ferent works, comprising a period of fifteen years, the last should be, as it unquestionably is, the best. Several of Bage's novels were translated into German, and published at Frankfort.

Whoever has read Haley's Life of Cowper will not be sorry that an author should speak for himself, instead of his biographer speaking for him: on this principle are given some extracts froin the letters of Robert Bage to his friend William Hutton. Hutton purchased nearly all the paper which Bage made during forty-five years; and, though Bage's letters were letters of business, they were written in a manner peculiarly his own, and friendship was, more or less, interwoven in them; for trade did not, in him, extinguish or contract one finer feeling of the soul. Bage, in his ostensible character of a paper-maker, says,—

"March 28, 1785.

"I swear to thee, I am one of the most cautious men in the world, with regard to the excise; I constantly interpret against myself in doubtful points; and, if I knew a place where I was vulnerable, I would arm it with the armour of Achilles. I have already armed myself all over with the armour of righteousness, but that signifies nothing with our people of excise."

“August 15, 1787.

"Oh how I wish thou would'st bend all thy powers to write a History of Excise-with cases-showing the injustice, the inequality of clauses in acts, and the eternal direction every new one takes towards the oppression of the subject: it might be the most useful book extant. Of whites and blues, blue demy only can come into thy magazine, and that at great risk of contention with the Lords of the Exchequer; for I know not whether I have understood the sense of people who have seldom the good luck to understand themselves. The paper sent is charged at the lowest price at which a sober paper-maker can live and drink small beer."

"December 10, 1788.

Authors, especially when they have acquired a certain degree of reputation, should be candid, and addicted to speak good, as well as evil, of poor dumb things. The rope paper is too thin, I own; but why abuse it from the crown of the head to the sole of the foot? If I have eyes, it has many good qualities, and I hope the good people of Birmingham may find them out. But it is too thin. I am heartily and sincerely concerned for it: but, as I cannot make it thicker, all I can do is to reduce the price. Thou proposest three-pence a ream-I agree to it. If thou really believest six-pence ought to be abated, do it. Combine together the qualities of justice and mercy, and to their united influence I leave thee.” "February 23, 1789.

"The certainty that it cannot be afforded at the stipulated price, makes me run my rope paper too thin. Of this fault, however, I

must mend, and will mend, whether thou canst, or canst not mend my price. I had rather lose some profit than sink a tolerable name into a bad one."

"March 11, 1793.

"I make no bill-of-parcels. I do not see why I should give myself the trouble to make thee bills of parcels, as thou canst make them thyself; and, more especially, when it is probable thou wilt make them more to my liking than the issues of my own pen. If the paper is below the standard so far as to oblige thee to lower the price, I am willing to assist in bearing the loss. If the quantity overburthens thee, take off a shilling a bundle-or take off two; for thy disposition towards me-I see it with pleasure—is kindly."

"June 30, 1795.

"Every thing looks black and malignant upon me.-Men clamouring for wages which I cannot give-women threatening to pull down my mill-rags raised by freight and insurance-excise officers depriving me of paper! Say, if thou canst, whether these gentlemen of the excise office can seize paper after it has left the maker's possession?-after it has been marked?-stamped?— signed with the officer's name?-Excise duty paid?-Do they these things? Am I to hang myself?"

“June 6, 1799.

"Thou canst not think how teasing the excise officers are about colour. They had nearly seized a quantity of common cap paper, because it was whitened by the frost. They have an antipathy to any thing whiter than sackcloth."

Bage actually had paper seized by the excise officers, and the same paper liberated, seized again, and again liberated. If his wisdom and integrity have been manifested in the foregoing extracts, the ignorance and folly of these men, or of their masters, must be obvious.

A few extracts, not so immediately connected with conduct in trade, may not be superfluous.

"I swear by Juno, dear William, that one man cannot be more desirous of dealing with another than I am with thee. The chain that connects us cannot be snapped asunder without giving me pain almost to torture. Thou art not so sure of having found the place where Henry the Seventh was lost as thou mightest have been of finding Elford and a friend."

"I received thy pamphlet,* and am not sure whether I have not read it with more pleasure than any of thy former works. It is lively and the reasoning just. Only remember, it is sometimes against the institutions of juries and county courts that thou hast

• Dissertation on Juries.

directed thy satire, which, I think, ought to be confined to the. abuses of them. But why abusest thou me? Didst thou not know of Mount Henneth, and Barham Downs, before publication? Yea, thou didst; I think thou didst also of The Fair Syrian. Of what, then, dost thou accuse me? Be just. And why dost thou call me an infidel? Do I not believe in every thing thou sayest? And am I not impatient for thy Derby? I am such a scoundrel as to grumble at paying 30 per cent. ad valorem, which I really do, and more, on my boards, as if one could do too much for one's king and country. But I shall be rewarded when thy History of Derby comes forth."

"Miss Hutton was the harbinger of peace and good-will from the reviewers. I knew she had taste and judgment; I knew also that her encomium would go beyond the just and proper bounds; but I also believed she would not condescend to flatter without some foundation."

"Eat my breakfast quietly, thou varlet! So I do when my house does not smoke, or my wife scold, or the newspapers do not tickle me into an irritation, or my men clamour for another increase of wages. But I must get my bread by eating as little of it as possible; for my Lord Pitt will want all I can screw of overplus. No matter, ten years* hence, perhaps, I shall not care a farthing." "Another meeting among my men! Another (the third) raising of wages! What will all this end in? William Pitt seems playing off another of his alarming manoeuvres-Invasion-against the meeting of Parliament to scare us into a quiet parting with our money.

"If thou hast been again into Wales, and hast not expired in ecstasy, I hope to hear from thee soon. In the interim, and always and evermore, I am thine."

"I am afraid thy straggling mode of sending me any body's bills, and every body's bills, will subject me often to returned ones. But I have received good at thy hands, and shall I not receive evil? Every thing in this finest, freest, best of all possible countries, grows worse and worse, and why not thou?"

"I looked for the anger thou talked'st of in thy last, but could not find it; and for what would'st thou have been angry, if thou could'st? Turn thy wrath from me, and direct it against the winds. and the fogs. In future, I fear it will be directed against the collectors of dirty rags in London and in Germany, where the prices, 'have increased, are increasing, and ought to be diminished'—but will not be so, because we begin the century by not doing what we ought to do. What we shall do at the end of it I neither know nor care."

In October, 1800, Bage had visited Hutton at Birmingham, where the latter still passed the hours of business, and had taken Bennet's

Bage lived eight months after the date of this letter, which was written Jan. 24, 1801.

Hill in his way home to call on Catherine Hutton, the daughter of his friend. Both were alarmed at the alteration in Bage's countenance, which exhibited evident symptoms of declining health. They believed that they should see him no more; and he was probably impressed with the same idea, for, on quitting the house at Birmingham, he cordially shook hands with Samuel Hutton, the grand nephew of his friend, and, said, "Farewell, my dear lad, we shall meet again in heaven."

At home, Bage seems to have indulged the hope of another meeting in the present world; for, two months after his letter of January, he says, in a letter to Hutton, "Tell Miss Hutton that I have thought of her some hundred times since I saw her; insomuch that I feared I was falling in love. I do love her as much as a man seventy-three years of age, and married, ought to love. I like the idea of paying her a visit, and will try to make it in reality some time-but not yet." In April he was scarcely able to write a let

In June he was again incapable of attending to business; but in reply to his friend, who had mentioned paying him a visit, he said, "I should have been glad and sorry, dear William, to have seen thee at Tamworth." On the 1st of September, 1801, he died.

Bage had quitted Elford, and during the last eight years of his life he resided at Tamworth, where he ended his days. His wife survived him, but is since dead. He had three sons, one of whom died as he was approaching manhood, to the severe affliction of his father. Charles, the eldest son, settled at Shrewsbury, where he was the proprietor of a very extensive cotton manufactory. He died in 1822 at the age of 70. Edward, the younger son, was apprenticed to a surgeon and apothecary at Tamworth, where he afterwards followed his profession. He died many years before his brother. Both possessed a large portion of their father's talents, and equalled him in integrity and moral conduct.

In his person, Robert Bage was rather under the middle size, and rather slender, but well proportioned. His complexion was fair and ruddy; his hair light and curling; his countenance intelligent, yet mild and placid. His manners were courteous, and his mind was firm. His integrity, his honour, his devotion to truth, were undeviating and incorruptible; his humanity, benevolence, and generosity, were not less conspicuous in private life, than they were in the principal characters in his works. He supplied persons he never saw with money, because he heard they were in want. He kept his servants and his horses to old age, and both men and quadrupeds were attached to him. He behaved to his sons with the unremitting affection of a father; but, as they grew up, he treated them as men and equals, and allowed them that independence of mind and conduct which he claimed for himself.

On the subject of servants, Bage says, in The Fair Syrian, "I pity those unhappy masters, who, with unrelenting gravity, damp the effusions of a friendly heart, lest something too familiar for their lordly pride should issue from a servant's lips." Of a parent he

says, in the same work, "Instead of the iron rod of parents, he used only the authority of mild persuasion, and cultivated the affections of his children by social intercourse, and unremitting tenderness." It matters not into what mouth Robert Bage put these sentiments; they were his own, his practice was conformable to them, and their good effects were visible on all around him.

The following comparison between Robert Bage and his friend, William Hutton, was written by Charles Bage, son of the former, in a letter to Catherine Hutton, daughter of the latter, October 6th,

1816.

"The contrast between your father's life and mine is curious. Both were distinguished by great natural talents; both were mild, benevolent, and affectionate, qualities which were impressed on their countenances; both were indignant at the wantonness of pride and power; both were industrious, and both had a strong attachment to literature; yet with these resemblances, their success in life was very different; my father never had a strong passion for wealth, and he never rose into opulence. Your father's talents were continually excited by contact with the busy haunts of men;' my father's were repressed by a long residence in an unfrequented place, in which he shunned the little society he might have had, because he could not relish the conversation of those whose minds were less cultivated than his own. In time, such was the effect of habit, that, although when young, he was lively and fond of company, he enjoyed nothing but his book and pen, and a pool at quadrille with ladies. He seems, almost always, to have been fonder of the company of ladies than of men."

After this satisfactory account of Bage's life and character, there remains nothing for the editor but to offer a few critical remarks upon his compositions.

The general object of Robert Bage's compositions is rather to exhibit character, than to compose a narrative; rather to extend and infuse his own political and philosophical opinions, in which a man of his character was no doubt sincere, than merely to amuse the reader with the wonders, or melt him with the sorrows of a fictitious tale. In this respect he resembled Voltaire and Diderot, who made their most formidable assaults on the system of religion and politics which they assailed, by embodying their objections in popular narratives. Even the quaint, facetious, ironical style of this author seems to be copied from the lesser political romances of the French school; and if Bage falls short of his prototypes in wit, he must be allowed to exhibit, upon several occasions, a rich and truly English vein of humour, which even Voltaire does not possess. Respecting the tendency and motive of these works, it is not the editor's purpose to say much. Bage appears, from his peculiar style, to have been educated a quaker, and he has always painted the individuals of that primitive sect of Christians in amiable colours, when they are introduced as personages into his novels. If