The British Critic: A New Review

I always sided together. I had broke his Majesty's bread for fourteen years, and would not, upon that account, hear his government spoken against. I had but poor help from the old soldier, and I had them all to contend with; but when I was like to be run down, I bothered them with latitudes and longitudes, and the old soldier swore to all I said, and we contrived to keep our ground, for we had both been great travellers. When they spoke of heavy taxes, I talked of China; when they complained of hard times, I told them of the West India slaves; but neither could make any impression on the other." P. 204.

After eleven years he again removed to Edinburgh; but work was slack, and his wife proved expensive. Four years ago she died, and her funeral and some debts which she left behind, compelled him to sell all his property excepting a small room in which he lives, and a cellar, which is his workshop. In conclussion, he must speak for himself.

"In the month of August, last year, a cousin of my own made me a present of as much money as carried me to London. I sailed in the Hawk, London smack. I was only a steerage passenger, but fared as well as the cabin passengers.' I was held constantly in tow by the passengers. My spirits were up. I was at sea again. I had not trode a I had always a croud round me, former voyages that I had made. than another. I was very happy.

deck for twenty years before. listening to my accounts of the Every one was more kind to me

Upon my arrival in London I waited upon my old captain, Portlock; but fortune was now completely against me. had been dead six weeks before my arrival. I left the house; my spirits sunk with grief for his death, and my own disappointment, as my chief dependance was upon his aid. I then went to Somerset House for the certificate of my service; seven years in the Proteus, and Surprise, in the American war; and seven in the Edgar, Goliah, Ramilies, and Ajax, in the French war. I was ordered to go to the Admiralty-Office first, and then come back to Somerset House. When I applied at the Admiralty-Office, a clerk told me I had been too long of applying. I then went down to the Governor of Greenwich Hospital. I was not acquainted with him; but I knew the Governor of Greenwich would be a distressed seaman's friend. His servant told me he was in Scotland. I then waited upon Captain Gore, whose son's life I had saved, but he was not at home. It was of no use to remain in London, as my money wore down apace. I took my passage back to Edinburgh in the Favourite, London smack, and arrived just four weeks from my first setting out on this voyage of disappointment. What can I do? I must just take what fortune has still in store for me.

was. The whole bay was covered with dead bodies, mangled, wounded, and scorched, not a bit of clothes on them except their trowsers. There were a number of French belonging to the French Admiral's ship, the L'Orient, who had swam to the Goliah, and were cowering under her forecastle. Poor fellows, they were brought on board, and Captain Foley ordered them down to the steward's room, to get provisions and clothing. One thing I observed in these Frenchmen quite different from any thing I had ever before observed. In the American war, when we took a French ship, the Duke de Chartres, the prisoners were as merry as if they had taken us, only saying, Fortune de guerre,' -you take me to-day, I take you to-morrow. Those we now had on board were thankful for our kindness, but were sullen, and as downcast as if each had lost a ship of his own. The only incidents I heard of are two. One lad who was stationed by a salt box, on which he sat to give out cartridges, and keep the lid close, it is a trying birth,-when asked for a cartridge, he gave none, yet he sat upright; his eyes were open. One of the men gave him a push; he fell all his length on the deck. There was not a blemish on his body, yet he was quite dead, and was thrown over-board. The other, a lad who had the match in his hand to fire his gun. In the act of applying it a shot took off his arm; it hung by a small piece of skin. The match fell to the deck. He looked to his arm, and seeing what had happened, seized the match in his left hand, and fired off the gun before he went to the cock-pit to have it dressed. They were in our mess, or I might never have heard of it. Two of the mess were killed, and I knew not of it until the day after. Thus terminated the glorious first of August, the busiest night in my life." P. 185.

The expedition to Egypt formed the close of Nicol's warlike exploits. Twenty-five years after he first left Edinburgh as a wanderer, he again returned, and having bought a house on the Castle Hill, he married a cousin of his own, and established himself as a cooper. Business flourished, till unfortunately war again broke out, and he was compelled to withdraw himself from the press-gangs. At Cousland, about nine miles from Edinburgh, he got employment in Mr. Dickson's lime-quarries; and, while thus engaged, adopted a species of political logic among his companions, which we recommend as highly useful in general practice.

"As Mr. Dickson knew I was anxious for the news, he was so kind as to give me a reading of the newspapers when he was done. The other workmen assembled in my cottage on the evenings I got them, and I read aloud; then we would discuss the important parts together. The others were not friendly to the government, save one, an old soldier, who had been in the East Indies; he and

“ In the month of August, last year, a cousin of my own made me a present of as much money as carried me to London. I sailed in the Hawk, London smack. I was only a steerage passenger, but fared as well as the cabin passengers.' I was held constantly in tow by the passengers. My spirits were up. I was at sea again. I had not trode a deck for twenty years before. I had always a croud round me, listening to my accounts of the former voyages that I had made. Every one was more kind to me than another. I was very happy.

Upon my arrival in London I waited upon my old captain, Portlock; but fortune was now completely against me. He had been dead six weeks before my arrival. I left the house; my spirits sunk with grief for his death, and my own disappointment, as my chief dependance was upon his aid. I then went to Somerset House for the certificate of my service; seven years in the Proteus, and Surprise, in the American war; and seven in the Edgar, Goliah, Ramilies, and Ajax, in the French war. I was ordered to go to the Admiralty-Office first, and then come back to Somerset House. When I applied at the Admiralty-Office, a clerk told me I had been too long of applying. I then went down to the Governor of Greenwich Hospital. I was not acquainted with him; but I knew the Governor of Greenwich would be a distressed seaman's friend. His servant told me he was in Scotland. I then waited upon Captain Gore, whose son's life I had saved, but he was not at home. It was of no use to remain in London, as my money wore down apace. I took my passage back to Edinburgh in the Favourite, London smack, and arrived just four weeks froin my first setting out on this voyage of disappointment. What can I do? I must just take what fortune has still in store for me.

"At one time, after I came home, I little thought I should ever require to apply for a pension; and therefore made no application untill Ireallystood in need of it.

"I eke out my subsistence in the best manner I can. Coffee made from the raspings of bread, (which I obtain from the bakers,) twice a day, is my chief diet. A few potatoes, or any thing I can obtain with a few pence, constitute my dinner. My only luxury is tobacco, which I have used these forty-five years. To beg I never will submit. Could I have obtained a small pension for my past services, I should then have reached my utmost earthly wish, and the approach of utter helplessness would not haunt me as it at present does in my solitary home. Should I be forced to sell it, all I would obtain could not keep me, and pay for lodgings for one year; then I must go to the poor's house, which God in his mercy forbid. I can look to my death-bed with resignation; but to the poor's house I cannot look with composure.

"I have been a wanderer, and the child of chance all my days; and now only look for the time when I shall enter my last ship, and be anchored with a green turf upon my breast; and I care not how soon the command is given." P. 208.

We sincerely hope that the object for which this little volume is published, may be fully attained; and that its sale will enable the aged sailor, whose history it recounts, to pass the short remnant of his days without the dread of penury.

ART. VIH. A Lecture on the History and Utility of Literary Institutions. Delivered at the Surrey Institution, London, on Friday, November 1st, and again at the Russell Institution, on Thursday, December 20, 1822. By James Jennings. 8vo. pp. 138. 6s. Sherwood & Co. 1823.

THE historical and scientific merits of this Lecture do not constitute a claim to the honours we are about to bestow upon it. Mr. Jennings gives his readers rather less infor mation about Academies, Lyceums, and Institutions, than they may gather from the London Directory, or the Guide to Paris. His literary talents will be appreciated when our extracts have been read, and the utility of the whole performance will be placed in a striking point of view. His object, in this Lecture" of two hours and twenty minutes," is to uphold the sinking fortunes of the Surrey Institution. Accordingly he furnishes "a select, yet numerous audience,"

"with the result of years of patient thought." He is thanked for his exertions by the Surrey managers, and he dismisses the misrepresentation to which his Lecture gave rise in the following dignified strain

"It was his intention to have noticed some extraordinary misrepresentions, to which the delivery of this Lecture at the Surrey Institution, gave rise; but, upon mature deliberation, he is persuaded that silence is the best course. The important subjects here discussed, ought not to be mixed up with that evanescent and garrulous anility, the frequent accompaniment of an imbecile understanding, which would attempt to judge of the writings of those who soar beyond its ken, or whose comprehensiveness eludes its grasp-Requiescat in pace." P. xi.

The curtain is then drawn up, and, after learning that man is a PROGRESSIVE BEING, and a being eminently social we are reminded of our duty to communicate that know ledge which we have acquired," and of the fitness of Literary Institutions for that purpose.-Apropos to Literary Institutions, (for "they ought to embrace the whole circle of human knowledge,") we have the following full and satisfactory account of the Bible, the Jews, the Egyptians, the Greeks, and the Romans.

"The most ancient volume (or rather books), of which we have any satisfactory information, and which has come down to us, is the Old Testament. A volumne, most certainly, deserving, even as a specimen of the earliest literature, our marked and respectful attention. The existence of such a book proves that the Jews were not inattentive to the advantages of recorded knowledge; nor to the striking events occurring in their own history. The Jews, when in the zenith of their prosperity, were, evidently, compared with the nations which surrounded them, a literary people. They had their historians and their chroniclers; and, as to their poetry, who is there that has not felt its force and its sublimity. Their prophets were poets;-their poets prophets.

"The Egyptians made also, in an early period of the world, great progress in some of the sciences. But it was reserved for Greece to shew, under the auspices of PLATO and other sages, the progress which philosophy and literature had made; and to give them an impetus and a power which they had never before ob.

tained.

"It was in Greece that Academies were first institued. Here Plato gave his lectures to crowds in the groves of Academus, near Athens; and here, for forty years, he presided, at the head of the first academy, diffusing the knowledge which he had acquired to eager and admiring audiences.

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