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heaven, and fall down extinguished on the earth. "That is myself," said his bleeding heart; and the serpentfangs of remorse pierced deeper into its wounds. His excited fancy showed him night-walkers gliding upon the roofs, and the windmill seemed to lift its arms threateningly towards him, while a solitary skull, that had been left behind in the empty charnel-house, gradually assumed his features.

In the midst of his horrors, there sounded suddenly from the church-tower, the music of the new year, like distant holy hymnings. He became softened and more composed. He gazed around upon the horizon, and upon the wide earth, and he thought of his early friends, who, as teachers of their fellows, fathers of happy children, honest and virtuous men, were all happier and better than himself; and he said, "Oh! I, too, on this first night of the new year, might have fallen asleep, like you, with dry eyes, if I would. I, too, dear parents, might have been happy, if I had followed your newyear's wishes and counsels."

steps he had taken in the dark passages of vice, and to place his feet upon the bright sunny path, which leads to the pure land of blessedness.

Turn back with him, young reader, if thou hast entered, like him, upon the path of error; otherwise, this frightful dream will, in future, be thy judge; and then, if, with a voice of anguish thou shalt cry, "Return again, fair youth,"-Alas! it will never return!-Jean Paul.

EDUCATION.

mind by inculcating any opinions before it had come to THELWALL thought it very unfair to influence a child's years of discretion to choose for itself. I shewed him my garden, and told him it was my botanical garden. "How so?" said he; "it is covered with weeds." "O," I replied, "that is only because it has not yet come to its taken the liberty to grow, and I thought it unfair in me age of discretion and choice. The weeds, you see, have to prejudice the soil towards roses and strawberries." --Coleridge.

To be humble to superiors, is duty; to equals, is courtesy; to inferiors is nobleness; and to all, safety: it being a virtue, that, for all her lowliness, commandeth the souls it stoops to.-Sir Thomas More.

In this feverish recollection of his youth, it seemed to him as if the skull, with his features in the charnelhouse, raised itself; and, at length, the superstition which, on New-Year's Eve, sees ghosts, and the events of the future, gave it the form of a living youth, in the attitude of the beautiful sculptured boy of the capital, who is taking a thorn out of his foot. He fancied he saw his own blooming youthful figure represented in Popular Notions of Scibitter mockery before him.

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CONTENTS.

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Church Architecture, No.
III., (with Illustration).... 308
The Last Word of the

Reading for the Young:Dornie Bach, (with Illustration)....

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Poems and Pictures .......... 317

The Spinning Maiden's

Cross, (with Illustration) 318 MISCELLANEOUS:

He could bear to look at it no longer; he covered his eyes; thousands of scalding tears streamed upon the snow; and, in low, broken, despairing tones, he sighed out, "Oh! come again, my youth, come again!" And it came again; for he had only been dreaming a horrid dream on this New-Year's Night: he was still a young man. But his errors were no dream; and he London :-Published by T. B. SHARPE, 15, Skinner Street, Snow-hill.

thanked God that he had still time left to retrace the

Singer, Chap. II............. 310
Popular Year-Book...... 314

New Year's Eve...
Education

Printed by R. CLAY, Bread Street Hill.

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SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF LORD COLLINGWOOD. THE most interesting description of biography is that which deals most largely with the private life of public men, and which exhibits them to us most clearly in those familiar relations which are common to them with the general herd of mankind. The subject of the biography must have borne, in some degree, a public character, otherwise its deficiency in dignity fails to invest it with such interest as will command general attention. We cannot bring ourselves to care much for commonplace details regarding men who have nothing that is not common-place in their histories. On the other hand, if the life of the individual is merely used as a guiding line along which to trace the narrative of public and historical events, then it is nothing else than history, imperfectly and inadequately written. That biography is the most successful, which, laying before us most fully the feelings, affections, and passions, the points of weakness and strength, of men, whom otherwise we should know only in their connexion with, and as influencing the course of, the great and stirring events which affect the fortunes and determine the struggles of nations, throws most of a human interest over characters whose position somewhat tends to raise them out of the region of general sympathy.

individual is so entirely absorbed by the public man, that, were we to exclude from the record of their deeds all that is not matter of general history, we should leave little or nothing worth knowing. Such men are mere historical monuments, convenient-perhaps necessaryfor giving some degree of individuality of interest to historical events; if very eminent or very successful, then, it may be, concentrating in their own persons the greater part of the historical interest of their day of glory; but as men, having human hearts in their bosoms, and standing towards other men in the varied relations of private life, we know them not, or care not for them; the marble effigies, which remain to represent them in the national depositories of memorials of the illustrious dead, are not less interesting to our feelings.

It is not every man, however, whose biography can thus be written. There are some in whom the private

Corresponding to the interest which we take in all that is purely personal to public men, is the pain with which we are too often obliged to pass from feelings of gratitude for great public services, and of admiration for splendid achievements in statesmanship or war, to those of stern moral reprobation for personal vices, or of compassion and humiliation for lamentable weaknesses and inconsistencies. The jar which is occasioned to our whole moral frame, by the encounter of feelings so opposite to each other, is one of the most unpleasing experiences to which the student of history, or of human

nature (the study of history is the study of human nature), is ever subjected; so unpleasing, that most men labour to escape from it, by stifling the one or the other, and leaving its opposite in undisputed possession of the field. They either borrow from the glories of the hero or the statesman a light, the glare of which prevents them from marking the moral deformity of the man; or, making the latter the chief feature in their picture, they throw from it a deep and dark shadow, which obscures, and utterly blots out, all the brightness of the former. How often is history written by men, of no dishonest purpose, but merely yielding to the natural tendency to shrink from painful impressions, as if private vices ceased to be such when marking the character of those whose public actions they admire; or, as if great action lost all worthiness and called for no approbation, because proceeding from men of whose personal characters they disapproved!

We do not profess here to write a life of Lord Collingwood, or to give any particulars regarding him which are not to be found in those sources of information already open to the public. But we have thought a very slight sketch of the leading particulars of his career may not be uninteresting to our readers. He was descended from a family of considerable antiquity and distinction in the county of Northumberland, where they at one time held large possessions. But of these a portion was lost in the great civil war, in which his ancestor adhered to the cause of Charles the First; another portion was forfeited on account of the accession of a second ancestor to the rebellion of 1715; a third passed to a younger branch of the family; so that Lord Collingwood's father succeeded to an ancient and honourable name, and a very moderate fortune. He settled at Newcastle-on-Tyne; and married the daughter of a Westmoreland Squire, by whom he had three sons and three daughters. Cuthbert (afterwards Lord Collingwood) was the eldest.

There have been, however, happily not a few men, great and admirable in public life, to the contemplation of whose private characters we can descend without a Cuthbert was born on 26th September, 1750, and single feeling of pain or misgiving; men who have was educated at Newcastle, along with the late lords not the less basked in the warm sunshine of domestic Stowell and Eldon; one of whom used afterwards to affection, unswerving friendship, and all the endearing speak of him as having been a pretty and gentle boy. relations of private life, that they have nobly confronted He was placed in the navy when he was only eleven the storm and turmoil of the encounter of human pas-years old, under the care of his cousin, Captain, afterwards sions in the great conflicts of parties and nations. It is Admiral Brathwaite, who then commanded the Shanin such cases that biography is truly delightful. We non. After having served with him many years, and are harassed by no struggle between the sentiment of subsequently with Admiral Roddam, he went, in 1774, admiration for greatness on the one hand, and our to Boston with Admiral Graves; and in 1775 was made moral judgment of right and wrong on the other. On a lieutenant, on the day of the battle of Bunker's Hill. the contrary, our admiration and our moral judgment In 1776 he went to Jamaica, as lieutenant of the Hornet moving in the same direction, and meeting in harmony, sloop. There he succeeded Lord Nelson, as lieutenant of form together a compound in which the firm solidity the Lowestoffe, on that officer's promotion to another of the one, and the warmth of the other, become amal-ship; and it is remarkable that, at each step of promogamated into a feeling of the most glowing and affec- tion gained by Nelson, Collingwood stepped into the tionate veneration. place he had left, until they both became post-captains. In 1786 Collingwood returned to England and remained at home four years, making acquaintance, as he said, with his own family. In 1790 an armament was prepared against Spain, and he was appointed to the command of the Mermaid, and went to the West Indies with Admiral Cornide; but affairs with Spain and Russia having been accommodated, and seeing no prospect of immediate employment, he returned to his native county, where he was soon after married to a Miss Blackett, by whom he had two daughters, one born in 1792, and another in 1793.

We would place Lord Collingwood high in the rank of men of this last class; as one, to either aspect of whose life, the public or the private, we can equally turn, with an increasing feeling of respect for his character. As a naval commander he occupied the second place in public estimation, only because, while Nelson lived, it was impossible that any one but he could occupy the first place, or that any one should share it with him; and, as a private man, a husband, and a father, we may search into his whole life with the most jealous scrutiny, without finding any such unhappy blots as dimmed the bright sun of Nelson's glory. But that which gives a most affecting interest to his history, is the species of martyrdom to which he was subjectedwhich he bore with so much uncomplaining fortitude and under which he ultimately sunk. As much an exile from home, and all its enjoyments, as any convict in a penal settlement; as entirely shut out from the solace of indulging those affections and home-keeping tastes with which he was so richly endowed, as if his country had driven him forth with dishonour, instead of employing him in its most honourable and important service; during seventeen years enjoying only one year of peace and home;--the constant cry upon his lips was, as his heart yearned after his beloved wife, and the two darlings who were growing up into womanhood without being almost known to him, "Would it were peace, that I might get home!" Never hunted deer longed for its resting-place as he did for his return to his wife, his children, and his garden. But it is remarkable that, in his utmost longings for home, he never disconnected, even in thought, the idea of his return from that of peace. He never dreamt of deserting his post. He did not, as he easily might have done, seize upon the excuse of failing health and long service, to ask for a release; like a sterling, noble-hearted, unflinching hero as he was, he went on working while he could be of use, bracing up his relaxed nerves as he best could, and stifling the longings which swelled in his bosom, but never leaving his haruess until he sunk in it, and literally died at his work.

When the war with France broke out in 1793. Captain Collingwood was appointed captain of the Prince, in which he was present at the action of the 1st of June, fought by Lord Howe, off Cape la Hogue, and highly distinguished himself, although, from some unexplained caprice of the admiral, his name was not mentioned in the despatches.

From the Prince, Captain Collingwood removed into the Barfleur, and afterwards into the Excellent, in which he went into the Mediterranean. He had not been long there when he had to bear a part in another victory, still more decisive and glorious than that, for his services in which he was so ill requited. On the 14th of February, 1797, was fought the battle of Cape St. Vincent, in which the Spanish fleet was defeated, and almost destroyed, by the British force under Sir John Jervis. Captain Collingwood wrote an account of this victory, in a letter to his wife, three days after it took place, from which we gather the following particulars :-They had been cruising at sea, off Cape St. Vincent, with fifteen sail of the line, when the admiral received information that the Spanish fleet, twenty-eight sail of the line, were come down the Mediterranean; and, a day or two afterwards, that twenty-seven sail were in his neighbourhood, one being left at Gibraltar, with ten or twelve frigates, making in all thirty-eight or forty sail. The British were fifteen, and four frigates. He determined to attack them. On the night of the 13th, the weather being fine, but thick and hazy, signal guns were heard, which announced the

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vicinity of the Spanish fleet, and soon after daylight they came in sight, very much scattered, while the British were a compact little body. "We flew to them," says Collingwood, as a hawk to his prey, passed through them in the disordered state in which they were, separated them into two distinct parts, and then tacked upon their largest division." A little incident, which was noticed with just appreciation by Nelson, in a letter to the Duke of Clarence (the late king), shows in a strong light the unostentatious, but earnest and business-like style in which Collingwood performed his duty. The first ship he engaged was the San Salvador del Mundo, of 112 guns. Her colours soon came down, and her fire ceased. He hailed, and asked if they surrendered; and understanding by signs, made by a man who stood by the colours, that she did, he, without waiting to see her hoist English colours, left her to be taken possession of by some one behind, and made sail for the next ship, which, after a short encounter, also surrendered. On this, Nelson remarks, in his letter to the Duke of Clarence: "The Salvador del Mundo and San Isidro dropped astern, and were fired into in a masterly style by the Excellent, who compelled the San Isidro to hoist English colours, and I thought the large ship, Salvador del Mundo had also struck; but Captain Colling wood, disdaining the parade of taking possession of beaten enemies, most gallantly pushed up, with every sail set, to save his old friend and messmate, who was, to all appearance, in a critical situation, the Captain (Nelson's ship) being actually fired upon by three firstrates and the San Nicholas, the 74 within about pistolshot distance of the San Nicholas. The Blenheim being a-head, and the Culloden being crippled and a-stern, the Excellent ranged up, and hauling up her mainsail just a-stern, passed within ten feet of the San Nicholas, giving her a most awful and tremendous fire. The San Nicholas luffing up, the San Joseph fell a-board of her, and the Excellent passed on to the Santissima Trinidada." This last was a four-decker, of 132 guns; a ship such as had scarcely over before been seen. Collingwood was engaged for an hour with her; and, but for an accident, would, according to the general opinion of the fleet, have compelled her to surrender. The service which Nelson so warmly acknowledges in the foregoing letter, Colling wood mentions in the slightest manner possible in his narrative, showing how little his mind was apt to dwell upon his own merits, or to magnify services rendered by him. "My good friend, the Commodore," he says, as if his interposition had been a mere accident, "had been long engaged with those ships, and I came, happily, to his relief, for he was dreadfully mauled."

There was no possibility of Collingwood's services being overlooked this time, had there been any inclination to do so, which does not appear. Letters of commendation and thanks poured in upon him from all quarters, Nelson, with characteristic warmth of expression, thanked him for the timely aid he had brought to him, while Collingwood, in his reply, made as light as possible of what he had done. The continued friendship of these two great men, so very dissimilar in many points of their character, and the eagerness with which each strove to magnify the merits of the other, even at the expense of his own, form some of the most delightful traits in the lives of both.

When the medals for the victory of St. Vincent were distributed, one was, of course, tendered to Captain Collingwood. But he refused to receive it until the slight passed upon him on the occasion of the 1st of June was repaired. "I feel," he said to Lord St. Vincent, by whom the intended honour was announced to him, " that I was then improperly passed over: and to receive such a distinction now would be to acknowledge the propriety of that injustice." "That is precisely the answer I expected from you, Captain Collingwood," was Lord St. Vincent's reply. The two medals were afterwards transmitted to him, with an apology (rather a lame one-but that was of little consequence-to go through the form

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of apologizing was a sufficient acknowledgment of the injustice) for the first having been withheld.

But amid all this excitement of battle, victory, and well-earned distinction, Collingwood's heart was, as it and children. ever was during his whole life, in his home with his wife Whatever the subject of his letters, or however much his mind was occupied by business, never did he omit to mention them with the warmest affection, and to commend them earnestly to the favour and protection of God. girls," he says, in a letter to his father-in-law, "give me "The accounts I receive of my dear infinite pleasure. How happy I shall be to see them again! But God knows when the blessed day will come in which we shall be again restored to the comforts of domestic life." kindness to me, to Sarah, and my darling girls. They "I am very thankful for all your do not know the want of a father's care while your protection is over them; and I hope they will live to tell you of their gratitude, when they can reason on your goodness themselves." Speaking of the kindness his wife and daughters had received from some relatives of rank, he says," I never think of it but with a satisfaction that goes to my heart. In this long cruise we want something to comfort us, and to make us amends for brown shirts and scanty dinners." Writing of the battle of St. Vincent, he says, " One of the great pleasures I have received from this glorious event is, that I expect it will enable me to provide handsomely for those who serve me well. Give my love to my wife, and blessing to my children. What a day it will be to me when I meet them again!"

At the next great triumph of the naval power of Britain, the battle of the Nile, fought in 1798, Collingwood had not the good fortune to be present. While deeply chagrined at his compelled absence, he rejoiced with all the ungrudging fervour of a true patriot, and of a mind above the littleness of envy, in the glory acquired by his more fortunate brethren in arms. "Say to Lady Nelson," said he, writing to his friend Nelson, his devoted attachment to whom was a conspicuously bright spot in a character in which there was nothing dark to set off its brightness by contrast,"when you write to her, how much I congratulate her on the safety, honours, and services of her friend. Good God! what must be her feelings! how great her gratitude to heaven for such mercies!" And to another friend he writes: "I congratulate you, my dear friend, on your success. Oh, my dear Ball, how I have lamented that I was not one of you! I have been almost broken-hearted all the summer. My ship was in as perfect order for any service as those which were sent; in zeal I will yield to none; and my friendship, my love for your admirable admiral gave me a particular interest in serving with him. I saw them preparing to leave us, and to leave me, with pain; but our good chief found employment for me, and to occupy my mind sent me to cruise off St. Luccars, to intercept the poor cabbage carriers. Oh, humiliation! But for the consciousness that I did not deserve degra dation from any hand, and that my good estimation would not be depreciated in the minds of honourable men, by the caprice of power, I should have died with indignation."

Shortly after this he was permitted to visit his home, but only for a few weeks. He was raised to the rank of rear-admiral, and returned in the Triumph to the Mediterranean. His longing for peace, that he might be able to settle at home, and spend the rest of his days in the bosom of his family, had now become the fixed habit of his mind, the hope which stimulated him to exertion, the reward to which he looked forward in return for so many sacrifices. Writing to his father-in-law on an occasion of his wife's illness: "Would to God that this war were happily concluded! It is anguish enough to me to be thus for ever separated from my family; but that my Sarah should, in my absence, be suffering, is complete misery. Pray, my dear sir, have the goodness

to write a line or two very often, to tell me how she does. I am quite pleased at the account you give me of my girls. If it were peace, I do not think there would be a happier set of creatures in Northumberland than we should be." Again: "It is a great comfort to me, banished as I am from all that is dear to me, to learn that my beloved Sarah and her girls are well. Would to heaven it were peace! that I might come, and for the rest of my life be blessed in their affection. Indeed, this unremitting hard service is a great sacrifice, giving up all that is pleasurable to the soul, or soothing to the mind, and engaging in a constant contest with the elements, or with tempers and dispositions as boisterous and untractable. Great allowance should be made for us when we come on shore; for, being long in the habit of absolute command, we grow impatient of contradiction, and are unfitted for the gentle intercourse of quiet life. I am really in great hopes that it will not be long before the experiment will be made upon me, for I think we shall soon have peace; and I assure you that I will endeavour to conduct myself with as much moderation as possible. I have come to another resolution, which is, when this war is happily terminated, to think no more of ships, but pass the rest of my days in the bosom of my family, where, I think, my prospects of happiness are equal to any man's." Almost every letter which he wrote at this period is in the same strain.

The peace of Amiens gave him a short enjoyment of the two great objects of his desire-peace and home. The short period of happiness and rest he then enjoyed, he employed in superintending the education of his daughters, and in continuing habits of study, which had long been familiar to him, and the fruits of which are very visible in his exceedingly well-written letters. On the recommencement of hostilities in 1803, however, he was again called away into active service.

We shall not dwell on minor incidents, but proceed to the next great event of his life-the battle of Trafalgar. He was here, as is well known, second in command to Nelson; and upon him devolved the task, a melancholy and painful one it proved, of completing the victory which Nelson lived only long enough to render certain. We cannot burden this brief sketch with details of mere fighting: it will be understood at once that Collingwood behaved with his usual distinguished gallantry, and justified to the full the confidence which Nelson reposed in him, which was, he said, as great as one man could have in another. Admiral Collingwood, on succeeding to the command, issued a general order immediately after the battle, appointing a day "of general humiliation before God, and thanksgiving for his merciful goodness, imploring forgiveness of sins, a continuation of his divine merey, and his constant aid to us in defence of our country's liberties and laws, without which the utmost efforts of man are naught." The day after the battle a violent storm sprung up, which rendered it impossible to secure the prizes; and most of them escaped, though in a wretched condition, or were sunk. The kindness with which Collingwood treated such prisoners as fell into his hands, elicited the warmest expressions of gratitude from the Spanish officers on the coast, and was the source of an abundant return of good services to the English. He thus writes to his father-in-law: "To alleviate the miseries of the wounded, as much as in my power, I sent a flag to the Marquis Solana, to offer him his wounded. Nothing can exceed the gratitude expressed by him for this act of humanity: all this part of Spain is in an uproar of praise and thankfulness to the English. Solana sent me a present of a cask of wine; and we have a free intercourse with the shore. Judge of the footing we were on, when I tell you he offered me his hospitals, and pledged the Spanish honour for the care and cure of our wounded men. Our officers and men, who were wrecked in some of the prize-ships, were most kindly treated: all the country was on the beach to receive them; the priests and women distri

buting wine, and bread, and fruit, amongst them. The soldiers turned out of their barracks to make lodging for them; whilst their allies, the French, were left to shift for themselves, with a guard over them to prevent their doing mischief."

A letter from the king's private secretary, Colonel Taylor, conveyed to Admiral Collingwood his majesty's warm admiration of his conduct during and after this engagement; and the Duke of Clarence presented him with a sword, an honour he had previously conferred on Earl St. Vincent and Lord Nelson under similar circumstances. He was raised to the peerage; received the thanks and freedom of the principal cities of Great Britain; and a pension was granted by parliament of 2,000l. per annum for his own life, and, in the event of his death, of 1,000l. per annum to Lady Collingwood, and of 500l. per annum to each of his two daughters. We cannot refrain from quoting the letter which he wrote to his wife on this occasion:-" It would be hard if I could not find one hour to write a letter to my dearest Sarah, to congratulate her on the high rank to which she has been advanced by my success. Blessed may you be, my dearest love, and may you long live the happy wife of your happy husband! I do not know how you bear your honours, but I have so much business on my hands, from dawn till midnight, that I have hardly time to think of mine, except it be in gratitude to my king, who has so graciously conferred them upon me. But there are so many things of which I might justly be a little proud,-for extreme pride is folly,that I must share my gratification with you. The first is the letter from Colonel Taylor, his majesty's private secretary, to the Admiralty, to be communicated to me. I enclose you a copy of it. It is considered the highest compliment the king can pay; and, as the king's personal compliment, I value it above every thing. I am told, that when my letter was carried to him, he could not read it for tears, joy and gratitude to Heaven for our success so entirely overcame him. I have such congratulations, both in prose and verse, as would turn the head of one a little more vain than I am.How are my darlings? I hope they will take pains to make themselves wise and good, and fit for the station to which they are raised."

This was the last of Lord Collingwood's battles. The remainder of his career of service was spent in a manner less congenial to his taste, though probably not less important to the interests of the country, in watching the operations of the enemy in the Mediterranean, counteracting their designs, promoting the political views and upholding the influence of his government, encouraging and supporting their allies, and overawing their enemies. The mass of business which these numerous employments heaped upon his shoulders was too much for his strength. His constitution was naturally a very hardy one, but it had been undermined by the long hard service he had passed through, and it gave way altogether under this accumulation of new and harassing labours. The constant confinement on board ship, and long bending over a desk, while engaged in his voluminous correspondence, (for so high was the opinion entertained of his judgment that he was consulted from all quarters, and on all occasions, on questions of general policy, of regulation, and even of trade,) brought on a contraction of the pylorus, which occasioned him the greatest suffering. Still he remained unflinchingly at his post: his friends repeatedly urged him to surrender his command, and to seek in England that repose which had become so necessary in his declining health, but he would not make any attempt to quit the station which had been assigned to him until he should be duly relieved, urging, that his life was his country's, in whatever way it might be required of him. It was only when he became literally unable to bear the slightest fatigue, and an immediate return to England was declared necessary to preserve him for any time in life, that, on the 3d of March, 1810, he surrendered his command. But it was now too

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