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"IV. To explain The various modes of occupying Land' in Arable, Culture, Grass, Gardens and Orchards, Woods and Plantations; and

"V. To offer some general remarks on the means of improving a country, by diffusing information, by removing obstacles to improvement, and by positive encouragement."

In the body of this Work general principles alone are dwelt upon; but where particular information is necessary, it is inserted in notes, and some points requiring minute details are considered in the Appendix.

The Author, having utility, rather than any claim to originality in view, "Has availed himself, in addition to the publications of the Board, of whatever useful information he could find in preceding writers on Agriculture, of acknowledged merit and authority, and has not hesitated to adopt their language and modes of expression, where they were distinct and perspicuous."

As an Author of several useful Works, and as the Founder of the Board of Agriculture, Sir John Sinclair has been known many years, during which his studies and pursuits have been exactly such as have invariably tended to qualify him for the execution of the present Work. His whole course, as an Agriculturist, has been marked with that degree of firmness and perseverance that seldom or never fails in attaining its object. His "Statistical Account of Scotland" was the grand preliminary to all the improvements he afterwards Ineditated. Its object was, to obtain parochial information; and it was begun and carried on under circumstances the most discouraging. In the space of less than ten years Sir John Sinclair wrote to each individual of near nine hundred Clergymen, more than thirty different letters of solicitation; when, after making with various success an infinite number of applications to persons of all ranks, after bestowing in particular a multiplicity of small favours on the Clergy of the Scottish Church, after enduring much from the selfish prejudices and literary pride of those whose papers he received and pub lished, Sir John at last finally accomplished, at the expense of several thousand pounds, the compilation and publication of " A Complete Statistical Account of all the Parishes

in Scotland," comprehended in 20 volumes octavo, and containing, for almost every one of about nine hundred parishes, a different article by a different author, which being made in form of answers to the queries proposed, required much alteration before they could be thrown into a connected composition.

Sir John's primary object was to obtain an account of the present state of each parish, without overlooking its Antiquities; yet he found that the Clergy were more inclined to fill their papers with these dry details than any other information; as many of them could not conceive that the common and familiar things constantly passing before them, such as the form of a plough, &c. could possibly possess aught worthy of being solemnly recorded in print! Thus to the labour of a Hercules, it was necessary for Sir John Sinclair to add the patience of a Job. These, however, were only a part of the task undertaken by our Author, with a view to the establishment of a Board of Agriculture, his most favourite object.

In the meanwhile, as all the experience of his public life contributed to enhance his first ideas of the importance of public, and especially of rural economy, in the progress of his Statistical Enquiries he gained new knowledge, which essentially contributed to strengthen the previous bias of his mind. The examples of a Board of Trade, and of a Scottish Board for Improvements, Manufactures, and Fisheries, suggested to him the idea of the institution of a Board of Agriculture. Upon its institution, under the administration of Mr. Pitt, Sir John Sinclair was chosen to be its President, and Mr. Arthur Young was nominated to the office of Secretary. Sir John resolved that this Board should not be subject to that ridicule of inactivity which Mr. Burke had thrown out upon a celebrated occasion against the Board of Trade. He instantly produced plans, which merited the approbation of the members of the Board, for engaging it in the most vigorous exertions to improve the agricultural state of the British Empire. It was upon his suggestion that the Board opened its office, in order to communicate every information which Farmers might solicit by correspondence, to assist

their practical operations; and on the other hand, from practical Farmers to receive every communication of new and peculiar facts or principles, the result of personal knowledge or experience.

The improvement and useful diversification of our principal tame animals, the introduction of new vegetables, and the perfection of the seeds and culture of such as Britain before possessed; the abbreviation and melioration of all the modes of rural labour; the reduction of all waste lands under tillage, and the making every field susceptible of perpetual fertility and cultivation; the instructing the Farmers of one district by adding to their knowledge the enlightened examples of others; the improvement of the utensils, the domestic accommodation, the promotion of the morals and the intelligence of the people by whom the labours of husbandry are to be carried on: all these entered as so many objects into the views of Sir John Sinclair for the prosecution of the Board of Agricul ture. As he was the author of these plans, so the burthen of carrying them into execution, for a time at least, fell upon him alone.

As a

Member of Parliament, he supported them with great ardour and perseverance; and a Bill for facilitating the legal subdivision and inclosure of common fields was one of the firstfruits of his application. Thus Sir John alone, like the discoverer of a rich mine, was the first to promote a practical demonstration of the immense augmentation of the wealth of Great Britain by agricultural improvements only. What was theory in him nearly thirty years ago, has since become the experience of the whole Nation.

A number of communications upon various agricultural subjects; a first edition of Reports of the State of Husbandry in all, or almost all, the Counties of Great Britain; a second and enlarged edition of not a few of these Reports, were communicated by Sir John to the world through the press. An annual grant of a few thousand pounds from Parliament, a subscription by the Members of the Board, and what copy-money was to be obtained by the sale of the books, were among the first resources for GENT. MAG. February, 1818.

the expenditure of the Board of Agriculture. Possibly the prospect of realizing all his views, which began to be no longer doubtful to persons of enlarged and sagacious minds with the unusual activity of the President, were features not approved of by Mr. Pitt; and Sir John was removed from that Presidency, in which it was his delight to serve, in order to make room for Lord Somerville.

But notwithstanding these discou ragements the patriotic ardour of Sir John Sinclair never abated. He was also founder of a Society for the improvement of British Wool, and a Member of the Highland Society for promoting the general improvement of the Scottish Highlands; and in patronizing the endeavours of others he was never accused of that littleness of mind which has stained the characters of too many persons anxious to secure public approbation for themselves. During the pursuit of his favourite object he was nevertheless doomed to hear it repeated, "that Agriculture is not susceptible of being reduced to science; that Farmers are incapable of learning any part of their business from books; that the Board of Agriculture could

ever make itself useful through the channel of the press," &c. &c. But what a triumph over all these ignorant prejudices has he lived to witness! Still to this ignorance and incredulity, so much to be regretted, there were many valuable exceptions; particularly one of his early biographers, who had no doubt but the labours of Sir John Sinclair would be hereafter regarded as forming a great æra in the progress of the Science of Public Economy."

After procuring Agricultural Surveys of all the different Counties in Britain, it was understood as his intention "to form a comparatively short but elaborate extract, which should serve as a manual of Agricultural art and science, to be valued by every British Farmer almost as his Almanack and Bible."

The latter, we conceive, though it is to be looked upon rather as an Original Work than an Extract, he has virtually effected in "The Code of Agriculture;" and to Sir John Sinclair may be imputed with singular truth, the praise of

"Nil

"Nil actum reputans, dum quid superesset agendum."

It is no flattery to Sir John Sinclair to assert, that by his example he taught some of our greatest Statesmen to appreciate their own interest and that of the Country.

In the Appendix to his "Code of Agriculture" before us, he observes,

"In the year 1791-2, Mr. Pitt explained, in a speech on the State of the Nation, what appeared to him the causes of the general increase of the national prosperity which had taken place at that time. That speech is very ably commented upon by Mr. Arthur Young in his Annals of Agriculture.' Mr. Young was shocked to find in that speech the greatest, dearest, and most important interests of the kingdom, totally and contemptuously overlooked, as of no sort of consequence in the great scale of national prosperity.

A Financier,' he observes, in giving a general view of the national resources, and dwelling with pride on the public revenue, does not think that Agriculture, which even then paid twelve millions sterling per annum in public burdens, worthy even of being named amongst the sources of prosperity.' "Mr. Young also remarks, 'that the Agricultural interests of the kingdom perhaps never found themselves placed in so contemptible a position as in this speech of the Minister, who, wishing to make the utmost parade of every circumstance that would count in a catalogue of national advantages, totally overlooks every thing connected with land.' Mr. Young little expected in the course of a few months to be Secretary to a Board of Agriculture, established by the concurrence of the very Minister by whom that speech had been deli

vered."

As late as the year 1796 another British Statesman, distinguished for political information (Lord Auckland), delivered a speech in the House of Lords, intending to enumerate the causes to which our prosperity was to be ascribed, without one word of Agriculture.

Upon which Sir John Sinclair remarks,

"We have hitherto been too much considered as a mere commercial nation; whereas every country possessed of an extensive and fertile territory ought to account the cultivation of its soil as the surest foundation of its prosperity, and the best entitled of all the

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Next to the judicious arrangement of the various materials, perspicuity of style appears to be the principal ornament of this elaborate and comprehensive Work; to which a copious Index and a number of Plates are attached.

The Plates annexed to this Work consist of au exquisite Portrait of the Author; a plan of Farms and Farm Buildings; description of the improved Swing Plough; the Grubber, and Mill for making Pot Barley; description of the Corn Stacks with cast-iron pillars; engraving of the Cradle Churn; description of a Wheel for raising Water; table of the Scotch mode of cultivating Turnips in Drills; engrav ings of an improved Granary; the Binot and the improved Binot; Drill Barrow and Drill Harrow; description of the Flemish Binot; description of the Barrow for sowing Grain in Drills; description of the Drill Harrow.

26. Reflections and Resolutions proper for the Gentlemen of Ireland, as to their Conduct for the Service of their Country, as Landlords, as Masters of Families, as Protestants, as descended from British Ancestors, as Country Gentlemen and Furmers, as Justices of the Peace, as Merchants, as Members of Parliament. 8vo, pp. 224. Dublin, re-printed 1816.

"THE very curious and interesting Work which is now re-printed, and intended for a wide and gratuitous circulation, is also of uncommon rarity; there is not a copy of it in the Library of Trinity College, or in any of the other Public Libraries of this City, which have been searched on purpose. The profoundly learned Vice-Provost, Doctor Barrett, never met with one; and many Gentlemen well skilled in the Literature of Ireland, who have been applied to for information on the subject, are even unacquainted with the name of the book.

"That a Work of such exceeding merit should be so little known in these days, might at first appear singular to

those

:

*

those who do not know that another work of the same Author is equally scarce, and that all the copies of it were called in with the most sedulous activity at this distance of time, we have not the means of ascertaining the motives which may have actuated the Writer to suppress his works, after having printed them; but we must lament that the wise and patriotic measures, so eloquently proposed, had not been diffused amongst the Gentlemen of Ireland, and acted upon by them, with the same ardour, that animated the respectable Author. If such had fortunately been the case, how would the Country and its natives have flourished, and what a contrast would the present times have afforded! It is with the sincerest and purest hopes that much positive, not ideal good, will arise from its circulation, that it is now revived; and if those into whose hands it may fall will, in their respective situations, conscientiously endeavour to attain what yet remains to be done, the expence and labour of its publication will be esteemed to have been well employed.

"Of the Rev. Dr. Samuel Madden, the reputed Author of this book, but few memorials exist at this day; and yet he was a man of whom the great Samuel Johnson said 'His was a name IRELAND ought to honour.' After very extensive and long-continued inquiries, the only authentic information respecting him that could be found, was in that valuable repertory, Nichols's Literary Anecdotes of the Eighteenth Century, vol. II. pages 31 and 169; and in Grosley's Tour in England, 3 vols. 12mo, Dubl. 1772, vol. II. p. 260. He is also mentioned in the new edition of the Biographia Dramatica, by Jones, London 1812, vol. I. page

478, and in Lempriere's Universal Biography. Not one of these Writers mention the Work now re-printed-a proof of its excessive rarity!"

Of this useful volume, and of its excellent Author, we shall speak further in our next. The benevolent Republisher, Mr. Thomas Pleasants, is already introduced to our Readers in p. 113; and in our Poetry, p. 161. 27. Answer of the Protestants to His Excellency the Catholic Board, on occasion of the Protocol, transmitted to them on Thursday, Dec. 4, 1817; and of an Article in No. LVII. of the Edinburgh Review. 8vo, pp. 47. Scott, Dublin, THIS pamphlet is by the Author of "Yorick's Letters," (vol. LXXXVII. ii. 52); and has excited considerable interest in Dublin. It is an answer to a very able and Jesuitical address of the Roman Catholics; and its view is to unite ALL the Protestants against the Jesuits; and, though ironical, it is sarcastically argumentative.—The Address came out about two months ago in all the Dublin Newspapers, the Government ones not excepted, and was immediately censured, by "Yorick," in "The Correspondent" (the chief Government Paper); and the Edinburgh Reviewers having since joined the standard of the "Addressers," they are also answered in the pamphlet now re-printed with corrections and additions.

28. A. Sermon to the Distressed Seamen on board the Abundance and Plover Store Ships, and at the London Workhouse, Bishopsgate-street, preached on Sunday,

"The title of this very rare book is 'Memoirs of the Twentieth Century: being original Letters of State, under George the Sixth, relating to the most important events in Great Britain and Europe, as to the Church and State, Arts and Sciences, Trade, Taxes, and Treaties, Peace and War; and the character of the greatest persons of those times, from the middle of the Eighteenth, to the end of the Twentieth Century, and of the World. Received and revealed in the year 1728; and now published, for the instruction of all eminent Statesmen, Churchmen, Patriots, Politicians, Projectors, Papists, and Protestants,' in six vols. 8vo. London, 1733. There was something very mysterious in the History of these Memoirs, which were addressed in an ironical dedication to Frederick Prince of Wales, and only one volume of the work appeared. One thousand copies were printed, but in less than a fortnight 900 copies were delivered up to Dr. Madden, and in all probability destroyed. The late Mr. Tutet had a copy of it, and never heard of another, although he made many inquiries after it. A second is in the curious library of Mr. Bindley, of the Stampoffice, London; and a third was sold in Dublin, at the sale of the library of Dr. Kearney, Bishop of Ossory, in June 1815, to Mr. Triphook of London, for 81. 2s. It is believed that the present Reflections,' are equally scarce, and much more valuable and interesting to Irishmen."

+"A well-informed Writer, in a Review of this book, in The Dublin Weekly Gazette, Sept. 28, 1816, shrewdly suggests the reason-That, in 1738, Sir Robert Walpole was in the zenith of his power; and every one knows that Minister's antipathy to free political discussion; and to this country [Ireland] thriving at the expence of England."

Jan.

1

Jan. 18, 1818, after Morning and
Evening Service. By James Rudge,
M. A. F. R. S. of Limehouse. 12mo,
pp. 28.

A PERSPICUOUS and appropriate Discourse, from Psalm evii. 23, 24.

"They that go down to the sea in ships, that do business in great waters. "These see the works of the Lord, and his wonders in the deep."

In one of his notes, the good and ndefatigable Preacher says,

"On board the Abundance store-ship, here were about 200 sailors, upwards of 100 on board the Plover, and in the London Workhouse about the same number. The whole of these poor men conducted themselves during service with the utmost propriety; and a brave and distinguished officer of the British Navy, who accompanied me on this interesting occasion, together with three or four gentlemen of the Committee besides, assured me, that in his life, most of which had been passed at sea, he never witnessed more decorum, and a greater appearance of devotion! For my own part, I was never more gratified by any thing than by the conduct of these brave fellows; and if any serious impressions were wrought, and any good effects produced, I shall consider myself abundantly remunerated, and ascribe the whole praise to that ALMIGHTY BEING, to whom all praise, and glory, and adoration, are due! I repeated my visit, on Sunday, Feb. 1, and read prayers and preached to the men on board the Sapphire, Nautilus, Dasher, Plover, and Abundance, receiving ships; and nothing could exceed the attention and gratitude with which I was heard! Many hundred copies of this sermon had been distributed on board the different vessels in the preceding week, and I was assured by the commanding officers, that each man was very thankful for his copy, and was often seen reading it, either to himself, or to a few around him. Many of them pressed around me, and gave me their blessing, both on entering and on leaving the ships; and such a sincere and unpurchased homage of the heart I received, I hope, with a proper spirit of gratitude, as I am sure I returned it, with many a secret prayer to Heaven for their present and everlasting good!"

29. Anselmo, a Tale; with the Departure of Bertha; and other Poems. 8vo. pp. 42. Longman and Co.

THE Hero of the Poem is introduced meditating on his own sorrows, as he returned at midnight to his lonely habitation from a ramble on the sea-shore on the coast of Spain.

"Oft the Ocean dark

Of grief had tost, and nearly whelm'd his bark.

Deep in his bosom had the scathing war He left his mother earth-so Rumour Of jarring passions set the searing sear; said, [his head;

Ere twice ten years had circled round Prey to the Gamester's fascinating crew, To them as wisest, best of friends he flew. Perchance no pitying hand was nigh, in time [crime;

To check his footsteps in the way of He ran his course, till mad with certain loss, [to cross: Desperate, he dared the worst his fate In maddening mood he reach'd the fatal Hall [lost-his all! staked — and sickening soul [tion - birth; That gave him - -now that irksome porHe reached Iberia's shore, and long had stood [blood; Beneath her banners in the field of But now withdrawn from off that stage

Of Vice-and, frantic, 'Twas then he left with the earth

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During his accustomed walks, a neighbouring Lord, who had in vain endeavoured to seduce Anselmo's wife, effected his purpose by brutal force. The wife, unable to survive the cruel outrage, takes poison.

An

selmo, assisted by some neighbouring peasants, kills the Ravisher, and afterwards dies weeping over the grave which contained his wife's remains.

Such is the story, not inelegantly related, by a Bard, who is evidently an admirer of the Byron school.

The smaller Poems are also deserving of commendation.

30. Case respecting the Maintenance of the London Clergy further considered; by John Moore, LL. B. Rector of St. Michael's Bassishaw, and Minor Canon of St. Paul's, London. 8vo, pp. 32. Nichols and Co.

IN olden times the Great Seals were not unfrequently committed to the custody of an eminent Churchman. Had the Author of this well-digested “Case” lived in those days, the ability which he has here shewn as an Ecclesiastical Lawyer would fairly have qualified him as a candidate for that high and important office. He has honestly and forcibly stated the pretensions of his brethren; and has demonstratively proved his various assertions.-Q. E.D.

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