Of the hardships and courage of the soldiers of the revolution, of whom

Not one betray'd his suffering Country's cause,
Not one deserted to the conq'ring band,
Or sold his comrades, or his native land:
Still to their glorious leader bravely true,
The war's vicissitudes they struggled through,
Sav'd this good land, and when the tug was o'er,
Begg'd their way home, at every scoundrel's door."

Then follows an eloquent eulogium on the spotless character of him who surpassed all Greek all Roman fame.' The canto ends with a description and vindication of the life of the frontier settlers, and here we lose sight of Basil till the conclusion of the poem. In the fourth canto the author has introduced the celebrated Prophet, by whose intrigues the war of 1812 was stirred up among the Indians. His character is drawn in a bold and masterly style, and his harangues and the war feasts of the savages communicate great interest to this part of the poem. The beginning of the fifth canto describes the preparations on both sides for hostilities, between the English and their Indian allies on one part, and the western republicans on the other. This unholy alliance between the christian and the savage, is adverted to with becoming censure and indignation; the rest of the canto is occupied with a dialogue between the Prophet and an aged pilgrim, in which the author has evinced great power and pathos. The defeat of the allied forces, the restoration of security to the American frontier, and the final happiness and prosperity of the west, are the themes of the last book. We have already made such copious selections, that we have but little room left for passages from this, which upon the whole we are inclined to think is the most striking part of the poem. The outrages committed by the British and their allies during the war of 1812, and the disinclination to defence manifested in one part of the union, call forth from the author the following animated and spirited lines:

'Could men, whose eyes first saw the blessed day,
In this good land, at home like women stay,
Plead conscience to escape the coming fight,
And skulk behind some vile pretence of right?

There have been such-oblivion shield their name,
Better forgot, their story and their shame.
Who would not battle bravely, heart and hand,
In any cause for this dear buxom land;
O, never may the heartless recreant know
The joys from conscious rectitude that flow;
Nor ever, for one fleeting moment, prove
Man's dear respect, or woman's dearer love;
Ne'er may he hold high converse with the brave,
But live with slaves, and be himself a slave;
Ne'er may he know the sober waking bliss,
Of living in a freeman's home like this,

The poor man's long-sought, new-found, promis'd land
Where gen'rous Plenty, with a lavish hand,
Pays honest Labour from her boundless store,
And each day makes him richer than before.
Ne'er may the dastard know such biding place,
Nor such a country stain with deep disgrace;
But pine on abject Afric's scorching sand,
Or banish'd to old Europe's dotard land,
Grovel beneath some tottering tyrant's throne,
Nor dare to call his worthless soul his own.'

After some striking passages on the alliance between danger and glory, we meet with a strong and earnest and feeling eulogium on the private soldiery, the peasantry who fight their country's battles: 'Not in the hope of glory or of gold,

Not in the hope their story will be told
In lofty rhyme, or high historic page,
To challenge wonder in some distant age.'

And then a lofty and contemptuous vindication of the capacity and power of these for self-government. But for this and many other beautiful passages we have no room. We must conclude our extracts with a description of the march of the militia against the British and Indians.

The nodding plume that shades the brow of war,
And hides the deep trench of the warrior's scar,
The gilded gorget, sparkling in the sun,
The beamy splendours of the vet'ran's gun,
The shoulder'd epaulette, the prancing steed,
The flashing sword, that does the bloody deed,
And all the fun'ral pomp of human strife,
That makes the very coward scorn his life,
And the seam'd visage of rough War appear
A glorious angel-all was absent here;
'Twas the scarr'd front of bloody baleful strife,
In all the naked lineaments of life.

No rattling drum its far-heard music made,
No piping fife, the noiseless march betray'd;

Each step they take, they pause with watchful care,
The forest warriors swift and wily are,

They come like foxes, like gaunt tigers fight,
And when they flee outstrip the pigeon's flight;
Silence and Care that never shuts his eyes,

Alone can guard against their quick surprise.

What we have already said is sufficient to show the estimation in which we hold this admirable performance. We consider it as one of the greatest accessions our poetry has received, whether we regard the pure taste, the sound political principles, or the descriptive talents of its author, and we hope that the success with which he has met in this work, will encourage him to other and higher exertions. To be the popular poet of a nation like this, is no mean distinction, and to direct the national taste to a source at

which patriotism and pure principles may be awakened, is an object worthy the labours of any man.

Many inaccuracies of style may be observed in the poem, which are evidently the result of haste, and a want of practice in versifying. There is a blot, however, of a more serious nature, and which we did not expect to meet with in one who advocates with so much zeal and eloquence the common cause of all. We allude to the lines in p. 39, 40, on the subject of the Germans of Pennsylvania. The reproach of selfishness and stupidity, here urged against them, has been made in other quarters, and gained so very general an assent, that we must be allowed the liberty of saying a few words in defence of so numerous a portion of our fellow citizens of Pennsylvania. The German population of this state then, we would observe, is almost entirely agricultural. The descendents of the other nations of Europe are more gregarious in their disposition, or less disposed to arrive at the means of subsistence by the most honest and independent, though perhaps the most laborious mode of life. Comparatively speaking, few Germans are to be found in our great cities, or even in the interior villages. We ask, then, in what respect the Germans differ from other agriculturists, that is not to the advantage of the former. They are admitted to be an industrious, active, steady and independent race, such in short as form the most solid foundation of the wealth and security of a state. But they are accused of intellectual dulness. If by this it is meant that the German farmers of Pennsylvania are inferior in genius and erudition to the same number of men taken from our large cities, no one will be disposed to question the truth of the position. But we doubt very much whether they would suffer in comparison with any other portion of the country population of the United States. The pursuits of agriculture have, as is well known, a tendency rather adverse to the cultivation of the mind, though we frequently find individuals breaking forth from this laborious employment. Among the Germans, men of genius and enterprise are as frequent as among any others. To say nothing of such men as Rittenhouse, and other learned mathematicians, some of the most ingenious persons in the mechanical arts, some of the best classical scholars, and some of the most able teachers of the physical sciences, have sprung from the German population of Pennsylvania, and we may safely challenge any other body of men, of like numbers and pursuits, to produce a greater proportion of honest and enlightened politicians. On the score of selfishness too, which is another frequent charge against the Germans, we believe them to be no less unjustly censured. They are occupied, it seems, mainly in the pursuit of wealth. Which of us in this country is not? The rich German farmer, it is true, seldom indulges in expensive luxuries, or disburses his hard earned gains in the acquisition of refinement, but he spares no money in the education of his children, and is as generous to others as persons in his class of life usually are. The love of glory or distinction

may not be the actuating principle of the German farm-house, but the domestic virtues, and the kindly feelings of the heart, are more frequently found in unison with the simple manners of its inhabitants. Nor are they deficient in patriotism, a virtue on which no one is more ready to bestow praise than the author of the Backwoodsman. By patriotism we do not mean the hollow and noisy professions of political wranglers, but a sincere and earnest devotion to the cause of the republic. When in the autumn of 1814 the city of Philadelphia was threatened with invasion, and a general gloom pervaded the country, hundreds of Germans came forth voluntarily to its defence from their remote and secluded vallies, where they might have remained in perfect security. Here, in many instances, deficient of necessary raiment, they encountered, without a murmur, the fatigues and perils of camp duty, and the inclemency of the season. Of the thousands who were assembled at that season, we have reason to know, that there were no more willing and zealous soldiers, none more patient of toil, or more faithful to the cause than the German volunteers. Most of them were ignorant of the language, and utterly unacquainted with military discipline, but in quickness of apprehension and submission to military authority, they had no superiors. The scanty pittance allotted by the government for their pay, could have been no recompence to them for their services, and the cause in which they were engaged was that of a distant portion of their fellow citizens, and in no wise affected their pecuniary interests. We know of no purer patriotism than this. Comparisons between particular portions of our population are invidious, but if they must be drawn, we can only say, that we infinitely prefer the patriotism of the Germans of Pennsylvania, with all their imputed dulness, to that characteristic acuteness which can find constitutional objections to the defence of their country, at a period of uncommon difficulty

and distress.

ART. III.-Select, Political, Philosophical, and Miscellaneous Writings of Benjamin Franklin; published from the Originals; and forming volume 3d of the Memoirs of Franklin:-by his grandson, Temple Franklin. 1 vol. quarto. London, 1818. IN the two articles which we devoted to the first and second volumes of these Memoirs, we expressed roundly our dissatisfaction with the management of Mr. Temple Franklin. We might repeat here the upbraidings extorted from us by our unbounded veneration for the philosopher, and by the reflection of what was due to his memory from an editor standing towards him in such binding and solemn relations. The mortification we experienced at receiving so imperfect a Biography, and so awkward a compilation of Letters, revives at the appearance of the third quarto: Our resentment kindles as we read in the preface, that with this volume the editor conceives he has faithfully discharged his trust, as the conservator of Dr. Franklin's literary remains.'

It was only by an elaborate, and skilful edition of all the works of his grandsire, that he could have fulfilled this trust, and answered the just expectation of the world. A selection made even with the nicest care and judgment, would be a very inadequate substitute; but the delinquency is incalculably greater, and unsusceptible of excuse, in the case of one which has no other sign of diligence or concern about it, than the mere distribution of the pieces chosen, under some general heads. Mr. Temple Franklin has attempted nothing more in the way of arrangement; he has supplied no dates nor explanations where these were wanted, in the compositions which he has reprinted-and he has not been at the pains to distinguish for the reader, the portion of the volume previously unpublished. On this point, he confines himself to the intimation conveyed in the following passage of his preface: • Though some of the essays contained under the head of "Philosophical Subjects," have already appeared, by far the greater portion of the contents of this part, (among which are some of the latest and most ingenious of Dr. Franklin's philosophical writings) are now for the first time printed from his own manuscripts.'

There are, however, in the other divisions of the volume, some things entirely new; and we find much interesting matter which is not comprised in the American edition of Franklin's works, in six volumes octavo. We should remark of this edition, by the way, that it is, nevertheless, palmed upon the public as the depository of the whole of the philosopher's writings. We ought, perhaps, to point out some of the shameful inaccuracies and repetitions by which the first and sixth volumes of it, recently published, are marked; but we can be more agreeably employed for ourselves and our readers, in holding communion with the soul of Franklin, than in exposing the demerits of his clumsy editors.

As we glance over the table of contents of this Selection, the first consideration that presents itself is the astonishing versatility of powers which their variety implies in the author. We are reminded at once of the language of the 16th Number of the Edinburgh Review, which contains so appropriate and beautiful an oblation to his genius. There are not many among the thorough-bred scholars and philosophers of Europe, who can lay claim to distinction in more than one or two departments of science or literature. The uneducated tradesman of America, has left writings that call for attention, in natural philosophy-in politics-in political economy-and in general literature and morality.'-The contrast has become stronger, and the enumeration of topics might be enlarged since the publication of the correspondence of the American tradesman,' and of the several physical essays and humorous compositions which are brought to light in the present volume.

Mr. Temple Franklin has excluded from it the more extended tracts of his grandsire, such as the Historical Review, and the admirable Canada Pamphlet, as well as most of the papers on electricity, with which editions and translations, without number, had

1