in imagination over the whole globe; through oceans, over mountains, across deserts and uncivilized regions, without either the risk of life, or the expenditure of money; nay, can follow the invincible Bonaparte through all his military manoeuvres, without the fear of being made conscripts, the danger of death, or of mutilation in his desperate battles.

The next step of our academical ladder was Logic, or a knowledge of the art of reasoning.

As the former branches which engaged our attention related to external things, this makes us in some degree acquainted with the powers of the human mind. O! the inexpressible comfort of chopping logic! by which truth is ascertained, error exposed, and ignorance silenced. Let not this branch of our education be objected to, as being too abstruse and abstracted for our juvenile minds. The human mind, be assured, is capable of much earlier and more extensive expansion than is generally imagined, and though we have not been able fully to comprehend all the intricacies of logical disquisition, yet its elementary principles which we could comprehend, were so far useful that they convinced us we were in possession of intellectual powers we should otherwise have been ignorant of, as well as of the proper application of them to the art of reasoning. During our progress through these scientific branches, a portion of each day was devoted to the art of writing, to arithmetic, to the correct reading of the highest English classics, Thomson, Milton, and Young, and our Saturdays to practical elocution, an examination in our respective catechisms, and an explanation by our director of some of the leading and general principles of Christianity; while the business of each day was commenced and closed by prayer, and the reading of the Holy Scriptures.

Such is the system of education we have passed through in this seminary and if it be not a complete English education, at least as to elementary principles, which is all that is ever taught at school, I know not what is: besides, in acquiring it, such habits of study and attention are induced, as must greatly facilitate the progress of higher studies, and accustom the mind to serious thinking.

Thus, ladies and gentlemen, I have given you the outlines of that course of education which has so happily terminated in presenting us before you this morning.

And now, having executed my proposed undertaking, I should congratulate you and myself on its accomplishment, and with a formal bow retire, were it not that being the last of the orators of the day, it me to conclude in the valedictory form.

is incumbent

upon

Permit me, therefore, reverend and respected Sir, to offer you my sincere and most grateful acknowledgments, and those of every indi

vidual of my class, for your benevolent attention and unremitted exertions in our behalf. The instruction you have communicated, and the precepts you have inculcated, will, we trust, ever maintain the most active influence upon our future conduct. May you long continue, Sir, to preside over this Institution, to dispense similar blessings to our successors, and in the fullest enjoyment of health, prosperity, and happi

ness.

The hour of our separation, my dear fellow students, is at length arrived; when we shall either prosecute our studies in other seminaries, or engage in some of the various employments of active life: receive, therefore, my parting advice, to cherish and expand the elements of science here acquired, and to regulate your future conduct by the dictates of Religion and Morality here delivered. I trust the friendships we have formed during our association here, will be continued through life, and that as we advance in age we may make proportionate advances in useful knowledge and in practical piety. Farewell! my friends, may the choicest blessings of heaven be liberally bestowed upon you!

To you, young gentlemen of the junior classes, I most earnestly recommend a diligent perseverance in the daily acquisition of knowledge, a cheerful conformity to the discipline of the Institution, and an affectionate and respectful deportment towards your teachers and superiors. Behold in us, the reward of diligence, and may you in course experience the honour and satisfaction which we now enjoy.

Accept, respected auditors, my most ardent thanks for the honour conferred on us this day, by your presence, and for your patient and polite attention.

TRAVELS. FOR THE PORT FOLIO.

LETTERS FROM GENEVA AND france,

Written during a residence of between two and three years in different parts of those countries, and addressed to a lady in Virginia.

LETTER LXVIII.

It was impossible to confine what I had to say of the deaf and dumb to one letter; and if I have been able, in any degree, to communicate what I feel with respect to this highly useful institution, you will scarcely regret that I could not. I twice attended the monthly exhibitions, of which I will give you an account presently, and had some con

versation with the Abbe Sicard; and I once had the pleasure of passing some time in a room where an assistant of the Abbe was giving lessons. On my arrival at the Carmelites, upon this last occasion, I asked a little boy, who was going out, to show me the school room, upon which he applied his fingers to his mouth and to his ears, to explain to me that he was deaf and dumb, and then imitated the action of a person taking a pencil out of his pocket, and writing on a piece of paper. All this was done in less time than words expressive of the same ideas could have been pronounced, and with a very intelligent countenance, and upon my writing down, that I was an American, and that I wished to see a countryman, a sourd-muet who had lately arrived, he conducted me to the room. I could perceive, as he went along the corridor of the ancient convent, that he told the boys we met, who I was, with his fingers; several of them appeared to be conversing, and all of them seemed cheerful and happy. As I requested the instructor to continue his lesson, I had the pleasure to see the mode of teaching, which the Abbe recommends, put in practice. A part of the wainscot was painted black, and upon this, the boys either drew the figures of different objects, or placed the names of them, or wrote sentences which the master dictated. Some of them were learning the numerical figures by making a greater or less number of radii meet in a common centre, where the figures were placed; and others, the government of a verb, by one or more substantives; in the case of the third person singular, for instance, of the verb to go, and in the present time, he was put at one extremity of a line and goes at the other; and in the third person plural, two lines, each having he at one extremity, terminated by forming an acute angle, and there the words they go were written. It was the commencement of each, ended in we are. I desired the instructor the same for the first person plural of to be: two lines, with I am at to dictate to one of them, that I was from North America, which he did by pointing to the west with one hand, and with a gesture which implied distance, and making a movement with the other in imitation

of a ship in motion. He comes from America, was

instantly written

down, and the boys immediately gathered about me and drew my attention to a little Creole of St. Domingo, implying, I presume, that he was my countryman. I then requested that the word North might be put before America, upon which the instructor, making a sign that all was not right, looked first as if incommoded by the sun, then turned suddenly round and pointed a little to the right of West, and the word North was immediately added. I observed that they expressed the future by moving the hand forward in a half circle vertically, and the past by an action which resembled the throwing of something over the shoulder. I am sorry I neglected to ask how many pupils there are at

be

present under the care of the Abbe Sicard, but I know the number to very considerable. Persons who are able to bear the expense, pay for the board and tuition of their children, the others are maintained by government. I should have been glad to have repeated my visit to this interesting place, but there were still a great many things to be seen in Paris, and my time has passed as rapidly as in a dream.

the

A great many of Massieu's definitions are the best I know, and I was only sorry, that a person of his respectable character and great acquirements should be called upon to act a part, once a month, upon a sort of public stage. As he expresses himself by looks, and by gesticulations, and motions of the body, there are times when it is impossible to keep one's countenance. But the good Abbe condescends to act a part also, and takes a great deal of pains to explain his system before persons, who pay very little attention to what he says, and are far from following him, as he imagines, into the regions of metaphysics. They. come to see the sourd-muets perform feats of knowledge, as they would go to see a monkey play tricks, and are impatient till the show begins..

There is a simplicity in the language of these people, when they express themselves upon paper, which is very interesting. It happened once to Massieu to have his pocket picked, and his attestation before the magistrate was as follows: "I am a sourd-muet. I was standing with others, sourd-muets like myself, looking at the pyx of the holy Sacrament, when a man perceived a red pocket-book in my right coat pocket. He approached me gently and took it. My hip informed me of what had happened. I turned towards him: he was frightened, and threw the pocket-book against the leg of another man, who picked it up and gave it to me. I took him by the coat; he turned pale and trembled. I beckoned to a soldier and showed him the pocket-book. The soldier brings this man-robber before you, and I have followed. I swear before God he took my pocket-book. He dares not swear before God. I hope he will not have his head cut off, but only be made to row upon the sea, for he has not killed."

The first effusions of his mind, when his teacher had made him feel the necessity of a supreme Being, and convinced his reason that there was a God were truly astonishing: He begged that he might return home and give the blessed information to his parents, and to his brothers and sisters; and when he was informed that the government had decreed him twelve hundred livres a year, as an assistant teachcr: "ah, how happy I am!" was his exclamation, "my dear parents now can never want bread."

The almost impious idea of Rousseau, that he would present himself to his creator, at the day of universal judgment; with the volume of his confessions in his hand, might cease to deserve that epithet, if

applied to these good and virtuous men, the Abbe de l'Epee and the Abbe Sicard. They, surely, if we can suppose such a moment according to the literal interpretation, might not fear to present themselves at the most awful tribunal, followed by numbers, for whom neither virtue nor religion had existed, but for their exertions.

NEW PERIODICAL PAPER,

BY MESSRS. COLERIDGE, SOUTHEY, AND OTHERS.

A VERY late London gazette announces that a new weekly paper, entitled THE FRIEND, was on the eve of making its appearance in the metropolis of the British empire. This Journal is to be conducted by the celebrated Coleridge, already advantageously known to the republic of letters by many ingenious performances both in Poetry and Prose. With the utmost cheerfulness we insert his Prospectus in The Port Folio, and this we do with the more alacrity, because it is plainly perceived that Time, Experience, and Observation, have totally changed the colour of this gentleman's mind, and that the reign of right principle is fully restored.

The execution of this Prospectus, we think, falls rather below Mr. Coleridge's brilliant powers. It is manifestly a hasty production; and, in the awkward form of a fragment of a letter, has the guise of affected negligence, not to say slovenliness. Mr. Coleridge is unquestionably capable of much more glorious exertion, and, when we recollect that, with all an architect's ability, he is about to construct a magnificent Temple, we are not a little surprised that he has not been more studious of the elegance of its porch.

The plan is nearly unexceptionable. It is liberal and extensive. The preference of prominent utility to transient delight is certainly judicious, but when Mr. Coleridge tremendously threatens his terrified readers with the menace of writing long essays, we tremble for the popularity of the work. If he depart from the plan of the Spectator, Mr. Coleridge does it at his peril. Brevity, he need not be told, is the soul of wit, and a long essay is as absurd as a long epigram.

EDITOR.