come a finger's breadth upon the curb-stone.' He notices the general handsomeness of the people,-the natural manner of the boys, so different from the little mannikins of the continent, and the easy gradation of ranks in England, where high and low are not separated by a chasm as insuperable as that between Dives and Lazarus. He recognizes and admires the feeling which makes the appellation of liar the worst insult which can be offered to an Englishman our church service and church music edified and affected him 'even to tears;' and the sight of a popular election, though he perceived that the license there was but the semblance of liberty, and that, too, tribunitial liberty,' warmed his heart.

'Yes, my friend,' he says, 'depend on it, when you see here how in this happy country the lowest and meanest member of society thus unequivocally testifies the interest which he takes in every thing of a public nature,--how high and low, rich and poor, concur in declaring their feelings and their conviction that a carter, a common tar, or a scavenger, is still a man and an Englishman, and as such has his rights and privileges defined and known as exactly and as well as his king, or his king's ministers,--take my word for it, you will find your self very differently affected from what you are when staring at our soldiers in their exercises at Berlin.'

Without any pretensions to wit, sentiment, philosophy, or fine writing, the simple story of this Prussian Parson Adams has found its way into popular collections in England, and perhaps few books have ever communicated to the reader a more distinct conception of the author's character. A more comprehensive and methodical account of England was published at the same time by one Wendeborn, author of a German grammar,-a book of solid materials, heavily concocted, but collected with industry, and arranged for the purpose of conveying accurate and impartial information to his countrymen. Most of the later French travels have been written with a very different feeling; a spirit of envious dislike is more or less apparent in all; to what an extent this spirit may be carried, the readers of this Journal will remember by the specimens which were given on a former occasion from the L'Angleterre of M. le Maréchal de Camp Pillet, Chevalier de St. Louis, Officer of the Legion of Honour, Grand Liar, and Knight of the Hulks. This indeed is a flagrant instance, and worthy of punishment as an audacious libel upon human nature; but the best accounts of England which the French have yet published are as little favourable to this country as they are little honourable to the national spirit which displays its unabated hostility.

M.Jean Baptiste Say is one of the least unfriendly of these writers, -he even says he should rejoice in the prosperity of England as much as in that of France, and for this valid reason, which it is

to be wished all statesmen of every country would bear in mind, that the prosperity of one country so far from being incompatible with that of another, as the generality of men imagine, is, on the contrary, favourable to it.' Yet it would be difficult to believe that M. Say's opinions have not been coloured by his wishes when he affirms that our taste for the arts has been by little and little corrupted, in consequence of our long exclusion from the classical ground of Europe; that for this reason our vases, candelabra, and furniture have neither neatness, lightness, nor elegance; we have fallen back into a Gothic and unmeaning taste of heavy and complicated ornaments; and in the patterns of stuffs and choice of colours we are now behind the rest of Europe. At home, he says, the government possesses the means of making the English pay for things more than their value, but it does not, thank God, possess the same power over the French, the Germans, or the Brazilians. This same ejaculation of thanksgiving is no doubt to be understood when he assures us that our manufactures obtain little success in the great markets of Europe;-that if corn does not rise in price the agriculturists and the landholders must be ruined, and if it does, that in that case commerce and manufactures will be destroyed; in short that we are reduced to this alternative, to borrow for our annual expenditure,-which is impossible, because it is already difficult to pay the interest of the existing debt, or under some shape or other to cease to pay the interest, and thus create a bankruptcy more or less disguised.' In this opinion M. Say is supported by the Morning Chronicle, a journal which for becoming national feeling, and felicitous political predictions, may vie with the Northern prophets; but M. Say is neither so senseless nor so dishonest as to dissemble that this would be an act of political suicide, which would bring the whole system to the ground. There might, however, he adds, be a third alternative, to lessen the expense by ceasing to embroil and agitate Europe, Asia, and America: but this is not likely to be adopted.' The French have repeated against us this charge of embroiling the world till they really seem to believe it! But we must not wonder at hearing it from them, when there are men in our own country wicked enough and traitorous enough to repeat month after month, and week after week, and day after day, the same impudent and detestable falsehood!

The anonymous author who has laid Dyche's Spelling-book under contribution, and compiled so largely from Joe Miller, does not venture upon prophecy, and deals but little in political matter, -that little however is rich in its kind. O Frenchmen, O my dear compatriots,' he repeats after some Frenchman as sage as himself, once for all, beware of those who are incessantly citing

England to you as a model! Your laws and your government are far superior to the laws and administration of Britain! In England he tells us, every thing is decided by money; it is money that makes our judges, our magistrates, our members of parliament, generals, admirals, and ministers! Every thing in England is venal: our county members are the slaves of the minister's will and the instruments of his passions. Generally speaking, we are an ignorant people; in the provincial towns the people hate learning, and yawn at the sound of Latin. And as for our national courage, it is a great mistake to suppose that the English are a brave people-that which is mistaken for courage in them, is a certain strength of character which perhaps is not found in the French, but which is only a disease of the mind, occasioned by excess in beef, and by the high duties upon wine, and leading to suicide. Suicide and consumption, as we learn from this judicious writer, were not known in England before the battle of Agincourt; but Henry V. thought proper after that battle to enact, that no Englishman should drink wine without mixing it with water; why this enactment should have been made, or in what archives the writer has discovered it, he has not thought fit to impart; but so it was, and from that time the English character became triste, taciturn, melancholic; consumption became the national disease, and suicide the national form of madness. The philanthropic author has kindly pointed out the means of delivering ourselves from these rooted evils;-it is but to plant vines in our colonies, and import their produce in great quantities,-to allow of balls and spectacles on Sundays,-and to have organs and good musicians in the churches; Alors l'atmosphère changerait dans dix à quinze années; la fureur du suicide serait arrêté, le peuple deviendrait gai, sociable et heureux.' Excellent as this is, it is not entirely original; the writer seems to have pursued a happy discovery of M. Grosley: (upon whom, indeed, he has drawn largely for materials:)-that earlier observer suggests that nothing would be so beneficial to the interests of England, physical, moral, spiritual, and political, as the free use of wine; it would make the English, he affirms, more active and less speculative-more addicted to gaiety, and less to reasoning-fonder of life, less atrabilious, less occupied with politics, and therefore better subjects-less theological, and therefore more religious. The political interests of England, and the financial interests of France, are alike concerned, as he shows us, in reducing the duties upon wine,il seroit, en effet, très-singulier que la chaleur des es prits et des révolutions en Angleterre y eût une progression graduée, en raison de l'augmentation des droits d'excise sur le vin. Consumption, jaundice, suicide, heresy, and sedition, all to be prevented by lowering the duties upon wine! Look to it, Mr. Vap

sittart! and ask yourself if, as a man and a minister, you can conscientiously suffer the continuance of these evils when the remedy is so easy.

Concerning the courage of the English, derived as it is from beef, and still more from mutton, the world has been greatly mistaken; though the truth upon this point was long ago seen by Sorbiere. In Louis the XIVth's time, says the anonymous compiler, the French sailors used to say-if they are Dutch, we shall fight them; if they are English we shall beat them:-s'ils sont Hollandais nous nous battrons; s'ils sont Anglais, nous les battrons. Cela était passé en proverbe. A stranger, we are told, lands at London; in that city parfaitement libre he meets the press-gang ten times in an hour pursuing the passengers to make sailors and soldiers by blows with a bludgeon. The next day he goes to Portsmouth, goes on board a ship, and finds half these involuntary heroes in chains below deck. On the day after, he arrives at Brest;-the sailors who are hastening thither without constraint and without guards, are disputing with each other the honour of embarking first. The enchanted traveller goes from vessel to vessel; he sees every where, in animated colours, the stamp of courage and of liberty. So far so good: but why does this enchanted traveller proceed no farther? Why does he not tell us how the gay volunteers on the one side, and the melancholy pressed sailors on the other, behaved when they were in battle, and in what plight they entered Portsmouth together after the victory? The name of the British Channel sounds ill in the ears of the Duc de Levis, and he asks, Who shall ensure proud Albion, that an enemy's besom shall not again be displayed in the Thames? So much for our navy. As for our army, the reader may be assured, upon the competent authority of a French Peer, that though the English troops yield to none in courage, they are inferior to almost all in evolutions and military spirit; and that the age of our Edwards and Henries is past. Doubtless it is: but in the way of military character, the age of Wellington has placed us upon as good a footing with our neighbours. But it seems we have less reason to plume ourselves upon our Edwards and Henries than has generally been supposed ;—a new salve has been discovered for the old sores of Cressy, and Poictiers, and Agincourt. We ought to speak with less pride of these victories; because the principal force of our armies, if we believe the Duc de Levis, consisted in soldiers drawn from the French provinces.-Poor England!-There are Portuguese, who tell us that they won for us all our battles in Spain; and in due time we shall probably be informed that it was the Belgians who won the day at Waterloo!

Much should be forgiven to national feeling; and it is as much

the virtue of the French to love their own country, and feel a lively sense of her triumphs or reverses, as it is the vice of our oppositionists and Ultra-Whigs to take part on every occasion against England. When the Duc de Liancour, travelling as an emigrant in Canada, and being received there not merely with hospitality, but with the respect due to his rank, and character, and misfortunes, gives vent to a strain of bitter and even hostile reflections against the country by which Canada was conquered from France, his English readers respected the principle on which those feelings arose, whatever they may have thought of the prudence or propriety of thus manifesting them. The Duc de Levis also touches upon Canada, and tells us that it adds little to the glory of our arms, and proves this by a notable piece of secret history, which, it must be admitted, comes upon high authority. In the battle wherein Wolfe fell, the command of the French, after Montcalm's death, devolved upon the Chevalier, afterwards Maréchal de Levis, father of the present writer, and he-beat the English ;-yes, reader, beat them in a pitched battle;-but-oh, most unfortunate conjunction disjunctive-but, in the very midst of his success, a total want of ammunition compelled him to yield to those whom he actually had defeated!* The son of the commander who so unluckily lost the battle which he won may naturally be excused for believing that this was the case, and that the glory of that bloody day belongs to France not England-to the Chevalier de Levis, and not to Wolfe. He, like the Duc de Liancour, observes with cordial hope that the Canadians had preserved their religion, their manners, and their language, and that they are still French in heart; and he points out, among other advantages which France would derive from the possession of her former colony, the ascendancy which it would give her over the councils of the United States.

6

The Duc de Levis cannot begin his History of London' with out comparing it to Carthage. Carthage, he says, was a golden Colossus with feet of clay, which the sword of the Romans overthrew, et Londres est peut-être chancelante sur ses monceaux de guinées. And supposing that France would be permitted to keep that extent of coast to the North and South which Bonaparte had annexed to the French empire, this union, he says, will perhaps suffice to re-establish the equilibrium of the seas. The spirit which such opinions, or rather such wishes, indicate, is more broadly ex

*Lorsqu'après des succès balancés, le Chevalier (depuis le Maréchal de Levis) succédant au brave mais malheureux Montcalm, eut pris le commandement en chef des troupes, il battît les Anglois dans une bataille rangée, et ce fut au milieu de ses succès que le dénuement total de munitions de guerre toujours interceptées, le força de se rendre aux vaincus.' Tom. i. Chap, 15. p. 368, London Edition

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