M. DE STAEL ON WASHINGTON'S EULOGIUM.

MR. OLDSCHOOL,

Ir the following compliment to our country be deemed worthy of insertion, I shall not regret the trouble of transcribing it. It is from the work on the Influence of Literature, by Madame de Stael, who, in speaking of the style proper for magistrates, proceeds thus:

THE noble and simple beauties of certain expressions command respect even from those who pronounce them: and among other woes attached to selfcontempt, we must also add the loss of this language, which causes the most exalted and pure emotions to those who are worthy of using it.

This style of the mind (if I may thus express myself) is one of the greatest supports of a free government; it arises from such a train of sentiments as must be in concordance with those of every honest man, and from such a confidence and respect for the public opinion, that it is a certain proof of much present happiness, and a sure guarantee of much happiness to come.

When an American, in announcing the death of general Washington, said, " Divine Providence hath been pleased to withdraw from the midst of us this man, the first in war, the first in peace, and the first in the affections of his country!" what sentiments, what ideas are recalled to the mind by those expressions! Does not this acknowledgment of a Divine Providence indicate, that, in this enlightened country, no ridicule is thrown upon religious ideas, nor on those regrets expressed in the tenderness of the heart? This simple encomium on a great man, and the gradation which gives for the last term of his glory," the affections of his country," conveys to the heart a deep and tender emotion.

How many virtues, in fact, are comprehended in the love of a free nation for their first legislator! for a man who, after twenty years of unblemished reputation in a public character, became, by his own choice, a private individual! It appears as if he had only traversed the fields of power, in the journey of life, as a road that led to retirement; a retirement honoured by the most noble, elevating, and pleasing recollections!

Never, in any crisis of the French revolution, was there to be found a man who could have spoken the language of which I

Pamt & by David

Buonaparte crossing the Alps,

скерет

have recited the above few remarkable words; but in every report that hath reached us of the connexion that subsisted between the American legislators and the citizens, there are to be found this purity and grandeur of style, which can only be inspired by the conscience of an honest man.

S.

THE FINE ARTS-FOR THE PORT FOLIO.

THE annexed engraving is from one of David's most distinguished paintings, The Passage of the Alps, which is in the Hospital of the Invalids at Paris.

NOTES OF A DESULTORY READER.-FOR THE PORT FOLIO.

It is thus that Silius Italicus in the 8th book of his epic poem on the Punic war, introduces his hero, Fabius, to the reader:

Primus Agenoridum cedentia terga videre

Eneadis dederat Fabius: Romana parentem

Solum castra vocant, solum vocat Hannibal hostem.

The sense of which lines, may be thus given in English:

First of the Roman chiefs whose martial might

Caus'd Punic bands to show their backs in flight,
Was Fabius: by his troops a father deem'd,

By Hannibal, sole worthy of his arms esteem'd.

To the historian we are indebted for the faithful recital of past and passing events, but more particularly to the poet, for the established decision of the world on these historical representations; and, in this view, in the merited praise bestowed on Fabius by his countrymen, how great the implied eulogium on the military talents of Hannibal!

There can be little doubt, that the prose style of a nation, is, in no inconsiderable degree fashioned by that of its poetry; and

perhaps no poet among the English, has had so great an influence in this respect as Shakspeare. His phrases are moulded into our every day compositions; and Mr. Burke, in his reflections on the French revolution, does more than once seem to have had him view, particularly his play of Othello. The exclamation of Othello's occupation's gone! with the Farewells which precede it, unquestionably gave form to the eloquent lamentation on the loss of chivalry, as noticed by Mr. Paine; nor can we doubt that the last speech of Othello was present to the mind of Mr. Burke, when he penned the concluding paragraph of his reflections. The structure of the sentences is the same, there is the same flow in the diction, the same melody in the cadence.

Then must you speak

Of one (says Othello) who lov'd not wisely but too well,
Of one not easily jealous, but being wrought,

Perplex'd in the extreme; of one whose hand, &c. &c.

I have little to recommend my opinions (says Mr. Burke) but long observation and much impartiality. They come from one who has been no tool of power, no flatterer of greatness, and who, in his last acts, does not wish to belie the tenor of his life. They come from one almost the whole of whose public exertion has been a struggle for the liberty of others; from one in whose breast, &c. &c.

As the style of our prose compositions partakes as observed of the manner of Shakspeare, so have the peculiarities of the English tragedy, been derived from his transcendant genius. Among these peculiarities may be reckoned the description of the apothecary and his shop in Romeo and Juliet, and that of the magic handkerchief in Othello, both master-pieces of picturesque and fanciful solemnity. Otway's wrinkled hag in the Orphan, is a portrait of the same school, and in its true manner and spirit.

The "Quidquid agunt homines, nostri farago libelli," would be more appropriate to the works of this admirable author, than to those perhaps of any other that ever wrote. They are in fact the characteristics of man in every rank and situation of life. Nothing so minute as to escape his observation, of which the allusion of