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12. At Leith, Jane Kirkwood, aged 66, wife of William Dods, smith there.

-At Edinburgh, Mrs Mary Mansfield, wife of William Mackenzie, Esq. writer to the signet.

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At Glasgow, Hamilton Macfarlane, merchant. 13. At Boroughmuirhead, near Edinburgh, Miss Christian Campbell, only daughter of the late John Campbell, Esq. Perth.

Mary Jane, aged 11, youngest daughter of John Thomson, Esq. Forth-street, Edinburgh.

Sarah Firth of Bradley, Yorkshire, aged 75, who, within the last 16 years, had been persecuted as a witch by an illiterate set of people.

14. At Edinburgh, Mr James Welsh, late baker there.

At Edinburgh, Miss Jane Campbell, daughter of the late John Campbell, Esq. cashier of the royal bank of Scotland.

At Leith, Alexander Shirreff, Esq. merchant there, aged 68.

-At Maryfield, near Edinburgh, aged 19, Agnes, only daughter of Mr William Elder, Leith.

16. At 134, George-street, Edinburgh, Mrs Elizabeth Constable, wife of Mr Robert Cadell, bookseller.

17. Of a fit of apoplexy, at the house of the Rev. Christopher Bird, High Hoyland, where he was receiving his education, Richard Henry Liulphus Lumley, third son of the Hon. and Rev. John Lumley Savile of Rufford, Notts. He was born September 16, 1800. His remains were deposited in the vault of the Savile family, at Thornhill.

18. At her house, 3, Roxburgh-place, Mrs Ann Allan, relict of Mr William Dick, attorney at law in Gibraltar.

At the Manse of Buncle, the Rev. John Campbell, minister of that parish.

19. Christina Dorothea Hamilton, infant daughter of Thomas Ewing, teacher, 41, North Hanover

street.

-At Ayr, aged 13, Mary Riddel, daughter of the late Dr David Linton, physician in the island of Grenada.

20. At Edinburgh, aged 16, John Henderson, only child of Mr Henderson of Johnson's-court, Fleet-street, London.

21. At Edinburgh, aged 19, Agnes, second daughter of Dr William Farquharson, physician.

21. At his house, in the Canongate, Mr John Henderson, tailor, aged 76.

23. At Bellwood, Henrietta Anna Jane, only daughter of John Young, jun. Esq.

24. At Argyle house, London, the Right Hon. Lady Caroline Catherine Gordon, second daughter of the Earl of Aberdeen.

William Hutton, engraver in Edinburgh. -At Edinburgh, Patrick, the infant son of John Campbell, Esq. of Achalader.

At Goodrich-house, near Ross, Herefordshire, Miss Ann Colquhoun Bruce, eldest daughter of Sir William Bruce of Stenhouse, Bart.

25. At Edinburgh, Marion, daughter of Mr John Nicol, Buccleuch-street.

26. At Edinburgh, William Jeffrey, Esq. 28. At Edinburgh, Alexander Hamilton Morehead, youngest son of the Rev. Robert Morehead. 29. At Ormsary, Miss Katherine Campbell, daughter of the deceased William Campbell, of Ormsary.

30. At No 2, Mound-place, Eliza Orr, relict of William Raeburn, perfumer, Edinburgh.

-At Drumsheugh, Jemima Barbara, youngest daughter of Sir John Hay of Smithfield and Haystown, Bart.

Lately-Mr Henry Richardson of Northallerton, Yorkshire, well known to the sporting gentlemen as an extensive breeder of game dogs.

In Barcelona, Captain-General Castanos, the commander-in-chief at the celebrated battle of Baylen.

At Eye, Thomas Wayth, Esq, solicitor. He was attending the election ball given in honour of the newly-elected members for the burgh of Eye, and partaking of the amusement of dancing, when he in a moment fell motionless, and instantly expired.

At Portobello, near Sheffield, Mr Joseph Voule, a self-taught mathematician of some emineuce in that neighbourhood, and an able instructor His death was caused by keeping the windows of his school-room open during the whole of the Wednesday preceding, to avoid as much as possible the inconvenience of the intense heat of that day, by which he caught an inflammatory fever, which cccasioned his death.

At Ferney Green, on the banks of Windemere, Westmorland, the seat of the late Mr Pringle, Robert Allan, Esq. banker, Edinburgh, aged 72.

At Greenhill, in the parish of Ruthwell, Andrew Rome, in the 76th year of his age. This old man, with his brother, who still survives, and is about 10 years older, is among the last of a daring and enterprising race of smugglers, who carried on an extensive contraband trade in Annandale, before the exclusive privileges of the Isle of Man were bought up and regulated by government. He was a native of the border parish of Dornock, but for the last 40 or 50 years resided in the parish of Ruthwell, where he rented a farm under the Earl of Mansfield. The character of this old smuggler was strongly marked with the peculiar features of his illicit occupation, and would have formed a fine subject for the graphic pen of the author of Guy Mannering.

Count Kalkreuth, the governor of that city. This distinguished officer lived to his 83d year, having spent no less than 67 years in the Prussian service, and been actively employed during the whole military career of his great friend and instructor, Frederick II.

At Calcutta, Sir John Hadley D'Oyly, Bart.

At Bombay, David White, Esq. second member of the medical board of the Bombay presidency.

Richard Miles Wynne, Esq. of Eyart-house, many years governor of Cape Coast Castle, Africa.

At Leamington Spa, Sir Thomas Bernard, Bart. D. C. L. long and deservedly celebrated for his philanthropic labours and writings for promoting the public charities and other useful institutions of the kingdom.

At Pisa, where she went for the recovery of her health, the Hon. Charlotte Plunkett. She was sister to Lord Cloncurry, and married, in 1803, Edward, eldest son of Lord Dunsany, by whom she has left two sons and one daughter.

He

At Dundee, in the 100th year of his age, John Fraser, a native of Strathspey, and one of the few remaining adherents of Prince Charles Stuart, having fought under that unfortunate Prince during the whole of the rebellion in 1745 and 1746. was buried at the church-yard of Logie; and the company who attended his remains to the grave followed the ancient Highland custom of drinking some bottles of whisky before leaving the buryingground.

On his passage home from Jamaica, the celebrated author, M. G. Lewis, Esq. well known by the name of Monk Lewis.

At Lynn Regis, Mr Gavin Mitchell, son of the deceased Dr Mitchell, minister of Kinellar.

At Newport, in this county, after a lingering illness, the Hon. Andrew Foley, M. P. for Droitwich, in Worcestershire, brother of the late Lord Foley, and father of Colonel Foley, one of the county members in the last parliament.

At Trinidad, in the end of March last, Thomas Bogue, eldest son of Jacob Bogue, lieutenant of police, Edinburgh.

At Trieste, a Greek, at the great age of 125. He lived in three centuries.

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WILLIAM BLACKWOOD, NO 17, PRINCE'S STREET, EDINBURGH ;
AND JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET, LONDON;
To whom Communications (post paid) may be addressed;

SOLD ALSO BY ALL THE BOOKSELLERS OF THE UNITED KINGDOM.

[OLIVER & BOYD, Printers.]

BLACKWOOD'S

EDINBURGH MAGAZINE.

No XVIII. SEPTEMBER 1818.

VOL. III.

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THE long dreaded but at last very sudden death of Madame de Stael, has recently taken one of its brightest ornaments from the literature of Europe, and the idol and centre of attachment from a circle of personal friends and admirers, wide beyond all example since the days of Ferney. Her birth, her family connexions, her residence, and the objects of her literary labours, had rendered this extraordinary woman almost equally the denizen of France, Switzerland, Italy, Germany, and Sweden. Even we, the most jealous of all nations, had relaxed our rules in her favour. Many of her greatest works were first published in England, and she was universally regarded among us with a feeling of partiality, which, laying every other reason out of the question, might not insufficiently be accounted for by the uniform and intelligent zeal, with which she was accustomed to hold up to the admiration and imitation of foreigners the severe beauty of our institutions, the consequent firmness, dignity, and generosity of the English character, as well as the varied strength and splendour of that literature which has been one of the noblest effects, and which is still one of the most powerful supports of that character and those institutions.

Considerations sur les Principaux Evenemens de la Revolution Françoise. Ouvrage Posthume de Mad. La Baronne De Staël, Publié par M. Le Duc de Broglie et

M. Le Baron A. De Staël. 3 vol. 8vo. Baldwin, Cradock, and Joy, London. 1818. VOL. III.

The lamentations of her devoted friends and worshippers arose loudly from every region of Europe; nor in truth can those who have studied the remarkable works of her genius be supposed to find much difficulty in lending, at the least, a very large share of sympathy to their affliction. We know of no author whose personal character may be guessed from his writings more safely than that of Madame de Stael from her Life of her Father, her book De l'Allemagne, and her Corinne. "Femina pectore, vir ingenio," she displays everywhere in her works, and in her own person she embodied, a most rare and graceful amalgamation of many of the best qualities of both the sexes,-the warmth, the tenderness, the submis sive veneration of woman,-adorning, not weakening, a depth, energy, and refinement of intellect, such as have been possessed by few men of any age, certainly surpassed by none of ours.

Uniting within herself so many sources of attraction; bearing firmly but meekly the highest hon ours of genius; adorning and delighting every society with her wit, grace, and elegance; the most pious of daughters; the most tender of mo thers; the most faithful of friends; the most generous of patrons; is it strange that she should have excited in all that approached her a mingled feeling, made up in different propor tions, no doubt, but still the same in its elements-a mingled feeling_of love, wonder, and reverence?-Her faults, for faults she had, were unobtrusive; and they who were best able to comprehend her, never suspected that they touched her heart. She was 4 L

worshipped and loved by all; but by few, very few, was she understood. The expression of one of her heroines was suggested, we doubt not, by her knowledge of herself; " il est des choses qui ne s'expliquent pas; et je suis peut-etre une de ces choses la."

A Treatise on the Life and Writings of Madame de Stael has already been promised to the world by her illustrious friend William Augustus Schlegel, whose kindred genius and attainments, and long domestic intimacy with the family of Copet, may certainly well entitle us to expect from him a most interesting as well as masterly specimen of biography and criticism. During the expectation of a work such as this is likely to prove, there would be presumption, as well as idleness, in any elaborate investigation which we might institute, either into the personal or the literary history of its subject. In the mean time, however, we cannot deny ourselves the pleasure of devoting a few pages to the consideration of her posthumous work on the French Revolution-a performance less finished indeed in its style, but containing, we imagine, more true wisdom than any of its predecessors-composed during the intervals of disease, in great part under the near expectation of death,-and forming, indeed, a legacy worthy of being bequeathed by Madame de Stael, and of being received with the admiration of England, and the gratitude of France.

This book, by whomsoever it might have been written, must always have been a most valuable present to the world; for it embodies, we think, more good observation and practical sense, in regard to the events of the revolutionary period, than we have elsewhere met with. But it is doubly interesting, and doubly instructive withal, when considered as the last work of this remarkable person, the whole of whose feelings and thoughts had been developed or tinged by the incidents of that strange time-whose life and genius bear vividly the stamp of that unequalled convulsion, which has run first like a fever, and then like a palsy, through the whole moral and intellectual circulation of her country. Into whichsoever of the works of Madame de Stael we may look, we shall be at no loss to detect the traces of this great presiding influence. The

first of all her writings, her Essay on the character of Rousseau, shews how early she had seized the full scope and tendency of those fervent declamations which first incited, not the light and the sarcastic, but the meditative and enthusiastic spirits of the world to a crusade of Change.* Her celebrated Defense de Marie Antoinette, which appeared a few years afterwards, is filled with the expressions of a wise and thoughtful generosity, and-where could higher praise be found?-is worthy of being read and admired, even by those who are familiar with the still more energetic masterpiece of Burke. The same may be said of her "Reflexions sur la paix adressees a M. Pitt et aux Francais," which were published in the year 1795. Neither is the bent of her spirit, the main and centre point of all her thoughts, less distinguishable even in those of her works which are not professedly or formally political. In Delphine, the agitation of generous souls deprived of the star and compass of principle and religion, and abandoned to the mingling winds and waves of scepticism and passion, is depicted with a power which can never be undervalued but by the obtuse, and a purpose which has never been

* In this work, which is not much read in our country, but which, when regarded as the first effort of a female author of twenty, must always be worthy of much attention, we find the character of Jean Jacques pourtrayed at least as well as it has ever since been by more mature critics. "Rousqu'on ner emarquoit point, quand on le voyseau," says she," devoit avoir une figure oit passer, mais qu'on ne pouvoit jamais oublier quand on l'avoit regardé parler; de petits yeux qui n'avoient pas un caractère à eux, mais recevoient successivement celui des divers mouvemens de son âme. Il por toit presque toujours, la tête baissée; mais ce n'étoit point la flatterie ni la crainte qui l'avoit courbée; la méditation et la mélanfleur que son propre poids ou les orages ont colie l'avoient fait pencher comme une inclinée. Ses traits étoient communs; mais quand il parloit, ils étinceloient tous. Son esprit étoit lent, et son âme ardente: à force de penser, il se passionnoit; il n'avoit pas de mouvemens subits du moins en apparence, mais tous ses sentimens s'accroissoient par la réflexion. Je crois que l'ima gination étoit la première de ses facultés, et qu'elle absorboit même toutes les autres. Il révoit plutôt qu'il n'existoit, et les événe mens de sa vie se passoient dans sa tête, plutôt qu'au-dehors de lui, &c.”.

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