which he received may excuse him for having drawn a more flattering portrait of the people of France, than is usually pencilled by Englishmen who have not been so fortunate as to the society into which they were thrown. The vo lume is ornamented with a variety of views taken by Mr. Carr on the spot: they do credit to his taste, and doubtless to his accuracy. ART. XXII. Paris as it was and as it is; or a Sketch of the French Capital; illustra tive of the Effects of the Revolution, with repect to Sciences, Literature, Arts, Religion, Education, Manners, and Amusements; comprising also a correct Account of the most remarkable National Establishments and Public Buildings. In a Series of Letters, written by an ENGLISH TRAVELLER during the Years 1801-2, to a Friend in London. 8vo. 2 vols. pp. 1040. THIS will be a very useful as well as entertaining companion to the Englishman at Paris, should a speedy peace allow him to visit the capital. The author has given a more ample and minute account of the various places of amusement, public buildings, galleries, scientific and learned institutions, &c. than any of the numerous travellers whose descriptions have come before us. His account is interspersed with a variety of historical anecdotes, illustrative of the French character and manners, and his attention is very properly employed in estimating the utility and intrinsic importance of those military, naval, and civil institutions which have been so multiplied since the era of the revolution. We ape the French in their fashions and their fooleries; it would be more becoming if, impressed with the just sense of the advantages they are likely to derive from their various schools for public services, we were to rival them in similar establishments. The author of pages is desirous of calling the attention of the British government to this subject, and by way of stimulating the ambition of British genius, he assures us that the arts and sciences in France are now making a rapid and simultaneous progress; first, says he, because the revolution has made them popular in that country; and secondly, because they are connected by new ties which in a great measure render them inseparable. Facts are then recurred to, less with a view to draw from them immediate applications, than to develope the truths resulting from them. "With them, method is an induction incessantly verified by experiment; whence it gives to human intelligence, not wings which lead it astray, but reins which guide these it." In a letter on the state of French literature, we find some ingenious remarks and shrewd distinctions. Under the constituent assembly the literary genius of the French was turned towards politics and eloquence; under the legislative assembly, literature was constantly cultivated under several forms, although the literati themselves became victims of the political convulsions of their country. The national institute was esta blished under the directorial government. It was at one time insinuated in many periodical publications of this country, that literature had been totally annihilated in France during the course of the revolution. This is a mistake; and our author seems justified in stating that " its aberrations have been taken for eclipses;" it has followed the revolution, says he, through all its phases. The literati, he observes, are now considered as men of secondary importance, the savans taking the lead; to these latter, who have revived the drooping arts and sciences, France is under the greatest obligations. The utility of the objects to which genius and labour are devoted, give them a fair title to prefcrence; the consequence has been, that while the French government has flattered men of letters, its solid distinctions and honours are reserved to men of science. Science and literature, however, must ever go hand in hand; and we are not at all surprised at the result of our author's observation, namely, on the one hand, that few men of science are unacquainted with the literature of their country; and on the other, that very few literati are unacquainted with philosophy and the sciences, and above all with natural knowledge. The general inference then is, that "French literature has not received any apparent injury from the revolutionary storm: it has only changed its direction and means it has still remaining talents which have served their time, talents in their maturity, and talents in a state of. probation, and of much promise." cling each. The coins begin at Hadrian, and end at Julia Domna. This border surrounds two bass reliefs, one of which, the largest, forms the centre piece: the rapid description which Mr. Weston gives of this "inestimable treasure of antiquity," makes us anxious to see the promised plate and dissertation of Citizen Millin. Has it yet made its appearance ? ART. XXIII. The Praise of Paris: or a Sketch of the French Capital; in Extraits of Letters from France in the Summer of 1802; with an Index of many of the Convents, Churches, and Palaces, not in the French Catalogues, which have furnished Pictures for the Louvre Gallery. By S. W. F. R. S. F. A. S. 8vo. pp. 186. "THE Praise of Paris"! Surely this is not the language of impartiality; but all things must be estimated by comparison, and in order to justify his eulogy, Mr. Weston could not do better than compare Paris with itself. "In the year 1792," says he, "I ran from Paris with fear and trembling, because she was possessed, like a demoniac, with a spirit of carnage, and reeked in the blood of August and September. During the interim between 1792 and 1802, when I revisited her again, she had continued in a state of siege for ten years, beset with troubles from without and violent agitations from within, and perpetual spoil. But all things have an end; and now on my return to the same place, before so full of confusion and disorder, I find it swept and garnished, restored to its senses, and in its right mind: this extraordinary change calls aloud for commendation, and is a sufficient apology for my title The Praise of Paris. We could have wished Mr. Weston to have "extracted" more fully from his letters; not that there is any dearth of information on the ordinary topics of enquiry, what is the colour of the consular livery? how many theatres are there? who dances best, Vestris or Didelot? Our tourists have not neglected to give an ample list of libraries and museums, but Mr. Weston has probably examined them with an antiquarian eye, and could easily have enlarged his too scanty list of curiosities; without much expence of labour to himself he could have set before us a much more ample and diversified repast; he has given us a bonne bouche, but it is rather calculated to excite than satisfy the appetite. In the medal room of the national library is a gold dish found at Rennes in 1774, of the year 960 of Rome, and 208 of Christ; it was found in repairing a house belonging to the chapter, six feet two inches below the surface, with a clasp, a chain four feet one inch in length, four coins of Posthumus encircled with a fillagree, and furnished with 2 ring to hang them about the neck, and ninety-three imperials, of which thirtyfour the flower of the die, are placed in the series of the emperors.The whole weighed together seventy ounces. Round the dish are sixteen imperial heads, let into the border with wreaths of parsley leaves or laurel encir We transcribe the following letter, as it affords a specimen of Mr. Weston's critical acumen : "A sepulchral urn, with a Greek inscription on it, has been found at Marseilles, in a part of the ancient Abbey of Saint Victor, which was demolished in the revolution, in order to erect on its scite a soap cellars many urns were found, one in par manufactory. About eight feet below the ticular, with a Greek inscription upon it, which has been published by Monsieur Fauris Saint Vincent, in Citizen Millin's Magazin Encyclopedique, for the year V. of the French Republick; having been first revised by the very learned D'Ansse de Villoison, who has corrected it all through, exCept in the last line: he is of opinion that is form of the letters, or, perhaps he might say, is of an age later than Augustus, from the than Severus. The monument was in an horizontal position when found, though originally intended to be set upright. It is made of a common, though very hard stone; its length is five feet; and its breadth nineteen inches below, and seventeen above the the stone. inscription, which is engraved long ways on that this monument served first for the person Fauris St. Vincent is of opinion, in the inscription; and in process of time was used for some other person; and had had its position changed from upright to horizontal. The urn is withont a cover, though it appears that it once had one, and, perhaps, a small statue on it in its erect state; some few bones were found in it. The inscription is thus engraved on the monument: ΓΛΑΥΚΙΑ ΕΣΤΙ ΤΑΦΟ ΠΑΙΣ ΔΑΝΕΘΗΚΕ ΝΕΟΣ ΣΑ ΤΥΧΗ ΜΗΤΡΙ ΜΕΝ ΕΝ ΕΝ ΠΑΙΔΟΣ ΑΜ ΟΡΦΑΝΙΚ This is the form of the inscription, as published by the French; and it consists of two hexameters and five pentameters. Monsieur Villoison has filled up the lacunæ, and corrected the slips of the graver; and presented it in the following form: in Hesychius is explained dualvor xxv. δύστηνον χαλεπόν. See also the Etymologicon magnum, where cvos is a poor wretch who has no place to set his foot. This agrees very well with an orphan. It is not improbable that ▲ should be engraved for A, since expor has been Γλαυκία ἐστὶ τάφος, παῖς δ' ανέθηκε νέος" for δείξας, and it is highly so, that the auwritten for ungor, Onxalo for Oxalo, and deiles Δείξας ἐκ μικροῦ πρὸς πάτερ ̓ εὐσεβίην. thor should have thought χηρίαν could be Οὐκ ἔφθης ὦ τλῆμον ἰδεῖν γόνον οιος ἂν ἦν made a dissyllable. 33 "In English: "This is the tomb of Glaucias, that a youth has consecrated to his father, as a testimony of his filial affection, of which he has given proofs from his infancy. It was not thy lot, O wretched Glaucias! to live long enough to see what thy son was able to do for thee; tin providing thee with a monument, but in procuring thee means of living in thy old age. To thee, and thine, Fortune has been uniformly unjust; to thy aged mother she has given tears; to thy wife widowhood, with a wretched orphan-son! "In order to correct the measure of the seventh verse, Monsieur Villoison writes Xaça, which by no means expresses the sense required of widowhood, as he seems ready to confess. What is then to be done? Kapizy may be Ionice for Xopiz, as, it is well known, undin and coumadin are for προμήθεια από συμπάθεια, in Herodotus and Aretous, and vain in the inscription itself; and then it may also be short, like the adjectives in : quorum penultima corripitur Ionicè, et Dorice, of which Dr. Burney has collected all the instances in his review of Mr. Professor Porson and Wakefield, To xxxpirov; but the next word is unmanageable as it stands, and must be corrected; I read, instead of ATETHNOT AETHNOT which means the same thing, and the sense is preserved, and the metre restored. Acv The correction here proposed is effected by leaving out one letter; in the sixth line there are two too many, EN.” Prefixed to this little volume is an image of Isis, with the following account of its preservation : "Paris is derived from Par Isis, because corner of the it was built near the famous temple of that goddess, not far from the scite of the abbey of Saint Germain des Prés. At the esta blishment of christianity the temple was destroyed, but the idol remained till the beginning of the sixth century, when it was church of Saint Germain des Prés, founded thrown as a trophy into a by Childebert with the title of. The Holy Cross, and Saint Vincent. This same trophy existed in the time of Cardinal Briçconnet, Abbé of Saint Germain, in the latter end of broke to pieces, which order was probably the fifteenth century, who ordered it to be Orus is now at the Petits Augustins, and never executed, as the image of Isis nursing was brought thither, with other monuments, Λευκετία, now. called Lutetia, is derived from Aɛuxórns out of a French church. whiteness, from the white plaister quarry on which Paris is built. From Aeuxórns came Lucotesia, and, finally, Lutetia, the second syllable having been dropped for shortness, as in regatta for remigatta, and Saint Meric for Saint Mederic." Mr. Weston is not inattentive to the state of manners and amusements among the Parisians, and the reason we have said nothing about his account of them is, that we have found something else to interest us: we find the description, too, more ample in many other volumes, where there is little else to delay us. ART. XXIV. Letters of a Mameluke: or a moral and critical Picture of the Manners of Paris. With Notes by the Translator. From the French of JOSEPH LAVALLEE, of the Philotechnic Society, &c. 2 Vols. 12mo. pp. 576. THESE letters are written in the manner of Miss Hamilton's letters of a Hindoo Rajah, but the character of the Mameluke is not so well supported as that of the Rajah: nothing can exceed the absurdity of putting such remarks and reflections as are interspersed through these pages, into the mouth of a Mameluke. The author seems aware of this, and yet suffers the absurdity to remain rather than take the trouble of correcting it. For a Mameluke to criticise the works and opinions of the old French philosophers; to send to his friend Giafar, a native and inhabitant of Egypt, remarks on the dramatic merits of Racine, Corneille, &c.; to give him an historical account of the factions which have reign ed in France for two or three centuries; and to talk as familiarly about the heroes of Greece and Rome as he would of his own Beys and Pachas; what can be half so absurd? But if the picture of French manners is a good one, it significs little whether the artist is a Mameluke or a Frenchman: the worst of it is, that when a man sits down to draw his own portrait, he may take a likeness, but it will most probably be a flattering one. That is a good deal the case here: the French are allowed to have a great many foibles and fopperies, but the more our Mameluke becomes acquainted with them, the more impressed he is with the goodness of their hearts, the variety and transcendency of their virtues. Let us speak of these, says he in one of his early letters: the French have one that is not sufficiently remarked, nor is it esteemed according to its value; it is that in general they never do mischief with reflection. To understand me, observe that it seldom happens that the man inclined to do mischief with a premeditated intention, repairs it. The French are not wicked; they are only mischievous. Philosophers have long and idly puzzled themselves about the causes of the French revolution: some attribute that event to the derangement of the finances, others to the oppression of an insolent nobility; some to the disorganization of the military, others to the introduction of commerce; some seek it in an individual cause, others in the co-operation of many. What philosophers, moralists, and politicians, however, have sought for without satisfaction or success, is at last discovered by an emigrant from the banks of the Nile! "In this country," says he to his friend Giafar, "the native inhabitants were called Gauls: their origin is of the most remote antiquity. Who knows it? no one. It is fifteen centuries since a conquering people came and incorporated themselves with them: they cailed themselves Francs. They possessed the same bravery, but not the same manners. It is imagined that they have been mixed, that every shade of distinction has disappeared. This is not the case: like two rivers, they have flowed in the same bed without mixing. During twelve years which they have just employed in their modern revolution, a thousand events appear to them an enigma. They are blind let them look, the solution Is there the Francs always rough, always untamed, always licentious: the Gauls always frivolous, always incon stant, always superstitious; and both always terrille in war. There lies the whole mystery." "For fifteen hundred years, two na. tions very distinct, inhabit the territory of France; a nation of victors, and a nation of vanquished; there is the grand cause; a complete mixture has never been effected: the present epoch is the first moment when it is beginning to take place." Our Mameluke traces the relative situation of these two nations, through the several dynasties of France; the Gauls have always continued to be the people, and the Franks their masters. "From the time of Clovis to the end of the eighteenth century, what was constantly the favourite expression of the monarchs, of the great, of the nobles, &c.? Our brave ancestors the Francs; and what is very worthy of remark is, that never, no never, was it employed by the people." Our Mameluke admits, indeed, that for some centuries this species of formula was used more from habit than from sentiment; and like a true systematist, exclaims, "but what signifies that? it is the true vestige: our ancestors the Francs !" So that the first grand cause of the revolution was a determination on the part of the aboriginal Gauls, the people, to drive away from their territory the lineal descendants, pure and uncontaminated no doubt, of those Franks who had invaded it 1500 years before, and had kept in their hands the offices, the honours, and emoluments of state ever since!!! Although, as we have already observed, the author of these letters has given his countrymen credit for all that is generous, brave, ingenious, &c. he satirizes with sufficient severity those follies and vices which he discerns, or rather which he acknowledges, in their character; he reprobates very properly their singular propensity for duelling, which we regret to learn is daily encreasing throughout the republic, and which our author thinks has taken so deep a root, that it can never be extir. pated. "The ordinance the most certain against duelling," says he, "would be an ordinance which should prohibit Frenchmen from exercising their wit. They fight, say they, to avenge their offended honour; this is a mere pretext; out of a hundred duels, ninety-nine have no other cause than a witty sally or a repartee. The sally makes the auditors laugh; and if the repartee is gay, lively, and strikingly pointed, all of a sudden the laughers change sides. Here then is a victory lost at the very moment when one party was beginning to enjoy it! It is very well known that the rage for duelling was attended with very serious evils in the army, not among the officers merely, but the privates, who are said to have gone out in bodies consisting of a brigade perhaps, and settled some affair of honour! Many of our readers will recollect the account in the Paris papers, (Nov. 3, 1803,) of two soldiers of the Parisian guard, who fenced with sabres, naked to the waist, in the Champs Elysées. Women of the first fashion and elegance attended the spectacle! fortunately for one of the com batants, whose blood began to Row, an officer interfered by his authority and saved his life. The translator of these letters says, that within this last year, even ladies have begun to fight with pistols: in May 1802, a Madame Deunaigly fought and wounded with a pistol a Madame de Tourville, whom she accused of having seduced her lover! On the whole, though by no means disposed to think highly of the execution of this work, it would be injustice not to say that there are several little traits of French character delineated, which, perhaps, scarcely any one but a Frenchman would have touched upon. The translation is wretchedly executed, abounding both with Gallicisms and blunders. ART. XXII. Travels from Moscow, through Prussia, Germany, Switzerland, France, and England. By NICOLAI KARAMSIN. Translated from the German. 3 vols. 12mo. OUR readers will naturally be curious to know the remarks of a Russian traveller, even in his tour through Germany, Switzerland, and France; but will survey, with peculiar interest, his observations on our own dear native country. We shall therefore devote a larger space to M. Karamsin on this account, than perhaps we should be induced to do from the sole merit of his publication. We learn, from the work before us, that M. Karamsin is a young Russian nobleman, well versed in German literature, and deeply enamoured of Sterne, and some other English authors of the same stamp. Neither science, nor natural history, nor politics, nor statistical details, appear to be the objects of his attention: he travels not like the illustrious Peter, to bring back to his country the arts and the sciences, but to satisfy at least a harmless curiosity, concerning the manners and social habits of the principal nations of Europe, and a desire of seeing and conversing with those literary men, from the perusal of whose works he had derived the greatest pleasure. The study, however, of men and national characters is attended with peculiar difficulty: it requires long residence, habits of great intimacy, a perfect command of the language of a country, quick discrimination, and a habit of seizing minute circumstances as they arise; in short, such a combination of natural talents and fortunate opportunities, as are very rarely found to unite in one person. But though Avs. Rav. Vol. II. M. Karamsin ranks not in the same class with the late Dr. Moore, he appears to have been by no means negli gent of the occasions afforded him of collecting interesting anecdotes, or describing his interviews and conversation with the literary characters of Germany and Switzerland; and if, in the other parts of his travels, he is guilty of egregious misrepresentation, it appears to be rather attributable to ignorance than an intention to deceive. M. Karamsin, on leaving Moscow, took the road to Petersburgh, whence he proceeded through Courland, and the Prussian part of Poland, to Berlin. At Konigsberg, he had an interview with the celebrated Kant, who appears to be an amiable old man, of simple manners and liberal sentiments many pages are devoted to conversations with innkeepers and his fellow-tra vellers in the stage-coach: an innkeeper is the same animal all the world over, and ignorance and brutality are not peculiar to Prussian officers. Too From Berlin, M. Karamsin, passing through Leipsig, Weimar, and Manheim, arrived at Strasburgh. "When we reached the French boundary the postillion stopped. A fellow of a filthy appearance, approaching the coach, addressed us, Vous êtes dejà en France, Messieurs, et je vous en felicite. It was the custom-house officer, who expected a few sous for this gratification." At Weimar, our traveller relates his visits to Herder and Wieland. To the H |