To the astonishment, and perhaps to the envy, of the fashionable world, those two unportioned young women made the most splendid matches of the season. The Duke of Hamilton fell in love with the younger at a masquerade, and made proposals to her. The marriage was to take place within some months; but his passion was so vehement, that in two nights after he insisted on marrying her at the moment. Walpole tells us that he sent for a clergyman, who however refused to marry them without license or ring. At this period marriages were frequently performed in a very unceremonious and unbecoming manner. From the laxity of the law, they were performed at all hours, frequently in private houses, and sometimes even in jails, by pretended clergymen. The law, however, was subsequently and properly reformed. The duke and duchess are said to have been married with a curtain-ring, at half-past twelve-at night, at May Fair Chapel. This precipitated the marriage of Lord Coventry, a personage of a grave stamp, but who had long paid attention to the elder sister Maria. He married her about three weeks after. Except that we are accustomed to hear of the frenzy which seizes people in the name of fashion, we should scarcely believe the effect which those two women, handsome as they were, continued to produce. On the Duchess of Hamilton's presentation at Court on her marriage, the crowd was immense; and so great was the curiosity, that the courtly multitude got on the chairs and tables to look at her. Mobs gathered round their doors to see them get into their chairs; people crowded early to the theatres when they heard they were to be there. Lady Coventry's shoemaker is said to have made a fortune by selling patterns of her shoe; and on the duchess's going to Scotland, several hundred people walked about all night round the inn where she slept, on the Yorkshire road, that they might have a view of her as she went off next morning.

Yet they appear to have been strangely neglected in their education; good-humoured and good-natured undoubtedly, but little better than hoydens after all. Lord Down met Lord and Lady Coventry at Calais, and offered to send her ladyship a tent-bed, for fear of bugs at the inn. "Oh dear!" said she, "I had rather be bit to death than lie one night from my dear Cov."

She is, however, memorable for one etourderie, which amused the world greatly. Old George II., conversing with her on the dulness of the season, expressed a regret that there had been no masquerades during the year, the handsome rustic answered him, that she had seen sights enough, and the only one she wanted to see now was—"a coronation." The king, however, had the good sense to laugh, and repeated it good-humouredly to his circle at supper.

Lady Coventry died a few years after of consumption, at the age of twenty-seven. It was said that her death was hastened by the habit of using white lead as a paint, the fashionable custom of the time. The Duke of Hamilton had died two years before, in 1758, and the duchess became subsequently the wife of Colonel John Campbell, afterwards Duke of Argyle. The narrative observes the remarkable circumstance, that the untitled daughter of an Irish commoner should have been the wife of two dukes and the mother of four. By her first husband she was the mother of James, seventh duke, and of Douglas, eighth duke, of Hamilton; and by her second husband, of William, sixth duke, and of Henry, seventh duke, of Argyle. The duchess, though at the time of Lady Coventry's illness supposed to be in a consumption, survived for thirty years, dying in 1790.

Mason the poet commemorated Lady Coventry's death in a long elegy, which had some repute in those days, when even Hayley was called a poet. They are dawdling and dulcified to a deplorable degree.

"Yes, Coventry is dead; attend the strain, Daughters of Albion, ye that, light as air, So oft have trips in her fantastic train, With hearts as gay, and faces half as fair; For she was fair beyond your highest bloom; This envy owns, since now her bloom is fled. &c. &c. &c.

We have then a sketch of a man of considerable celebrity in his day, Lord Sandwich. Educated at Eton and Cambridge; on leaving college, he made the then unusual exertion of a voyage round the Mediterranean, of which a volume was published by his chaplain on his return. Shortly after, taking his seat in the House of Lords, he came into ministerial employment as a Lord of the Admiralty. In 1746, he was appointed minister to the States General. And from that period, for nearly thirty years, he was employed in high public offices; was twice an ambassador, three times first Lord of the Admiralty, and twice Secretary of State. Lord Sandwich's personal character was at least accused of so much profligacy, that, if the charges be true, we cannot comprehend how he was suffered to retain employments of such importance for so many years. Wilkes, who had known him intimately, describes him, in his letters to the electors of Aylesbury, as "the most abandoned man of the age." He is even said not to have been a man of business; yet the Admiralty was a place which can scarcely be managed by an idler, and the Secretaryship of State, in this country, can never be a sinecure. He had certainly one quality which is remarkable for conciliation, and without which no minister, let his talents be what they may, has ever been personally popular; he was a man of great affability, and of shrewd wit. The latter was exhibited, in peculiarly cutting style, to Mr Eden, afterwards Lord Auckland. Eden, sagacious in his generation, had suddenly ratted to Pitt, adding, however, the monstrous absurdity of sending a circular to his colleagues by way of justification. Obviously, nothing could be more silly than an attempt of this order, which could only add their contempt for his understanding to their contempt for his conduct. Lord Sandwich's answer was in the most cutting spirit of scorn:—

"Sir,—Your letter is now before me, and in a few minutes will be behind me."

An unhappy circumstance brought Lord Sandwich with painful prominence before the world. A Miss Ray, a person of some attraction, had unfortunately lived under his protection for several years. It happened, however, that a young officer on the recruiting service, who had dined once or twice at Lord Sandwich's house in the country, thought proper to pay her some marked attentions, which, after allowing them, as it appears, to proceed to some extent, she suddenly declined. On this the officer, whose name was Hackman, and who was evidently of a fantastic and violent temperament, rushed from England in a state of desperation, flew over to Ireland, threw up his commission, and took orders in the church. But instead of adopting the quietude which would have been suitable for his new profession, the clerical robes seem to have made him more intractable than the military uniform. After some months of rambling and romance in Ireland, he rushed over to England again, resolving to conquer or die at her feet; but the lady still rejected him, and, being alarmed at his violence, threatened to appeal to Lord Sandwich. There are many circumstances in the conduct of this unfortunate man, amounting to that perversion of common sense which, in our times, is fashionably and foolishly almost sanctioned as monomania. But nothing can be clearer than the fact, that the most unjustifiable, dangerous, and criminal passion, may be pampered, until it obtains possession of the whole mind, and leads to the perpetration of the most atrocious offences against society. The modern absurdity is, to look, in the violence of the passion for the excuse of the crime; instead of punishing the crime for the violence of the passion. We might as well say, that the violences of a drunkard were more innocent the more furiously he was intoxicated; the whole being a direct encouragement to excessive guilt. The popular feeling of justice in the last century, however, was different; robbers and murderers were put to death as they deserved, and society was relieved without burlesquing the common understandings of man. Mr Hackman was a murderer, however he might be a monomaniac, and he was eventually hanged as he deserved. The trial, which took place in April 1779, excited the most extraordinary public curiosity. By the statement of the witnesses, it appeared that a Mr Macnamara, being in the lobby of Covent Garden Theatre when the audience were coming away, and seeing Miss Ray making her way with some difficulty through the crowd to her carriage, he went forward with Irish gallantry to offer her his arm, which she accepted; and as they reached the door of the carriage, a pistol was fired close to them, when Miss Ray clapped her hand to her forehead and fell, when instantly another pistol-report followed. He thought that she had fainted away through fright; but when he raised her up, he found that she was wounded, and assisted the people in carrying her into the Shakspeare Tavern; and on Hackman's being seized, and being asked what could possess him to be guilty of such a deed, his only answer was to give his name, and say, "It is not a proper place to ask such questions." It appeared in evidence, that Hackman had been waiting some time for Miss Ray's coming out of the theatre; that he followed her to the carriage door, and pulling out two pistols, fired one at the unfortunate woman, the ball of which went through her brain, and the other at himself, crying out as he fell, "Kill me—kill me!"

Of course, after evidence like this, there could be no defence, and none as attempted. Hackman evidently wished to have died by his own hand; but having failed there, his purpose was to perish by the law, and plead guilty. However, on being brought to trial, he said that he now pleaded not guilty, that he might avoid the appearance of contemning death—an appearance not suitable to his present condition; that, on second thoughts, he had considered the plea of guilty as rendering him accessory to a second peril of his life; and that he thought that he could pay his debt more effectually to the justice of the country by suffering his offences to be proved by evidence, and submitting to the forms of a regular trial. This, though it was penitence too late, was at least decorous language. His whole conduct on the trial showed that, intemperate as his passions were, he possessed abilities and feelings worthy of a wiser career, and a less unhappy termination. Part of his speech was even affecting.

"I stand here this day," he said, "the most wretched of human beings, and confess myself criminal in a high degree; yet while I acknowledge, with shame and repentance, that my determination against my own life was formal and complete, I protest, with that regard which becomes my situation, that the will to destroy her who was ever dearer to me than life, was never mine till a momentary frenzy overpowered me, and induced me to commit the deed I deplore. Before this dreadful act, I trust, nothing will be found in the tenor of my life which the common charity of mankind will not excuse. I have no wish to avoid the punishment which the laws of my country appoint for my crime; but being already too unhappy to feel a punishment in death, or a satisfaction in life, I submit myself with penitence and patience to the disposal and judgment of Almighty God, and to the consequences of this enquiry into my conduct and intentions."

After a few minutes' consultation, the jury returned a verdict of guilty, and he was executed two days after. It is surprising how strong an interest was felt on this subject by persons of every condition; by the populace, who loved excitement from whatever quarter it may come; by the middle order, to whom the romance of the early part of the transaction and the melancholy catastrophe were subjects of natural impression; and by the nobility, to whom the character of Miss Ray and the habits of Lord Sandwich were equally known.

The Earl of Carlisle thus writes to Selwyn, beginning with a sort of customary allusion to Selwyn's extraordinary fondness for those displays:—

"Hackman, Miss Ray's murderer, is hanged. I attended his execution in order to give you an account of his behaviour, and from no curiosity of my own. I am this moment returned from it. Every one enquired after you. You have friends every where. The poor man behaved with great fortitude; no appearances of fear were to be perceived, but very evident signs of contrition and repentance."

A novel, of some pathos and considerable popularity, was founded on this unhappy transaction, and "The Letters of Mr Hackman and Miss Ray" long flourished in the circulating libraries. But the groundwork was vulgar, mean, and vicious, after all; and, divested of that colouring which imagination may throw on any event, was degrading and criminal in all its circumstances. The shame of the wretched woman herself, living in a state of open criminality from year to year; the grossness of Hackman in his proposal to make this abandoned woman his wife; the strong probability that his object might have been the not uncommon, though infinitely vile one, of obtaining Lord Sandwich's patronage, by relieving him of a connexion of which that notorious profligate, after nine years, might be weary—all characterise the earlier portion of their intercourse as destitute of all pretence to honourable feelings. The catastrophe is merely the work of an assassin. If there may be some slight allowance for overwhelming passion, for suddenly excited jealousy, or for remediless despair, yet those impulses act only to the extent of inflicting injury on ourselves. No love ever seeks the death of its object. It is then mere ruffianism, brute cruelty, savage fury; and even this becomes more the act of a ruffian, when the determination to destroy is formed in cold blood. Hackman carried two loaded pistols with him to the theatre. What other man carried loaded pistols there? and what could be his purpose but the one which he effected, to fire them both, one at the wretched woman, and the other at himself? The clear case is, that he was neither more nor less than a furious villain, resolved to have the life of a profligate milliner's apprentice, who preferred Lord Sandwich's house and carriage, to Mr Hackman's hovel and going on foot. We shall find that all similar acts originate in similar motives—lucre, licentiousness, and rage—the three stimulants of the highwayman, the debauchee, and the ruffian; with only the distinction, that, in the case of those who murder when they cannot possess, the three criminalities are combined.

Even with the execution of the criminal, the excitement did not cease. The papers of the day tell us, that when the body was conveyed to the surgeon's hall, so great a crowd was assembled, and the efforts to obtain entrance were so violent, that caps, gowns, wigs, were torn and cast away in all directions. Old and young, men, women, and children, were trampled in the multitude. In the afternoon, the crowd diminished, and several persons of the better order made their way in, but with not a less vexatious result; for, on reaching the staircase leading to the theatre, they found themselves saluted with a shower from some engine worked under the staircase. This was rather a rough mode of tranquillizing public excitement, but seems to have been effectual. It was probably a trick of some of the young surgeons, and excited great indignation at the time. Hackman was but four-and-twenty, and rather a striking figure.

The letters to which we have alluded, entitled "Love and Madness," attracted attention in higher quarters, and even perplexed the fastidiousness of Walpole himself. In one of his letters of March 1780, he thus writes:—"Yesterday was published an octavo, pretending to contain the correspondence of Hackman and Miss Ray. I doubt whether the letters are genuine, and yet, if fictitious, they are executed well, and enter into his character. This appears less natural, and yet the editors were certainly more likely to be in possession of hers than his. It is not probable that Lord Sandwich should have sent what he found in her apartments to the press; no account is pretended to be given of how they came to light."

After having thus puzzled the dilettanti, it transpired that it was written by Sir Herbert Croft, Bart.

Another singular character, who, in connexion with one still more singular, remarkably occupied the ear and tongue of the beau monde of his day, is introduced in these volumes. This was Augustus John, Earl of Bristol, third son of John, Lord Hervey, by the beautiful Mary Lepel. He entered the sea service at an early age, and prospered as the sons of men of rank prospered in those days, being made a post-captain in 1747, when he was but three and twenty years old. Promotion was heaped upon him, and he was rapidly advanced to the rank of vice-admiral and colonel of marines. He was, however, said to be a brave and skilful officer. More good fortune was in store for him; he was placed in the king's household, was a member of Parliament, was appointed one of the Lords of the Admiralty, and finally rounded the circle of his honours by succeeding to the earldom of Bristol. The history of his wife is a continued adventure. Miss Chudleigh, maid of honour to the Princess of Wales, had, immediately on her appearance at court, become the observed of all observers. She was regarded as one of the most beautiful women of her time, was remarkably quick and witty in her conversation, of a most capricious temper and a most fantastic imagination—all qualities which naturally rendered her a topic in every circle of the country. The circumstances of her marriage rendered her if possible, still more a topic. On a visit at the house of a relation, she met Lord Bristol, then but a lieutenant in the navy, and plain Mr Hervey, and disregarding all the formalities of high life, they were privately married at Lainston, in Northamptonshire. They were, however, separated the very next day, the lady declaring her determination never to see her husband's face again. This, of course, produced an ample fund of conversation of every kind; but the lady returned to court, and the gentleman returned to his ship, and went to sea. However, they met again, and the result was, she became a mother. From her determination to keep her marriage secret, she retired for her accouchement to a secluded spot in Chelsea, where her child was born, and where it soon after died.

It may easily be supposed, that the sudden disappearance of so conspicuous a person from the most conspicuous society, must have given rise to rumours and ridicule of every kind. She returned to court nevertheless, and constantly denying her marriage, fought it out with the effrontery which is so easily forgiven, in fashionable life, to youth, wit, and beauty.

Yet she could not quite escape the flying shafts of wit herself. One day after her return, meeting the memorable Lord Chesterfield—"Think, my lord," said she, with an air of indignation, "to what lengths the scandalous chronicle will go, when it absolutely says that I have had twins." "My dear," said Lord Chesterfield, "I make it a rule never to believe above half what the world says."

She now received the attentions of many suitors, extraordinary as the circumstance may be, when the mystery of her own conduct and the surmises of the public are considered; and, to make assurance doubly sure, she determined to extinguish all proof of her hasty marriage. Ascertaining that the clergyman who had married her was dead, she went to Lainston church, and contrived to carry away the entry of her marriage from the register. Some time after this, Miss Chudleigh (for she never would take her husband's name) married the Duke of Kingston. It was strongly asserted, though the circumstance is so dishonourable that it can scarcely be believed, that the silence of the real husband was purchased by the advance of a large sum of money from the pretended one. The marriage remained undisturbed until the death of the duke. She then came into possession of his very large disposable property, and traveled in great pomp to Rome; but the duke's nephew and heir, having his suspicious of the fact excited, commenced proceedings against the duchess for bigamy. She was tried before her peers in Westminster hall, and found guilty of the offence, in April 1776; but by claiming the privilege of peerage, she was discharged on payment of the usual fees.

It is scarcely possible to believe that a man of the rank and profession of Lord Bristol, could have been base enough to connive at his wife's marriage with the Duke of Kingston. But there can be no question, that in the prevalent opinion of the time, he had even taken a large sum of money for the purpose. In one of Walpole's letters, subsequently to the trial, he says, "if the Pope expects his duchess back, he must create her one, for her peers have reduced her to a countess. Her folly and her obstinacy here appear in the full vigour, at least her faith in the ecclesiastical court, trusting to the infallibility of which she provoked this trial in the face of every sort of detection. The living witness of the first marriage, a register of it fabricated long after by herself, the widow of the clergyman who married her, many confidants to whom she had entrusted the secret, and even Hawkins, the surgeon, privy to the birth of the child, appeared against her. The Lords were tender, and would not probe the earl's collusion; but the ecclesiastical court, who so readily accepted their juggle, and sanctified the second match, were brought to shame—they care not if no reformation follows. The duchess, who could produce nothing else in her favour, tried the powers of oratory, and made a long oration, in which she cited the protection of her late mistress, the Princess of Wales. Her counsel would have curtailed this harangue; but she told them they might be good lawyers, but did not understand speaking to the passions. She concluded her rhetoric with a fit, and retired with rage when convicted of the bigamy."

The charge to which Walpole alludes, was, that the earl had given her a bond for L.30,000 not to molest her; but as there was no proof, this gross charge certainly has no right to be implicitly received. Still it is unaccountable why he should have suffered her to have married the Duke of Kingston without any known remonstrance, and why he should have allowed her to retain the title of the duke's widow until the rightful heir instituted the proceedings. The earl died in 1779, within three years from the trial.

Among the characters which pass through this magic-lantern, is Topham Beauclerk, so frequently mentioned, and mentioned with praise, in Boswell's Johnson. He seems to have been a man of great elegance of manner, and peculiarity of that happy talent of conversation whose wit seems to be spontaneous, and whose anecdotes, however recherche, seem to flow from the subject. "Every thing," remarked Johnson, "comes from Beauclerk so easily, that it appears to me that I labour when I say a good thing."

Beauclerk was the only son of Lord Sydney Beauclerk, a son of Charles, first Duke of St Albans. He was educated at Trinity College, Oxford, and, from the moment of his entering fashionable life, was remarked for the elegance of manner, and the liveliness of conversation, which continued to be his distinctions to the close of his career. Unfortunately, the fashion of the time not only allowed, but seems to have almost required, an irregularity of life which would tarnish the character of any man in our more decorous day. His unfortunate intercourse with Viscountess Bolingbroke, better known by her subsequent name of Lady Diana Beauclerk, produced a divorce, and in two days after a marriage. She was the eldest daughter of Charles, the second Duke of Marlborough, and was in early life as distinguished for her beauty, as in later years she was for her wit.

Johnson in his old age became acquainted with Topham Beauclerk, through their common friend, Langton, and even the sage and moralist acknowledged the captivation of his manners. "What a coalition!" said Garrick, when he heard of their acquaintance, "I shall have my old friend to bail out of the roundhouse." But whatever might be the elegance of his companion's laxity, Johnson did not hesitate to rebuke him. Beauclerk, like wits in general, had a propensity to satire, on which Johnson once took him to task in this rough style—"You never open your mouth but with the intention to give pain; and you have now given me pain, not from the power of what you have said, but from my seeing the intention." At another tine, applying to him that line of Pope's, slightly altered, he said—

'Thy love of folly, and thy scorn of fools;'

everything you do shows the one, and every thing you say the other."

Another rather less intelligible rebuke occurred in his saying, "Thy body is all vice and thy mind all virtue." As the actions of the body proceed from the mind, it is difficult to conceive how the one can be impure without the other. At least Beauclerk did not appear to relish the distinction, and he was angry at the phrase. However, Johnson's attempt to appease him was a curious specimen of his magniloquence. "Nay, sir, Alexander the Great, marching in triumph into Babylon, could not have desired to have had more said to him."

Topham Beauclerk had two daughters by Lady Diana, one of whom became Lady Pembroke. He died at his house in Great Russell Street, then a place of fashion, in 1780, in his 41st year.

Selwyn's seat, Matson, in Gloucestershire, received some pretty historical reminiscences. One of Walpole's letters to Bentley, thus speaks of a visit to his friend's villa in the autumn of 1753.

"I staid two days at George Selwyn's house, which lies on Robin Hood's hill. It is lofty enough for an Alp, yet is a mountain of turf to the very top, has woods scattered all over it, springs that long to be cascades in twenty places; and from the summits it beats even Sir George Littleton's views, by having the city of Gloucester at its foot, and the Severn widening to the horizon. The house is small but neat; King Charles (the First,) lay here at the siege, and the Duke of York, with typical fury, hacked and hewed the windows of his chamber, as a memorandum of his being there. The fact however being, that both the princes, Charles and James, who were then mere boys, remained at Matson—a circumstance frequently mentioned to Selwyn's grandfather by James II., observing:—'My brother and I were generally shut up in a chamber on the second floor during the day, where you will find that we have left the marks of our confinement inscribed with our knives on the ledges of all the windows."'

The house must have been quite a treasure to Walpole, for he found in it a good picture of the famous Earl of Leicester, which he had given to Sir Francis Walsingham; and what makes it very curious, Walpole observes his age is marked on it fifty-four, in 1752. "I had never been able to discover before in what year he was born, and here is the very flower-pot and counterfeit association for which Bishop Sprat was taken up, and the Duke of Marlborough sent to the Tower."

It is, however, by no means clear, that this was a "counterfeit association," though Walpole abandons his usual scepticism on all disputable points with such facility. The "association" was a plot to bring back that miserable blockhead and bigot, James II., said to be signed by Marlborough, the Bishop of Rochester, Lords Salisbury, Cornberry, and Sir Basil Firebrace. On the information of one Young, the draft of the plot was found in a flower-pot in the Bishop's house at Bromley. But fortunately the days of royal terror had passed by. The crown was strong enough to treat conspiracy with contempt, and the affair was suffered to fall into oblivion. Yet it is now so notorious that many of the highest persons in the state were tampering with the exiled family, that the plot is rendered sufficiently probable. There seems to have been some political infatuation connected with the name of the Stuarts. Though, excepting the bravery of Charles I. and the pleasantry of Charles II., they all were evidently the dullest, most mulish, and most repulsive of mankind; yet many brave men periled their lives to restore them, and many men of great distinction hazarded their safety to correspond with them. The "Stuart Correspondence" was less a breach of loyalty than a libel on the national understanding.

On the whole, these volumes are interesting, in many parts—very much so. The editor has evidently done his best to illustrate and explain. But can he not discover any remnant of the letters of Selwyn himself? he might then remove the objection to his title, and please all readers together.

* * * * *



NEWS FROM AN EXILED CONTRIBUTOR.

MELBOURNE, PORT PHILIP, NEW SOUTH WALES, July 1, 1843.

BELOVED AND REV. CHRISTOPHER,

You have been pleased many times, in very decided terms, to express your ever-to-be-respected conviction that I should eventually come to something; haply to the woolsack—possibly to the gallows; from which prophetic sentiment, I have naturally inferred that my genius was rare, and that your eagle eye had discovered it.

Before my letter reaches your generous shores, twelve months will have elapsed, most reverend Christopher, since we parted in the Hibernian city. Then we were as near to one another as firmly grasped hands could render us; now sixteen thousand miles effectually divide us; and whilst I sit silently wishing you ages of health and mortal happiness, the mercury of my thermometer stands lazily at freezing point, whereas your own sprightly quicksilver rushes up to 92. All things tell me of our separation. We sailed, as you will find by referring to your pocket-book—for you made a memorandum at the time—on the 14th day of November last from Cork; sighted Madeira—about thirty miles abreast—in eight days, and out of sight of it on the 22d. A fine fair wind was sent to us, and we crossed the Line, all well, on the 14th of December; then steering pretty far to westward, we luckily caught the trade-wind, and rounded the Cape in a good gale on the 15th of January. And here it came on to blow right earnestly; but we kept the gale for about eight days on our larboard quarter, and we scudded on our course at a fearful rate. Our mizen mast was carried away—both our mainsails split—and we smashed a few spars, and lost some running gear; nothing more serious happened, save the loss of as fine a young fellow as ever trode shoe-leather—a seaman. He was caught sharply by one of the ropes that gave way, and it carried him overboard like a feather. We saw him drop—the sea was running mountains high—we could render him no assistance; and he perished under our very eyes. The wind, fortunately for us, continued on either quarter of our ship; and it is a remarkable fact, and deserving of notice, that, during the whole of our voyage, we had occasion only to put the ship about TWICE. We cast anchor in Hobson's Bay, Port Philip on the morning of the 21st of February, having made our voyage in the short space of ninety-nine days, and the land within a quarter of an hour of the captain's reckoning. The events of the passage may be given paucis verbis. We had nine accouchements in the steerage amongst the emigrants, some of them premature from violent sea-sickness, and seven deaths—all children.

Our deaths, as I have said, were confined to the children. The adults kept free from fever; an astonishing fact, when the confinement and closeness of a steerage birth is taken into account. The voyage was agreeable. We were good friends in the cabin. The captain, a prudent, temperate man, took his three glasses of grog per diem, and no more; the first at noon, the second at dinner, the third and last at "turn-in." Your obedient servant, ever mindful of your strict injunctions, and of your eloquent discourse on sobriety and self-denial, and believing that he could not do better than regulate his watch according to the captain's chronometer, followed precisely the same rule. We maintained a glorious state of health after the first week; and if all future voyagers would do the same, let them neither eat nor drink aboard ship to the full extent of their appetites. This is simple advice, but I reckon it the first great secret which my nomadic experience enables me to put down for the benefit of my fellow-creatures; especially on board of a ship, leave off with an appetite. We passed our time—not having the fear of the Ancient Mariner before our eyes—in shooting albatrosses, Cape pigeons, and the like; in picking up a porpoise, a bonnitta, or a dolphin. Books, backgammon, and whist, filled up the measure of the day. Mem.—had we been favoured with less wind, we should have got more porpoises. We speared many—first-raters; but the speed at which we cut along, prevented our securing them.

But we have cast anchor. The harbour of Hobson's Bay is a splendid inlet of the sea. The bay is very narrow at the entrance, but the moment you get past the Heads, it extends to a breadth of eight or ten miles, and to a length of twenty-two miles, from the mouth to the anchoring place. The land around the bay is flat and sandy, and covered with wood almost to the water's edge. The tree there resembles our common mountain fir: it is exactly like it in the bark; but it is called by the settlers, the she-oak. I reckon it to be the beef-tree, for it has its appearance when cut up, is hard, and takes a beautiful polish. Inland, this wood grows to a considerable height and thickness; but the principal part of the interior is thickly covered with the various species of the gum and peppermint trees, many of them of a singularly large growth: but more of the interior anon. Immediately opposite to the anchorage ground, there is a pretty little town called Williamstown, in which the water-police magistrate, an old seafaring gentleman, Captain ——, has his residence. The gallant captain has enough to do with the jolly tars, who invariably attempt to cut and run as soon as they have got here. A sailor misconducting himself on the voyage, has at least two months' reflection in the jail of Williamstown, commencing immediately upon his arrival. The news of this prison establishment will probably reach England before my letter. Should it be spoken of in your presence, say that it has been found absolutely necessary for the protection of shipmasters, and that an act was passed accordingly for its erection. Gordon law, so called after the first magistrate, is proverbial, and very summary. Every fellow found drunk gets two hours in the stocks, and he becomes sober there much sooner than if he had been simply fined five shillings.

The town of Melbourne is beautifully situated on the face of a hill, in the hollow of which runs the noble river called the Yarra-Yarra, words which signify in the native language, "flowing constantly." It is distinguished by its title from the large majority of rivers, which are nearly still, and which, after extending only for a mile or two, form at length a species of swamp. Such rivers are generally styled lagoons. The Yarra-Yarra is navigable up to the town of Melbourne for ships of a large size—say 400 tons; but the seven miles of distance being circuitous, and the banks of sand at the mouth of the river occasionally shifting, the larger class of ships generally remain at the anchorage ground in the bay, and discharge by common lighters. At the present moment, from twenty to thirty very large ships are riding in the bay. A pretty little steamer plies three times a-day between the towns of Melbourne and Williamstown—price five shillings, up and down. Another steamer, "The Sea Horse," plies between Melbourne and Sydney once a fortnight; the passage is made in three days, and the fares L12 for cabin, L6 for steerage. The communication is a vast accommodation to this district. The steamer is in private hands, and did not answer at first; she now carries the mail, and promises to turn out a profitable spec. The coast is very dangerous, and at every season of the year liable to very violent gales. Even in the bay the squalls are sudden, violent, and dangerous, and many lives are lost for want of proper precaution and care, on board of small boats. Only yesterday, my friend, Mr G——, and three men, were out in a pleasure boat; in five minutes they were swept off to leeward, the boat was upset, and they were all drowned.

Melbourne is perhaps the most surprising place in her Majesty's dominions. Nothing, in the history of colonization, approaches her as regards the rapidity of advancement and extent. Six years ago there were not twenty British subjects on the spot, and at the present hour, Melbourne and its suburbs boast of a population of ten thousand souls. There are already built four splendid edifices for public worship—Episcopalians, Presbyterians, Wesleyans, and Independents, are provided for—and there is in addition a very large Roman Catholic chapel in the course of erection. There are three banks all doing excellently well—"The Australasian," "The Union Bank of Australia," and "Port Philip's Bank"—and there is yet a good field for another, under prudent management. The rate of discount is L10 per cent; and the interest given on deposit accounts L7 per cent. The common rate of interest, given with good mortgage security, is L20 per cent; and in some instances, where a little risk is taken, L25 and L30. Bills past due at the bank, are charged L12 per cent. A court of law (by act of Council) allows L8 per cent on all bills sued upon, with a discretionary power of extending the rate to L12 per cent, to cover any damage or loss sustained. There are two Club houses, a Royal Exchange, and some very large buildings for stores. A spacious new jail is building in a most commodious situation, and a public court house will soon follow; the one existing being but small and temporary. The new customhouse, which has been completed since my arrival is a fine building, and forms one side of the Market Square. In front of this, and about four hundred yards distant, stands the wharf. Melbourne rejoices likewise in its theatre, or, as it is called, "pavilion," which place of amusement, however, the governor does not think proper to license. His refusal is, I believe, very properly founded upon the questionable condition of the morals of the great body of the population. Two hours at the police-office any morning, afford a stranger a tolerably clear insight into this subject generally, and acquaint him particularly with the over-night deportment of the Melbournese. The police magistrate holds any thing but a sinecure. We have three newspapers in Melbourne, namely, The Patriot, The Herald, and Gazette, each published twice a-week; the first on Monday and Thursday, the second on Tuesday and Friday, the third on Wednesday and Saturday; so that we have a newspaper every day. The advertisements are numerous and varied in matter. I have heard upon good authority that the proprietor of any one of these journals draws at least L4000 to L5000 per annum from the profits of them. It is not difficult to account for these enormous gains. Every thing here is sold by auction, and the advertisements are in consequence more numerous than they would otherwise be. An auctioneer alone, in good business, will pay each of the papers about L1000 per annum for printing and advertising his numerous sales. We have a supreme court with a suitable establishment of officers. John Walpole Willis, Esq., was resident judge. He is now amongst you, for, by the slip which carries this letter, he starts for England, circumstances having occurred that render it necessary for him to vindicate in person a character which requires no vindication. The people of Melbourne part with the upright and learned judge with infinite regret, softened only by the certain hope they entertain of his immediate return. The resident judge holds civil courts as in England during the several terms, and criminal courts of general jail-delivery every month. The pleadings are conducted by barristers at law, who have been duly admitted in England, Ireland, Scotland, or Isle of Man. The agents or attorneys and solicitors are those duly admitted at Sydney, at courts of Westminster in England, High Courts in Ireland, and writers to her Majesty's Signet in Scotland. Others who may have served a regular apprenticeship of not less than five years to any such agent, after undergoing a necessary examination, are likewise suffered to practise as attorneys. The supreme court has been established about twelve months. Before that time all suits were carried on in Sydney. Conveyances of land may be prepared by any one, and, before professional men appeared amongst the settlers, there were some rare specimens of deeds in this branch of English law. Now they are of course better—and those to which I have adverted have fortunately paved the way for endless litigation. We have a sprinkling of military and mounted police; two very large steam mills for grinding flour and sawing timber; and in a word, all the concomitants of a large and flourishing city. I should, however, except the public streets. These are still unpaved, and consequently in wet weather, in some places, impassable, and in dry weather insufferably dusty. I have spoken of the sudden squalls which arise often in the Bay. Whilst one of these prevails, clouds of dust are carried from the streets so dense that you cannot see half a yard before you. If you are exposed to the whirlwind, and chance to wear clothes of a dark colour, you issue from it with the appearance of a man who has been confined in a mill for a week. A house of furniture well cleaned in the morning, looks at dinner-time as if it had been coated with dirt for a twelvemonth. Should there be a sudden mortality among the ladies of Port Philip, it will undoubtedly be occasioned by this warfare with the dirt, which is carried forward day after day without any prospect of retreat on either side.

Having read thus far, you will very likely tap the floor impatiently with your foot, and say—if you have not said it already—"Well, but what is the fellow about himself?" Patience, gentle Christopher. I will tell you now. Upon my arrival with a pocket, as you are aware, not very inconveniently laden, I kept of course "my eye ahead" for any thing suitable in the farming way; sheep-stock or cattle. But it would not do. Capital was required to get a sheep-station, and employment as an overseer, in consequence of the depression that existed in the markets for all kinds of stock, altogether hopeless. No man is idle here longer than he can help it, unless he have the wherewithal to look to; and there are fifty modes of gaining bread here, if a man will turn to them? What could a briefless barrister do better than throw himself upon the law? I smelled out the attorneys to begin with. The first with whom I came in contact was one Mr ——, from a northern county in England. He had been here only three years, and was already rattling about in his carriage. He arrived without a shoe to his foot, or a sixpence in his pocket. Another was my old and respected friend Mr ——, writer to the signet, of Edinburgh, who had been here about eighteen months, was living like a gentleman, and on the point of entering a fine new dwelling-house, which he had himself erected out of his own honourable gains. Upon him I waited, and from his kindness I obtained all the information I stood in need of; and not only this, but immediate profitable employment in his office, which, with his leave, I hold until something offers—whether I shall claim admission as attorney, solicitor, and proctor, as some have done before me, or resort to my old calling of advocate, is as yet an undecided question. I am now in the receipt of more than is necessary for subsistence, and I shall look before I leap. The rents of houses are extravagantly high. The poorest tradesmen pay fifteen shillings a-week for his small house—and he must pay it weekly; the better class of tradesmen pay twenty and twenty-five shillings, and the higher class from two to four pounds a-week; for a petty dwelling containing only three rooms and a kitchen. A small brick cottage held by a friend of mine, and consisting of sitting-room, bed-room, servant's room, and kitchen, is considered a great bargain at a hundred pounds per annum. The hours of business are limited with strictness to seven—videlicit, from nine in the morning until four P.M. You are your own master after four o'clock, and need fear no business-calls or interruptions. Whilst business, however, is going on, the excitement and bustle compel me to regard Cheapside on a Saturday afternoon, as a place of great quietness and an agreeable promenade. Fellows are riding as hard as they can tear from one end of the town to the other—cattle are driving to and fro—bullock-drays are crowding from the interior with wood—auctions are eternally at work—settlers are coming from their stations, or getting their provisions in. Tradesmen and mercantile men are hurry-skurrying with their orders. A vast amount of work is done up to four o'clock, and afterwards all is silence, and the place looks unlike nothing so much as itself; and yet, notwithstanding all this bustle, money is altogether out of the question. From what exact cause or series of causes, I cannot tell you now—but the fact is certain that the mercantile community here is nearly bankrupt. There is a glut of goods, a superabundance of every thing in the market. It has been wrongfully supposed in England that every thing would sell here, and the consequence has been that an overflow of every kind of commodity has poured in upon us. The supply has doubled and trebled the demand. Upon the first establishment of these settlements the wants of the people were of course many, and their prices for stock were so good, and their speculations in land so profitable and bright, that they could afford the indulgence of a luxury, no matter what price was asked to purchase it. It is very different now. The staple commodity of this colony is wool. Well, so long as all the stations or sheep-runs continued unoccupied, and new settlers arrived, the price of sheep kept naturally very high; but every station that can command a due supply of water, is now in occupation, and consequently the demand for stock has ceased. Sheep, which three years ago sold for twenty-five and eighteen shillings, command now, for first quality, eight shillings and sixpence only; ordinary quality, six shillings; and middling as low as five shillings. For cash sale by sheriff-warrant, I have seen beautiful ewes, free from all disease—2000 of them—sold for two and sixpence each! Cattle three years ago sold for ten, twelve, and sometimes fifteen pounds per head. At this moment they are so plentiful that I could purchase a drove of fat cattle, two to three hundred head—and some of them weighing eighty stone—for eight pounds a beast, and that on credit too by approved bill at four months' date. Such are a few of the reasons why a damper has come over the Port Philip market, reducing amongst other things the price of wages by nearly a third. Emigrants continue to pour in, and they stare and are grievously disappointed at the rate of wages, so very different to that which they expected. Twelve months since, a single labouring man got forty pounds per annum, with weekly rations of provisions; now with his rations, he receives only twenty-five, or at most thirty pounds per annum. Married men with young families will not be hired at any rate, for they are only burdens on a station. A good thorough-bred shepherd maintains his price. He is still in great demand, and may command from sixty to seventy pounds per annum, with rations, cow's milk, free hut, and a portion of produce of stock in addition to all, if he chooses to put his wages to that mode of profit. Women servants were formerly much wanted. They are now at a discount. The filthy drabs ejected from Ireland are scarcely worth their meat. I am proud to say it, and you should be proud to hear it, gentle Christopher, that a Scotch servant, male or female, is forty per cent above every other in value in this colony. Scotch servants get ahead in spite of every thing. The Scotch tradesmen have almost all of them made money; some abundantly. I have met many here from the North who brought nothing but their energy, moderation, and unconquerable perseverance with them, and they are affluent, and are becoming daily more so. Donald ——, who was a servant lad at home, and is now a respected and respectable man in Melbourne, is independent. He went first to Van Diemen's Land, and came here some three years ago. "And had you arrived," he said to me the other day, "at the same time, you might now have been moving home a prosperous gentleman." However, nil desperandum. There is still a fair opportunity for an industrious man, who above all things has resolution to be SOBER in his habits. The mischief with the labouring man has been, that having suddenly discovered his wages to be high in comparison with those he received in the mother country, he has considered himself entitled to have a proportionate extra amount of enjoyment at the public-house, where drink is very high. Good tradesmen would infallibly make money, but for this great failing. The bullock dray-drivers, certainly the best paid of all the working men, absolutely think nothing of coming from the Bush into Melbourne, with twenty or thirty pounds in their pocket, and spending every farthing of the sum—in one night—champagne to the mast-head. The innkeepers make fortunes rapidly. Shall I tell how much Boniface will draw in a week? No—for you will not believe me. Certainly as much as many an innkeeper in a country town would draw in twelve months. An innkeeper's license to Government is thirty pounds per annum. This entitles him to keep his house open from six in the morning until eleven o'clock at night; ten pounds more enables him to have open house during the night; and an additional ten pounds enables him to keep a billiard table. There are a great many houses with tables and a number of light houses; but, as I have hinted before, our police courts exhibit abominations, and a police court is a good criterion of the morals of a people. In the first formation and early beginnings of this colony, a man having sheep took up his abode in the interior, on any spot which he considered suitable and agreeable, and he was called a squatter. Now no individual may pasture sheep or cattle of any kind without receiving a license from Government, for which he pays ten pounds annually, and making a return every year of all his stock, servants, and increase—the license, by the way, not being available within three miles of Melbourne. The holder of such a license is called a settler. A settler is entitled to cut wood upon his own station or run, for firing for himself and servants; but if he cut it for sale—and we have no coal here—he pays, in addition to the ten pounds, three pounds more per annum for the permission so to do.

You shall now receive a faithful account of the settling of a settler. Suppose him to have a station in the interior, or as it is invariably styled, "in the Bush." The distance is forty, fifty, or it may be eighty, miles from Melbourne, and the stock consists of from four to five thousand sheep, and from one to two hundred head of cattle. The settler, in all probability, has been accustomed in early life to good society, has been well educated and brought up. Living at his station he sees none but his own servants, his chere amie, (always a part of a settler's stock,) and perhaps a few black natives, not unfrequently hostile visitors. Business calls the settler to Melbourne; he puts up at his inn; any thing in the shape of society rejoices his heart, and forthwith he begins "the lark;" he dines out—gets fuddled, returns to his inn, finds a city friend or two waiting for him, treats them to champagne, of which, at ten shillings per bottle, they drink no end. Very well. His horse is in the stable at seven shillings and sixpence a-night, his own bill varies from six to eight pounds per diem, and at the end of a fortnight my settler is called upon to hand over a cheque upon his banker to the tune of a hundred pounds, or, if he has no bank-account, his promissory note at a very short date. Away starts the settler back to his solitude; he has given his bill, and he thinks no more about it; but the bill finds its way quickly into the hands of an attorney, and in eight days there is an execution out for recovery, with an addition of ten pounds already incurred in legal expenses. The sheriff's bailiff rides to the station and demands payment of the whole. He gets no money, but settler and bailiff return in company to Melbourne: a friend is applied to; he discounts a bill for the sum required. The attorney is paid the amount by the hands of the sheriff. The bill once more becomes due, and is once more dishonoured; expenses run up like wildfire. This time there is no escape, and a portion of the stock must be sold to avoid ruin—and it is sold sometimes at a fearful sacrifice. This is no insulated case. It is the history of nine-tenths of the thoughtless fellows who dwell away in the Bush. Such gentlemen at the present hour, in consequence of the depressed state of the stock market, are all but ruined. Any one of them, who twelve months since purchased his flock of two thousand sheep at eighteen or five-and-twenty shillings, can only reckon upon a fourth of the amount in value now. It is increase only that enables him to pay his servants, and he has as much off the wool as affords him the means of living. The sale of his wethers would not pay for the tear and wear of bullocks and drays; and if any profit does by any chance arise, it can be only from occasionally catching a few head of cattle, which, as they run wild in the woods, the settler can keep no account of, and only with difficulty secure when they come to a lagoon for water, where they are watched, because at one time or another they are certain to appear. Horses are very dear in Melbourne: a useless brute, which in England would be dear at ten pounds, sells here quickly for thirty; a good saddle horse will fetch a hundred, and I have seen some tolerable cart horses sold for fifty and sixty pounds. In a new colony, where almost all the draught is performed by bullocks, cart horses must realize a good price. The hire of a horse and cart in Melbourne is, one pound four shillings for the day.

In addition to those above spoken of there is another class of settlers, who were the original stock-holders and land-purchasers in the district. They have large tracts of country in the Bush, and thousands of sheep and cattle on then, and all managed by servants and overseers. These proprietors live at the clubs in Melbourne and constitute what is here termed the elite of society. A short time ago these gentlemen entertained the pleasing notion, that there was to be no termination to the increase and extent of their wealth; and one very young member of the society was heard to exclaim, in apparent agony at his excessive good fortune, "upon my soul, I am become most disgustingly rich." But mark the difference The elite have been living in the most extravagant manner. They discounted bills at their own pleasure here at ten per cent; and knowing well that these bills would not be honoured at maturity, they sent them to London, and cashed them there: with the funds thus raised, they speculated in the buying of land and stock, hoping to get (as in many instances they did) at least eighty per cent profit by their transactions. But now stock has fallen to a trifle; bills are falling due, rushing back from England under protest—and the bubble bursts. The banks are drawing in their accommodation, and the elite, who were a short time back so disgustingly rich, are, whilst I write, most disgustingly poor. This is no imaginative statement; it is a sober fact. But I do not suppose that the present state of things will last long. Speculation and the rate of interest must come down. When the human body is disordered, it is a happy time for the doctor; when the body mercantile is diseased, it is the attorney's harvest time. If an attorney has any business at all, he must do well in Melbourne, for his fees are inordinately high. Protesting a bill is five-and-twenty shillings; noting, half-a-guinea; every letter demanding payment of account, if under twenty pounds, half-a-guinea; above twenty and under a hundred pounds, one guinea; above a hundred, two guineas. Every summons (a summons being a short printed form) before the supreme court, is charged six guineas; and the clients pay down at once, without any questions, too glad to do so, provided they can get rid of their temporary difficulties. Litigation is short and quick. Conveyancing is downright profit; a deed, however short, conveying a piece of land, however trifling, costs five guineas. There are no stamps, and the work is done in an hour. More valuable properties are conveyed by a deed generally charged nine guineas. My friend —— has drawn twelve such deeds in his office in the course of one day; and with these eyes I have seen him earn six guineas in as many minutes, by appearing at the police-office when a dispute has arisen between a master and his servant. All quarrels of this kind are arranged at the police-office, when the amount of wages received by the servant does not exceed thirty pounds annually. An attorney with brains cannot fail to get ahead. He has only to use dispatch, and to begin and continue in one even and undeviating course. Our barristers are few in number. There are but four of then. There is still a glorious field for a barrister of talent, and especially if he be conversant with the nicer points of conveyancing. Any clever barrister up to the business and a good speaker, might rely upon making immediately at least a thousand a-year; the community are looking and waiting for such a man. A fellow with no capital and no profession had better not show his face in Melbourne. It is a thousand to one against him. Compared to his position that of a labourer is an enviable one; yet any respectable and intelligent man tolerably well educated, coming here with four or five hundred pounds in his pocket, may certainly, in a couple of years, and in twenty different ways, treble that capital. The best and most promising is the following:—Buy in any growing part of the town of Melbourne, a small piece of town allotment. This will cost fifty pounds, upon this you may erect two small brick cottages, containing each two rooms and a kitchen, and well fitted for a respectable tradesman. Two hundred and forty pounds will build them up; thus the whole expense of cottages and ground is two hundred and ninety pounds at most. Each cottage will, for a moral certainty, let for one pound five shillings per week, and thus return you a clear rental of sixty-four pounds per annum, for the sum of one hundred and forty-four pounds laid out. Some capitalists are not long in discovering this mode of adding to their fortunes, and it is not surprising that such men, with ease, get speedily rich. Many individuals are personally known to me who arrived here with small means a few years back, and who are now receiving an income of fifteen hundred pounds a-year from houses, which they have raised upon their profits and by not slow degrees. Their returns are certain for, mark you, every tradesman pays his rent every Monday morning, there is no delay. If it be not paid the hour it is due, the landlord is empowered by law to send a bailiff to the house, to keep him there at an expense to the tenant of three shillings per day—and to request him, at the end of five days, to sell off the goods and chattels provided the demand is still unsatisfied. I know no better investment for capital, be it large or small, than that of which I speak. There are no taxes, no ground-rents, and the tenant is bound to keep his premises in repair. If a mistake has been made in the building of houses, it is because some have overshot the mark, and built dwellings that are too large for the purposes required; these large houses cost a large sum of money, and neither let readily nor nearly so high in proportion, as the smaller houses occupied by the working-classes.

I am unable to give you an accurate notion of the general appearance of the country. Speaking in broad terms it is wooded, but not so densely as on the Sydney side, Van Diemen's Land, or New Zealand. The peculiar and beautiful feature of this country is the open plain which is found at every ten or twelve miles spreading itself over a surface not less than three miles in length and half the distance in breadth. It is as smooth as a lawn. A magnificent tree rears itself to a great height here and there upon the sward, on either side of which appears a natural park, the finest that taste could fashion or art could execute. Nature has done in fact what no art could accomplish. Gaze upon these grounds, and for a moment imagine that the enormous bullocks before you, with their fearful horns, are a gigantic herd of deer, and you have a sight that England, famous for her parks, shall in vain attempt to rival. But against this royal scene—set off a melancholy drawback, one which I fear may never be made good even by the ingenuity and indomitable energy of man. The land has an awful want of spring water. There are a few small holes, called lagoons, the remains of ancient rivers, met with now and then; and strange to say, one of such holes will be found to contain salt sea-water, whilst another, within a very few yards of it, has water quite fresh, or nearly so. In the former are found large seafish, such as cod, mullet, sea-carp, and a fish similar to our perch. I an speaking of holes discovered at a distance of a hundred and twenty miles from the sea, and having no visible communication with it. In several districts there are large rivers, but their course is uncertain, and it is impossible to say that any one river empties itself into the sea. Goulburn is a fine river, and ninety miles from this on the banks of that river, are found very large lobsters, and other shell-fish. To stand on an eminence, and to cast your eye down into the valley beyond and beneath you, is to have an enjoyment which the ardent lover of nature alone can appreciate. Far as the eye can look, there is uninterrupted harmony. Splendid plains covered with the fleecy tribe, and here and there (alas! only but here and there) a speck of water, enough to vindicate nature from the charge of utter neglect—and no more. A glance thrown in another direction brings to your view an endless tract of country deprived even of these solitary specks, where the grass grows as high as your knee, and where no man dare take his flocks and herds for lack of the sweet element. If the surface of this land were blessed with spring water as England is, the wealth of this colony would surpass the calculation of any living man. As it is, who can tell the ultimate effect of this important deprivation? There are one or two stations, on which spring water has been discovered, but it is a rare discovery, and dearly prized. In Melbourne we have no water, but such as is carted by the water barrel carters from the river Yarra-Yarra. Every house has its barrel or hogshead for holding water. The Yarra-Yarra water is brackish, and causes dysentery. The complaint is now prevailing. In many parts of the interior puddle holes are made, and water is thus secured from the heavy rain that falls in the early part of summer. Water saved in this manner never becomes putrid. The leaves of the gum-tree fall into the pool abundantly, and not only give to the water a very peculiar flavour, but preserve it from all putrefaction. This gum water is safest when boiled with a little tea, and drunk cold. Every settler in the Bush drinks water in no other way, and—for want of better things—he takes tea and fresh mutton at least three times a-day. His bread is a lump of flour and water rolled into a ball, and placed in hot ashes to bake. The loaf is called "a damper." The country, as far as I have seen it, bears evident marks of great volcanic change. You meet with a stone, round like a turnip, as hard as iron, like rusty iron in appearance, and on the outside honey-combed. There are large beds of it for miles. You then come to the flat country where the soil surpasses any thing you can conceive in richness, fit for any cultivation under heaven, and upwards of fifteen feet in depth. Before I quitted London, I heard that the climate of Australia was fine and equable, seldom varying, and well suited to a delicate constitution. I am satisfied that many consumptive persons live here, who in Scotland would be carried off in a month. You seldom hear a person cough. In church I have listened in vain for a single hoste; no, not even before the commencement of a psalm do you find the haughting and clachering that are indispensable in England. All pipes are clear as bell. I noticed this as a phenomenon on my first arrival. We are now, as you would say, in the dead of winter; a strange announcement to a British ear in the month of July. The air is chill in the morning and evening, before sunrise and after sunset, but during the day the weather is as fine as on the finest September day in Scotland. Notwithstanding what I have said, I would not have you ground any theory upon my remarks as yet—or deceive Sir James Clark, and the rest of the medical gentlemen, who are looking on all sides of the world for a climate for their hopeless invalids. I have stated facts, but those which follow are no less authentic. On the 30th and 31st of December last, the thermometer at the observatory stood in the shade at 70 deg. and 72 deg. noon. On the 1st of January at noon, and up to three o'clock, P.M., it stood in the shade at 92 deg. and 93 deg. On the 2d it rose to 95 deg. at noon, and fell at sunset, eight P.M., to 69 deg. In the middle of the foresaid month of December the thermometer was 86 deg. at breakfast time, and before dinner down to 63 deg. These memoranda, gained from undoubted sources, would show the climate—in summer at least—to be more variable than my reference proves it; yet I am told that even in summer time you hear of little sickness amongst grown up people. New comers suffer from dysentery, and children are attacked in the same way. I have had two visitations, from which I rallied in the course of four and twenty hours, with the aid of arrow root, port wine, and laudanum. A free use of vegetables is always dangerous to strangers, and they are obtained here in perfection. The weather is too hot for apples, pears, and gooseberries in the summer. Grapes and other English hot-house fruits come to delicious maturity in the open air. The melons are inconceivably exquisite, and grow, as they were wont in Paradise before the fall, without care or trouble spent upon them. The seed is put into the earth; a little water is given to it at that time, and the thing is done—"c'est un fait accompli." Potatoes grow at any season of the year, and cauliflowers and turnips spring up almost in a night like mushrooms. There are some five farms in cultivation around Melbourne, and the crops of wheat are very fair in quality but fall off in quantity. Thirty bushels per acre is considered a good crop. Oats grow too much to straw, and are generally cut in the slot blade, winnowed, and carted to Melbourne and sold for hay. Rye-grass hay does not answer, and clover is not more successful; but vetches have just been introduced on a small scale, and nothing yet grown has succeeded so well as green food for horses and cows. Hay of fine quality is brought from Van Diemen's Land, but it is very dear. A cart load of good oaten hay sells here for about forty-five shillings. Van Diemen's Land hay is at present eleven guineas per ton.

The aboriginal natives of this colony are a very savage race, and all the efforts hitherto made by missionaries, protectors, and others, have never given promise or warrant of effectual civilization. The males are tall, and of fierce aspect; the skin and hair are exceedingly black—the latter very smooth. In many instances, the features are striking and good. The women are slender, and during the summer, naked; in winter, the females in the immediate neighbourhood procure clothes from the inhabitants of Melbourne, and cut, as you may suppose, a very original figure. Nothing will induce the natives to work. They live in the Bush, and the bark of a large tree forms their habitation. There are three distinct tribes around us in a circuit of about a hundred miles, and the difference of features amongst these tribes is easily observed. The three tribes speak three different languages unintelligible to one another. They meet at different periods of the year, and hold what they term a "corroborice,"—that is—a dance. Their bodies on these occasions are covered with oil, red paint, and green leaves. I have seen two hundred at a meeting, but they assemble double that number at times. The festival concludes in pitched battle. There is a grand fight with clubs, or arrows and spears. Three or four are generally killed in the onslaught, and as many of the survivors as are fortunate enough to get a bite, feast upon the fat of the victims' hearts. This fat is their richest dainty. Those who are able to form an opinion on the subject, pronounce the aborigines of this colony to be cannibals. Many of their children disappear, and it is generally supposed that they are devoured by their friends and acquaintances. In many districts of the interior, the blacks have lately committed many depredations amongst the sheep, and many of the devils are shot without judge or jury. Two natives are now in the jail of Melbourne under sentence of death, for committing a dreadful murder upon two sailors who were cast ashore from a whaler. These savages had been for thirteen years under the instruction of a protector and others. They belonged originally to Van Diemen's Land, but migrated to a part of this colony called Portland Bay. They spoke English quite well, yet, notwithstanding all their advantages, they perpetrated this cruel and cold-blooded murder, and then cunningly hid the bodies in the ground. They were detected by the merest chance, in consequence of their having in possession of a few articles which had formerly belonged to the unhappy mariners. None of the natives is allowed to carry fire-arms, and a heavy fine is inflicted upon any individual who is known to give them spirits. They are passionately fond of spirits, and next to these of loaf bread. The females are called by the males "Loubras," and the males are designated "Coolies." There is not promiscuous cohabitation. When a Coolie reaches the age of twenty-one, he is allowed to choose his own "Loubra." Every male who then takes unto himself a helpmate, loses a front tooth, which is knocked out of him. The natives generally tattoo their arms and breasts, but not their faces; many carry a long white wooden pin, or a feather, pierced through the thin part of the nose; and they all twist kangaroo teeth and the bones of fishes more or less in their hair. Every thing small and diminutive they call "Pickaninnie," and any thing very good, "Merri jig." Their language is a queer, rattling, hard-sounding gibberish, incomprehensible to most people; they speak as fast as possible, laugh immoderately at trifles, and are excellent mimics. Their own children they stile "Pickaninnies."

From all that I have seen, I do not hesitate to say, that this country will prove a splendid field for future generations. At the present time, no man should venture here who is unprepared for many privations and a numerous list of annoyances. The common necessaries of life he will certainly find, but none of his ancient and English luxuries. Society is, as you may guess, very limited. You may acknowledge an acquaintance with any one, without committing yourself. To say that you know a man intimately is hazardous; I mean—a man whose friendship you have cultivated only since your arrival. There are many whom you have known at home, and whose friendship it is a pride and a pleasure to renew in your exile. But, as a general rule, "keep yourself to yourself" is a serviceable adage. If it be attended to—well. If it be neglected—you run your head against a stone in less than no time.

If any man have a competency, let him not travel hither to enjoy it. If he has a little money, and desires with a little trouble and inconvenience to double his capital in the shortest possible space of time—let him come out, and fearlessly. Living is cheap enough as far as the essentials are concerned. Butcher meat, not surpassed in any part of England, Scotland, or Ireland, is to be had at twopence per pound; the fine four pound loaf for sixpence halfpenny; brown sugar, fourpence; white, sixpence; candles, sixpence per pound; tea, the finest, three shillings the pound; fresh butter, one shilling and threepence per pound. Wild fowl in abundance. Vegetables are cheaper than in any part of England. Wines of moderate price, but not of good quality. Spirits first-rate, and every kind cheaper than in England, except whisky, which is seventeen and eighteen shillings per gallon; very old at twenty-one and twenty-two. The wine most wanted here is claret. A great deal of it is drunk during the summer, but the quality of it is bad. Fish are abundant in the river and pools, but the people will not trouble themselves to catch them. However, for eighteenpence or two shillings, you may get a good dish of mutteel, carp, or a small fish called "flatties." I have never seen any of the salmon tribe, or any fish like a sea or river trout. Wild swans—both black and white—quails, snipes, cranes, and water-hens, are everywhere abundant, and in the Bush, the varieties of the parrot kind are out of number. Kangaroos, opossums, and flying-squirrels, are common near the town, and afford plenty of amusement to the sportsman. No game license required! Sunday used to be the tradesman's day for shooting, and to a new comer the proceeding had a very queer appearance. By act of council, Sunday shooting is prohibited under a heavy penalty, which has been inflicted on several transgressors, but, like most laws, this is evaded. Shooting is forbidden, but hunting is not. Accordingly numerous parties sally forth on the Sabbath to hunt the kangaroo. The dog used for the sport is a cross between a rough greyhound and a bull; but others follow in the pack. Every man, woman, and child, keeps a dog. Some families have eight or nine running over a house, and the natives have them without number. A few months ago these animals congregated so thickly in the streets, that the magistrates directed the police to shoot all that were not registered and had a collar with the owner's name; as many as fifty were killed in a morning. It costs nothing to feed a dog; the heads of bullocks and the heads and feet of sheep are either thrown away or given to any one who asks for them. The bone manure system, if brought into operation, would help to keep the streets from a bony nuisance. Memorandum: Let the next emigrant to this colony bring a good strong fox-hound bitch with him; he will find it to his advantage. A cross between her and a Newfoundland or large greyhound would do any thing. There are a couple of fox-hounds here, but no bitch. It would do your heart good to see the pace at which the fellows ride. Twenty miles on horseback they think about as much of as we do of five. There is nothing to obstruct the animals; they are not even shod, and they fly over the smooth sward. A hundred and twenty miles is reckoned a journey of a day and a half. A dray, with eight, ten, or twelve bullocks in it, according, to load, will travel thirty miles a-day. When the folks travel, they take no shelter in a house or hut for the night. When night approaches, they alight, and tie their horses to a stump; they draw down some of the thick branches of the gum-tree, and peel off the bark of a large tree, kindle a fire with a match, or, for want of this, rubbing two sticks together, get up a blaze, and fall to sleep beside it. If the traveller be accompanied by a dray, the tarpauling, is drawn round, and he sleeps beneath it.

Not amongst the least of the annoyances found here are the ants. There are three species of the insect, and they are all very large. Many of them are an inch long, and they bite confoundedly. A hand bitten by some of the monsters will swell to the size of a man's head. Along the coast, and in every house, smaller ants prevail, and fleas innumerable. The number of the latter, which you shall find upon your blanket any day of the year, is literally not to be computed. No house is free from this little disturber, who spares neither age nor sex. I have stood upon the sea beach adorned with white trousers, which in less than ten minutes have been covered with hundreds of the vermin. It is an easy transition from the trousers to the inner legs. But this is nothing when you are used to it. The grey horse won't live in the colony. So it is said; at all events none are seen; and I am very sure that every emigrant ship brings its fair stock. It is a wise ordination that forbids their settling. The mawk fly is indigenous, and thrives wonderfully, as you shall hear. This fly is very like our British bluebottle, with a somewhat greener head, and a body entirely yellow. I have seen two mawk flies strike (as it seemed) a joint of meat, just as it was removing from the spit, leaving their fly blows there. Before the joint had been ten minutes upon the table, small white mawks were moving upon the surface of the meat in considerable numbers. If by any chance these animals are suffered to accompany the meat to the safe or larder, in the course of twenty-four hours the small white mawks increase to the length of one-eighth of an inch, and are found crawling in hundreds and moving about, as you have observed the yellow flies buzzing over the old and rotten carcass of a horse that has been exposed for weeks. In the winter these creatures are, of course, less troublesome than in summer. Wire meat-covers are in constant use during the latter season.

Thus far had got in my epistle, when a torrent of ill news rushed in upon us, and compelled me to delay my scribble. I am sorry to say, that in addition to the account which I have already given of the depressed state of the markets, I must add some dismal intelligence. The markets are in a deplorable state, and so is the mercantile community in general. Every day there is a fresh bankruptcy, and the heaviest yet has just taken place. I cannot but believe that if more emigrant laborers come out just now, they must starve. Any man with ten or fifteen thousand pounds could buy half of the district for ready cash. The moneyed men are making fearful hauls as it is. Let emigration stop for a time, and the markets must look up again. At the present moment every thing is selling cheaper here than in England; men's wages are down to the ordinary English rate. So long as the banks afford seven per cent for deposits, moneyed men will lie in wait for bargains, and until such present themselves, will lock up the capital which at first was in circulation through the immense speculations in land and stock. The men who saw no end to speculation are gone and floored, every one of them. Will you believe that Messrs —— sent out three thousand pounds worth of brandy to Sydney, and so glutted the market that part of the cargo was bought low enough to make it a good spec to reship it for England. Such is the fact. There never was a better moment than the present for a hit in land—sheep are at so low a figure, and settlers so hard run. The former I still believe will gradually rise; for, on the Sydney side, the process of boiling down sheep for the sake of the tallow, has commenced, and if it succeed, as I believe it will, the standard value of a sheep will be fixed at something like eight shillings. So much for the fleece and skin, so much for the bones, so much for the kidney fat, and so much for the tallow or fat recovered by boiling the carcass. The great object of this colony must be to increase the export produce, and to bring capital in its place. Wool no doubt is, and will prove to be, the staple commodity; and in time, the settlers will pay more attention to the getting up of it, and to the packing. But above all they must speedily rid themselves of their bloodsuckers, a set of men who charge enormous commissions for anticipated sales, and what not, amounting to thirty and forty per cent; a sum that is nothing short of utter ruin to a poor fellow who has nothing but his wool to depend upon. Had Judge Willis remained amongst us, he would have rooted out whole nests of these hornets. I have no fear of the ultimate success of the colonist, if they will but be faithful to themselves. They have a splendid country, and its capabilities are now only beginning to be known. Before the end of the present year, our exports will consist of wool, bark, tallow, gum, hides, furs, and last, although not least, the finest cured beef in the world. If the latter article of produce is acknowledged as it deserves to be, and finds and establishes an eastern market, nothing will prevent the colony from rising to importance. As far as price is concerned, we can compete with any country in the world. We have no politics in Port Philip. The community are far better employed in attending to their commercial affairs. Let them but persevere honestly and prudently in their course, and they must do well.

And so much for my first epistle, honoured Christopher. If it afford you amusement, you shall hear from me again. I have spoken the truth, and have writ down simple facts. As such, receive them, and communicate them to your neighbours. And now, with affectionate remembrances to yourself and all enquiring friends,

Believe me,

Reverend Christopher,

Your grateful and attached,

JOHN WILLIAM.

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THE PROPHECY OF THE TWELVE TRIBES.

"And Jacob called into his sons, and said, Gather yourselves together, that I may tell you that which shall befall you in the last days.

"Gather yourselves together, and hear, ye sons of Jacob; and hearken unto Israel your father."

—GENESIS, xlix. 1, 2, &c.

The Patriarch sat upon his bed— His cheek was pale, his eye was dim; Long years of woe had bow'd his head, And feeble was the giant limb. And his twelve mighty sons stood nigh, In grief—to see their father die!

But, sudden as the thunder-roll, A new-born spirit fill'd his frame. His fainting visage flash'd with soul, His lip was touch'd with living flame; And burst, with more than prophet fire, The stream of Judgment, Love, and Ire.

"REUBEN,[6] thou spearhead in my side, Thy father's first-born, and his shame; Unstable as the rolling tide, A blight has fall'n upon thy name. Decay shall follow thee and thine. Go, outcast of a hallow'd line!

"SIMEON and LEVI,[7] sons of blood That still hangs heavy on the land; Your flocks shall be the robber's food, Your folds shall blaze beneath his brand. In swamp and forest shall ye dwell. Be scatter'd among Israel!

"JUDAH![8] All hail, thou priest, thou king! The crown, the glory, shall be thine; Thine, in the fight, the eagle's wing— Thine, on the hill, the oil and wine. Thou lion! nations shall turn pale When swells thy roar upon the gale.

"Judah, my son, ascend the throne, Till comes from heaven the unborn king— The prophesied, the mighty one, Whose heel shall crush the serpent's sting. Till earth is paradise again, And sin is dead, and death is slain!

"Wide as the surges, ZEBULON,[9] Thy daring keel shall plough the sea; Before thee sink proud Sidon's sun, And strong Issachar toil for thee. Thou, reaper of his corn and oil, Lord of the giant and the soil!

"Whose banner flames in battle's van! Whose mail is first in slaughter gored! Thou, subtler than the serpent, DAN,[10] Prince of the arrow and the sword. Woe to the Syrian charioteer When rings the rushing of thy spear!

"Crush'd to the earth by war and woe, GAD,[11] shall the cup of bondage drain, Till bold revenge shall give the blow That pays the long arrear of pain. Thy cup shall glow with tyrant-gore, Thou be my Son—and man once more!

"Loved NAPHTALI,[12] thy snow-white hind Shall bask beneath the rose and vine. Proud ASHER, to the mountain wild Shall star-like blaze, thy battle-sign. All bright to both, from birth to tomb, The heavens all sunshine, earth all bloom!

"JOSEPH,[13] come near—my son, my son! Egyptian prince, Egyptian sage, Child of my first and best-loved one, Great guardian of thy father's age. Bring EPHRAIM and MANASSEH nigh, And let me bless them ere I die.

"Hear me—Thou GOD of Israel! Thou, who hast been his living shield, In the red desert's lion-dell, In Egypt's famine-stricken field, In the dark dungeon's chilling stone, In Pharaoh's chain—by Pharaoh's throne.

"My son, all blessings be on thee, Be blest abroad, be blest at home; Thy nation's strength—her living tree, The well to which the thirsty come; Blest be thy valley, blest thy hill, Thy father's GOD be with thee still!

"Thou man of blood, thou man of might, Thy soul shall ravin, BENJAMIN.[14] Thou wolf by day, thou wolf by night, Rushing through slaughter, spoil, and sin; Thine eagle's beak and vulture's wing Shall curse thy nation with a king!"

Then ceased the voice, and all was still: The hand of death was on the frame; Yet gave the heart one final thrill, And breathed the dying lip one name. "Sons, let me rest by Leah's side!" He raised his brow to heaven—and died.

HAVILAH.

[6] The privileges of the first-born passed away from the tribe of Reuben, and were divided among his brethren. The double portion of the inheritance was given to Joseph—the priesthood to Levi—and the sovereignty to Judah. The tribe never rose into national power, and it was the first which was carried into captivity.

[7] The massacre of the Shechemites was the crime of the two brothers. For a long period the tribe of Simeon was depressed; and its position, on the verge of the Amalekites, always exposed it to suffering. The Levites, though finally entrusted with the priesthood, had no inheritance in Palestine: they dwelt scattered among the tribes.

[8] The tribe of Judah was distinguished from the beginning of the nation. It led the van in the march to Palestine. It was the first appointed to expel the Canaanites. It gave the first judge, Othniel. It was the tribe of David, and, most glorious of all titles, was the Tribe of our LORD.

[9] Zebulon was a maritime tribe, its location extending along the sea-shore, and stretching to the borders of Sidon. The tribe of Issachar were located in the country afterwards called Lower Galilee; were chiefly tillers of the soil; were never distinguished in the military or civil transactions of the nation, and, as they dwelt among the Canaanites, seem to have habitually served them for hire. Issachar is characterised as the "strong ass"—a drudge, powerful but patient.

[10] The tribe of Dan were remarkable for the daring of their exploits in war, and not less so for their stratagems. Their great chieftain Samson, distinguished alike for strength and subtlety, might be an emblem of their qualities and history.

[11] Gad; a tribe engaged in continual and memorable conflicts.

[12] Naphtali and Asher inhabited the most fertile portions of Palestine.

[13] The two tribes Ephraim and Manasseh, descended from Joseph, possessed the finest portion of the land, along both sides of the Jordan. The united tribes numbered a larger population than any of the rest. Besides Joshua, five of the twelve judges of Israel were of the united tribes. In the formation of the kingdom of Israel, an Ephraimite was the first king.

[14] The tribe of Benjamin was conspicuous for valour. But its turbulence and ferocity wrought its fall, in the great battles recorded in Judges xix. and xx. Saul was of this fierce tribe. It was finally lost in that of Judah.

This great prophecy was delivered about three hundred years before the conquest of Palestine.

* * * * *



A BEWAILMENT FROM BATH;

OR, POOR OLD MAIDS.

Mr Editor!—You have a great name with our sex! CHRISTOPHER NORTH is, in our flowing cups—of Bohea—"freshly remembered." To you, therefore, as to the Sir Philip Sidney of modern Arcadia, do I address the voice of my bewailment. Not from any miserable coveting after the publicities of printing. All I implore of you is, a punch of your crutch into the very heart of a matter involving the best interests of my sex!

You, dear Mr Editor, who have your eyes garnished with Solomon's spectacles about you, cannot but have perceived on the parlour-tables and book-shelves of your fair friends—by whose firesides you are courted even as the good knight, and the Spectator, by the Lady Lizards of the days of Anne—a sudden inundation of tabby-bound volumes, addressed, in supergilt letters, to the "Wives of England"—the "Daughters of England"—the "Grandmothers of England." A few, arrayed in modest calf or embossed linen, address themselves to the sober latitudes of the manse or parsonage-house. Some treat, without permission, of "Woman's Mission"—some, in defiance of custom, of her "Duties." From exuberant 4to, down to the fid-fad concentration of 12mo—from crown demy to diamond editions—no end to these chartered documentations of the sex! The women of this favoured kingdom of Queen Victoria, appear to have been unexpectedly weighed in the balance, and found wanting in morals and manners; or why this sudden emission of codes of morality?

No one denies, indeed, that woman has, of late, ris' wonderfully in the market; or that the weaker sex is coming it amazingly strong. The sceptres of three of the first kingdoms in Europe are swayed by female hands. The first writer of young France is a woman. The first astronomer of young England, idem. Mrs Trollope played the Chesterfield and the deuce with the Yankees. Miss Martineau turned the head of the mighty Brougham. Mademoiselle d'Angeville ascended Mont Blanc, and Mademoiselle Rachel has replaced Corneille and Racine on their crumbling pedestals. I might waste hours of your precious time, sir, in perusing a list of the eminent women now competing with the rougher sex for the laurels of renown. But you know it all better than I can tell you. You have done honour due, in your time, to Joanna Baillie and Mrs Jamieson, to Caroline Southey and Miss Ferrier. You praised Mrs Butler when she deserved it; and probably esteem Mary Howitt, and Mary Mitford, and all the other Maries, at their just value—to say nothing of the Maria of Edgworthstown, so fairly worth them all. I make no doubt that you were even one of the first to do homage to the Swedish Richardson, Frederika Bremer; though, having sown your wild oats, you keep your own counsel anent novel reading.