the yew, and box, by his relentless fheers, grew into the forms of meri, monkies, dogs, ducks, and devils. "What man of any tafte can behold the studied labour that appears in every of his operations, without mortification and difguft -Instead of thofe artless and delightful fcenes, which rife from woody hills, far winding streams, and vivid lawns-thofe fcenes which captivate at firít fight, and rivet the attention;-he fighs to fee nature fo wantonly tortured by the formal pencil of art; his eyes are every where abforbed in a profufion of expenfive finery, and whimsical extravagance: he looks round, treads a thousand perplexed, methodical zig-zag gravel walks-finds himself still furrounded by a tiresome famenefs; his expectation is wearied out, and he retires unfatisfied and fatigued. "But thefe ridiculous, fantastical fooleries, in gardening, are at last become obfolere: the science now ftands in a pure and true character; and the grand principles on which it acts, are firmly fixed upon a fuperftructure, never to be shaken." We believe this gentleman to be pretty right, in general, with respect to the principles and practice of modern gardening, as they are deduced from nature; but we think he might have expreffed himself with lefs pofitivenefs, than in faying, he "fhall never depart from his opinion, that any operation, conducted by the laws that regulate the modern practice, can be exceptionable." At the fame time, we conceive, he might have expreffed himself with fomewhat more moderation, in speaking of deficient artists and ignorant patrons. He fhould have recollected the poet's humane and political reflection, when, fpeaking of Lord Timon's extravagance, "Yet hence the poor are cloath'd, the hungry fed, We fubfcribe indeed to the encomiums, he paffes on a Lyttelton and a Shenstone; but we object to his treating patrons of inferior genius with ill-manners and abuse. "Since gardening has emerged from its former vicious and puerile ftate, the delightful scenery that has fprung from the pure principles of the modern practice, is really admirable. The science has been brought into fuch perfection, that in many places, the greatest diffi culty is to discover where art has been busy to arrive at it; fo fimple, yet fo elegant; every fcene fo beautifully characterifed; fo different, yet fo configurative! but where are the men who have powers, thus to pleafe the eye, and give art the confequence, and life of nature herTelf! where find a Lyttelton! where a Shenftone !-Defigners, it is true, fpring up in every corner; but their first efforts are fufficient; they fpring up but to fall, like the infects of a day, never to rise again. "Indeed there are men who have crept into fame through the influence, perhaps, of fome noble patron or other, whofe taste happened to be fomewhat congenial with their own, and who cared not, provided his park was made as fine as his palace, that have sometimes given a fcene or two in the juít style of beauty and character: but this by by no means juftifies them as able and expert defigners; the fame power is required to give an equal portion of beauty in the drefs, the genius of every different fcene may require: without which, of what confequence is the one beautiful fcene only! it becomes of no imporLance; it is loft; buried for ever in the defects of the others. "This is a very effential point, and ought to be attended to with extreme caution; it is the very foul of the science: but fo little is it attended to, either through ignorance or inability, that you seldom fee the operations of our profeffed defigners (I mean trading ones) in this refpect, but what are enveloped in error.” Again, in the next page, our letter-writer vents his fpleen in a manner altogether rude and illiberal. "How often have we had occafion to pity the vanity and weakness of thofe felf-adopted fons of genius, whom folly and extravagance draw fo eafily from that fphere which only can become them? no fooner does the fashionable whim infect them, of retiring into the country, but their former profeffions in life, where fortune fmiled upon them, and what only fat eafy on their shoulders, are despised, remembered no more.-Up ftarts the gentleman, the man of taste, and the architect the villa awkwardly rifes; woods are to cover that part; water this; there the lawn; and yonder, calcades, grottos, rocks.— Big with the importance of their great ideas, every intended ob ject plays in their eyes, as a future monument of their tafte; and in the prefumption of a fuperior judgement, will fcorn to afk the opinion of another, reputable in the fcience: or, if they fhould condescend to it (as I have known), are fure to betray, by their manner of address, and puffed-up confequential air, an invincible determination to follow their own. "It is the part of friendship, however difagreeably it may be received, to be free in its cenfures, where there is occafion: and when thefe flaves of tolly are told of their errors-when they are told, that the place defigned for a wood, would be an eternal difgrace to it: that rocks, grots, and calcades, fo fituated, would become objects of derifion to every beholder-in filent contempt they turn away; and though certainly ftruck with the abfurdity of their proceedings, that alone, fuch is the pitiful tyranny of an illiberal mind, tetters them in the pur fait of their own defigns; and when bewildered in the web their ig norance has wove about them, will do, and undo, and will do again, till the whole is tortured into a no-meaning, vacant nothingness, the very picture of that which is fo vifibly stamped upon their own coun Lenances. "Will the affertion hold good, that every one has a right to pursue what he thinks right; and if it affords pleature to himfelf, the opinions of others are not to be regarded —perhaps it may, if it be indifferent to him what the world thinks: but, when a man, either through a ridiculous obftinacy, or felf-importance on any occafion, will not be con vinced of his folly, nor open his eyes to conviction, he is certainly, notwithstanding that fort of right, a fool." In the fame ftile of abufe and ribaldry runs the following reprehenfion, "There are fellows, upon an impudent prefumption of their abili ties, because they happen to know how to lay turf, to fet a tree, a cabbage, or, with their great friend the line, ferpentine a walk; and from fome encouragement they have met with from a few of their mafters, very near as clever as themselves, fet up for defigners-for men of taste truly! and with all the bare-faced effrontery in the world, undertake to lay out the grounds of any gentleman that would be weak enough to employ them." 66 "I mention this to put you in mind, that the many miferable fquibs, which fhew themfelves about the doors of almost every country villa, are the noble operations of thefe fhilling-a-day fellowsthefe great, little men, who ridiculoutly aim at throwing into a meer acre, or lefs, every variety you have feen in a park of two or three hundred-a confufed, motley medley, of little lawns, little hills, little woods, little pools, little walks, and little peeps-in fhort, every thing that can expofe the littleness of their genius." Surely the terms little geniuses, fools, and filling-a-day fellows, are beneath the dignity of a man of tafte and a gentleman. Not that we impeach the tafte of this writer in refpect to the fubject of which he treats; we are, however, too fearful of giving offence to a man of fuch delicate refinement as our author, by commending it; left, by his own construction, we fhould run the rifk of calling him a fool." Let us not heighten the blufh already raifed upon his honeft countenance -praife, if really merited, in the ears of a man of fenfe, is as difcordant, as it is in thofe of a fool fweet and harmonious.” -So fays Mr. Heely, and heaven forfend that discord should reach his ear from our commendations! K. The State of the Prifons in England and Wales; with preliminary Obfervations, and an Account of fome foreign Prifons. By John Howard Efq. F. R. S. 4to. 12s Cadell. Among the many inconfiftences, to which all human inflitutions are liable, it has been long the greatest difgrace to the English Conftitution, that a country, which boasts, above all others, of perfonal as well as political liberty, should contain a proportionally-greater number of prifoners, and those the moft vilely incarcerated, of any nation in Europe. Not to dwell on the abfurdity of perfonal ar:eft, in a free country, on the fufpicion of owing fo paltry a fum as forty fhillings; the ftill greater abfurdity of making imprisonment in civil *To the honour of Scotland, the bears no part in this juft reproach. cafe cafes mere falva cuftodia, and, in criminal ones, a compenfas tion for the offence; humanity fhudders at the horrid treat+ ment with which both debtors and culprits are fubject by the laws (or rather the lawyers) of this country, to be treated by disappointed creditors, fpiteful profecutors, and cruel gaolers! Too great an encomium cannot be paid to the truly-patriotic author of the prefent publication, for his indefatigable attempts to remove fuch an opprobrium to our country, and to restore fuch poor and pitiful pretenders to liberty, even to the common rights of humanity! "When I formerly, fays Mr. Howard, made the tour of Europe, I feldom had occafion to envy foreigners any thing I faw with respect to their fituation, their religion, manners, or government. In my late journies to view their prifons, I was fometimes put to the blush for my native country. The reader will fearcely feel, from my narration, the fame emotions of fhame and regret as the comparifon excited in me, on beholding the difference with my own eyes: But from the account I have given him of foreign Prifons, he may judge whether a defign of reforming our own be merely vifionary-whether idlenefs, debauchery, difeafe, and famine, be the neceffary attendants of a prifon, or only connected with it, in our ideas, for want of more perfect knowledge, and more enlarged views. I hope too he will do me the juftice to think that neither an indifcriminate admiration of every thing foreign, nor a fondness of cenfuring every thing at home, has influenced me to adopt the language of a panegyrift in this part of my work, or that of a complainant in the rest. Where I have commended I have mentioned my reafons for fo doing; and I have dwelt perhaps more minutely upon the management of foreign prifons, because it was more agreeable to me to praife than to condemn. Another motive induced me to be very particular in my accounts of foreign houses of correction, efpecially thole of the freeft itates: It was to counteract a nation prevailing among us, that compelling prifoners to work, especially in public, was inconfiftent with the principles of English liberty; at the fame time that taking away the lives of fuch numbers, either by executions, or the difeafes of our prifons, feem to make little impreffion upon us. Of fuch force is cuttom and prejudice in filencing the voice of good fenfe and humanity!" And yet we plume ourselves, and are often complimented by foreigners, on being a nation of philofophers. Ridiculous vanity contemptible compliment! in how many inftances do not our political regulations appear to be the down-right effect of idiotifin or infanity! In foine cafes, not individuals of the most savage nations are allowed to prey upon others, as they Hence a ruffian, an impoftor, a fodomite, &c. is frequently enabled, by a few months confinement, to commute for chimes the moft atrocious and unnatural; while a poor prifoner for the pitiful fum of a few pounds fhall lie immured for years, without a farthing's abatement of his debt. are legally permitted to do in England. It is no wonder, therefore, that a man, of so much fenfibility and philanthropy, as our author appears to be poffeffed of, fhould be induced, on having an official opportunity of coming to the knowledge of fuch diftress, to intereft himself in behalf of the oppreffed and the unhappy. * "Hearing, fays he, the cries of the miferable, I devoted my time to their relief. In order to procure it, I made it my business to collect materials, the authenticity of which could not be difputed. For the warmth of fome expreffions where my fubject obliges me to complain, and formy eagerness to remove the feveral grievances, my only apology muft be drawn from the deep diftrefs of the sufferers, and the impreffions the view of it excited in me ;-impreffions too strong to be effaced by any length of time!" How amiable the motive! How laudable the purfuit! May thofe impreffions, though not to be effaced, be accompanied by fuch fenfations of fatisfaction and delight as ever attend the consciousness of doing good! May the bleffings, pronounced in the gofpel to the vifitors of the fick and imprifoned, be the reward of fuch chriftian benevolence! The pains, indeed, which Mr. Howard appears to have taken, in order to fet on foot a reformation in abuses so flagrant, and evils fo diftreffing, entitle him to the warmest gratitude from the objects intended to be relieved, as well as from the community in general. Not content with the information of others, he made thrice the tour of England and Wales; vifiting and examining, with particular attention, the feveral gaols and houses of correction in the different counties. After acquiring the knowledge of the true ftate of the gaols in this kingdom, he repeatedly vifited the principal prifons of France, Flanders, Holland. Germany, and Switzerland; in none of which, it seems, the gaol-diftemper, which makes fuch ravages in England, was to be met with. In converfing on this fubject with the celebrated Dr. Haller, he tells us, the doctor afcribed its malignancy entirely to the number of unhappy captives, and their families, with which the prisons in England were crowded. In the foreign prifons, it does not appear, that the confined are fuffered to herd together, to combine, to cherish. to fortify, each other in vice and wickedness, as in England. Imprifonment is there not only a punishment, but in fact the difcipline of a houfe of correction; whereas, in England, it is, in many cafes, neither one nor the other, Particularly on ferving the office of theriff for the county of Bedford. though |