It would indeed be truly superfluous, to say one word of our own in favour of so humane an establishment as this. Let those who have experienced its bless ed effects-let the dumb speak! One boy thus writes:

When I came to the school I could know nothing. I am very glad that I am stop at the school at long time. I have learnt many things. I was much grieved at myself when nobody gave me education. I was like a dog when I was at home; I was very grumble for being deaf and dumb when I was a little boy. I did not know about God that made me deaf. I was very disobedient to my father or mother; I am very sorrow; I was very bad boy; I will not disobedient to my parents again."

"9

Another lad thus expresses his ideas of man's accountableness and obligation to the Supreme Being.

"It is a very good to fear the Lord. God is in the room, but I cannot see him. He is a spirit; he is every where present. I like to pray the Lord to give me what I need. I thank him that he is very kind to all his creatures a great number of creatures; but God knows the evil of the wicked. I hate the sin, and I must not forget but fear the Lord, and his eyes sees me. If we sin, God will be very angry. I think about God and Jesus Christ much. O Lord, give me wisdom, and I will be a good man. I like to read the Bible; I thank master to give me a large Bible; I love large holy Bible; I would like to read the Bible.

ROBERT REID."

Sarah Anderson thus writes to her father in Glasgow:

"Edinburgh, 16th June 1818. "My dear Father, On the 23d February there were fifteen pupils ill of a fever. I and companions were lying on the bed for seven days, and some fourteen days. The maids watched over us. Dr Keith came and looked at the poor deaf children lying on the bed; he felt the pulse of the poor children; he gave them medicine. My head was beat like a hammer. Doctor was very kind to the poor children. I think he is a good and kind doctor; he loves us all. I and they

were thankful to him for his kindness to us. We are not die, because God take care of us. I often think about God when I was lie in my bed, and ill. I was afraid of dying. I thank God for his great kindness.

ciated with him in the management of this interesting institution, to avail themselves of this opportunity of offering a humble, but sincere tribute, to the memory of those talents and virtues which had already raised their possessor to so high a rank among his fellow-citizens; and which, had it pleased Providence to prolong his useful life, would have numbered him among the brightest ornaments of his country."

I am wearying to see you. It is long since I heard from you. I hope you and all my kindred are very well. I will be happy to see you all. I will not go to see you this year,

because I have no vacation, and I would not like at Glasgow better than Edinburgh. I am going to leave school very soon. I will be a servant. I would like to stay with my master to be a servant. My sister Betty will leave school next summer. She will go to Glasgow, and she will be a dressmaker. I will go away home next summer, and I will come back. I will never go away home again, because I will be a servant for my master's family. I and my sister are quite well. I have no more to say to you. I am, dear father, your affectionate daughter, SARAH ANDERSON."

The two following dreams are by a very intelligent and amiable boy, who lost his hearing when about six years old.

"Edinburgh, Dec. 1817. "Yesterday I was reading about Turkey in Asia, and at night I dreamed about it.

"This was my dream.-I dreamed I and my brother took a walk out of Europe. We saw fine buildings, and we came into Asia; but the part of it we were in was Turkey. We admired the beauty of it, and I saw some of the Turks come to us; we spoke kindly to them to speak to us. I asked them where they lived. They pointed to a house, and said words which I did not understand, for they were educated in Turkish language; so they took me to a fine park, and we played several games there, and we came out of the park and saw two Turkish children playing. I saw the Turks at their dinner; they had no plate nor knife, but ate it out of their hands. I wanted to see the Emperor of Turkey; but the Turks said, by signs, we must not, for he was cruel. After this my father came, and nodded to the Turks, and shook hands with them, and took us home. The Turkish school was a great many children sitting on the ground in a park, with paper in their hands, and reading them, and the schoolmaster, when they are idle, took them by the ears and whipped them with the bough of a tree.

"Again I dreamed that King James the 2d, afraid he would be killed by the Prince of Orange, ran about the hills, and I was walking on a road, I met the Prince of Orange. I saw him praying to God to deliver him from James the 2d, his enemy; and when he ended his prayer, he cast his eyes on me, and I bowed to him, and said I would chastise his enemy myself. This made the Prince very joyful, and he was going to offer me £100; but I said I could not take it, but that I thanked him much. So I and the Prince walked. I walked at his left hand, till we came to a hill; we saw an old castle on the top of it. There we saw James the 2d building a stone

We

house. The moment the Prince of Orange saw him, he became enraged. He and I took up great stones and sticks, and we both ran after James, and threw the stones at him. The Prince of Orange, as he ran, could not forbear crying out, Villain! thou deservest this fate. I said to the Prince, James deserved a much worse fate. ran throwing our stones, and hit him on a great many parts of his body. I saw that James had on armour. We threw the stones till they were all spent. We gathered more, but the Prince was so much out of patience, that he did not care what stones he gathered, and we threw at James. The Prince drew his scymitar, and said, these are the keys of death, and we ran till James the 2d stumbled and fell into a deep hole, and the Prince of Orange ran to the hole in a rage, and stabbed James through the body and killed him, and buried him in the hole, and the Prince covered it with grass, and wiped the blood off his scymitar, and he and I went away. The Prince told me, I may go where I pleased, and he said he would give me a reward, and he was crowned king of England, by the name of William the 3d.

K."

We take leave of this excellent Report with the following most interesting letter to the Committee, from Joseph Turner, the youth who is to be henceforth a permanent assistant in the school.

"Edinburgh, 4th Feb. 1818. "Gentlemen-I am greatly obliged to you for your kindness in conferring benefits on me and on my poor deaf companions. I feel very thankful for my education, and I have felt much inclined to commit it to my memory. I ought to be thankful to God Almighty, for giving Mr Kinniburgh ability and patience to teach me and my companions, and for giving me wisdom and instruction that is very pleasant to my soul. If I had not come to school to be taught, I would have been ignorant, and have known nothing that is proper, and no religion would have come toward me. When I was at

home I knew one word, " God," but I did not know what it meant, nor how the world was made, and my mind was very hard and uncultivated, resembling the ground that is not plowed, and I was perfectly ignorant. I thought then, that my mind would open when I was a man, but I was mistaken; it would not have opened if I had not come to school. I must study my Bible till my life is departed, and I hope God will please never to forsake me. If it be your pleasure, I wish to remain with Mr Kinniburgh as an assistant teacher, as the time for my education is expired. I express much gratitude to him for his kind treatment of me, and for you all for your kind bounty. remain, Gentlemen, your obliged servant, JOSEPH TURNER.

To the Committee of the Deaf and Dumb Institution.

I

"A gentleman, present at the late examination in the Assembly Rooms, wished the teacher to ask Joseph Turner what is prayer? Turner, after giving the answer which is contained in the Assembly's Catechism to this question, wrote the following definition:

"The act of praying to God Almighty is a giving up of our wishes to him for things pleasing to his will, in our Saviour Jesus Christ's name, with avowal of our transgressions, and grateful owning of his heavenly compassions."

MISS SPENCE AND THE BAGMAN.

A MATRIMONIAL alliance between the Travelling Spinster and the Literary Bagman could scarcely fail of producing the most surprising results. Nature has formed them for each other, for there is "similitude in their dissimilitude,"-a principle which one of the Lake-Poets has informed us is at the bottom of all Poetry, and may therefore be well supposed to have no little influence on the passions. Miss Spence talks very freely of love and marriage in many parts of her volume,

and the anonymous Bagman is equally facetious to Cupid and to Hymen. Were they to travel a few stages together in a neat post-chaise, with the front blinds up, there can be no doubt that the preliminaries of a closer connexion would speedily be settled. They could then tour along through the united kingdoms of marriage, Great Britain and Ireland, and twin-volumes, at least, would annually bless their literary loves. Sir Richard Phillips, we believe, has been in the habit of sending off Miss Spence in Shandry-dans, and other vehicles, throughout the more picturesque regions of the island; and she, on her return, sells her literary bantlings to that generous and eccentric bibliopolist. But there is a want of romance in all that. An unprotected female is often at a loss in inns where the beds are full of young sportsmen; and were

Letters from the North Highlands, during the Summer 1816; by Elizabeth Isabella Spence, author of "A Caledonian Excursion," &c. &c. 8vo. pp. 364. Longman, &c. London. 1817.

Letters from Scotland; by an English Commercial Traveller: written during a Journey to Scotland in the Summer of 1815. 12mo. pp. 224. Longman, &c. London; Constable & Co. Edinburgh. 1817.

She keeps driving about the Highlands for nearly a month after thishunting waterfalls and other curiosities. But our limits, we find, will not enable us to quote any of her poetical descriptions or sapient remarks. She seems to have been so enchanted with every thing she saw, that never, in one single instance, has she rightly spelt the name of a place or a human being, and all the old positions on Ainslie's Map of Scotland are shifted, and made to dance about in a very perplexing way. She seems to have been perfectly intoxicated. The pure air of the Highlands was too much for her, and she returns to Edinburgh just in time for the Caledonian Races. Of Leith Races in the days of her youth, of which the remembrance is pleasant, but mournful to the soul, she thus speaks:

"The Isthmian games scarcely excited a stronger sensation in Greece, than these equestrian contests produced in the frugal North; for there, public amusements, on an expensive scale, were formerly of rare occurrence. Though the superior pleasure of social intercourse and intelligent conversation were perhaps more generally understood and cultivated than in any other part of the island, the thoughts of the young and the gay were, for half a year before, occupied with the appearance they were to make at the races, and still more at the pre-eminent ball given by the noblemen and gentlemen of the Caledonian Hunt, distinguish. ed by the title of the Hunter's Ball. To be admitted to this truly happy meeting was a mark of gentility sufficient for life. Never to have been at the Hunter's Ball was a melancholy blank, of which none chose to be reminded. This gala lived as long in recollection as in anticipation, not being obliterated by other splendid gaieties. But these glories were, like all others, destined to decay, after enjoying their undiminished pre-eminence for more than a century."

Miss Spence of course attends the theatre, and informs us, that she saw Mr Kean go through the fiery ordeal of an Edinburgh audience, of which, no doubt, he was much afraid.

"In short, in what is pre-eminently styled the intellectual city, this actor exhibits his powers to an audience composed entirely of ladies or gentlemen, studious of the decorum of their characters, and unapt to lavish praise incautiously. They think it extremely inelegant to interrupt the actor in the current of his feelings, and destroy the momentary illusion of the audience with noisy applause; and when any person attempts this transgression on good taste, he is immediately silenced by expressed dis

approbation. They receive and dismiss a favourite performer with plaudits, more gratifying for not being rashly bestowed. Nothing could be more fervent than the applause dience of which mob formed no ingredient. conferred on this great tragedian by an au

"The chief of critics, in this region of criticism, had not words to express his admiration, but was obliged to have recourse to a poetical figure for that purpose. He said, That in Sir Giles Overreach the hero so completely realized the idea of fiendish wickedness, that he every moment expected horns to sprout from his forehead, and flames to issue from his mouth.” ”

The chief of the critics really seems no great witch in the memorabilia of Miss Spence. This nonsense is nothing more than a vulgar paraphrase of Othello's exclamation about Iago

"I look down at his feet," &c.

Miss Spence having thus communicated so much rare and valuable information about Edinburgh and its vicinity, let us turn to her picture of Glasgow.

Glasgow is a very flourishing city, and in point of commerce and opulence is considered one of the first in the kingdom. It is thought in appearance to resemble a continental town in its long and spacious streets, numerous spires, and handsome stone buildings. The Lunatic Asylum, lately erected, is a noble edifice. No stranger can visit this asylum for the most pitiable of all mankind, without a sentiment of the most pleasing satisfaction in beholding their melancholy condition ameliorated, as far as the

utmost tenderness and humane treatment

will admit. Comfort, cleanliness, and wholesome food, is afforded to the unhappy patients; and such judicious indulgence, except in hopeless and violent cases, that many salutary cures have been effected.

"Being a Sunday in the neighbourhood of Glasgow, I made one in the vast multitude now attracted to the Tron Church to hear the Rev. Dr Chalmers. Never did I behold so crowded an assemblage of persons on so sacred an occasion. Long before the ed to excess, and people of the first condiservice commenced the church was throngtion were satisfied with standing-room in the aisles. The silence was so profound, as to give additional solemnity to the sacred occasion. The use of an organ would be considered an innovation, as inconsistent with the rigid simplicity of the followers of John Knox; but notwithstanding the absence of one, when hundreds of voices unite in the song of praise to the Almighty, the effect is touching and sublime.

"Dr Chalmers, who is at present the boast and ornament of the Scotch church, gratified me exceedingly, by hearing elo quence of a very superior order, consecrated to its best and highest purposes, in the discourse which he delivered.

"I expected to be pleased and edified, and I was so; but after so much preparation, could not expect to be, as I was, surprised, very much surprised, at the boundless power of real genius, which, even in this fastidious critical age, achieves such unlimited power over the mind, without any of the accompaniments which so often usurp its name, and to vulgar minds supply its place. Dr Chalmers is popular, while avoiding, and seemingly disdaining, the arts which many consider as essential to popularity. No grace of appearance or manner, no melody of voice, nothing in appearance that conveys the idea of dignity or elegance. In short, his power over the will, and even the affections, is a victory over prejudice and every visible obstacle. He owes nothing to any extraneous aid whatever. It is the genius of a logician, a poet, (for there is much poetry without numbers) an astronomer, a mathematician, a powerful intellect, in short, which, after grasping all human science, soars beyond it, inflamed by zeal, and exalted by pure Christianity. No man can sink lower in familiar simplicity of diction, without touching the level of vulgarity; no man can rise higher, where the grandeur of his subject without once approaching the borders of bombast or false sublimity. He is always clear, because he goes directly to the point in view, without deviating in search of studied effect. He is always impressive, because he evidently speaks from the heart as well as from the understanding His figures and illustrations, the spontaneous and sudden powers or fruits of a bright and vigorous imagination, illuminate his subject, and enchain attention. It is the privilege of true and high genius to exercise this engrossing power over minds capable of reflecting its light. What a blessing it is to humanity when such talents are exercised to the noblest purposes, and when

is his muse,

commensurate virtues add force to science so powerful.

It has been for some time lamented, that the church of Scotland, rich in pastors, who, with complete learning and exemplary diligence, instruct their people in sound doctrine, unforced by good example, has rather sunk in regard to genius. Of these extraordinary persons, who are born to live beyond the limits of mortality even in the present world, none have appeared since the days of Robertson, Blair, Erskine, and Henry. But the few of the remaining contemporaries, who have witnessed the rising of this new star, acknowledge its brightness, and rejoice in its growing celebrity.

"Mr Henry Mackenzie, always celebrated for the elegance and purity of his literary taste, and now venerated, as I before observed, as a veteran in letters, and the only remaining light of a constellation of Scottish genius, bore testimony to the merits I have endeavoured feebly to desGribe. In a meeting of the Literary Society VOL. III.

in Edinburgh, he stood forth, and in an eulogium full of spirit, and all his wonted elegance, paid his tribute of admiration to this extraordinary person."

So much for the Spinster-now for the Bagman. He seems never to have left his mother's apron-string, till he conceived the sublime idea of travelling into Scotland. His reflections on taking his seat in the mail-coach for York, are almost equal in simple sublimity to those uttered by Mungo Park when he first embarked upon the Niger.

"Attached to home and its quiet enjoy. ments, and unaccustomed to travel, I left my friends with regret, and looked forward with apprehension of difficulties to which flections were not interrupted by my fellowmy inexperience might expose me. My retravellers, who appeared fully occupied with their own cogitations; and, at the end of the first stage, the production of napkins and nightcaps sufficiently indicated that none were inclined to conversation. Like my

companions I disposed myself to sleep; but discomposed. My separation from all those a variety of mixed emotions kept my mind sarily occasioned melancholy, which was who were interested in my welfare neceslittle alleviated by expectation of novelty, but sometimes forgotten when the anticipation of disagreeable incidents gave exercise in imaginary situations. Though I courted to my mind in laying down rules of conduct repose most devoutly, it was in vain.”

Our elegant and enterprising cit is sorely beset by three Scotsmen, one of whom has all that undisguised partiality for his own country, and illiberal or affected contempt for every other, which render Scotsmen in general so unamiable, so offensive to their southern neighbours." He finds shelter from the sarcasms of this Sawney in his admiration "of the endless succession of trees and hedges, apparently gliding rapidly past;" a phenomenon which he had never before witnessed, and which all his philosophy cannot explain. At York he not only visits the minster, but recounts, on his return to the more congenial atmosphere of the traveller's room, the following most excellent story. A gentleman of the party had, it was thought, given his mare too much water. This the gentleman denied. But 66 a stout man said it was arrogance in a young man to differ from the majority, who were his seniors. 'Sir,' said B. if you rest your faith on the opinion of the majority, you ought not to be a Christian.' Sir,' rejoined his opponent,

3 I