t

'he account; only, in the language of arithmeticians, it is of a higher denomination.

These however were private comnections, which perhaps are beneath the notice of the public. But you had fome friendships of a higher kind, which involved objects the most im portant and momentous, the dignity of the Monarch, the welfare of the people. The effect of fuch a connexion we are entitled to trace, and it is probable your pride will be flattered while we trace it. You derived this, like other distinctions, from a female title; and had it been exercifed only on female subjects, the petits Soupers of Cn or Cd Houfe, or had it only regulated the business of Brooks's or New-market, we should have looked on it as one of those trivial connexions, those humours of his idleness,' which, though ferious men might regret, it were rather cynical to blame. But you were almost the single member of his cabinet, when subjects of the highest moment were agitated; fubjects, that were to mark his character as a fon, a p-e, and citizen. With easy natures, and at a certain time of life, to be counselled, is to be governed; you are therefore responsible for the conduct of your illustrious friend in all

these characters.

As to filialobligations, I am willing to allow, that from your own mind or conduct you could not easily draw conceptions of their force; but pofsessing the imagination of a poet, you might have created a character you never felt, and made your friend fomewhat a different fon to a father more indulgent than yours.

In a public capacity it were an irkfome and ungracious tafk to retrace that conduct which you prompted, and would recall to our remembrance a period of national fear and uneasiness which, we hope, no future time will equal. There were, however, some advantages derived from those evils. Virtues and talents were dif

played on which the people could build future trust; on both fides were such virtues and talents exhibited; the D. of Pd, with an integrity and a fpirit worthy of his high character, shewed that there were conditions on which he would not floop to hold the highest station of the empire.

In this intended first public act of adminiftration in which "your little bark was to fail attendant, was to " Pursue the triumph and partake the gale." It was not the money which the peo ple regarded; to have paid your debts as an individual was a calculable ex pence on the revenue; but to have paid them as the debts of a copartnery, was as humiliating as it was corrupt, and led to an idea of connection, of which the danger could not be calculated. It has been the fashion of late to make allufions from a great ancient to a great modern name; and the hero of Agincourt has been quoted in vindication of youthful levities which maturer age is to cure. Have you had no part in this dramatic allufion? " Rob me the Exchequer the first thing you do." But you have less comedy in your figure, and more seriousness in your designs than Falftaff; and therefore such an advice from you excited graver emotions. In the fociety of diffipation, a young man risks more than his money; he stakes his feeling, his principle, his sense of private virtue, and of public duty.

But you are skilful in the ridicule of fentiment, and will perhaps laugh at this as the cant of hypocrify. But no-you have of late assumed that tone yourself, and have preached from the Manager's box in WestminsterHall, and from your place in the House of Commons. In WestminsterHall, indeed, your speeches were exhibitions merely; and when you declaimed against ambition, venality, and the filial inhumanity of the Begum's fon, we conceived no more relation between the speech and the speaker

speaker than when mild Mr Bensley perfonates a murderer, or honest Mr Parsons represents a pickpocket. But do not carry this matter too far. An establishment of virtues is expenfive, and may puzzle even you to keep. In the House of Commons, and applied personally to yourself, you must beware of talking so much of the danger of lotteries and gaming, and of the confciousness of honour, of principle, and of virtue. I know you don't allow much penetration to the country gentlemen; but they have

Extracts from Pennant's London.

Tomb of the Tradescants.

ralist hath made more than reparation, by giving to a genus of plants the title of Tradescantia. The Museum Tradescantianum, a small book, adorned by the hand of Hollar with the heads of the father and the fon, is a proof of their industry. It is a catalogue of their vast collection not only of the subjects of the three kingdoms of nature, but of artificial rarities from great variety of countries. The collection of medals, coins, and other antiquities, appears to have been very valuable. Zoology was in their time but in a low state, and credulity far from being extinguished: among the eggs is one supposed to have been of the dragon, and another of the griffin. You might have found here two feathers of the tail of the phenix, and the claw of the ruck, a bird able to truffe an elephant. Notwithstanding this, the collection was extremely valuable, especially in the vegetable kingdom. In his garden, at his house in South Lambeth, was an amazing arrangement of trees, plants, and flowers. It seems to have been particularly rich in those of the eaft, and of North America. His merit and affiduity must have been very great; for the eastern traveller muit have

IN N the church yard of Lambeth, is a tomb which no naturalist should neglect visiting, that of old John Tradefcant, who, with his fon, lived in this parish. The elder was the first person who ever formed a cabinet of curiofities in this kingdom. The father is said to have been gardener to Charles I.'; but Parkinson says, " sometimes belonging to the " right honorable lord Robert earl " of Salisbury, lord treasurer of Eng" land in his time; and then unto "the right honourable the lord Wot"ton, at Canterbury, in Kent; and " lastly unto the late Duke of Buck"ingham." Both father and son were great travellers: the father is supposed to have visited Russia and most parts of Europe, Turky, Greece, many of the eastern countries, Egypt, and Barbary; out of which he introduced multitudes of plantsand flowers, unknown before in our kingdom. His was an age of florists: the chief ornaments of the parterres wereowing to his labours. Parkinson continually acknowledges the obligation. Many plants were called after his name: these the Linnæan system has rendered almost obfolete: bu: the great natu3 F2

"

have labored under great difficulties from the barbarity of the country : and North America had in his time been but recently settled. Yet we find the names of numbers of trees and plants still among the rarer of much later times. To him we are also indebted for the luxury of many fine fruits; for, as Parkinson observed, "The choysest for goodneffe, and " rareft for knowledge, are to be had " of my very good friend Master "John Tradefcante, who hath wonderly labored to obtaine all the ra" rest fruits hee can heare off in any "place of Chriftendome, Turky, yea, or the whole world." He lived at a large house in this parish, and had an extenfive garden, much visted in his days. After his death, which happened about the year 1652, his collection came into the poffeffion of the famous Mr Elias Ashmole, by virtue of a deed of gift which Mr Tradefcant, junior, had made to him of all his rarities, in true aftrological form, being dated December 15, 1657, 5 bor. 30 minutes poft merid. Mr Ashmole also purchased the house, which is still in being; the garden fell to decay. In the year 1749, it was visited by two respectable niembers of the Royal Society, who found among the ruins some trees and plants,

which evidently were introduced here by the industrious founder. The collection of curiosities were removed by Mr Afhmole, to his Museum at Oxford, where they are carefully preferved. Many very curious arti'cles are to be seen; among others, feveral original dreffes and weapons of the North Americans, in their original state, which may in some period prove serviceable in illuftrating their mnaners and antiquities.

The monument of the Tradescants was erected in 1662, by Hetter, relict of the younger. It is an altar tomb: at each corner is cut a large tree, seeming to support the slab: at one end is an hydra picking at a bare scull, possibly designed as an emblem of Envy; on the other end are the arms of the family: on one fide are ruins, Grecian pillars, and capitals; an obelisk and pyramid, to denote the extent of his travels: and on the opposite, a crocodile, and various shells, expressive of his attention to the study of natural history. Time had greatly injured this monument; but in 1773 it was handsomely restored, at the parish expence; and the infcription, which was originally designed for it, engraven on the stone. As it is both fingular and historical, I present it to the reader :

Know, stranger, ere thou pass, beneath this stone
Lye John Tradefcant, grandfire, father, fon;
The last dy'd in his spring; the other two
Liv'd till they had travell'd Art and Nature through,
As by their choice collections may appear,
Of what is rare, in land, in sea, in air :
Whilft they (as Homer's Iliad in a nut)
A world of wonders in one closet shut ;
These famous Antiquarians that had been
Both gardeners to the Rofe and Lily Queen,
Transplanted now themselves, sleep here; and when
Angels shall with their trumpets waken men,
And fire shall purge the world, these hence shall rife,
And change this garden for a paradife.

Henry

Henry VII. his Chapel in Westminster
Abbey.

In order of time I must pass into the beautiful chapel of Henry VII. nearly the rival in elegance with that of King's College, Cambridge. Who can look at the roof of either without the highest admiration! Henry, finding the chapel of the Confeffor too much crouded to receive any more princes, determined on the building of this. That of the Virgin was facrificed to it; also an adjacent tavern, diftinguithed by the popular sign of the White Rote. Abbot Iflip, on the part of the king, laid the first stone on February 11th, 1502. The royal miser scrupled no expence in this piece of vanity. By his will it appears, that he expressly intended it as the mausoleum of him and his house, and that none but the blood royal thould be interred in this magnificent foundation. It was built at

the expence of fourteen thousand pounds. In the body of this chapel is the superb tomb, the work of Pietro Torregiano, a Florentine sculptor; who had, for his labor and the materials, one thousand pounds. This

admirable artist continued in Lon

don till the completion of his work in
1519. But the reigning prince and
Torregiano were of tempers equally
turbulent, so they soon separated. To
him is attributed the altar tomb of
Margeret countess of Richmond, with
her figute recumbent in brass. Henry
VII. had made a special provision for
this tomb in his will, for the images
and various other ornaments, which
were to decorate this his place of reft.
The tomb itself is, as he directed,
made of a hard Basaltic stone, called
in the language of those days Touche.
The figures contained in the fix bas
reliefs in brafs on the fides, are strong
proofs of the skill of the artist. The
figures fuit the fuperftition of the
times : St Michael and the devil,
joined with the Virgin Mary and
Child: St George with St Anthony,
3 F2

a

and his pig: St Christopher, and
perhaps St Ann: Edward the Con-
Benedictine monk:
feffor, and
Mary Magdalen, and St Barbara:
and several others. One pretence is
a respect to his grandmother, whose
bones he left flung into an ordinary
chest. He and his quiet neglected
queen lie in brafs on an altar tomb
within the beautiful brazen precinct;
his face resembles all his portraits.
I have seen a model, a still stronger
likeness, in possession of Mr Walpole;
a bust in ftone taken from his face

immediately after his death. A ttrong-
er reluctance to quit the possessions
of this world could never be expref-
sed on the countenance of the most
griping mortal,

The peaceful pedant James I, his amiable Henry, and the royal rakish Charles, the second of the name; the fullen mif-treated hero William, his royal confort the patient Mary, Anne, glorious in her generals, and George II. repose within the royal vault of this chapel. No monument

blazons their virtues: it is left to history to record the busy, and often empty tale of majesty. George I. was buried at Hanover; his son caufed a vault to be made in this for himself, his Caroline, and family, and directed the side board of her coffin, and that of his own (when his hour came) to be constructed in sucla a manner as to be removed, so that their loving duft might intermingle,

Palace of Whitehall.

Immediately beyond Canon Row began the vast palace of Whitehall, which was originally built by Hubert de Burgh earl of Kent, the great, the perfecuted justiciary of England, in the reign of Henry III. He bequeathed it to the Black Friars in Holborn, and they disposed of it to Walter de Gray archbishop of York, in 1248. It became for centuries

the