If tempted by int'reft hie ventures to fhun
The gentle affections his tenderness won,
With another thro' paffion's wild mazes to rove
Where's then the delight of the Virgin's First Love?

See her eye, when the tale of his treach'ry she hears,
Now beaming with fcorn, and now glift'ning with
tears;

How great is the anguish she's fated to prove!
Farewell the delight of the Virgin's First Love.

No more fweet emotion fhall glow on her cheek,
But palenefs her bofoin's keen agony speak,
And dimm'd by affliction that
eye fhall now prove,
Which spoke the mild warmth of the Virgin's First
Love.

FA

By W. HAMILTOn Reid.

AR on the boundless void, the wat`ry vaft,
Where fkies converging human vifion shrouds;
Where full-ftretch'd fail, or high-erected maft,
Seems flowly breaking from the parting clouds.

High from fome gallant veffel's trophied prow,
Let me enraptur'd feast my grateful eye,
When fearce a zephyr curls the flood below,
And ftorms falt bound in dreary caverns lie.

Whilst full-orb' Cynthia, with enamour'd rays,
O'er all the glaffy furface streams afar,
Whofe kindred bofom previous to the blaze,
Reflects a Heav'n and every glowing itar.

Not lefs delighted near the fteepy fhore,

Her playful beams on caftled cliff's I view,
And broken rocks the fea-beach bending o'er,
Whofe fhelving fands their wave-dafh'd fragments
ftrew.

Invites to the sports of the chace,
How ruddy, how bright, and how chearful the morn,
How healthy and blooming each face.
To the grove with Diana, I'll haften away,

Nor lofe the delights of the morn,

The hounds are all out, hark, hark forward, away,
While echo replies to the horn.

Gay health ftill attends thro' the sports of the field,
O'er mountain and valley we go;

for I think the fubject is worthy of attention:

That an imitation of the drefs and manners of people of fafhion,, is in fome degree proper or neceffary, I am not disposed to deny, but mere imitation is dangerous, unlefs the judgment be employed to felect the proper from the improper, the becoining from the unbecoming, and the decent from the indecent.- Perfons of rank are undoubtedly thofe to whom we are to look up as the leaders of fashion, and in an age of modern refinement, an attention to fashion will be found to carry a degree of neceffity with it, which a man or woman of sense will not think it worth while to difpute, while they follow the fashions in nothing that is improper.

The drefs of the ladies is perpetually The joy of the chace, health and pleasure can yield, changing. If a lady were to drefs herNo wishes beyond it we know. felf this day in the height of the fashion, and fall afleep for a month or two, fhe would awake and difcover herfelf to be a very aukward creature-The mode of caps, hats, gown-ileeves, the materials of every part in their drefs, &c. &c. are undergoing a perpetual change, which, at leaft, has one good effect-it gives employment to many who otherwife would have none.

To the grove, &c.
Our innocent paftime each virgin may share,
And the cenfure of envy defy,
While Cupid foon follow'd by grief and despair,
The bleffing of youth wou'd deftroy.
To the grove, &c.

MY HEAVY HEART,

A favourite Scotch Song.
Sung by Miss BERTLES, at VAUXHALL.
Composed by Mr. Hook.

BLOW

LOW on ye winds, defcend foft rain,
To foothe my tender grief,
Your folemn mufic lulls my pain,

And yields a fhort relief.

O my heart, my heavy, heavy heart,
Swells as 'twould burit in twain;
No tongue can e'er defcribe the finart,

Nor I conceal its pain.

The fun, which makes all nature gay,
Torments my weary eyes,
And in dark fhades I pats the day,
Where echo fleeping lies.

O my heart, &c.

The strongest paffions of the mind,
The greatest blifs we know,
Arifes from fuccefsful love,

If not, the greatest woe.

But to the point-there is a fafhion lately much prevailing, and borrowed I believe from the French ladies, which I am forry to find is gaining ground among our Englith beauties-which is the fashion of naked bofoms-The very mention of these two words, muit, I am fure, appear indelicate, but is not the fault itself more fo? -The gauze, or whatever ought to cover the breait, is fo difpofed to the right and left, that every thing is feen for nothing. A lady who would blufh if accidentally a very finall portion of her breast was to be difcovered in fuckling her child, appears in public with her bofom laid open for the infpection of every perfon who chooses to feaft his eyes with thofe beauties which ought to be facred!-Perhaps you will fay I am too fevere, and that you doubt my word-but fatisfy yourfelf-go into every public or private affembly, and you may foon be aflured of the truth of what I fay..

Perhaps it may be alledged that many of the ladies do this merely from fashion-and that there is no harm in it-This

O my heart, &c. may be true in part-They think there is no harm, and I will be fo bold as to fay that their thoughts are as pure and unful lied as before-They may imagine that what every body does cannot be wrong;

To the Editor of the COUNTY MAGAZINE. but they are not aware of the confequence

SIR,

which may arife. Men are but menfrail flesh and blood, and flesh and blood

PLEASE to communicate the follow- will rebel at times, particularly where ing fentiments to the readers of your ftrong temptations are thrown in the way. very useful and entertaining Mifcellany,For my own part, I am no prudith,

Nnz

Extract from Strictures on FEMALE EDU-
CATION; chiefly as it relates to the Culture
of the Heart. In Four Ejays. By a
Clergyman of the Church of England.

Small 8vo.

HIS ingenious treatife confifts of four ellays. The firft contains a flight furvey of the treatment of women in the different ages and nations of the world; and an investigation of the caufes which have contributed to the obvious and hameful negligence in their education. In the fecond, the author makes obfervations on the manner in which the treatment of this fex will be influenced by, and will reciprocally influence, the tafte, the fentiments, the habits and purfuits, the manners, the morals, the public and private happiness, of a people. The third contains a difquifition concerning the nature, quality, and extent, of female talents, and the comparative difference of understanding in the fexes. In the fourth we have reflections on the dangers and infufficiency of boarding-fchools, confidered as a mode of female education.

of thinking; to all their defigns, and all But let not fancy dream over all the bliss their undertakings; to all their actions of fuch a scene, to be awakened only in and intercourfe with the world. They difappointment. The prefent education get modes of levity, effeminacy, and dif- of women blafts this profpect, and deftroys ipation, which are equally incompatible fuch an hope. Senfible men, if they be with the acquirement of fcience, or the determined to form this connection, muft laborious efforts of virtue. Their pur- do it often to a difadvantage; they muft, fuits of every kind will be marked with in general, marry females merely. They this frivolity. The youth, which fhould must not always expect in them affociates be the glory of a nation, will become its or friends. The union of knowledge and reproach. Inftead of climbing, with talents with frivoloufnefs and infipidity canarduous labour, the facred hill of virtue not be agreeable. What is not agreeable or of learning, they will endeavour to will not be lafting. The heart can feel transform and remodify their nature, and no durable attachment where it knows no take up with fuch imperfect fragments of eftcem. Without the fecret concurrence both as they are able to find in the bofom of the heart, there cannot be enjoyment. of pleafure, or the inglorious vale of indul- Marriage is nothing more than a bare, cegence. Such a revolution this age has remonious union of hands. This foeming experienced. This expedient has been ri- paradife of fweets will roughen, as we apdiculously attempted. Philofophy has proach it, into a wilderness of thorns. The refigned its ufual fternnefs, and dropped fenfes are foon palled. Difguft fucceeds to its abitracted language, to pleafe the la- fatiety; quarrels to difguft; where the foul dies. Authors, in general, affect to lie has no freth graces to expand, and there reupon the toilet. They fkim the furface, main no new and unexplored treafures in and publifh the beauties of fine writers. the understanding. Morality affumes the meretricious drefs of novels to captivate the rake. We have very pretty preachers; we have amiable feAs a fpecimen of this performance we nators; we have very polite officers; and fhall extract a paffage from the third ef- few great men. Confequences fo maligfay. The author having mentioned the nant, and fo comprehenfive in their efinfignificant and frivolous intercourfe fects, deferve confideration. A difeafe, which takes place between the fexes, interwoven with the vitals of the conftiwhofe ufual converfation turns on the lit-tution, fhould not be neglected. tle a.. cdotes of the day, the laft intrigue or amour which fame has published, or fome confidential friend whifpered; the brilliance of a birth-night, or the adventures of a ball; proceeds in the following animated and fenfible manner.

I have not enumerated half the evils of this fashion. If it prevents not many marriages, it robs thofe which do exift of all their fweetnefs, and all their joys.

Though this fubject is of fo immenfe a magnitude, and fo intimately connected with the first and deareft interefts of fociety, as to deferve the attention of any monarch or legiflator in the world; yet, in a free and opulent country like our own, where edufocation cannot be made a public concern, and where any particular edicts of a prince would be efteemed a grofs infringement on the liberty of the subject, it is only in the power of parents or guardians to remove or palliate fo malignant an evil. If there be a fpecific, it is a better and a more rational It is in retirement that fenfible minds education of women; and if that education look for real, heart-felt fatisfaction. It is is to be better and more rational, it must in woman, as the friend and companion of not be left to a vain, a fuperficial, or merthat retirement, that felfifh is exalted into cenary governefs, but planned by the wif focial enjoyment; and that the fweets of dom, and executed by the zeal and affecfriendship, and the luxury of confidence, tion of thofe mothers, who, under Provileave us nothing to defire but their ftabi-dence, have given them existence. lity and their duration. How does the Nor let the fex fuppofe me their accufer moft diftant profpect of fuch a state, amidst or their foe. If I have not wholly mistaken the toils of labour, the wrinkles of care, the method, I mean to be their advocate and the agonies of difappointment, charm and friend. I have left them the feeds of the moft elevated and penetrating mind! every thing that pleases and captivates in How often has it adminiftered courage to woman. Their brows were not intended the hero, eloquence to the fenator; and to be ploughed with wrinkles, nor their inhow equally do the monarch and the pea-nocent gaiety damped by abftraction. They fant court it as a relaxation from their were perpetually to pleafe, and perpetualtoils! The tender interview of Hector ly to enliven. If we were to plan the cdiwith Andromache, immortalized by Ho-fice, they were to furnish the embellifhmer, and the modeft, timid fhrinking of Aftyanax from his helmet, are pleafures which the pureft virtue may acknowledge for her own; and which the greateft fchoNor is the lofs of time the only difad-lars, generals, or politicians, need not vantage arifing from this fyftem. The propenfities it gives are unfavourable to every great and magnanimous exertion.

"In this career of gallantry much time must be spent, and in that precious and important feafon of life when the foundations of every thing great fhould be laid, when activity fhould be roufed, when talents fhould be ripened, and when the thirft of glory fhould be felt as the grand and ftimulating movement of the foul; with men of finifhed gaiety, fcarcely is a little life fufficient for the purpose. Attention and attachment must be varied and multiplied in an endlefs fucceffion. This fair one must be forfaken, and another must be addreffed. It were horrid to be conftant where variety is the fashion; where fashion only gives the laurel of diftinction, and adjudges it to fit moft gracefully upon the brows of thofe who can make their ravages amongst the fex diffufive as their connections.

Young men become infenfibly affimulated to the frivoloufnefs they addrefs and affect to admire; and that frivoloufnefs extends itself to all their habits and modes

blufh to accept as a recompence for their
fatigues! How pleafing to refign the
fceptre and the laurel for the foftneffes of
fuch an intimacy, the careffes of fuch a
friend; and to forget, in the affection of a
virtuous woman, tumults, conflicts, dif-
appointment, and the world!

ments. If we were to lay out and cultivate the garden, they were beautifully to fringe its borders with flowers, and fill it with perfume. If we were deftined to fuperintend the management of kingdoms, they were to be the fairest ornaments of thole kingdoms, the embellifhers of fociety, and the fweetners of life.

If we confult fcripture, we fhall discover that fuch was the original intention of Heaven in the formation of the fexes. The fentence of fubordination obviously implies,

country and its inhabitants. All the cities,
villages, roads, and canals, are fo fimilar,
that they appear copies of the felf fame in-
dividual picture. The country indeed is
only made to take a walk through; and,
without business, no man of tafte will stay
in it long. With refpect to real value alfo,
it is only a frogged out beggar parading
about in a rich gown which he has ftolen.
The Palatinate, which is not more than one
fifth of Holland, is of infinitely more natu-
ral value.

that man fhould have the pre-eminence on, habitants, which revolts at every idea of fubjects that require extenfive knowledge, facrifice to the public good, compels the courage, ftrength, activity, talents, or labomagiftrate to lay thefe heavy imports upon rious application. Women were not the firft neceffaries of life. It is thefe formed for political eminence, or literary heavy charges, as well as the aftonishing. refinement. The foftnefs of their nature, tranquillity of the inhabitants, which, are the delicacy of their frame, the timidity of the caufes of the miferable living of this their difpofition, and the modefty of their country. I will only give you one fpecifex, abfolutely difqualify them for fuch men of their police, which is extraordinadifficulties and exertions. Their deftiny of ry enough. A ftranger, who knows nobearing and nurfing children; the neceffity thing of the laws and cuftoms of the of fuperintending domeftic concerns, and country, happens to fend his fervant to a the peculiar difeafes to which they are The inhabitants likewise, taken in gene- wine-merchant to buy a bottle of wine; liable, leave them little time for fuch public ral, are only well dreffed beggars; their the merchant gives it the man, without undertakings; whilft the humble offices in riches do not belong to them, for they en- telling him a word of his danger; the ferwhich they are engaged confer a bleffing joy them not; they are only the guardians vant carries the bottle home open in his and a benefit upon fociety that are infinite- of their money. When you are invited to hand; he is met by a conftable, and afked ly beyond the coldnefs of knowledge, and dinner by a man of middling rank, the mag-where he bought it, which the other tells the apathy of fpeculation. The wife, the nificence of the dishes, the cleanliness of the without difficulty; but no fooner has he mother, and the economift of a family room you dine in, and the expenfivenefs of done fo than he is arrefted, and, in due would unfortunately be loft in the literary the furniture, make you expect a princely procefs of time, tried, and banished the pedant; the order of nature would be to-meal; but when the dishes are fet on, you country. Thus the poor fervant alone tally reverfed, and the population of the find no more nor lefs, than you would have fuffers; and neither the mafter who fent globe prepofteroufly facrificed to the cold, at the table of a good Weftphalia peafant. him, nor the merchant who fold the wine forbidding pride of a ftudious virginity. All the merchants pafs the whole week in in retail, which, according to law, ought The woman of the cloifter would want the their counting houfes, where they gorge only to have been done by those who keep graces of a citizen of the world. In that themselves with tea. They are fo intent taverns, are at all punished. ardour of understanding, which roufes upon their bufinefs, and fo entirely taken emulation, fhe would lofe that foothing up with their fpeculations, that you may manner which conciliates and endears. pufh their guts out almoft without dif The world would be deprived of its faireft turbing them. On Saturdays they go to ornaments, life of its higheft zeft, and man their expenfive gardens, where they spend of that gentle bofom, on which he can re- the whole of the Sunday, and enjoy cline amidst the toils of labour, and the ago- themfelves juft as they do in their countnies of difappointment. ing houfes. I had occafion to vifit one of them in his garden: he was taken up all the afternoon, in gathering fallad for his fupper. Another fhut himfelf up, and fpent the whole Sunday in killing flies in his fummer houfe. Thefe, and finoaking tobacco, are their common amufements in their hours of recreation. When they are in company, they fit as if they were pinned to their chairs, gape at each other, and every quarter of an hour converfe on the news of the day, which, of all the news published in Europe, is the moft piteous. This is the quinteffence of political nonfenfe; and their ecclefiafticks, who, to the fhame of the reformation, are greater monks than the German capuchins, will give you the quinteffence of the fpiritual. Were it not for the tranPICTURE of the MANNERS of the gers, efpecially the officers, and fome of

So far as the qualities of the heart are concerned (and this has fometimes formed a part of the queftion), I think the fexes will not bear a comparifon. Women, in this refpect, have every claim to a marked fuperiority. If their retired, domeftic life did not of itfelf lead to more innocence and contemplation, their natural difpofitions are certainly more favourable to piety and virtue. Their ftrong fenfe of weakness prompts them to fupplicate the protection and affiftance of a fuperior, invifible power, whilst their exquifite fenfibility powerfully difpofes them for all the energy and ardours

of devotion."

I

DUTCH.

From the Baron Piefbeck's Travels, lately publifhea.]

mag

SHALL fay nothing to you of the nificence, fymmetry, and cleanliness of the Dutch cities, nor of the numerous and expenfive canals, the fides of which are for the most part planted with fine rows of trees, nor of the numerous gardens. There are defcriptious of all thefe things in abundance. This magnificence, however, and regularity is tire fome in the end. I at least cannot stand the tedious uniformity of this

the nobility, who have been polifhed by
rable fociety to be met with throughout
their voyages, there would not be a tole-

all Holland.

Their government and police is as extraordinary as their country, and every thing bears a tint of the inconverfible melancholy, and niggardly humour of the natives. It is received as a common opinion here, that no difh of fish, which you know is the most ordinary produce of the country, is brought to table, which has not been paid for once to the feller, and fix times to the ftate. The fpirit of the in

COMMERCIAL ADVANTAGES OF

T

FRANCE..

HOSE advocates for the French treaty, who seem to be under no apprehenfion that the fuperior advantages which France enjoys will eventually be deftructive of our trade, and confequently. of our national greatnefs, would do well to attend to the fentiments of that eminent writer, Monf. Deflandes. In his Treatife on the French Marine, drawn up by theorder of, and addreffed to, Count Maurepas, Secretary of State, and of the marine of France, he fays:-As to the advantages which regard the marine, and which France in her fituation may find in her own proper bofom, they may be reduced: to four; of which the first, without contradiction, is her fituation; the most commodious and the moft advantageous that can be in the world, as well for attacking. as defending, and far difturbing the commerce of others, as for cultivating her own; fending to all places, and receiving trading veffels from all parts of the earth. Hence head was always full of great projects; it was faid to the late Czar Peter I. whofe and to the king of Sweden, Charles XII. fo unfortunately affaffinated before Frederikfhal, That if any kingdom could afpire to be mistress of all her neighbours, it must be. FRANCE. In effect, the is placed in the middle of Europe; nothing can impede, nothing can prove an obftacle to her; the commands on the one fide over the ocean, and it feems, by the extent of her coafts, by their turnings and windings, that the feas of Spain, Germany, and Flanders