.

this will be done, unless the government on the eastern side of the Atlantic shall choose to will some of these things, and to enforce them peremptorily, with such an interference with the colonial legislatures, as will excite even a still louder outcry than that which stormed against the abolition.

There are many interesting remarks and points of information in this most singular farrago which we cannot particularize. Those who are not too much fretted by bad writing to be instructed by a very considerable portion of good sense, will do well to read, or at least try to read the volume.

Art. VII. An Account of the past and present state of the Isle of Man including a topographical Description; a sketch of its Mineralogy ; an outline of its Laws, with the privileges enjoyed by Strangers; and a history of the Island. By George Woods. 8vo. pp. 370. price 10s. 6d. Baldwin. 1811.

MR. WOODS states himself to have been led to the publi cation of this volume, by the difficulty which he experienced in procuring any sufficient information, in a printed form, before his visit to this singular island-singular, we mean, in reference to its laws, customs, language, and privileges. Subject to the British Empire, it has not yet adopted its institutions; and we are at a loss to conceive the reasons for that anomalous policy, which can suffer one part of the kingdom to offer an exemption from penalties incurred in another.

This 'Account' is divided into three books containing'a general and particular account of the Isle of Man' the constitution and laws of the Isle of Man',-and the History of the Island." To these heads the various particulars are, with sufficient accuracy, referred. The mineralogy of the island is the subject of the 1st Chapter, and a general view of it is given in the following paragraph.

• The northern portion of the island is a light sand, resting on a bed of common clay the greatest portion of the island consists of a barren soil, resting on grey wacké-slate, and on clay-slate: a small portion around Castletown is composed of limestone of transition: and the mountains are formed chiefly of strata of clay-slate, much intersected by veins of quartz, and which seem to rest on mica-slate, a mineral that occurs on the sides and summits of several of theni, and which probably rests on gra nite. The dip of the strata, whether of slate, of lime-stone, or sand. stone, is almost invariably south-east The chief metallic repositories are veins of lead and copper ores near Laxey, at Foxdale, and at Bredahead near Port Erin.'

Rats and Puffins seem to form the most important article in

Manks zoology. The latter are said to make excellent soup, and the former, after effecting a debarkation from the wreck of a Russian merchantman, declared war against the "poor puffins," who burrow in rabbit holes, and nearly exterminated the puffin race. The following method of settling territorial dispute is exceedingly good. We wish that all national squabbles were adjusted as rationally.

"Noxious reptiles are not to be found. Whether they would be able to live and multiply is not agreed upon. Giraldus notes a dispute between the Kings of England and Ireland for this little domain, which was agreed to be amicably settled by the introduction of venomous reptiles from England which would not live in Ireland. The reptiles lived, and the King of England consequently took possession of it."

It is,'

This Island presents a dreary and sterile surface. observes Mr. W. destitute of woods, and of almost all trees not planted. Sometimes I observed a little brushwood, and at others have had pointed out to me places where bushes and hazel trees used to grow.

The population is supposed to exceed 30,000. The climate is somewhat milder in winter than that of the neighbouring shores,' and the heat of summer, on the other hand, is not so great. The land is chiefly divided into small farms, from 150 to 200 acres each. The duration of leases is most absurdly limited by legislative enactment to 21 years, a system clearly fatal to the advancement of agriculture; but the mystery is solved when we find it attributed by Mr. Woods to the selfish apprehensions of the governors, that long leases would, by affecting the frequency of purchase, keep a few fines on alienation out of their pockets. About twenty shillings per English statute acre may be the average amount of farm-rent.

The cattle are turned to graze upon the uncultivated land which is common, and amounts to more than one third of the island. We mention this unimportant fact merely for the purpose of introducing the following instance of brute saga city.

"Horses being accustomed to take in larger mouthfuls and longer branches than the sheep, cannot eat the furze in its natural state, on account of the prickles. When confined to this sort of food, they trample upon the branches, and paw them with their forefeet, till the prickles be come mashed together or rubbed off; and so completely do they perform their work, that the food thus prepared might be squeezed by the bare hand with impunity."

"Sleep in this country, are subject to as peculiar and fatal disease, called by the natives Oun, supposed to be owing to the eating of the hydrocotyle vulgaris, marsh pennywort. Its leaf is said to corrode the liver; and no opening a sheep that has died of the disease, to be found attached

thereto, transformed into an animal, having apparent life and motion, but retaining its primitive vegetable, shape."

The manufacturers of the island export to the value of from 5,000 to 10,000l. yearly in strong linens and sailcloth. The remainder of the annual exportation consists in herrings,varying in quantity, with the success of the fishery, lead, or lead ore, fowls, butter, a few eggs, and some other trifling articles.' The Manks berring fishery employs nearly 00 fishing boats of about 16 tons each. The season commences in July, and ends with September. The numbers caught do not, probably, admit of calculation, but the average quantity annually cured is sup posed by Mr. W. to be between eight and ten millions, being some years double this quantity, and some years only haif. The present price of fresh herrings varies from 12s. 6d. to 20s. per maze of 30 score.'

We pass over a considerable variety of matter which, though introduced with perfect propriety into the work, does not ap pear very susceptible of analysis, nor very important in itself, The attractions of the island,' except in the valuable instance of exemption from taxes, are not great. Living is cheap, but not cheaper than in more desirable parts of the British Empire. The Itinerary seems to present but little charm to the picturesque traveller. Mr. Woods has enlivened it by two or three good fairy tales, among which the maüthe doog-the 'spectre hound' of Walter Scott-makes a conspicuous figure.

There is some want of discrimination in the chapter on the constitution, but as far as we can collect the government of the Island is now merely nominal. The legislative and judicial functions seem to be united, and a system of appeals to be es tablished which must, we apprehend, prove occasionally vexatious. The government such as it is, is in the hands of the Governor, the Deemsters and the Keys, apparently a sort of King, Lords, and Commons. Of the latter, the number is twenty four; and of the Deemsters-it could not well be less-only two. The revenue of the island was stated by the Duke of Athol in the year 1790 to amount to upwards of 80001. per annum ; but according to Mr. Pitt's statement in the House of Commons in 1805, it amounted to the gross sum of 12,000). per annum, upon the average of the last few years.

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The essays on the Manks laws contain a very sufficient exposition of their character and extent. The most interesting of their peculiarities is, that they afford protection to debtors against legal process on account of debts not contracted in the island. Some anecdotes, in connection with this privilege are related by Mr. Woods. A chapter is devoted to the sale of the island, a transaction which will probably be known, to the end

of English history by the name of the Athol job. The last chapter details the history of the Island. d 13 Food

With some deduction for a want of distinct statement in some parts of this work, we are disposed to consider it as a very respectable compilation.

Art. VIII. The Life and Original Correspondence of Sir George Radcliffe Knight, LL.D., the Friend of the Earl of Strafford. By Thomas Dunham Whitaker, L.L.D., F.S.A., Vicar of Whalley, in Lan, cashire. 4to. pp. 300. Price 11. 1s. Longman and Co; Edwards, Halifax'; 'Ford, Manchester. 1810.

MOST men who have much imagination and but little money,

can recollect that, oftener than once in their lives, perhaps, it has occurred to them, what a number of concealed and lost deposits of treasure there are within the country, and probably within the county, in which they are living. Even within a more neighbouring space, perhaps within their parish-there may be several unknown spots,possibly in stopped up hotes in walls that they have numberless times seen,-under stones or floors on which they have trodden, or in gardens from which they have had their cabbage and gooseberries, where boxes or little jars of precious coins are lying, as useless as the jewels that Clarence dreamed he saw in the sockets of the dead men's eyes at the bottom of the sea. And for a moment or two they have indulged in a kind of fretting amusement, to think, what delightful luck it would be to fall on one of those idie juntas of golden and silver monarchs..

We presume that our inveterate insatiable antiquaries may be liable to lapse into a similar kind of musings respecting the undetected lodgments of old papers: Often must their ima ginations be played upon, and pleased and vexed at once, by the Elysian but visionary forms of the lumber-rooms of manorhouses and castles-of the twilight garrets actually existing somewhere within the immense mass of English buildingwhich contain trunks or boxes, with venerable dust thickly overspreading them, and black spiders standing centinel in perpetuity over them, and which trunks contain antique registers, or letters, or topographical legends, or the rhyming literature of some extinct family. And these papers are perhaps not yet, oh! not even yet, so irretrievably worm-eaten as to be totally illegible. What distressing chasms in the history of a title might be supplied! How many pedigrees might be settled half-way up toward the Conquest! What light would burst forth on the important questions concerning a Popish foundation or a royal progress—or the quarrels of two neighbouring districts or the ancient convivialities of the old man

sion of nobility or which it was of the ancestors of the family once inhabiting it that went with Edward or Henry to the wars in France-or the real character of some subordinate statesman;-if we had but some supernatural instinct to lead us, or if but some auspicious accident would point us, to exactly the right garret, or trunk, or closet, of all the garrets, trunks, and closets in the country.-If any partial intelligence is obtained concerning the existence of such an inestimable deposit, there is no rest till it can be inspected; after it has been inspected, there is no rest till its contents are printed; and when they are printed, there is no ordinary strain of exultation in congratulating myself and the public, on the discovery, and the patriotic communication, of the hidden riches.

The present work is given to the public with no equivocal intimations of its importance. The title page announces the Friend of Lord Strafford.' We all know that Strafford was an exceedingly conspicuous man, and how should we have failed to know also that a very great man never makes a friend of a little one? As to the manner in which these letters have been so long preserved, to be brought out at last so oppor tunely to alleviate a famine of literature, the advertisement informs us, that Sir G. Radcliffe's son, (his only child,) dying without issue, in Dublin, in 1679, a part of the paternal estate was sold to a family of the name of Elmsall, by whom,' says the Editor, according to the best information, I have been able to obtain, these letters, &c. were discovered in an old neglected trunk or bureau, and have ever since been preserved with the care and respect to which they are entitled.' The first announcement to him of their existence, was made by an antiquarian friend, who brought him extracts, as Columbus brought back samples of the productions of the new world. A desire was excited to obtain access to inspect the whole collection. The privilege was politely granted by the possessor;

and

6

on a careful perusal, I thought them too valuable to be left to the fate of many similar collections, which, having neither been printed nor placed in any great national repository of ancient papers, have either perished in the changes of family property, or remain perpetually exposed to that calamity.'

On the whole this volume may be considered as a sequel to the col lection of "Lord Strafford's Letters," to the editor of which the contents of it were evidently unknown; and for that reason, had the quantity of matter permitted, it would have been expanded into a thin folio, in order to bind up uniformly with that magnificent work. By means, indeed, of Carte's Life of Ormond," and "Thurloes State Papers," this object might still have been accomplished, had not an aversion to the modern arts of book making long since determined me, in every collection which I might lay before the public, to confine myself to original matter?