successful in their different states? Could any friend to good order wish other means to be employed, or other results to follow? No statesman can wish to exclude influence, but only bad influence ;-not the influence of sense and character, but the influence of money and punch.

A very disgusting feature in the character of the present English government is its extreme timidity, and the cruelty and violence to which its timidity gives birth. Some hot-headed young person, in defending the principles of liberty, and attacking those abuses to which all governments are liable, passes the bounds of reason and moderation, or is thought to have passed them by those whose interest it is to think so. What matters it whether he has or not? You are strong enough to let him alone. With such institutions as ours he can do no mischief; perhaps he may owe his celebrity to your opposition; or, if he must be opposed, write against him,-set Čandidus, Scrutator, Vindex, or any of the conductitious penmen of government to write him down ;-anything but the savage spectacle of a poor wretch, perhaps a very honest man, contending in vain against the weight of an immense government, pursued by a zealous attorney, and sentenced by some candidate, perhaps, for the favour of the crown, to the long miseries of the dungeon. A still more flagrant instance may be found in our late suspensions of the Habeas Corpus Act. Nothing was trusted to the voluntary activity of a brave people thoroughly attached to their Government-nothing to the good sense and prudence of the gentlemen and yeomen of the country— nothing to a little forbearance, patience, and watchfulness. There was no other security but despotism; nothing but the alienation of that right which no king nor minister can love, and which no human beings but the English have had the valour to win, and the prudence to keep. The contrast between our Government and that of the Americans upon the subject of suspending the

*

* A great deal is said about the independence and integrity of English judges. In causes between individuals they are strictly independent and upright; but they have strong temptations to be otherwise in cases where the Crown prosecutes for libel. Such cases often involve questions of party, and are viewed with great passion and agitation by the minister and his friends. Judges have often favours to ask for their friends and families, and dignities to aspire to for themselves. It is human nature, that such powerful motives should create a great bias against the prisoner. Suppose the chief justice of any court to be in an infirm state of health, and a government libel-cause to be tried by one of the puisne judges -of what immense importance is it to that man to be called a strong friend to governmenthow injurious to his natural and fair hopes to be called lukewarm, or addicted to popular notions and how easily the runners of the government would attach such a character to him! The useful inference from these observations is, that in all government cases the jury, instead of being influenced by the cant phrases about the integrity of English judges, should suspect the operation of such motives-watch the judge with the most acute jealousy-and compel him to be honest, by throwing themselves into the opposite scale whenever he is inclined to be otherwise.

Habeas Corpus, is drawn in so very able a manner by Mr. Hall, that we must give the passage at large.

"It has ever been the policy of the Federalists to 'strengthen the hands of Government.' No measure can be imagined more effectual for this purpose than a law which gifts the ruling powers with infallibility; but no sooner was it enacted, than it revealed its hostility to the principles of the American system, by generating oppression under the cloak of defending social order.

"If there ever was a period when circumstances seemed to justify what are called energetic measures, it was during the Administration of Mr. Jefferson and his successor. A disastrous war began to rage not only on the frontiers, but in the very penetralia of the republic. To oppose veteran troops, the ablest generals, and the largest fleets in the world, the American Government had raw recruits, officers who had never seen an enemy, half a dozen frigates, and a population unaccustomed to sacrifices, and impatient of taxation. To crown these disadvantages, a most important section of the Union, the New England States, openly set up the standard of separation and rebellion. A convention sat for the express purpose of thwarting the measures of government; while the press and pulpit thundered every species of denunciation against whoever should assist their own country in the hour of danger. And this was the work, not of Jacobins and democrats, but of the staunch friends of religion and social order, who had been so zealously attached to the government while it was administered by their own party, that they suffered not the popular breath 'to visit the President's breech too roughly.'

"The course pursued, both by Mr. Jefferson and Mr. Maddison, throughout this season of difficulty, merits the gratitude of their country, and the imitation of all governments pretending to be free.

So far were they from demanding any extraordinary powers from Congress, that they did not even enforce to their full extent those with which they were by the constitution invested. The process of reasoning on which they probably acted may be thus stated. The majority of the nation is with us, because the war is national. The interests of a minority suffer; and self-interest is clamorous when injured. It carries its opposition to an extreme inconsistent with its political duty. Shall we leave it an undisturbed career of faction, or seek to put it down with libel and sedition laws? In the first case it will grow bold from impunity; its proceedings will be more and more outrageous: but every step it takes to thwart us will be a step in favour of the enemy, and, consequently, so much ground lost in public opinion. But, as public opinion is the only instrument by which a minority can convert a majority to its views, impunity, by revealing its motives, affords the surest chance of defeating its intent. In the latter case, we quit the ground of reason to take that of force; we give the factious the advantage of seeming persecuted by repressing intemperate discussion, we confess ourselves liable to be injured by it. If we seek to shield our reputation by a libel-law, we acknowledge either that our conduct will not bear investigation, or that the people are incapable of distinguishing between truth and falsehood. But for a popular government to impeach the sanity of the nation's judgment is to overthrow the pillars of its own elevation.

"The event triumphantly proved the correctness of this reasoning. The Federalists awoke from the delirium of factious intoxication, and found themselves covered with contempt and shame. Their country had been in danger, and they gloried in her distress. She had exposed herself to privations from which they had extracted profit. In her triumphs they had no part, except that of having mourned over and depreciated them. Since the war Federalism has been scarcely heard of.”—(Hall, 508–511.)

The Americans, we believe, are the first persons who have discarded the tailor in the administration of justice, and his auxiliary the barber-two persons of endless importance in the codes and pandects of Europe. A judge administers justice without a calorific wig and parti-coloured gown, in a coat and pantaloons. He is obeyed, however; and life and property are not badly protected in the United States. We shall be denounced by the Laureate as Atheists and Jacobins ; but we must say that we have doubts whether one

"In Boston, associations were entered into for the purpose of preventing the filling up of government loans. Individuals disposed to subscribe were obliged to do it in secret, and conceal their names, as if the action had been dishonest."-(Vide "Olive Branch," p. 307.) At the same time, immense runs were made by the Boston banks on those of the Central and Southern States; while the specie thus drained was transmitted to Canada, in payment for smuggled goods and British Government bills, which were drawn in Quebec, and disposed of in great numbers, on advantageous terms, to monied men in the states. Mr. Henry's mission is the best proof of the result anticipated by our government from these proceedings in New England.