upon which they were let in. They fearched all over the houfe, but could not find him. Roe preffed them to make a fecond fearch. In one of the rooms they obferved a large old cheft. Mrs. Horne, Mr. Horne's wife, faid, there was nothing in it but table linen and fheets. Roe infifted on looking in it; and going to break the lid, Mrs. Horne opened it, and her hufband ftarted up in a fright bare-headed, faying, "It is a fad thing to hang me; for my brother Charles is as bad as myfelf, and he can't hang me without hanging himself." He was carried before two juftices of Nottinghamshire, and after an examination of fome hours, having little to offer in his defence, he was committed to Nottingham goal, to take his trial at the aflize. Soon after his commitment he made application to the court of King's Bench to be removed by Habeas Corpus, in order to be bailed; for which purpofe he came, in cuftody of the goaler, to London; but the court denied him bail. So he was obliged to return to Nottingham goal, there to remain till the fummer affize, held on Saturday the 10th of August 1759, before the Lord Chief Baron Parker, when, after a trial, which lafted near nine hours, the jury, having withdrawn half an hour, brought him in guilty of the murder. The very perfons who found the child appeared, and corroborated the brother's evidence. He immediately received fentence to be hanged the Monday following: but in the evening, at the interceffion of fome gentlemen, who thought the time too fhort for fuch an old finner to fearch his heart, the judge was pleased to refpite the fentence for a month at the expiration of 66 which he obtained another refpite till further orders. This time he fpent in fruitless applications to perfons in power for pardon, discovering little fenfe of the crime of which he had been convicted, and often faid, it was doubly hard to fuffer on the evidence of a brother, for a crime committed fo many years before. A day or two before he died, he folemnly denied many atrocious things which common report laid to his charge; and faid to a perfon, My friend, my brother Charles was tried at Derby about twenty years ago, and acquitted, my dear fifter Nanny forfwearing herself at that time to fave his life. His life, you fee, was preferved to hang me; but you'll fee him." He told the clergyman who attended him, "That he forgave all his enemies, even his brother Charles; but that, at the day of judgment, if God Almighty fhould ask him how his brother Charles behaved, he would not give him a good character." He was executed on his birth-day, and was exactly 74 years of age the day he died. This he mentioned feveral times after the order of his execution was figned; and faid, he always ufed to have plum-pudding on his birth-day, and would again, could he obtain another refpite. He was of fo penurious a difpofition, that it is faid he never did one generous action in the whole courfe of his life. Notwithstanding his licentious conduct his father left him all his real estate, having fome time before his death given all his perfonal eftate, by a deed of gift, to Charles. The father died on a couch in the kitchen, and happened to have about twelve guineas in his pocket, which certainly belonged to Charles; the other, other, however, took the cath out of his dead father's pocket, and would not part with it till Charles promifed to pay the whole expence of burying the old man ; which he did; and infifting afterwards on his right, the elder brother turned him out of doors; and though he knew he was master of fuch an important fecret, would not give the leaft affiftance to him, nor a morfel of bread to his hungry children begging at their uncle's door. Charles kept a little ale-house at a gate leading down to his brother's houfe; which gate he ufed frequently to open to him, pulling off his hat at the fame time; yet he would never fpeak to him. Not only his brother, but the whole country round, had reafon to complain of his churlifhnefs and rigour. He would scarce fuffer a man, not qualified, to keep a dog, or a gun; fo that he was univerfally feared and hated. Befides his inceft, and the murder of the young woman who was with child by him, he confeffed that he broke one Amos Killer's arm, with a violent blow, which occafioned the poor fellow's death. NATURAL HISTORY. An Efay on a method of claffing mal, vegetable, and mineral; and animals. as he shall have taken, at the fame time, a clear idea of these grand WITH regard to the gene- objects that are fo different, viz. ral order, and the method of distribution of the different fubjects of natural history, it is purely arbitrary; and therefore we are fufficiently at liberty to chufe that which appears the most commodious, or the most commonly received. But, before we give the reafons that might determine us to adopt one order rather than another, it is neceffary to make fome further reflections, whereby we will endeavour to fhew what reality there may be in the divifions that have been of natural productions. In order to know this, we muft, for a moment, diveft ourselves of our prejudices, and even ftrip ourselves of our notions. Let us fuppofe a man who had actually forgot every thing, or who awakes quite freth to view the objects that furround him; let us place fuch a man in a field, where animals, birds, fishes, plants, ftones, &c. prefent themselves fucceffively to his eyes. In the first rencounters he will diftinguish nothing, and confound every thing; but let his ideas be gradually confirmed by reiterated fenfations of the fame objects, he will foon form to himfelf a general idea of animated matter; he will eafily diftinguish it from inanimated matter, and in a little time after he will diftinguifh very well animated matter from vegetative, and naturally arrive at this first grand divifion, namely, ani the earth, the air, and the water, he will come in a little time to form a particular idea of animals that dwell upon the earth, of those that refide in the waters, and those that fly aloft in the air; and confequently, he will eafily form to himself this fecond divifion of animals, namely quadrupeds, birds, and fishes the fame thing will happen in the vegetable kingdom, as trees and plants; he will diftinguish them very well, either as to their bulk, their fubftance, or figure. This is what a bare infpection must neceffarily produce in him, and what with a very flender degree of attention he cannot fail to know, and this is likewife what we ought to confider as real, and as a divifion which nature herself has made; let us put ourselves in the place of fuch a man, or let us fuppofe he has acquired the fame degree of knowledge, and has the fame degree of experience, as we have; he will judge of the objects of natural hiftory according to the relations they bear to him thofe objects that are the most neceffary and useful, will hold the first rank; for instance, he will give the preference, in the order of animals, to the horse, the dog, the ox, &c. and he will always much better know thofe that are moit familiar to him; in the next place, he will be taken up with fuch animals, as, though not fo fa miliar to him, yet live in the fame place and climate, as the deer, hares, and all the wild animals; and it will be only after the acquifition of all this knowledge that his curiofity will lead him to find out what may be the animals of foreign climates, as the elephant, dromedary, &c. The cafe will be the fame as to fishes, birds, infects, fhells, plants, minerals, and all other productions of nature; he will ftudy thefe in proportion to the ufes he may draw from them, according as they prefer.t themselves the more familiarly to him; and he will arrange them in his mind, according to this order of his knowledge, because it is actually the order according to which he has acquired it, and according to which it concerns him to retain them. This order, the most natural of all others, is that which I would recommend, believing that this fimple and natural method of confidering things is preferable to any methods that are far more fetched and more compounded, because there is none either of such as have been already adopted, or of all thofe that may be formed, but in which there is more of the arbitrary than in this; and that, to take every thing, it is much easier, and more agreeable and useful for us, to confider things with regard to ourselves, than under any other point of view. Two objections, I forefee, may be here ftarted: first, that thefe grand divifions, which we confider as real, are not, perhaps, accurate; that, for inftance, we are not certain, that a line of feparation can be drawn betwixt the animal and vegetable kingdoms, or even betwixt the vegetable kingdom and the mineral, and that there may be found in nature fome things that equally par take of the properties of the one and the other; which, confequently, cannot enter into the one or the other of thefe divifions. To which I anfwer, that if there exist any things which are exactly half animal, and half plant, or half plant and half mineral, &c. they are hitherto unknown to us; so that, in fact, the divifion ftands entire and accurate; and it is evident, that, the more general divifions are, there will be the lefs hazard to meet with bipartite objects, that participate of the nature of two things comprized in these divifions; fo that this very objection, which we have made ufe of to advantage, against particular diftri-, butions, cannot hold good in treating of divifions that are full and general, efpecially if thefe diftributions be not made exclufive; and if we do not pretend to comprize therein, without exception, not only all known beings, but likewife all thofe that may hereafter be discovered: add to this, if we attend to it, we fhall plainly fee, that; our general ideas being only compofed of particular ideas, they have a relation to a continued fcale of objects, of which we clearly perceive only the mean terms, and whofe two extremities always more and more disappear, and efcape our understandings; fo that we never confine ourfelves to things but in the grofs, and that confequently we ought not to think our ideas, how general foever they may be, comprize the particular ideas of every thing existing or poffible. The fecond objection may be, that, by pursuing this order we must join together objects very different; for example, in the hiftory of animals, if we begin with thofe that are the most useful and familiar to us, we fhall be obliged to give the his 1 tory of a dog, after or before that of a horse; a thing which does not feem natural, because these animals are so different in all other respects, that they do not at all appear to have been made, to be placed fo near each other, in a treatise of natural hiflory; and perhaps it may be further urged, that it would be better to follow the ancient method of the divifion of animals into whole-footed, and cloven-footed, or the modern method of divifion, by their teeth and teats, &c. va This objection which at firft may appear pretty plausible, will nish, when we come to examine it, Were it not better to arrange, not only in a treatife of natural hiftory, but even in a picture, or any where elfe, objects in the order and pofition in which they are commonly found, than to force them to be joined together by virtue of an hypothefis? Would it not be better to make the horse, who is whole-hoof ed, to be followed by the dog, who is claw-footed, and actually ufes to follow him, than an animal we know little of, and which probably has no other relation with a horfe than that of being whole-hoofed Add to this, does there not arife the fame inconvenience from the differences in this arrangement as in ours? Does a lion, becaufe clawfooted, resemble a rat, which is fo too, more than a horfe refembles a dog? Does a whole hoofed elephant refemble an afs, that is whole-hoof. ed too, more than a flag which is cloven-footed? And fhould we fol low the new method, in which the teeth and the teats are the fpecific characters, and upon which the divifions and diftributions are founded, fhall we find, that a lion is more like a bat, than a horse is like a dog? Or rather to make our comparifon a little more exact, does a horfe refemble a hog more than a dog, or is a dog more like a mole than a horfe? And fince there are as many inconveniencies, and as great differences, in thefe methods of arrangement, as in that we have adopted, and feeing, befides this, thefe methods have not the fame advantages, and are a great deal more remote from the common and natural method of confidering things, we have fufficient reafon for giving it the preference, We fhall not particularly examine all the artificial methods that have been given in the divifion of animals; they are all more or lefs fub ject to inconveniencies; and it ap pears to us, that the examen of one of them only, is fufficient to difcover the faults of the reft; we shall therefore here confine ourselves to examine the method of the celebrated Linnæus, which is the most modern, whereby we may be enabled to judge whether we had reafon to reject it, and confine ourselves folely to the natural order, in which all mankind are wont to view and confider things. Linnæus divides all animals into fix c'affes, viz. quadrupeds, birds, amphibious creatures, fishes, infects, and worms. The firft divifion is very arbitrary and very incomplete; for it gives us no idea of certain kinds of animals, which are nevertheless very confiderable and extenfive; ferpents for example, fhell-fifh, and crustaceous animals, appear at first glance to have been forgotten; for, at firft, one does not imagine, that ferpents are amphibious, that cruftaceous animals are infects, and fhell animals worms; if, inftead of making only fix claffes, he had made twelve, |