Of Pall-Mall old Gardiner, whose dirt rank'd his

god-o!

Sometimes us'd the press: who as strange as

Monboddo,

That once held opinion, men, erst like the brute,
Had tails, and with all fours proceeded en route;
So he while determin'd on earth beast to vie,
In room just existed like a pig in a stye.
By Darwin allur'd, many scribes prove gallants,
pay their devoirs to sweet misses, the plants (e).

And

know the writer, and will let you into the secret;" when, with a very grave face, Mary Anne was given to understand that the unknown writer of Junius's Letters was no other than his own august father; which information the lady was enjoined to keep a dead secret from all the world.

(e) The late eccentric Mr. Gardiner was by no means divested of a literary talent at retort; his peculiar predilection however for dirt, and consequent hatred of a besom, rendered the result of a visit to his shop rather dangerous. The late Lord Monboddo, who cherished many singular notions, has told us in his works, that men originally had tails like monkeys, which

On Cooking some court of Apicius the muse; (f) Sage Crispins must publish for dames to make shoes.

forcibly brings to mind Swift's honourable representation of the human race under the title of Yahoos. Darwin's Loves of the Plants is pleasingly written, and speaks the writer to have possessed a most inventive and playful genius.

(f) Since the period of Mrs. Glass, of culinary renown, many works on cookery have issued from the press to tantalize and satiate the Epicurean palate. With respect to shoemaking, every dame of quality is now acquainted with the bristle, wax end, awl, and the last: that the ladies, however, may form some judgment of the difference in opinion as to this now fashionable employment, I have to request their perusal of the ensuing statement.

A writer on the customs of Spain, as they were but a few years ago, says that parents who had a regard to the respectability of their offspring would as soon bring up their son to the occupation of a hangman as apprentice him to the trade of a shoemaker. This is amongst the occupations which an old Spaniard calls dishonest, and by which he would as effectually pollute his blood, as an Indian would forfeit his cast by eating hog's flesh out of the unclean platter of a Portuguese. To be a mender of shoes, or in vulgar phrase a cobbler, is no degradation to a Spaniard's dignity; but to be a maker of them in the first

Long strictures on velvet designs gives a Towne ;
While leaving to ages unborn the renown

Of wond'rous Mnemonics, a volume I've seen,

Which states that our thoughts, when by art render'd

keen,

Not only to mem'ry can actions recall,

But note down what never existed at all:

Of satirists able but few now are seen,

Abuse is retail'd for just sarcasm keen;
While crowds may be rated of mungrels that bark,
Who libel and lie, dastard knaves, in the dark ;
And fearless with rancour e'er virtue assail, (g)
Nor halt till chief justice condemns them to jail.

instance is corrupt and vile, and such an artisan cannot consort or intermarry with the persons that are uncontaminated with any thing but poverty and vermin.

(g) Mr. Towne, whose name stands recorded as the instructor of Mary Anne Clarke in this branch of fashionable education, has absolutely made the press subservient to his purposes, in holding forth a frippery art of this nature as an acquirement of the most essential consequence to ladies of refined

Some samples we boast of the ludicrous school,
In Hamlet Travesty shines ably a Poole. (h)
At Parnass the great and the small wet their whistles,
Enroll'd public scribblers by printing epistles; (i)

education. The short-lived reign of this new system, tending to elongate the memory, is a convincing proof of its inefficacy when put into practice in order to answer any purpose of extensive and real importance. Satire is much easier talked of than really defined; we have very few writers who comprehend its meaning, since that which is most frequently denominated satire in the present day is little removed from scurrility and abuse, and not unfrequently downright libel.

(h) Hamlet Travesty, by Mr. Poole, is one of the best works of this class now extant in the English language. The Bombastes Furioso of Rhodes possesses great merit; and Syntax's Tour, from the pen of Doctor Coombe, can never fail to repay the reader for an attentive perusal of this last-mentioned gentleman many other works are before the public, which he scrupulously conceals as being emanations from his prolific talent.

(i) Of epistolary writers the late Lady Mary Wortley Montague has justly acquired fame for the information her letters contain, and the easy stile of composition in which they are endited. Of Junius it would be needless to offer a word on the score of panegyric. With respect to the posthumous works

And as for translators we boast 'em in legions, Retailers of works from all climates and regions; (k)

of Miss Ann Seward, they are pedantic and inflated in the extreme. Independently of these, as writers of epistles that have been published, we might even note down the Prince Regent, Duke of York, &c. &c.: one letter, however, shall, for its singularity, be subjoined, with which I will close the subject under review.

The following is an exact copy, verbatim et literatim, of an epistle sent, in 1804, from a poor woman in Scotland to the Emperor Alexander:

"Unto the Most Excellant Alexander Emprore of that Grat Dominion of Russia, and the Teratorys the Unto Belonging, &c. &.&.

"Your Most Humble Servant Most Humbly beges your Most Gratious Pardon for my Boldness in aprotching your Most Dreed Sovring for Your Clemency at this Time.

"My Sovring the Candour of this Freedom is on the account of Your Sovrings Goodness in the Serving and Inlarging of My Son, whose Name is John Duncan, aged 26 years, who was on a Premce, who was prisioner with Robert Spittle his Master Captaen of the Han, Spittle of Alloa at the Time of the British Embargo in Your Sovring's Dominions in Russia, who is the only Seport of me his Mother and Besaid I have no other freend