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Here, could I stop with strict justice, I would-But, behold! the French again came; again they opened their gates to receive them; and again they were, with tenfold fury and rapacity, pillaged, oppressed and insulted; and at the very time I am writing this, the guillotine is doing its office-enforcing the payment of the most exorbitant and enormous contributions, and compelling, it is said, one hundred thousand of the ill-fated inhabitants to take the field, as soldiers of the republic.

Human opinion is so chequered and uncertain, that two very honest men may in certain cases act in direct contradiction and hostility to each other, with the very best intentions-He, therefore, must have but a cold heart, and a contracted understanding, who cannot forgive the man that acts in such cases erroneously, when he acts from the exact dictates of his opinion, and upon the principle which he has conscientiously adopted: but when a whole people are seen whisking about with every gust of fortune, and making a new principle for every new point of convenience, we must despise them even when they happen to act right, and can scarcely afford them so much as pity in their calamities. The Austrian Netherlands are now in that state; and, without presuming to say in which of their tergiversations they were right, I will venture to pronounce that they deserve punishment, and I believe they are in hands very likely to give them their due.

To return-Ostend is a sea-port of Austrian Flanders, and is situated in the Liberty of Bruges. It was, at one time, the strongest town in Flanders: but a double ditch and ramparts, which constituted its strength, are now destroyed; and in the place where the-former stood, docks, or rather basons, extremely capacious and commodious, are formed, for the reception of shipping. The ground about the town is very low and marshy, and cut into a number of fine canals-into some of which, ships of the largest size may enter-and in one of which, vessels of great burthen may ride, even close to Bruges. The harbour here is so fortunately circumstanced, that it was once thought, by engineers, entirely secure from a blockade; and its pristine strength can in no way be

so well described, as by a relation of the defence it made in the four first years of the seventeenth century—tho' near the close of the sixteenth, it was no better than an insignificant fishing town. It held out against the Spaniards for three years, two months, and sixteen days. Eighty thousand men lost their lives before it, while fifty thousand were killed or died within. It at last surrendered, but on good terms; and not for want of men or provisions, but for want of ground to stand on, which the enemy took from them, at an amazing loss, step by step, till they had not room left for men to defend it. Three hundred thousand cannon-balls, of thirty pounds weight each, were fired against it; and the besieged often filled up the breaches made in their ramparts with heaps of dead bodies.

Such, my dear boy, are the miracles that men, animated with the all-subduing spirit of Liberty, can perform-Liberty! that immediate jewel of the soul that first moving principle of all the animal creation-which, with equal power, influences the bird to beat the cage with its wings, and the lion to tear the bars of his imprisonment the infant to spring from the tender confinement of its nurse, and the lean and shrivelled pantaloon to crawl abroad, and fly the warmth and repose of his wholesome chamber-Liberty! which, for centuries enthralled by artifice and fraud, or lulled into a slumber by the witching spirit of priestcraft, now rises like a giant refreshed with wine-in its great efforts for emanci pation, destroys and overturns systems but, when finding no resistance, and matured by time, will, I sincerely hope, sink appeased into a generous calm, and become the blessing, the guardian and protector of mankind!

It is your good fortune, my dear children, to be born at a time when Liberty seems to be well understood in your own country, and is universally the prevalent passion of men. It is almost needless, therefore, for me to exhort you to make it the groundwork of your political morality but let me remind you to guard, above all, against the despotism of certain tyrants, to whom many of the great advocates for Liberty are strangely apt to submit-I mean, your passions. Of all other tyrants, they are C

the most subtle, the most bewitching, the most overbear ing, and, what is worse, the most cruel. Beneath the do minion of other despots, tranquility may alleviate the weight of your chains, and soften oppression; but when once you become the slave of your passions, your peace is for ever fled, and you live and die in unabating misery.

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THE pride of the English is remarked all over the globe, even to a proverb! But pride is a word of such dubious meaning, so undefined in its sense, and, strained to such various imports, that you shall hear it violently execrated by one, and warmly applauded by an ather this denouncing it as a sin of the first magnitude, and that maintaining it to be the most vigilant guardian of human virtue, Those differences in opinion arise not from any defect in the intellects of either, but from each viewing the subject in that one point in which it first strikes his eye, or best suits his taste, his feeling, or his prejudices. I have no doubt, however, but a full consideration of the subject would shew, that pride as it is called, is only good or bad as the object from which it. arises is mean or magnificent, culpable or meritorious.. That noble pride which stimulates to extraordinary acts of generosity and magnanimity, such as, in many instances, has distinguished, above all others, the nobility of Spain, exacts the homage and admiration of mankind: But I fear yery much that our English pride is of another growth, and sinelis too rankly of that overstrained commercial spirit which makes the basis of the present grandeur of Great Britain, but which, in my humble judgment, raises only to debase her by slow, subtle degrees, poisons the national principle, enslaves the once bold spirit of the people, detracts from their real sclid felicity, and, by confounding the idea of national wealth with that of national prosperity, leads it in rapid strides to its downfall. In short, we are approaching, I fear, with daily accelerated steps, to the disposition and sordid

habits of the Dutch, of whom Doctor GOLDSMITH SO very pertinently and truly speaks, when he says,

"Ev'n Liberty itself is barter'd here!"

Without leading your mind through a maze of disquisition on this subject, which might fatigue with abstruseness and prolixity, I will bring you back to the point from which the matter started, and content myself with remarking, that the pride of the English, speaking of it as a part of the national character, is the meanest of all pride. The inflation of bloated, overgrown wealth, an overweening affection for money, an idolatrous worship of gain, have absolutely confounded the general intellect, and warped the judgment of the many to that excess, that in estimating men or things, they always refer to "what is he worth?" or, "what will it fetch?" This sordid habit of thinking was finely hit off by a keen fellow, the native of a neighbouring kingdom, who, for many years, carried on business in London, and failed:-Sitting one day in a coffee-house in the city, where some wealthy citizens were discussing a subject not entirely unconnected with cash concerns, one of them observing him rather attentive to their conversation, turned to him, and said, "What is your opinion, Sir, of the matter?""'Sblood, Sir !" returned he, peevishly, "what opinion can a man have in this country, who has not a guinea in his pocket?"

Under the influence of the various caprices inspired by this unhappy purse-pride, I am sorry to say our countrymen do, when they go abroad, so play the fool, that they are universally flattered and despised, pillaged and laughed at, by all persons with whom they have any dealing. In France, Mi Lor Anglois is, or at least was, to have six times as great a profusion of every thing as any other person, and pay three hundred per cent. more for it; and the worst of it was, that a Mi Lor was found so conducive to their interest, that they would not, if they could help it, suffer any Englishman to go without a title-nay, would sometimes, with kindly compulsion, force him to accept of it, whether he would or not: but if an Englisman be, above all others, the object of imposition in foreign countries, certainly none pillage him

there.

so unmercifully as his own countrymen who are settled In all the places through which I have travelled, I have had occasion to remark (and the remark has been amply verified by every gentlemen I have ever conversed with on the subject), that the most extravagant houses of entertainment are those kept by Englishmen. At Ostend, as well as other places, it was so; therefore, as economy, when it does not trespass upon the bounds of genteel liberality, is the best security for happiness and respect, I advise you, whenever you shall have occasion to visit the Continent, in the first place to avoid all appearance of the purse-proud ostentation of John Bull; and, in the next place, to avoid all English houses of entertainment.

It is a singular circumstance, and belongs, I should suppose, peculiarly to Ostend, that the charity-children of the town are permitted to come on board the vessels arrived, to beg of the passengers, one day in the week.

Before I bid adieu to Ostend, I must remark one heavy disadvantage under which it labours the want of fresh water; all they use being brought from Bruges. In going from Ostend to Bruges, a traveller has it in his choice to go by land, or water-If by land, he gets a good voiture for about ten shillings of our money; the road is about fourteen or fifteen miles-If by water (the mode which I adopted, as by far the cheapest and pleasantest), he travels in a vessel pretty much resembling our Lord Mayor's barge, sometimes called a trackschuyt, but of. ten la barque, or barke: it is, in truth, fitted up in a style of great neatness, if not elegance; stored with a large stock of provisions and refreshments of all kinds, and of superior quality, for the accommodation of the passengers; and has, particularly, a very handsome private room between decks, for the company to retire to, in order to drink tea, coffee, &c. &c. or play at cards. In this comfortable, I might say, delightful vehicle, as perfectly at ease as lying on a couch in the best room in London, are passengers drawn by two horses, at the rate of about four miles an hour, for about ten pence, the same length of way that it would cost ten shillings to be jumbled in a voiture over a rough paved road.

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