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cinations of the verse, the pathos of the sentiment, or the justness and vividness of the description, that I have been at a loss where to fix. The two passages which I have at length ventured to transcribe, have been chosen on account of their bearing a nearer relation to the subjects that usually occupy your pages, than any others which would equally admit of being dissevered from the text. The first extract I shall give, represents the fatal termination of one of those single combats which, in the dark ages, were the appointed means of deciding such disputes as involved the honour of either party. ""Tis done, 'tis done! that fatal blow

Has stretch'd him on the bloody plain : He strives to rise-brave Musgrave, no! Thence never shalt thou rise again. He chokes in blood-some friendly hand Undo the visor's barred band, Unfix the gorget's iron clasp, And give him room for life to gasp! O bootless aid!-Haste, holy friar, Haste, ere the sinner shall expire! Of all his guilt let him be shriven, And smooth his path from earth to heaven. In haste the holy friar sped, His naked foot was dyed with red,

As through the lists he ran:
Unmindful of the shouts on high
That hail'd the conqueror's victory,
He rais'd the dying man.

Loose wared his silver beard and hair,
As o'er him he kneel'd down in prayer;
And still the crucifix on high
He holds before his darkening eye;
And still he bends an anxious ear,
His faultering penitence to hear;

Still props him from the bloody sod,
Still, even when soul and body part,
Pours ghostly comfort on his heart,

And bids him trust in God, Unheard he prays: the death-pangs o'er, Richard of Musgrave breathes no more."

I shall add only one more passage. It is taken from the close of the Poem, and describes the funeral rites performed, after the popish manner, in honour of the unfortunate Musgrave. It thus proceeds: "And slow up the dim aisle afar With sable scowl and scapular, And snow-white stoles in order due, The holy fathers two and two In long procession came;

Taper and host, and book they bare, And holy banner flourish'd fair

With the REDEEMER'S name. Above the prostrate pilgrim band, The mitred abbot stretch'd his hand,

And bless'd them as they kneeld: With holy cross he sign'd them all, And pray'd they might be sage in hall,

And fortunate in field.

Then mass was sung, and prayers were

said,

And solemn requiem for the dead;
And bells toll'd out their mighty peal,
For the departed spirit's weal;
And ever in the office close
The hymn of intercession rose:
And far the echoing aisles prolong
The awful burthen of the song

DIES IRA, DIES ILLA
SOLVET SÆCLUM IN FAVILLA:
While the pealing organ rung;

Were it meet with sacred strain
To close my lay, so light and vain ;
Thus the holy fathers sung:

Hymn for the Dead.

That day of wrath, that dreadful day,
When heav'n and earth shall pass away,
What power shall be the sinner's stay?
How shall he meet that dreadful day?
When shrivelling like a parched scroll,
The flaming heavens together roll;
When louder yet, and yet more dread,
Swells the high trump that wakes the dead:
O! on that day, that wrathful day,
When man to judgment wakes from clay,
Be THOU the trembling sinner's stay,
Though heav'n and earth shall pass away."
L. B.

To the Editor of the Christian Observer. THE subject of duelling has of late been so fully investigated, and its sinfulness so clearly demonstrated, that one would imagine no unbiassed and considerate mind would resist the proofs which have appeared in your publication, and in many excellent dissertations on the subject. But we find by daily experience the truth of that scriptural declaration, that the depravity of human nature requires line upon line, and precept upon precept, here a little and there a little;" and this has induced me to hope, that notwithstanding the number of treatises that have

appeared on the subject, another short consideration of it might, by the grace of God, not be found unprofitable. And I was more especially desirous to address you, because I thought it might be useful to make more public a very forcible argument against duelling, which I first learned from a novel, and never saw in any other publication. In the novel to which I allude, a professed libertine has by the most disgraceful means ruined a virtuous young lady, and thus occasioned her death. In consequence her cousin challenges, and kills him; but being a man not wholly destitute of serious impressions, he afterwards breaks forth into this pathetic lamentation: "When God would have given him time to repent, I would not." I know not, Mr. Editor, that I ever saw an argument against duelling, which speaks more forcibly to a heart not utterly devoid of feeling. Would every duellist, before he enters the lists, reflect that in seeking his adversary's life, he endeavours to send him laden with unrepented sin into the presence of an avenging God; that he aims to the utmost of his power to consign him to a place of eternal torments; I think it might be a check even to some whom abstract considerations of duty fail to move. Surely human nature, even in its most depraved state, would shudder at the thought of being the cause of eternal misery to a fellow creature.

And let not the man who accepts a challenge merely to preserve his character in the world, without any feelings of malice, hatred, or anger, against an adversary, nay, who enters the lists with a full determination not to take away his life, let him not I say, imagine, that this consideration does not apply to his case. Is not self murder (I would demand of him) a breach of the sixth commandment? In the same manner as the sixth commandment applies to the case of a self murderer, does the consideration now before us apply to the case of the per

son who hazards his own life in a
duel, even though he attempts not
that of his adversary. God would
give you time to repent: you
refuse
it; you voluntarily throw yourself
upon his anger, laden with all your
unrepented sins; nay, leaving the
world by a sin which, in as much as
it is a violation of his law, an express
contempt of his command, is alone
sufficient to whelm you in everlast-
ing misery. You are the condemned
criminal, who, scorning the reprieve
offered by royal clemency, insists
on dying by the hands of the exe-
cutioner. Such an infatuated wretch
you would in any other case pity or
despise; yet by your actions you
approve his conduct. Thus you treat
your heavenly king; thus you refuse
to receive his merciful offers. The
sinner, who lives from day to day
in his iniquity, expects, or at least
hopes, that a time may come when
worldly cares and worldly enjoy-
ments will no longer oppose his re-
ceiving God's offers of mercy, and
piously employing the time granted
for repentance. You at once cut
yourself off from every such hope;
you look forward to no such future
day, but willingly and purposely die
in your sins. He acts as a hardened
but trembling sinner; you as an in-
fidel. You may escape from a duel
with life; possibly the chances are
in your favour; still, however, your
guilt is the same; still you cannot
deny that you court death, that you
provoke damnation.

I would wish that every one, who has received a challenge, and finds it difficult to incur the disgrace attendant on refusing it, would once ask himself the following questions: If I kill my adversary, do not I deny him the time which God would grant him for repentance? If I myself am killed; do not I, as a self murderer, deny to myself that time for repentance which God would grant

to me?

S. F. N.

To the Editor of the Christian Observer.

Is your volume for 1801, p. 547, you have inserted an anecdote of the Slave Trade which must have impresed with horror every person who read it. It states that, "In the month of March, 1783, the following circumstances came out in the trial of a case of insurance before the Chief Justice of the Court of King's Bench, at Guildhall. An ignorant master of a slave ship had overshot his port, Jamaica, and was afraid of wanting water before he could beat up again to the island. He himself fell sick. In the course of his illness he ordered his mate, who was the man that gave the evidence, to throw overboard 46 slaves handcuffed and he was readily obeyed. Two days after he ordered 36 more to be thrown after them, and after two days more another parcel of 40. Ten others, who had been permitted to take the air on deck unfettered, jumped into the sea indignantly after them. The ship after all brought into port 480 gallons of water."

My object in adverting to this horrid story is to furnish you with a more correct and circumstantial account of it, which I am enabled to do in consequence of my being favoured with minutes of the abovementioned trial, taken at the time by a gentleman of the first respectability, and which have since been carefully preserved. The particulars, as stated in evidence, will shew that, dreadful as are the facts related in the above anecdote, they fall far short of the real enormity of the transaction. Permit me to detail it at large.

The ship Zong, Luke Collingwood, master, sailed from the Isle of St. Thomas, on the Coast of Africa, the 6th September, 1781, with 442 slaves and 17 whites on board, for Jamaica; and on the 27th November following, she fell in with that island; but instead of proceeding to some port, the master, either through ignorance or a sinister intention, ran

the ship to leeward, alleging that he mistook Jumtiica for Hispaniola.

Sickness and mortality had by this time taken place. It is needless to state, that previously to the act regulating the transport of slaves*, these evils scarcely ever failed to carry off vast numbers during the voyage; the avarice of the traders inducing them to crowd, or rather to pack, too many slaves together in the holds of their ships. On board the Zong, between the time of her leaving the Coast of Africa (6th September) and the 29th November, 1781, upwards of SIXTY slaves and SEVEN white people died, and a GREAT MANY of the remaining slaves, on the day last mentioned, were sick of some severe disorder, and LIKELY NOT TO LIVE LONG.

These circumstances of sickness and mortality are necessary to be remarked; and also the consequence. of them, viz. that the dead and dying

slaves would have been a dead loss to the owners, and in some proportion also to the captain of the ship, who was allowed a certain per centage on the proceeds; unless some pretence or expedient had been found to throw the loss upon the insurers, as in the case of Jetsam, or Jetson, i. e. a plea of necessity to cast overboard some part of a cargo to save the rest. These circumstances, I repeat, are necessary to be remarked, because they point out the most probable inducement to this enormous wickedness.

The sickness and mortality on board the Zong, previous to the 29th November, 1781 (the time when they began to throw the poor negroes overboard alive) was NOT occasioned by the want of water; for it was proved that the people on board did not discover till that very day, the 29th November, that the stock of fresh water was reduced, as was alleged,

in the passing of this act as some alleviation of a monstrous evil, yet I am of opinion that it stains and disgraces our statute book. What is it, in truth, but au act regulating robbery and murder?

*Though I am one of those who rejoiced

to 200 gallons. Yet the same day, or on the evening of it, before any soul had been put to short allowance, and before there was any present or real want of water, the master of the ship called together the officers, and told them to the following effect, that if the slaves died a natural death, it would be the loss of the owners of the ship: but if they were thrown alive into the sea, it would be the loss of the underwriters,' and to palliate this inhuman proposal, the master, Collingwood, argued, that it would not be so cruel to throw the poor sick wretches (meaning the slaves) into the sea, as to suffer them to linger out a few days, under the disorders with which they were afflicted. To this scheme the mate (whose name was Kelsall) objected at the first, and said there was no present want of water to justify such a measure.' But Collingwood prevailed upon the rest of the officers and crew to listen to his proposal, and on the same evening, and during two or three following days, he caused to be picked out from the ship's cargo 133 slaves, all or most of whom were sick, and thought not likely to live, and ORDER

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ED THE CREW BY TURNS TO THROW

THEM INTO THE SEA, which order was readily complied with. It appeáred by the evidence of Mr. Stubbs, late Governor of Anamaboe, then a a passenger, and of the chief mate Kelsall, that on the 29th November, 54 persons were actually thrown overboard alive, and that on the following day 42 more were also thrown overboard.

On the second day after this barbarous murder had been committed, viz. on the 1st of December, and be fore the stock of water was consumed, there fell a plentiful rain, which was admitted to have "continued a day or two," and which enabled them to collect six casks of water, which was "FULL ALLOWANCE for 11 days, or for 23 days at half allowance," whereas the ship actually arrived at Jamaica in 21 days afterwards, viz. on the 22d December, 1781. They seem also to have had an opportunity of

sending their boat for water, no less than 13 days sooner, viz. on the 9th December, when they "made the west end of Jamaica distant two or three leagues only," as was stated by a person who was on board; so that the six casks of rain water caught on the 1st and 2d of December, (only seven days before this opportunity of obtaining water from Jamaica) was not only a providential supply, but may perhaps be viewed as providentially demonstrating the iniquity of pretending a necessity to put innocent men to death, through the mere apprehension of awant, which, even supposing it had taken place, could not have afforded an admissible justification of the horrible deed; but which did never really exist or take place at all in their case; their stock of water having never been actually consumed.

But this is not all. Notwithstanding this supply, and the proof which it afforded of the possibility of obtaining further supplies by rain; and although they had the additional hope of being able to hold out with their increased stock of water, till they might chance to meet with some ship, or be able to send to some island for a further supply; they nevertheless cast 26 more human persons alive into the sea, EVEN AFTER THE RAIN! whose hands were also fettered. And this act was done, it seems, in the sight of many of the unhappy slaves who were upon deck at the time. And such an effect had the sight on them, that apprehending a similar fate, and dreading, it would seem, the being fettered, ten more of them in despair jumped overboard, and were likewise drowned!

All these facts, it is never to be forgotten, came out, not upon the trial of Collingwood for murder, but upon a civil suit instituted by the owners, for the purpose of recovering from the underwriters, the value of the slaves thus cruelly murdered. And, still more strange to relate, the owners gained their cause, while the agents in this horrible transaction were not even questioned criminally upon it.

No comment can add to the impression which these atrocities are calculated to leave on the reader's mind. And does not the blood of these murdered Africans, and of hundreds of thousands, who in various ways have been equally the victims of British avarice, cry for vengeance upon us? This is an awful consideration, which you indeed, Mr. Editor, have not forgotten to press upon the national conscience; but which, alas, is too much overlooked, in estimating our state and our prospects, even by many good men. Let me call on them, as they value the innumerable blessings with which Providence has crowned this Island, to lay it more to heart, and to unite to their prayers, their earnest endeavours to remove that load of guilt with which the detestable slave trade is weighing us down to the dust.

AN ABOLITIONIST.

To the Editor of the Christian Observer. Ox taking up the last number but one of the Anti-jacobin Review and Magazine in a public library, for, without any offence intended to the conductors of that Miscellany, I I am neither a subscriber to it nor a constant reader, my eye and cu riosity were attracted for a few minutes to the Review of Foster's Essays; and two or three particulars amused me.

I was amused by the Reviewer's discovery of the religious persuasion of the author. He is, it should appear, one of the people of Mr. Wesley's connection, because he says so much about the influence of the Holy Spirit. By this medium I should imagine that he might, not imprcbably, be concluded to be a quaker: but I willingly bow to that sagacity, which has found out, that Hooker was an Arminian, and that Mr. Pearson, Mr. Cooper, and the AntiJacobin Reviewers entertain precisely the same sentiments on the subject of human corruption*.

*It furnishes a curious illustration of the theological discernment of these men, that

I was amused by the Reviewer's claiming with so much eagerness Mr. Foster as an Anti-Calvinist, for a sentiment in which many reputed Calvinists would heartily concurf. Even according to the worst construction of the doctrine of Calvin himself, does the Reviewer think that that Reformer had attained the ne plus ultra of rigour in his creed? Grotius, not a Calvinist at least till the Anti-jacobin Review has made him such-will tell him a different story. Having spoken of the doctrine of Calvin, that eminent theologian adds, Auxit sententiæ rigorem Geneva Beza, per Germaniam Zanchius, Ursinus, Piscator, sæpe eo usque provecti, &c. &c. Annal. Belg. 1. xvii.-Bezeans, Zanchians, Ursinians, or Piscatorians, would by no means be improper epithets to substitute in the place of Calvinists; particularly, as they convey more reproach.

I was amused, in the third and last place, by the logic of the Keviewer respecting the term Evangelical. This term he considers, or reasons as if he did, as void of signification and therefore useless, because every Christian teacher will assume that his doctrine is evangelical. Upon this principle we must abandon every term expressive of commendation, because every person, as occasion requires, will apply it to himself. We are therefore to discard from the language the words, honesty, justice, piety, sobriety, &c. &c.-at least we can never distinguish a rogue from an honest man, because the rogue will assume this same Mr. Foster, instead of being an Arminian Methodist, as they suppose, is, in fact, a minister of that denomination of Christians, who call themselves particular Baptists, from their holding the tenet of particular, as opposed to general, redemption. EDITOR.

+It is singular enough that the Anti-jaco

bin Reviewers should have discovered Mr.

Foster to be an enemy to Calvinism: and

yet that it should fall to the lot of the Chris

tian Observer to censure some of his expressions as exceeding the ordinary measure of calvinistic opinions. (See the last Number, EDITOR,

P 108, note).

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