was conscious I must have occasioned to them. But my politeness was cut short by the frank assurances of my host, reiterated more gently, but not less warmly, by his lovely daughter. Carlo and I were now separated, much against the wishes of both, but my fair physician was inexorable, and I was compelled to turn in again, in seaman's phrase, till the morrow, and to suspend for the same time my curiosity.

The next day at length came, and I requested my entertainers to favour me with answers to the questions which I should propose to them. They smiled at my eagerness, and promised to satisfy my curiosity. It was easily done. The old man had a son, who, passing by the Falls of Ohiopyle some nights before, in the evening, was attracted by the moanings and lamentations of a dog, and descending to the bottom of the fall, perceived me at the river-side, where I had been entangled among some weeds and straggling roots of trees. From this situation, he had great difficulty, first, in rescuing me, and, having succeeded in that point, in carrying me to his father's dwelling, where I had lain several days, till by his daughter's unremitting attention (the old man himself being unable materially to assist me, and the son compelled to depart from home on urgent business,) I had been restored, if not to health, to a state of comparative strength. Such were the facts which I contrived to gather from the discourse of my host and his daughter, notwithstanding their softening down, or slightly passing over every thing the relation of which might seem to claim my gratitude, or tend to their own praise. As to themselves, my host was a Pennsylvanian farmer, who, under pressure of misfortune, had retired to this spot, where the exertions of the son sufficed for the support of the whole family, and the daughter attended to the household duties, and to the comfort of the father.

When the old man and his daughter had answered my queries, I renewed my thanks, which were, however, cut short. If they had been of service to a fellow-creature, it was in itself a sufficient reward, even if they had suffered any inconvenience from assisting me (which they assured me was not the case). Many other good things were said at the time, which I forget, for-shall I confess it? the idea that all that had been done for me was the effect of mere general philanthropy displeased me. When I looked at the lovely woman who had nursed me with sister-like affection, I could not bear to reflect that any other placed in a similar situation might have been benefited by the same care, and have been watched over with equal attention, and greeted with the same good-natured smile; that I was cared for no more than another, and valued merely as a being of the same species with themselves, to whom, equally with any other, their sense of duty faught them to do good.

In a day or two my health was so much improved, that I was

permitted to walk out in the small garden which surrounded the cottage. Great was my pleasure in looking at this humble dwelling; its thatched roof, with patches of dark green moss and beautiful verdure; its white walls, and chimney with the wreaths of smoke curling above it; the neat glazed windows; the porch, and its stone seat at the door; the clean pavement of white pebbles before it; the green grass-plat edged with shells, and stones, and flowers, and gemmed with "wee modest" daisies, and the moss-rose tree in the middle, were to me objects on which my imagination could revel for ever, and I sighed to think that I must shortly part from them. It remained for me in some manner to show my gratitude before I parted from my benevolent host; but I was long before I could settle the thing to my mind. I felt unhappy, too, at the thought of leaving the old man, and his beautiful and good daughter; " and yet it cannot be helped," I repeated again and again. "How happy I should be," I thought, "in this lovely spot, and perhaps, the daughter"-dare a man at first acknowledge even to himself that he is in love? "And why should I not be happy?"

I am now married, need I say to whom? And the whitewashed cottage, with its mossy thatch, has the same attractions for me; nay, more, for it is endeared by the ties of love, of kindred, and of happiness. I have lived in it nine years; my children flock around me; my wife loves me; and her father is happy in seeing her happy. Her brother is flourishing in his business, and none in our family are dissatisfied, or in want. Often do I thank God for my blessings, and look back with pleasure to the day when I passed the Falls of Ohiopyle.

ART. V.-Essays, Moral, Philosophical, and Stomachical, on the important science of Good-Living. By LAUNCELOT STURGEON, Esq. Fellow of the Beef-Steak Club, &c.

don. 1822.

12mo. Lon

A GREATER change probably never took place in the manners of the world than that which may be observed in the increased demands for books, and the very considerable portion of time now consumed in reading, compared with the abstemiousness of our ancestors in both these points. In place of a solitary volume of Chaucer, or the amusing history of Froissart, and perhaps another "Frensh boke" to boot, which, reposing in the window-seat of his hall, would most commonly form the entire library of a country gentleman of the olden time, no house is nowa-days duly furnished, without its dazzling files of history and poetry, philosophy and theology, travels and romances, which glitter on the shelves of a room peculiarly dedicated to their reception. The female employments of spinning, sewing, emhroidering, and fineworking, have yielded before the combined

charms of literature and music; and treatises of political economy, the last volume of travels, or the last new romance, usurp the place of the "Complete Racing Calendar," and even divide empire with the sports of the field and the pleasures of the chase. What are likely to be the results of this important change, or how far it may gradually affect the national character, are matters of most interesting speculation, which we cannot now take time to pursue; but we may just remark the fact, that, at no period of history, and in no country of the world, has the appetite for reading been so vigorous, so widely extended, so largely supplied, or so indiscriminately craving, as at this moment in Great Britain. It is the age of book-clubs, circulating libraries, reviews, magazines, and newspapers without end, -in short, of reading and writing, printing and publishing. The busy, bustling world, which has so long kept up a continual coil, seems now at length about to sit still and read; and we can almost anticipate the time when men will forget to perform achievements, and be content with descriptions of them-when the only symptoms of activity to be discerned in the great metropolis will be found in the purlieus of the "Row" on the days of publication-the only movers on the face of this habitable globe will be travellers catering in order to write-and the only voices heard to disturb the deep serene of the public mind, the wrangling of those who are disagreeing upon the merits of the last productions. But be this consummation at hand, or only in distant perspective, the writers of the present day appear determined to let no subject pass unsaid or unsung. They seem to view the things of this world merely as materials for making books, and appreciate every object they behold, by its capabilities for serving their favourite purpose-just as the celebrated farmer and traveller, Arthur Young, who, looking upon the volcanic fire in Italy, said, "I wish I had it at Bradfield, (his farm) I would use it for boiling potatoes for the bullocks." We would not, however, by these random reflections, be understood as throwing out cynical objections to the present state of things in literature-but rather as pointing out to the notice of the observer of manners, some of the inevitable attendants upon an extensive spread of literary information, such as shoals of goodfor-nothing books and superficial readers. Where the great fish haunt, the small fry are sure to swarm; and we could not have had our Shakspeares, Bacons, and Miltons, without myriads of minor writers. Luxury invariably follows the increase of wealth; and the literary riches of England are so vast that we must not be surprised if she grow capricious, and require every whim of mental appetite to be pampered-every freak of her wanton fancy to be gratified. Piquant cates must be searched for, to stimulate the languid appetite-sauces to enrich and vary the flavour of meats grown too familiar to the palate,-and-but

we have inadvertently hit upon an illustration which savours to much of good living not to recal to our memory the little book, which, though it lies open before us, had been, but for our culinary metaphor, lost in the reflections to which a perusal of it gave rise. These essays, then, good reader and liver! may be considered in literature what a paté, a curry, a puff macaroni, or any other of those appendages of a feast, which stud the table around the principal dishes, like stars about the moon, are in good-eating. They are the offspring both of literary and stomachic luxury,-for, had not good living become an object of peculiar attention, and the public grown gourmands of every highly-seasoned delicacy in the shape of a book, these essays would never have been written. They are evidently the composition of a man sated with the pleasures of the table, and cloyed too with the stores of the bookshelf, who, finding nearly every topic, human and divine, loaded with commentations, appears to have said why not sing, or rather say, the praises of a wellfurnished board, a nicely judging cook, a learned and liberal master of the feast? Truly the essayist is himself Epicuri de grege porcus, and, we doubt not, deserves to be called after that great but calumniated professor of pleasure-an appellation in which, as he ingeniously attempts to prove it second to none, he will doubtless glory. His book, too, bears about the same relation to those we should most willingly recommend, which a sprat holds to a salmon, or a basin of thin broth to a tureen of turtle,— but yet it has some merit, which we have no doubt will insure to it a fair proportion of readers,--especially of those who have no objection to purchase the praises of eating and drinking, occupations assuredly not to be regarded with indifference. Nor is it altogether confined to their tastes alone. Manners take their turn in the hands of our essayist, and the severity of didactic composition is tempered by amusing anecdotes, and a fund of small wit--the whole served up in language as smooth and polished as the "round fat oily man," whom, he would fain make us believe, toils in his kitchen to dress his daily meal. But it is time to give a few specimens. The first extract we shall make is from the essay on the " Qualifications necessary in those who give dinners:"and here it appears, that he who cau only pay for that which he chuses to invite his guests to eat, is very far indeed from possessing the right to give a dinner. We quote the character of Count Zinzendorff, whom the essayist describes as a man after his own heart.

"Lewis, Count Zinzendorff, one of the ministers of the Emperor Charles VI., kept the most elegant, as well as the most profuse, table in all Vienna. Although formed to shine with distinguished lustre in the cabinet, yet he was less jealous of his reputation there, than of that more solid renown which he might acquire by giving the most splendid entertainments of any minister in Europe. He was equally acquainted with Asiatic and European luxury: his curries rivalled those of the Great Mogul; his olios exceeded

:

those of Spain; his pastry was more delicate than that of Naples; his macaroni was made by the Grand Duke's cook; his liver-pies were prepared at Strasburg and Toulouse, and his Périgueux patés were really brought from thence; nor was there in any country a grape of the least repute, but a sample of it in wine was for the honour of its vineyards, to be found on his sideboard. His kitchen was an epitome of the universe; for there were cooks in it of all nations, and rarities from every quarter of the globe. To collect these, he had agents appointed in each place of any note for its productions: the carriages on which they were laden came quicker and more regularly than the posts; and the expenses of the transport of his dinners ran higher than those for secret correspondence. In his general conversation, the Count was cautious in his conferences with other ministers, he was reserved: but at his table all this state machinery was thrust aside: there he discoursed at large, and delivered the most copious and instructive lectures on all his exotic and domestic delicacies; and here no professor was ever less a plagiary. He had this pillau from Prince Eugene, who had it from the Bashaw of Buda; the egg-soup was made after a receipt of the Duke de Richelieu; the roan-ducks were stewed in the style of the Cardinal du Bois; and the pickled-lampreys came from a great minister in England. His dishes furnished him with a kind of chronology: his water-souchy was borrowed from Marshal d'Auverquerque's table, when he was first in Holland; the partridge stuffed with mushrooms and stewed in wine, was a discovery made by that prince of good livers, the Duke de Vendôme during the war of the succession; and the Spanish Puchero was the only solid result of the negociation with Riperda. In short, with true Apicean eloquence, he generously instructed the novices in the arts of good living; and as Solomon discoursed of every herb, from the cedar of Lebanon to the hyssop on the wall, so, he began with a champignon no bigger than a Dutchman's waistcoat button, and ended with a wild boar, the glory of the German forest.

"There was always an hour in his public days when he was totally inaccessible. The politicians were astonished at a retirement for which they could assign no reason, until an inquisitive foreigner, by giving a large gratuity to one of his servants, was let into the secret. Being placed in a closet between the chamber of audience and the room where the Count was, he saw him seated in an elbow chair: when, preceded by a page with a cloth on his arm and a drinking glass, one of his domestics appeared, who presented a salver with many little pieces of bread, elegantly disposed; and was followed by the first cook, who, on another salver, had a number of small boats filled with as many different kinds of gravy. His Excellency then, tucking his napkin in his cravat, first washed and gargled his mouth, then dipped a piece of bread successively into each of the sauces, and having tasted it with much deliberation, carefully rincing his palate after every one, to avoid confusion, he at length, with inexpressible sagacity, decided on the destination of them all.

"He was indeed a host! take him for all in all,

We ne'er shall look upon his like again."

In the hints to grown gentlemen, we find the following ludicrous instance of calm self-possession.

"If you should, unhappily, be forced to carve,-neither labour at the joint, until you put yourself into a heat and hack it so that one might with justice exclaim," mangling done here!" nor make such a desperate effort to dissect it, as may put your neighbours in fear of their lives. However, if an accident should happen, make no excuses, for they are only an acknowledgment of awkwardness. We remember to have seen a man of high fashion deposit a turkey in this way in the lap of a lady; but, with admirable composure, and without offering the slightest apology, he finished a story which he was telling at the same time, and then, quietly turning to her, merely said—“ Madam, I'll thank you for that turkey."