4. It only remains to notice what is said with regard to Negro Slavery;-and on this we shall be very short. We have no doubt spoken very warmly on the subject in one of our late Numbers;-but Mr W. must have read what we there said, with a jaundiced eye indeed, if he did not see that our warmth proceeded, not from any animosity against the people among whom this miserable institution existed, but against the institution itself-and was mainly excited by the contrast that it presented to the freedom and prosperity upon which it was so strangely engrafted;-thus appearing Like a stain upon a Vestal's robe, The worse for what it soils. '. Accordingly, we do not call upon other nations to hate and despise America for this practice; but upon the Americans themselves to wipe away this foul blot from their character. We have a hundred times used the same language to our own countrymen-and repeatedly on the subject of the Slave Trade; and Mr W. cannot be ignorant, that many pious and excellent citizens of his own country have expressed themselves in similar terms with regard to this very institution. As to his recriminations on England, we shall explain to Mr W. immediately, that they have no bearing on the question between us; and, though nobody can regret more than we do the domestic slavery of our West India islands, it is quite absurd to represent the difficulties of the abolition as at all parallel in the case of America. It seems to be pretty clearly made out, that, without slaves, those islands could not be maintained; and, independent of private interests, the trade of England cannot afford to part with them. But will any body pretend to say, that the great and comparatively temperate regions over which the American Slavery extends, would be deserted, if all their inhabitants were free-or even that they would be permanently less populous or less productive? We are perfectly aware, that a sudden or immediate emancipation of all those who are now in slavery, might be attended with frightful disorders, as well as intolerable losses; and, accordingly, we have nowhere recommended any such measure: But we must repeat, that it is a crime and a shame, that the freest nation on the earth should keep a million and a half of fellow-creatures in chains, within the very territory and sanctuary of their freedom; and should see them multiplying, from day to day, without thinking of any provision for their ultimate liberation. When we say this, we are far from doubting that there are many amiable and excellent individuals among the slave proprietors. There were many such among the importers of slaves in our West Indies; Yet, it is not the less true, that that accursed traffic was a crime-and it was so called in the most emphatic language, and with general assent, year after year, in Parliament, without any one ever imagining that this imported a personal attack on those individuals, far less a blot upon the nation which tolerated and legalized their proceedings. Before leaving this topic, we have to thank Mr W. for a great deal of curious, and, to us, original information, as to the history of the American slave trade, and the measures pursued by the different States with regard to the institution of slavery: From which we learn, among other things, that, so early as 1767, the legislature of Massachussets brought in a bill for prohibiting the importation of negroes into that province, which was rejected by the British governor, in consequence of express instruc tions; and another in 1774 shared the same fate. We learn also, that, in 1770, two years before the decision in the case of Somerset in England, the courts of the same distinguished province decided, upon solemn argument, that no person could be held in slavery within their jurisdiction; and awarded not only their freedom, but wages for their past services, to a variety of negro suitors. These, indeed, are fair subjects of pride and exultation; and we hail them, without grudging, as bright trophies in the annals of the States to which they relate. But do not their glories cast a deeper shade on those who have refused to follow the example-and may we not now be allowed to speak of the guilt and unlawfulness of slavery, as their own countrymen are praised and boasted of for having spoken, so many years ago? We learn also from Mr W., that Virginia abolished the foreign slave trade so early as 1778-Pensylvania in 1780—Massachussets in 1787--and Connecticut and Rhode Island in 1788. It was finally interdicted by the General Congress in 1794; and made punishable as a crime, seven years before that measure was adopted in England. We have great pleasure in stating these facts. But they all appear to us not only incongruous with the permanent existence of slavery, but as indicating those very feelings with regard to it which we have been so severely blamed for expressing. We here close our answer to Mr W.'s charges. Our readers, we fear, have been for some time tired of it: And, indeed, we have felt all along, that there was something absurd in answering gravely to such an accusation. If any regular reader of our Review could be of opinion that we were hostile to America, and desirous of fomenting hostility between her and this country, we could scarcely hope that he would change that opinion for any thing we have now been saying. But Mr W.'s book may fall into the hands of many, in his own country at least, to whom our writings are but little known; and the imputations it contains may become known to many who never inquire into their grounds: On such persons, the statements we have now made may produce some impression-and the spirit in which they are made perhaps still more. Our labour will not have been in vain, if there are any that rise up from the perusal of these pages with a better opinion of their Transatlantic brethren, and an increased desire to live with them in friendship and peace. There still remains behind, a fair moiety of Mr W.'s book; containing his recriminations on England-his exposition of her sores and blotches '-and his retort courteous for all the abuse which her writers have been pouring on his country for the last hundred years. The task, we should think, must have been rather an afflicting one to a man of much moral sensibility:-But it is gone through very resolutely, and with marvellous industry. The learned author has not only ransacked forgotten histories and files of old newspapers in search of disreputable transactions and degrading crimes-but has groped for the materials of our dishonour, among the filth of Dr Colquhoun's Collections, and the Reports of our Prison and Police Committees-culled vituperative exaggerations from the record of angry debates-and produced, as incontrovertible evidence of the excess of our guilt and misery, the fervid declamations of moralists exhorting to amendment, or of satirists endeavouring to deter from vice. Provincial misgovernment from Ireland to Hindostan-cruel amusements-increasing pauperism-disgusting brutality-shameful ignorance-perversion of law-grinding taxation-brutal debauchery, and many other traits equally attractive, are all heaped together, as the characteristics of English society; and unsparingly illustrated by loose extracts from English Journals, '-quotations from Espriella's Letters-and selections from the Parliamentary Debates. Accustomed, as we have long been, to mark the vices and miseries of our countrymen, we really cannot say that we recognise any likeness in this distorted representation; which exhibits our fair England as one great Lazar-house of moral and intellectual disease-one hideous and bloated mass of sin and suffering-one festering heap of corruption, infecting the wholesome air which breathes upon it, and diffusing all around the contagion and the terror of its example. We have no desire whatever to argue against the truth or the justice of this picture of our country; which we can assure Mr W. we contemplate with perfect calmness and equanimity: but we are tempted to set against it the judgment of another foreigner, with whom he cannot complain of being confronted, and whose authority at this moment stands higher, perhaps with the whole civilized world, than that of any other individual. We allude to Madame de Staël-and to the splendid testimony she has borne to the character and happiness of the English nation, in her last admirable book on the Revolution of her own country. But we have spoken of this work so lately, in our Number for September 1818, that we shall not now recal the attention of our readers to it, further than by this general reference. We rather wish to lay before them an American authority. 6 In a work of great merit, entitled, A Letter on the Genius and Dispositions of the French Government,' published at Philadelphia in 1810, and which attracted much notice, both there and in this country, the author, in a strain of great eloquence and powerful reasoning, exhorts his country to make common cause with England in the great struggle in which she was then engaged with the giant power of Bonaparte, and points out the many circumstances in the character and condition of the two countries that invited them to a cordial alliance. He was well aware, too, of the distinction we have endeavoured to point out between the Court, or the Tory rulers of the State, and the body of our People: and, after observing that the American Government, by following his councils, might retrieve the character of their country, he adds, "They will, I am quite sure, be seconded by an entire correspondence of feeling, not only on our part, but on that of the PEOPLE of Englandwhatever may be the narrow policy, or illiberal prejudices of the British MINISTRY;'-and, in the body of his work, he gives an ample and glowing description of the character and condition of that England of which we have just seen so lamentable a representation. The whole passage is too long for insertion; but the following extracts will afford a sufficient specimen of its tone and tenor. A peculiarly masculine character, and the utmost energy of feeling are communicated to all orders of men,-by the abundance which prevails so universally,-the consciousness of equal rights,the fulness of power and fame to which the nation has attained,-and the beauty and robustness of the species under a climate highly favourable to the animal economy. The dignity of the rich is without insolence, the subordination of the poor without servility. Their freedom is well guarded both from the dangers of popular licentiousness, and from the encroachments of authority.-Their national pride leads to national sympathy, and is built upon the most legitimate of all foundations-a sense of preeminent merit and a body of illustrious annals. Whatever may be the representations of those who, with little knowledge of facts, and still less soundness or impartiality of judgment, affect to deplore the condition of England,-it is nevertheless true, that there does not exist, and never has existed elsewhere, -so beautiful and perfect a model of public and private prosperity, -so magnificent, and at the same time, so solid a fabric of social happiness and national grandeur. I pay this just tribute of admiration with the more pleasure, as it is to me in the light of an Atonement for the errors and prejudices, under which I laboured, on this subject, before I enjoyed the advantage of a personal experience. A residence of nearly two years in that country,-during which period, I visited and studied almost every part of it,-with no other view or pursuit than that of obtaining correct information, and, I may add, with previous studies well fitted to promote my object,-convinced me that I had been egregiously deceived. I saw no instances of individual oppression, and scarcely any individual misery but that which belongs, under any circumstances of our being, to the infirmity of all human institutions. ' The agriculture of England is confessedly superior to that of any other part of the world, and the condition of those who are engaged in the cultivation of the soil, incontestably preferable to that of the same class in any other section of Europe. An inexhaustible source of admiration and delight is found in the unrivalled beauty, as well as richness and fruitfulness of their husbandry; the effects of which are heightened by the magnificent parks and noble mansions of the opulent proprietors: by picturesque gardens upon the largest scale, and disposed with the most exquisite taste: and by Gothic remains no less admirable in their structure than venerable for their antiquity. The neat cottage, the substantial farm-house, the splendid villa, are constantly rising to the sight, surrounded by the most choice and poetical attributes of the landscape. The vision is not more delightfully recreated by the rural scenery, than the moral sense is gratified, and the understanding elevated by the institutions of this great country. The first and continued exclamation of an American who con. templates them with unbiassed judgment, is Salve magna Parens frugum, Saturnia tellus It appears something not less than Impious to desire the ruin of this people, when you view the height to which they have carried the comforts, the knowledge, and the virtue of our species: the extent and number of their foundations of charity; their skill in the mechanic arts, by the improvement of which alone, they have conferred inestimable benefits on mankind; the masculine morality, the lofty sense of independence, the sober and rational piety which are found in all classes; their impartial, decorous and able administration of a code of laws, than which none more just and perfect has ever been in operation; their seminaries of education yielding more solid and profitable instruction than any other whatever; their emi |