and convenient little volume, we shall present him with one other extract: it relates to the mineral provincially denominated tias, and by Kirwan calp, but which is here properly called

"Argitto-ferruginous limestone, which is found massive in beds, or in globular and spheroidal masses, traversed by veins of calcareous spar. It is tougher than common limestone, and is of a bluish black (blue lias), or greyish blue colour (white lias); it has an argillaceous odour when breathed on, and when burnt is of a buff colour. Calp is composed of 68 per cent of carbonate of lime, 18 of silex, 75 of alumine, 2 of oxide of iron, 3 of carbon and bitumen, and 5 of water. It is quarried at Leixlip, near Dublin, (calp of Kirwan), and occurs in beds at Aberthaw, in Glamorganshire, whence it has obtained the familiar name of Aberthaw limestone. The name of lias, which originally was provincial, has, of late, been much adopted by mineralogists. The blue and white varieties alternate with each other, generally in thin beds. The lias encloses ammonites, and great variety of sea-shells, and is remarkable for containing the remains of crocodiles at Lyme, in Dorsetshire. Its geological situation is under the Oolite, as near Bath; and above the red marl, as in some parts of Somersetshire. It occurs in spheroidal masses in the blue clay of the isle of Sheppey, and of Highgate-hill, &c. (in the latter form it is generally called septaria). When burnt, it forms a cement, which has the property of setting very strongly under water, and for this reason was used in constructing the Eddystone Lighthouse. (It is likewise the substance sold under the name of Parker's cement.)

"Lias has, of late, been employed in a manner which merits notice, as being a branch of the curious and important art of multiplying copies of drawings or of penmanship. A drawing is made on prepared paper, with a peculiar ink: a slab of lias, perhaps an inch thick, is then heated, the drawing is placed upon it, and both are passed through a rolling-press. The paper is afterwards wetted, and washed from off the stone; but the ink, being of a gummy or glutinous quality, becomes in part absorbed by the stone, and remains. It is then ready for the printer. Previously to the taking of each impression, fresh ink is added; but the stone is first wetted with a sponge, in order to prevent the ink, which is said con siderably to resemble printer's ink, and to be put on with a ball similar to that used by letter-press printers, from adhering to it: the consequence is, that it adheres only to the ink absorbed by the stone from the paper on which the drawing was originally made: paper is then placed on the stone, and both are passed through a rolling-press as before. This art has been practised in Germany with great success, though, it is said, not precisely in the same manner; the practice there, being to make the drawing upon the stone, with a prepared ink, whence it may correctly be termed the Lithographie Art: the lias of that country is particularly adapted to it: some beautiful specimens of this art may be seen in this country. It is also said, that copies of military drawings and orders were multiplied by this means to a very large amount, at the head-quarters of the armies lately employed on the Continent. An artificial composition is sometimes used instead of lias."

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ART. V.-Essays in Rhyme, on Morals and Manners. By JANE TAYLOR. 12mo. London. 1816. I

THIS is of the School of CowPER and CRABBE; though, unfortunately, it bears a much stronger resemblance of the manner than of the beauties of these two powerful writers. There is very little of the lovely and quiet landscape of the first -his smoking villages, undulating bells, his sunshine, and the music of his woods; or of his delightful and exquisite pictures of domestic comfort and rural retirement; or of his amiable egotism; and still less of the high-toned and indignant eloquence which he pours upon the oppressors and the conquerors of the earth. Nor is there any attempt to imitate CRABBE in his use of those dark and stormy passions which shake the bosom; or of those more silent and déchirant sorrows which wring the heart; nor yet in his power of exciting pain and disgust, by dwelling, in his own vigorous way, precisely upon those objects which a painter, less bold, and more solicitous about pleasing his readers, would have cast entirely into shade. But the authoress has adopted the manner of CowPER in his quaint and half sarcastical style of drawing character, in the profusion of theological discussion with which this is contrasted, and in the abrupt and peculiar structure of his sentiment and versification; and that of CRABB E, in his selection of striking contrasts and correspondent associations; in his choice of prominent points; in the laborious and minute and Flemish finishing of his details; in the total disregard of stateliness and emphasis; and in the love of dry humour, irony, and antithesis. These are not the best properties of these writers: but the selection of them for imitation is, in itself, an evidence of a mind of no common strength. We must not expect, in these degenerate days, that first-rate poets are to rise in clusters and in constellations,' as they did in the golden times of Queen Elizabeth: we must be thankful for one such as CRABBE in a generation. Our readers must not, therefore, hope in this volume to meet with such tales as Ellen Orford, or Peter Grimes; Sir Eustace Grey, or the Hall of Justice; or the display of such force of characterpainting as they find in Edward Shore, or in the story called Resentment; nor even with the charming freshness and fragrance, and the rapture of repose which the poetry of Cowper breathes but we will tell them what they may look for, and what they will find-some fineness of tact in the discernment of character, and a good deal of talent in unfolding it; an

inclination to irony, which is sometimes successful, but which has nothing like the epigrammatic point and glitter of POPE, nor the bitter and contemptuous air of CowPER. The abrupt and dry manner in which she makes the application of her example sometimes is amusing, but never very effective: in fine, her sarcasm, where it hits, adds little to her strength or her terrors; and where, from its weakness, it inisses, (as it more frequently does,) it considerably takes away from them. This deficiency in force seems rather to be caused by an anxious and overstrained delicacy about the feelings of those at whom she points her satire, than by any want of natural tendency that way. Indeed her sarcasm is rather of a robust, and coarse, and vulgar form, than fine and pointed: but she ought to know that the opinions and manners to which she thinks it necessary to apply it at all, should be made to feel it. It is no reply to this, to say that the author is a woman; for unfortunately we all remember Madame Du DEFFAND, Mademoiselle DE LESPINASSE, Madame DE STAEL, and a thousand other French women, who have possessed a vein of satire of the most powerful description, and who have exercised that talent without regard to vulgar prejudices: and in our own country we have many female names scarcely less memorable. Our readers will discover too, in this volume, traces of a thinking and active mind, particularly on subjects of theology; and evidences of some reading, which, however, would have appeared to much greater advantage, if the allusions had not been made in a way which reminds us so very strongly of the Royal Institution. However, we shall dwell no longer upon the general character of these Essays, but shall present our readers with a few specimens, taken from them without much labour of selection, which shall exemplify both the good and the bad qualities for which the book is remarkable.

Our first shall be from the first Essay, which is entitled Prejudice. Miss Taylor speaks of the influences of taste upon our reason, in matters of religion; and the examples which she has chosen to illustrate her remarks, are well-selected, wellcontrasted, and altogether exhibit considerable vigour both of fancy and expression.

"There is a tender, captivating glow

Which certain views on certain objects throw.
Taste and poetic feeling range alone,

A fairy world exclusively their own;

And gather airy delicates that rise

Where'er they turn, unseen by vulgar eyes.

Their dainty aliment serenely floats

On every breeze they live like gnats on motes,

"When Paul the walks of beauteous Athens trod,
To point its children to their‘unknown God,'
If some refined Athenian, passing by,

Heard that new doctrine, how would he reply?
Regarding first, with polish'd, scornful smile,
The stranger's figure and unclassic style,
Perceiving then, the argument was bent
Against the gods of his establishment,-
He need but cast his tutor'd eye around,
And in that glance he has an answer found:
Altars and theatres, and sacred groves,
Temples and deities, where'er it roves:
Each long perspective that the eye pervades,
Peopled with heroes, thick'ning as it fades ;
-Those awful forms that hold their silent sway,
Matchless in grace, while ages roll away.
There, softly blending with the ev'ning shade,
Less light and less, the airy colonnade:
Here, in magnificence of Attic grace,
Minerva's Temple, rising from its base:
Its spotless marble forming to the eye
A ghostly outline on the deep blue sky :-
'Enough-the doctrine that would undermine
These forms of beauty cannot be divine.' --
Thus taste would, doubtless, intercept his view
Of that 'strange thing,' which after all-was true.
"When Luther's sun arose, to chase away
The dim religious light' of Roinish day,'
Opposing, only, to the mellow glare

Of gold and gems that deck the papal chair,
And each imposing pageant of the church,-
Good sense, plain argument, and sound research,
Here taste, again, would prove a dang'rous guide,
And raise a prejudice on error's side.
-Behold the slow procession move along!
The Pontiff's blessing on the prostrate throng;
The solemn service, and the anthem loud,
The altar's radiance on the kneeling crowd.-
Or seek, at summons of the convent bell,
Deep, sacred shades, where fair recluses dwell;
See the long train of white-rob'd sisters come,
Appearing now-now lost amid the gloom,
Chaunting shrill vespers in the twilight dim,
-The plaintive music of the virgin's hymn.
Then would not taste and fancy join the cry,
Against the rude, barbarian heresy,

That sought those sacred walls to overthrow,
And rend the veil from that seducing show?
And yet, according to our present light,

That barb'rous, tasteless heretic was right."-P. 18—21.

The following picture, we think, in spite of a good deal of mawkishness and bad taste, is very striking: it is of the same cast, but better than CowPER's Crazy Kate,' and has a large portion of the force and oppressive sadness of CRABBE's painting:

"Once in a town remote in Britain's isle,

A female stranger lodged in humble style:
The village gossip, roused when first she came,
At last discover'd little but her name;
And scandal, weary with its fruitless quest,
Conjectur'd and invented all the rest.
Her quiet habits, and abstracted cast,
Repell'd inquiry, and it dropt at last.
Her years were waning, and her whole array
Bespoke neglect, indiff'rence, and decay ;
Yet no wild look betray'd a wand'ring brain,

It was not crazy Kate,' nor crazy Jane;'
Nor high expression mark'd some sudden fall,

A common care-worn person-that was all.
"Year after year she wander'd up and down,
'Mid the dull out-skirts of that little town:

She lov'd a lonely turn, but 'twas her way
To put it off till towards the close of day;
And there, all winter long, she might be met
Taking her walk as soon as sun was set.
When the dark sky foretold a stormy night,
And all the parlour fires were blazing bright,

Just as their social parties came to meet,
They used to see her pacing down the street.
'Twas said she used a wishful eye to cast
On such a lively circle as she pass'd,
As though the smiling group and cheerful blaze
Wak'd some remembrance of her early days;
But still her lonely wand'rings would prefer,
For she was strange to them, and they to her.
"Beyond the town some low, damp meadows lay,
Through which a sluggish stream pursued its way;
Tall reeds in that slow, silent water stood,

And curling vapours rested on its flood:

This walk she chose, and though it seem'd so dull,
It pleas'd her much, because her heart was full;

And there, unheeded by the passing breeze,

She used to vent it, in such words as these:

"There's something suits the temper of my mind
In the deep bowlings of this wintry wind:
How the sky low'rs! all darkly overspread,
Save one horizon streak of awful red;

So low'rs my sky, and that bright line appears,
Like the last glimmer of departed years.

If those who lov'd me then, could see this sight,-
-Me, wand'ring here on such a cheerless night,
A poor, lone stranger in this friendless wild,
How they would mourn for their deserted child!