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EUROPEAN MAGAZINE

The Seat of His Grace the Duke of Norfolk. Engravd by S.Ramle from an Original Drawing by LNixon Esq

Published by J. Sewell, Cornhill, D23602.

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Having paffed through a country finely diverfified with the garb of fylvan variety, I arrived at the diftance of the place of my fojournment, which is twelve miles, and found myself standing on the laft ground of the county of Denbigh, which is here difunited by the wide flowings of the river Conway from the shores of Carnarvonshire; on whofe fide, fronting the water's edge, where I ftood, rofe its noble cale, with its bold turrets, while its walls extended like an amphitheatre, embracing in its ancient arms the whole of the town of Conway, which thereby acquired a peculiarly compact and romantic appearance, although bending beneath the weight of many centuries, and expofed to the diffolving touch of the flow wasting elements, as well as worn by the cankering tooth of fecret gnawing time. This edifice till maintained an air of fupreme grandeur, and has experienced a premature downfall, chiefly by the cowardly affails it has met with from the rude hand of civil violence, as the huge undecayed fragments torn from its bafe plainly exhibit, where the ground, on which thefe cumbrous heaps repofe, appears like a fecond Stonehenge laden with " Weights immovable by man." It is built upon a rocky foundation, clofe to the water's brink, whofe furface appears darkened by the overhanging shade of its naked towers, which caufe the traveller to look up, as he furveys the quivering of their watery images in the waves below, fearful left the pile itfelf is fliding from its wearied bale, and on the point of overwhelming him beneath its falling ruins.

I experienced a great treat, in the landscape of full-blown fummer that presented itfelf before me, where every charm that belongs to paftoral perfection fhewed themfelves in endless variety throughout this exuberant vale. Nature here has felected a choice pot to difplay her favourite embellishments; and man, I perceived, had fully improved them by the best graces of cultivation. On every fide around, fave where the broad green bofom of the Irish Ocean fhowed itfelf to the right, and travelled onwards, with its waves, till they were loft in the blue haze of diftance: on every fide elfe was difplayed every combination of richnefs and elegance to be found in the rural and picturelque. The three fruitful daughters of the Earth, Ceres, Flora, and Pomona, were feen hand in hand throughout this narrow but extenfive fertile tract, distributing their various gifts. Corn-fields, orchards in full bloom, and meadows variegated, like the rainbow, with flowers of every hue, filled my fenfes with ideas of adoration to that Supreme Being who fhowers down profufion for the use and pleasure. of man; and I could not help exclaiming, in the language of the fublime Milton, Thefe are thy glorious works, Parent of Good,

This univerial frame, thus wondrous fair.

The fcenery, if no where partaking of thofe mafculine features of grandeur and confufion which the neighbouring regions of the English Alpine, Snowden, exhibit, and which the genius of a Baffans or Salvator Rofa would delight to pourtray, was in all parts highly finished, and imoothed down by the polifh of cultivation; and when the letting fun began to light up the landscape with his evening fmile, a tint of rich mellownefs threw a foft luftre, harmonifing all around with the livelinefs of light finking gradually into the fobernefs of fhade, which a Gainsborough or a Willon, a Poutin or a Claude, might have delighted to have transfufed into their pieces, and which was capable of producing an equal masterpiece of art to any of thole that have ever been delineated by either of their glowing pencils.

On being wafted across the Ferry, the locality of the fcene brought to my mind thole two lines which sprung from the Theban lyre of Gray,

On a rock, whose haughty brow
Frowns o'er old Conway's foaming flood.

VOL. XLII. Nov. 1892.

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ESSAYS AFTER THE MANNER OF GOLDSMITH.

ESSAY XXI.

"Who can but love the fex? whoever hates them is a ftranger to Virtue, Grace, and AGRIPPA.

Humanity."

IET it not be imagined, because the Author of thefe Effays has chiefly devoted the labours of his pen to men and morals, that the fair-fex have not been at times the objects of his contemplations; he has the utmoft refpect and regard for them; and is of opinion, that their delicate manners and conversation constitute what may be properly called les delices of fociety. He frankly avows, that he, as well as others, has often been bewitched with their foft allurements and attractions, and that a filk stocking, or a white petticoat, have occafioned him, at times, much ferious difquiet; a pair of blue eyes have frequently produced a palpitation of the heart; and the wifeft refolutions have been melted away on the glimpse of a bofom of fnow. He corfelles, however, that he has never been much in danger from the prefent fashion of female drefs, refembling the naked draperies of the Roman women; he would even prefer the Invisible Girl to thofe Godivas who would fcarcely, from their being grown fo common, attract the notice of a Peeping Tom from Coventry: indeed it is probable, that if that curious character were in being, he would not be prevailed upon to ftir from his thopboard for the fight. After all, drett or undreft, women are the lovely objects of our regard and attention.

There is not a more unnatural cha-, racter than a Myfogynist, or womanhater.

Plutarch wrote a large volume De Virtutibus Mulierum.

Sweet fociety of woman, how much do we owe of happiness to thy foft influence? How much are our cares abated, and our anxieties hushed to reft, by the fide of a lovely female, inquiring into our folicitudes, and

with smiles and perfuafive confolation alleviating misfortune and removing difficulties; a wife, a sister, a friend. Let the Lords of the creation fay what they will, they would be poor creatures without the Ladies of the creation, after all.

The fociety of woman ferves admirably to foften the strong features of our national character, and to fit as for the tender offices and duties of humanity.

It becomes us, then, to confider them with affection and esteem, and. on all occafions to be ready to protect them from the infults and power of man, and the confequences of his artifices; and, whenever we are truck with the perfonal charms of a handfome woman, to remember, that the gratification of a fenfual paflion will be the total ruin of the object that we admire.

There is not a more beautiful fight than a young and accomplished maiden, grown to the full poffeffion of the charms of nature, and with the excellencies of the mind, "like the po-. lifhed corners of the temple;" her morals pure, and her perfon chafte; modeit, yet fenfible and witty; governed, in all her actions, by principles engraven fo ftrongly on her mind, as not in the fmallest instance to allow her to fwerve from the precepts of virtue; every stage of her life is gradual improvement. She is a wife, and adorns, with becoming dignity, the table of her husband, fmiling cheerfully on his guests, and inviting them to the pleafures of rational converfation. By her economy the manages his domeftic affairs, the moft faithful fteward of his houfehold. The next stage is yet more gratifying; it is the mother; fresh ftreams of love and tenderness flow with the milk from

her

I could not obferve any reality of likeness to the above images, which our British Pindar has here drawn; the courfe of the river, as it empties itfelf into the Irish Channel, being remarkably fmooth and regular, its mirror furface not being interrupted by any of thote chaims or rocks fuch as break its uneven progrefs among t the dreary dells and hollow declivities of Snowden,

Hammersmith, 8th November 1892.

T. E. S

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Her breaft, and the is more amiable than ever; her infants grow up to be men and women; and in the next ftage, Time marks her features with his iron hand, yet they become not de. formed; mildness and ferenity give their accustomed graces, and the is lovely even in age. She dies tranquil, at peace with the world, and leaves to her children the richest legacy the could bestow, a good example.

Such an example, one would think, would prefent the beauties and advantages of virtue in fuch enchanting colours as at all times to settle and determine the wanderings of the female heart in her favour; for the difference of the fituation of the victim to an unfortunate attachment is a melancholy reverse that needs no com

ment.

Above all other mifchiefs, that of conjugal infidelity ranks the firft: the defire that permits the crime of adultery is deftructive of its object; and the accomplishment of the wifh is the beginning of defpair. By adultery, the husband is bereft of his companion, the wife of her prerogatives, of her honour, and of her children; the children of their mother, the feducer of his friend; all the ties of relationship are fnapt afunder, and the interefts of the parties broken up. Adultery is an irreparable mifchief, which no time can cure, no expedient remove; not the lalt event of Providence, that reconciles even enemies, the Grave, has power to close upon this fcene of ruin, the confequences of which remain to the third and fourth generation.

Would to Heaven that man, in his career of pleasure and diffipation, would for an inftant imagine the fatal confequences of fashionable vice! then would the wife of his friend become his after, and the innocent girl that he would have betrayed, his wife.

It is poffible to be a man of gal lantry, without purchafing the remorfe or practising the arts of feduction, as my honest friend Bob Ogle proved in a life spent in the fervice of the Fair.

Bob Ogle was a very good natured, high-fpirited fellow, of an eafy deportment, good addrefs, and a great deal of small talk; he had a handsome perfon, and was, in fhort, the very man for the Ladies. But though woman, lovely woman, was his conftant theme, and the object of his adorations, yet Bob loved them with an honeft intention,

and confidered them as the delight of fociety and the charm of converíation. Poor Bob, in the courfe of his love adventures, ever viewed feduction with horror, and confidered adultery as a cruel interruption of the peace of a whole family, that could never be put to rights : he poffeffed the trueft principles of humanity, and would not have been the inftrument of creating a moment's uneafinefs in the breaft of any fellow creature; yet, to own the truth, Bob liked a pretty girl; he ufed to fay, that a lively wench was the best cordial for low fpirits; that the touch of the hand only of a fine woman was worth a hundred of Perkins's Tractors; and that a falute was the best fpecies of medical electricity; that a great cause of human happiness was the having an agreeable object to look to; and that if it were a fin to love the fex, he was a finner past all redemption.

Innumerable were the love adventures that Bob was engaged in from his youth; gallantry was his favourite paffion. When a fchool-boy, he dif played his particular attention, at the age of thirteen, to a pretty Mifs only twelve, which excited the refentment of a rival about the fame age; who was, however, by dint of Bob's fuperior addrefs, difmiffed for ever.

Bob's admiration of the fex in

creafed with his years, and numerous, indeed, were the young Ladies who were, at times, the objects of his attentions; many were the fcrapes he got into with the papas, and various the whole fome lectures he received from the mammas of the parties: but Bob meant no harm; and if he was very warm, he was alfo very inconftant; fo that his paffion feldom lafted above a week he was often in danger of being involved in a licentious amour; but he had a heart that put him to rights on fuch occafions, and a true Epicurifm of pleasure that abhorred giving or receiving pain.

At the age of twenty-one, however, Bob carried all before him he had

bought himfelf a commiffion in the Regulars, and, by the help of a fine figure and a regimental coat, he became the favourite of many a woman of fashion, and was invited to every party: but Bob's pocket could not keep pace with his gallantry, and card-money was an inconvenient tax upon his income,

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Bob

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