"are despotical, and nations that are enslaved; for what rights " in effect has a slave to lose? But in reality the owners of slaves

are humane from policy, and sedulous of their lives from interest; "and the deliberative slowness of the trial by Jury, gives time "to these calculating principles of our nature to expand and " operate."

This is all we could gather from our author on the state of slavery in Barbadoes - a subject which, of all others, interests our feelings and warms our imaginations. It is lamentable to think, that there are so many thousands of our fellow-creatures lost to morals, to science, and to humanity, through the selfish and base purpose of pampering the luxuries of a few of their species. Policy may indeed require that the préscription of property remain inviolate, and justice may dictate that what has been established by public sanction, should be guarded by public faith; but the time is not far distant when the Negroes will assert the native independence of their nature, and bury their chains amid the ruins of their oppressors. They have now the example of Hayti before their eyes, nor is there any thing so dreadful in rebellion as the abjectness of slavery. It needs but time and the accession of a few ideas, which the abolition of the slave trade will tend to excite, to turn them loose on their owners. Dreadful indeed will be the havoc that will ensue! But we turn our eyes with horror and dismay from the contemplation of this scene, nor will we call up the prophetic spirit to lap the blood of our brethren. The lesson, however, may be learned by statesmen, how dangerous it is to disturb the natural order of society, and to expose so foul an example to the world, as that the right of the stronger should be the rule of the universe.

The cries of politicians for the decline of population, are usually weak and chimerical. Arising, as does marriage, from the intentions of nature, and by no means proceeding from the artificial refinements of man, it will ever furnish citizens for the state, if there be room for their labour, or food for their support. But Barbadoes is placed under peculiar

circumstances. The newly-settled southern colonies, offer abundant field for industry and speculation; the proprietors of plantations find it their interest to elude the laws which enact, that there shall be cottages for poorer tenants, in proportion to the number of their acres; the slaves who are trained up by their owners for this purpose, turn the poorer whites fairly out of the market of competition, as artisans or mechanics. Thus exiled from home, this unhappy people are forced to seek a miserable subsistence on foreign shores, and Barbadoes is deprived of the most valuable of her citizens. This is an evil particularly to be dreaded, in a country whose population consists of slaves as well as free men. The former must gain boldness from numbers, nor is there any chance for victory to the whites, when they may be so greatly overpowered by the physical force of their opponents. The enforcement of the militia act, by which the planter may be obliged to send armed whites into the field, and the discouragement of slaves in the mechanical arts, are recommended by our author as remedies for this evil. But perhaps the abolition of the slave trade will do more for its suppression, than positive statutes, which are always either useless or dangerous when they go counter to the interests of men. It will now be to the advantage of the proprietor, to bring up his slave to the cultivation of the soil, as he can no longer rely on Africa for supplies for his gang.

It now remains that we should give our opinion concerning the general merits of the work. It might be said of this history, as of the Palace of the Sun, that the materials are of less value than the execution of the workmanship. The history of a small colony is not likely to afford much information, that is amusing or instructive; and the author has abridged the value of his work, by neglecting some of the materials. The little he possessed, he has rendered still less important by with-holding half. We question, however, whether the work would have been really more interesting, by an addition of political matter. It is already heavy and cold, and wears more the appearance of a political treatise, than of a genuine history. It wants the soul of history, splendid personages, illustrious actions, brilliant achievements, great events. All that swells the imagination, or elevates the feelings, is not here to be found, and is ill supplied by the petty debates of a remote assembly, or the humble pliancy of an illconstituted council. All that could be done by a man of genius, the author has perhaps effected. He is perspicuous without being languid, and dignified although sometimes pompous. Occasionally, indeed, he might have retrenched much awkward ornament, and generally have consulted ease more and correctness in his style: but this history is a splendid fête in the Barbadian annals, and will deserve much better to be recorded, than most of the events in the pages before us. Nor will the colonists triumph less, that it was written three ✓ thousand miles from the seat of arts, learning, and refinement. The situation, indeed, of a writer should at all times be considered in estimating the merits of his work. The transatlantic author before us was attended by many disadvantages in the prosecution of his history, which, as they were beyond his control, we should rather consider, as in some degree redounding to his credit. In spite however of his strained manner, his cumbrous attempts at the pathetic, and his occasional dryness of style, there is so much good sense, so much candour, and so much unaffected patriotism in the book, that we cannot help thinking it deserves a better fate than from its want of interest it will probably experience.

93

MRS. INCHBALD'S BRITISH THEATRE.

HAVING

(Continued.)

AVING in the last number gone through our remarks on Mrs. Inchbald's Theatrical Criticisms, as far as they relate to the works of Shakspeare, it now remains to notice her observations on the minor luminaries of the British drama.

Mrs. Inchbald prefaces her edition of the comedy of "Rule "a Wife and have a Wife," with some observations on the two brother-poets, Beaumont and Fletcher. She very justly remarks, that " to the querulous and vain, it must be a "subject of astonishment, how two persons could derive fame " so directly from the same source as writing plays together, " without contending which had the strongest claim to that "general admiration which their productions excited. But "all accounts upon this point are merely conjectural; for "the authors behaved too much like men, to disclose the " secret means of their labour; and here a curious enquirer " after facts, might almost wish they had been women."

The Reviewer trusts Mrs. Inchbald will forgive him for entering his protest against the concluding sentence of this quotation, and for declaring it as his decided opinion, notwithstanding the proverbial notion that has given a name to one of our comedies, that a secret is to the full as safe in the breast of a woman, as in that of a man. The conjectural criticism of the editors of the joint works of these poets, has however supplied the intelligence which their candour denied; for in the late editions, the precise labours of each are defined, with nearly as much exactness, as if the critic had been the most confidential friend of both.

The censure of the conduct of the fable, and the morality of the female characters in this entertaining play, does honour to the fair critic; but when we accede to her concluding remark, that "to preserve its fame on the stage, no common " performers can be entrusted with the charge," we must reflect on how many of our plays the same remark is equally applicable.

The alteration of the comedy of " the Chances," by Villiers, Duke of Buckingham and Garrick, though perhaps necessary for the theatric representation, certainly takes off from the intrinsic merit of the play, however careless the united poets generally are in the catastrophe of their pieces, they seldom deviate from consistency of character; but the Don John of Villiers and of Garrick, is not the Don John of Beaumont and Fletcher.

To the opinion of Mrs. Inchbald that Massinger's comedy, "A New Way to pay Old Debts," though a very admirable play, is not altogether a pleasing one, we cannot implicitly assent; surely it affords an abundant source of amusement; no doubt it has many faults, but the fault attributed to Massinger and many past dramatists (and writers of novels may be added) " of bestowing spirit, life, and every powerful emotion of the soul, upon the wicked, and making all their good people insipid," must be imputed, not to the poet, but to the general feelings of mankind. This it is not the intention of the Reviewer to try to account for here, and still less to vindicate: but undoubtedly Lothario is a more popular character than Altamont, and Lovelace than Sir Charles Grandison. With regard to female characters, we are more just; there virtue always confers dignity, and no vice can be so elevated as not to excite hatred or contempt: in women. there is no poetic goodness, distinguished from moral good

ness.

In Mrs. Inchbald's remarks on Dryden's "All for Love," this passage occurs: "Who can be inattentive to the loves "of Marc Antony? (why not Mark Anthony, if his name " must be Anglicised?) Yet, thus described, their fate in re"presentation seldom draws a tear, or gives rise to one "transport of passion in the breast of the most discerning