1823.]

.

NIGHT.

By JAMES MONTGOMERY, Esq. [From "Forget me Not," reviewed p. 449.] NIGHT is the time for rest;

How sweet when labours close,
To gather round an aching breast
The curtain of repose;

Stretch the tired limbs and lay the head
Upon our own delightful bed!

Night is the time for dreams;

The gay romance of life,

When truth that is and truth that seems
Blend in fantastic strife;
Ah! visions less beguiling far
Than waking dreams by daylight are!
Night is the time for toil;

To plough the classic field,
Intent to find the buried spoil
Its wealthy furrows yield;
Till all is ours that sages taught,
That poets sang or heroes wrought.

Night is the time to weep;

To wet with unseen tears
Those graves of memory where sleep
The joys of other years;

Hopes that were Angels in their birth,
But perished young, like things of earth!
Night is the time to watch;

On ocean's dark expanse,
To hail the Pleiades, or catch

The full moon's earliest glance, That brings into the home-sick mind All we have loved and left behind,

Night is the time for care;

Brooding on hours mis-spent,
To see the spectre of Despair

Come to our lonely tent;
Like Brutus midst his slumbering host
Startled by Cæsar's stalwart ghost.
Night is the time to muse;

Then from the eye the soul
Takes flight, and with expanding views
Beyond the starry pole,
Descries athwart the abyss of night
The dawn of uncreated light.

Night is the time to pray;

Our Saviour oft withdrew

To desert mountains far away,
So will his followers do;

Steal from the throng to haunts untrod,
And hold communion there with God.

Night is the time for death;

When all around is peace, Calmly to yield the weary breath

From sin and suffering cease; Think of Heaven's bliss and give the sign To parting friends :-such death be mine! Sheffield.

THE POET'S STUDY.

By BERNARD BARTON.

[From "Forget me Not," reviewed p. 449.] OH! not in ceiled rooms of state,

Cumber'd with books the while,
Would I the Muse's influence wait,
Or there expect her smile.

A nook in some lone church-yard green,
Fann'd by the summer breeze-
The living and the dead between,
Would more my fancy please.

Not unto Fancy's power alone

Should such a scene appeal ;
Its sober and its chasten'd tone
My iumost heart would feel.
The moss'd trunk of a scathed tree
Should be my only seat;

And more than moral tomes to me
That relique should repeat.

There too in living leafy pride,
Another tree should grow,

Whose writhed branches far and wide
Their welcome shade should throw.
Those boughs, by whisp'ring breezes stirr'd,
My canopy should be,

And every gentle whisper heard

Should tell a tale to me.

A crystal brook should babble by,
And to its bordering flowers
Impart fresh loveliness of dye,

And yet more fragrant powers.
Behind me, half conceal'd from sight
As shunning public view,
The ivied church-tow'r's humble height
Should greet Heaven's vaulted blue.
A few low grassy mounds should tell

Where slept the silent dead;
And there the modest heather-bell
Should bend its graceful head.
A guileless infaut too should stray
Where those blue flowers might wave,
And cull, perchance, a posy gay
From off a parent's grave.
While o'er her head a butterfly,
That type, with beauty crown'd,
Of future immortality,

Should lightly flutter round.

My task is done :-who scorns my taste
May paint me, if he can,

A scene with gentler beauties grac'd
For poet or for man."

~1.823.]

SPAIN.

Ferdinand has again entered his capital, amidst shouts of " Long live the Absolute King." In our last we mentioned his departure from Cadiz, and the arbitrary decrees subsequently issued. At Seville, on the 9th of October, he put forth a decree, ordaining thus: "A funeral service shall be celebrated in all the churches of the monarchy for the repose of the souls of those, who, since the 7th of March 1820, died in support of God's cause and mine." He published another document, stating, among other things, that "all those who exercise ecclesiastical jurisdic'tion, shall prepare missions, which shall exert themselves to destroy erroneous, pernicious, and heretical doctrines, and shut up in the monasteries, of which the rules are the most rigid, those ecclesiastics who have been the agents of an impious faction."

The Madrid Gazette of 28th Oct. contains a proclamation, issued by Ferdinand at Seville ou the 22d, having all the semblance of a preparatory step towards revoking or modifying the decrees of Port St. Mary, Xeres, and Seville. His Majesty postpones, "till his arrival in Madrid, and till he is surrounded by the gravest and most enlightened of his counsellors, his final resolve touching the acts and the actors in the late revolution;" but he has decided, that the principal delinquents who had placed themselves beyond the reach of pardon, should suffer the punishment to which their transgressions had rendered them liable."

A Letter from Madrid, of Oct. 17, says, "Riego has been tried and condemned to death. Cavia was his Judge, the nephew of the Bishop of Osma, one of the Regents; and the crime in the Act of Accusation is the having voted, as a Deputy of the Cortes, the deposition of the King during his translation to Cadiz, and the nomination of a Regency." Riego was executed at Madrid on the 7th. The unfortunate man was carried to the place of execution in an ass's pannier, doubtless as a mark of ignominy.

All the Spanish Generals have capitulated. Mina, and several of those most implicated have left their Country for England or France. Many of the Cortes are in London. A letter from Gibraltar, dated Oct. 16, says, "We are crowded with unfortunate Spaniards, who have taken refuge here to escape the miseries of a dungeon, or the tortures of the Inquisition. Among them are upwards of sixty Deputies of the Cortes of the most distinguished, as Valdez, Alava, GENT. MAG. November, 1822.

and Infantes; Quiroga, Yandiola, Manzanares, and Calatrava, are also here. There is a warm feeling among the inhabitants of the Rock in favour of these unsuccessful patriots."

We learn that it is a settled point that France is to continue the military occupation of Spain to a certain extent, and for a definite object-namely, until the Government of Ferdinand is entirely and firmly re-established.

GERMANY, &c.

The activity of the Prussians in availing themselves of peace, by placing their towns in the most complete state of defence, has been most unremitting, particularly at this moment. The important fortress of Ehreinbriesten, at the confluence of the Rhine and Moselle, blown up by the French, will be in a most formidable state. The fortifications are on a prodigious scale. The town of Coblentz is fortifying. Three vast fortresses have also been built at a mile distant from the town, to command the roads from France and Mayence. Similar operations are also going on with vigour at Cologne and in three years all these will be completely finished. The King of the Netherlands is also not inactive. He has built a fortress on one of the heights above Liege, which will contain several thousand men. A second has been founded on an elevation commanding the road to the French frontiers; and ground is marked out for a third on one of the hills overhanging the town.

The number of Students at the University of Gottingen is one thousand four hundred and twenty, amongst whom are four princes; two hundred and seventy of them are occupied with theology, seven hundred and thirty with law, two hundred and twenty-five with medicine, and one hundred and ninety-five with philosophy and philology. TURKEY.

A French Journal relates a fresh instance of the fury of the Turks against the Greek Christians. A priest called Christ has just been crucified in mockery of his name. After being thus tortured several hours, and paraded through the streets in the dress of a buffoon, he was daubed with pitch, and then burnt alive.

SOUTH AMERICA.

A Treaty of Alliance, offensive and defensive, between the States of Colombia and Buenos Ayres has been agreed to, in which they bind themselves to assist and support each other in maintaining "their indepen

dence

458

[Nov.

her, may seek to establish, as a compensation for the loss of her sovereignty over her late colonies. WEST INDIES.

A vessel arrived at Liverpool on Monday, bringing advices from Demerara to the 17th September, at which time all was quiet. Twenty-three of the black insurgents had been executed, and the trials of others were proceeding. Smith, the missionary, was still in custody, and there was every appearance of proof being produced that he was the principal promoter of the insurrection. He preached to a large assembly of blacks on the evening previous to the intended massacre of the whites.

IRELAND.

The Report on the Condition of the Poor in Ireland, has been laid before the publick, and clearly establishes the reality and extent of the distress in that unhappy country. The Committee have proved to demonstration, that the employment of the people of Ireland and the improvement of their moral condition, is essentially necessary to the peace and tranquillity of that Island, as well as to the general interests of the United Kingdom." It would appear from the Report, that the distressed districts constitute half the country, and that one half of the entire population are supported by charity. A pretty clear estimate of the miserable poverty of these unfortunate beings may be formed from the fact, that in the County of Clare 26,846 persons, most of them unfitted, from age or disease, to procure by labour the means of existence, have been supported at an expense of not quite one penny per diem. The Countess of Glengall, a lady of great and active benevolence, in her examination before the Committee, described the labourers under the better sort of farmers in Ireland, as worse off than the slaves in the West Indies.

The Irish papers describe many recent outrages; such as wanton burning of farm produce, and barbarous mutilations of cattle, &c.

INTELLIGENCE FROM VARIOUS

PARTS OF THE COUNTRY. Within the last ten years the progress of the Cotton Manufacture in this Country has been so rapid, that the annual consumption of cotton has increased, we believe, from 250,000 to 1,000,000 of bags! At the present moment the seats of the cotton manufacture are in a state of the greatest activity, and the manufacturers, and other capitalists concerned in this important branch of the national industry, are progressively advancing in prosperity. The population of Lancashire, Lanarkshire, Renfrewshire, &c.

has also increased, and is increasing with surprizing rapidity, whilst the gigantic progress of machinery and science is daily enlarging the prodigious productive power already wielded by the Country. So long as markets can be found for the vast product of this scientific and mechanical power, the competition which it maintains with manual labour will not be felt by the working classes in all its severity. It is impossible, however, not to be sensible that, depending as she does upon Foreign markets for taking off the product of her manufactures, and continually enlarging, as she is, her manufacturing population, England is collecting within her bosom the materials for an explosion, which may one day be attended with the most alarming results. Even now, any derangement of our commerce, which should occasion a staguation for six months in the cotton manufacture, would produce a state of unbounded distress and of frightful danger. It is to the rising markets of South America, and to the growing demand for British cottons in the East Indies, that England can alone look for any increased demand that shall be at all commensurate with the progress of her productive power, and with the increasing number and energies of her great manufacturing population; and for that, and other reasons, it is absolutely necessary she should exert all her strength, if need be, for frustrating projects, the execution of which would have the effect of excluding her commerce from the ports of South America.

The commerce between Great Britain and the South American States has rapidly increased since 1817. In the year ending Jan. 5, 1817, the value of British goods exported to Buenos Ayres was 388,4172.; in the year ending Jan. 5, 1823, their value was 1,161,765l. The value of exports to Valparaiso in the year ending Jan. 5, 1818, was 32,7971.; while in the year ending Jan. 5, 1823, their amount was 462,8481.

Liverpool,