Mifs Owenson left Dublin in the autumn of 1806, with the intention of rambling through fuch fcenes in the north-west of Connaught as fhe had not yet vifited; and it was there that the compofed the different fketches which occupy these two volumes. They will not detract from her name. Her picture of the Irish peafantry is a highly interefting one; and the warm benevolence that prompts her many withes for their welfare and amelioration, do as much honour to her heart, as the language it is conveyed in does to her pen.Many characterstic anecdotes are fcattered through the volumes, which it without life, and the never will enare highly interefting. dote) was walking in the vicinity of Sligo at a very early hour, when a found, wild, low, and plaintive, fought his ear; and approaching the fpot from whence it feemed to proceed, he obferved an elderly female leaning over a little paling which encircled a cabin. Her hair was difhevelled, her eyes full of tears, and her voice, though broken and inarticulate, refpired in the intervals of her deep-heaved fobs, a melancholy recitative accompanied by these simple words- A few days are gone by; fhe entered this gate in all her beauty and health; to-morrow the will pas A young peafant in Weftmeath gave me the following account of his family, which I believe is an epitome of the general ftate of the peafantry in a county not thirty miles from the metropoiis. The boy was the eldest of feven children though fcarcely twelve years old, and of courte the only one able to labour; in the fum mer and harvest feafon he earned four-pence a day, his father worked for fix-pence and eight-pence a day thro' the yea; they paid iix pounds for an acre of oats, forty fhillings a year for grafs for their cow, and forty fhillings for their cabin and a little ground for their potatoes; in winter, when the cow was dry, they lived upon oaten bread, and potatoes and falt. Engaged with the care of feven children, the mother could give little affiftance except by fpinning founetimes and out of the year's hire of the father, Sundays and holidays were deducted.' This fhews indeed that the fish peafantry are reduced to a very low ftate, and policy and human ty all.c demand that their condition thould be ameliorated. The following anecdote refpecting this clafs of people is a highly interefting one: But a few days back, a musical profeffor (from whom I had the anec ter it more. This funeral fong was the impromptu requiem of a wretched mother, whofe only daughter (a young and lovely girl) had expired the night before." The heavieft curfe that an Irish pealant can breath upon his enemy is, the fcreech of the morning be upon you;' of which the following explanation is given by mifs Owen, fon :-- When the dawn rifes for the first time on the remains of a beloved and deceased object, those feelings of forrow which were till then faintly expreffed, or filently betrayed, become. wild and vehement in their indul gence; and the thrick of despair which ufhers in the dawn's grey light to the bed of death, may indeed well, be confidered as an anathema by the ear and the heart on which it falls.' Our authorefs fometimes fhews' herfelf to be equally able to wield the pen of bumorous delineation, as of penfive melancholy. The following. is fotruly characteristical of the Irith character, and furnithes fo amuting a fpecimen of mils Owenfon's powers, that we cannot refrain from prefenting it to the reader : My rambles and frequent converfations with the peafantry in the neighbourhood of L*** house, have obtained me a degree of ruftic notori-> ety, ety, to which I ftand indebted for a bare-footed and bare-headed to Mun- When I complimented him on the extent of his erudition, and expreffed my aftonishment at his having acquired it in fo remote a fituation, he replied: Young lady, I went far and near for it, as many a poor fcholar did before me for I could conftrue Homer before I ever put on fhoe or ftocking, aye, or a hat either, which to be fure I never did till I was twenty years of age.' He then at my requeft gave me a sketch of his peripatetic ftudies. When he was a young man (he faid) there were but few fchools in Connaught, and those few but bad and that it was not unufual for eight or ten boys who had the love of learning firong upon them,' to fet off to whom (faid he) I am teaching : The lyceum of this Connaught of of his young difciples to the door, clad in a drapery light and frugal as Philofophy herfelf could dictate; for neither the Greek fandal, the Roman perones, nor the Irish brogue, fecured Virgil.There (faid Thady pointtheir naked feet from the damp earth- ing to the incom), there is my there I moment Thady himself appeared in Homer, philofophy and the matheall the majefty of pedagogue power: matics and taking down an old his hair, drefs, and manier were all book (which had fympathized in the admirable, and left the Lingo and destiny of Virgil) he exclaimed : O'Sullivan of O'Keefe far behind; This is the only Homer I have ; his low clumfy figure, clerical-ton- and though feven boys read out of it fore, rubicund face; his wrapping daily, it never caufes a moment's coat, according to the old Irish col- difpute: whereas, if I had two young tume, faftened with a fkewer, the gentlemen ftudying in it, my Homer flecves unoccupied, and the collar of would be a bone of contention to his fhirt thrown open; combined them from morning till night.' Inwith his Greek and Latin quotations, deed Thady endeavoured continually his rich brogue, and affected dignity, to imprefs us with an idea of the to render him a finished character. fubordination and civilized manners Having reprimanded his pupils for of his fcholars, and we faw nothing their want of good manners, he wel- that in the leaft degree contradicted comed us with a look and air that his affertions; he affured us that the feemed to convince us, as well as labourer who earned but fixpence a them, that their dereliction from de- day, would fooner live upon potatoes corum proceeded not from any defi- and falt, than refuse a little learning ciency of precept or example on the to his child. I have,' faid he, part of their mafter. He then apo- above twenty boys who are come logized for the abfence of his firft clafs, from diftant parts to me, who begged who, he faid, he intended fhould their way, and who are now mainhave confrued fome of Homer for tained among the poor of the neighus; but that they had gone to cut bourhood, who, far from confiderturf for a poor diftreffed family in the ing them a burthen, were fo eager neighbourhood, and that for that day to have them, that to avoid jealousy, the Trojan plains were refigned for I was obliged to have lots drawn for the bog. It was but the other day them; the boys indeed are grateful, (faid he) they built up that cabin and make the best returns they can yonder for a poor old widow, and I by working early and late for their gave them a holiday for it and my patrons when not engaged with me.' blefling into the bargain." Having procured a holiday for his pupils, we now take leave of Thady; and if to be a school-mafter, it is requifite to be more or less than man,' as Le Sage declares, Thady certainly conceived himfelf the former, as he detailed the merits of his feminary, and the claffic progress of his difciples.' dery, while their eyes were fixed onthe vifitors; and three tall fellows were.. endeavouring to read all at the fame time out of an old tattered volume of en floor of the academy. The next fanctum fann: there is my The interior of Thady's cabin perfectly correfponded with its external afpect. It was divided into two apartments, which boafted no other furniture than an old deal table covered with copy-books and flates, and a few boards placed on ftones which ferved as feats to the young ftudents. fome of whom were poring over the Seven wife Mafters of Greece; others, vainly held a Cor- muft sonclude. With this, our extracts and our criticifm of thefe interesting volumes ORIGINAL ORIGINAL POETRY, Ode, for the New Year, 1808. Pugnatum fatis eft, gladüs in mutua ftrictis Con aureo piede a noi s'entorni, e il freno NOW let harmonious mufic found, Let mirth in ev'ry note appear :— And foon bright Sol with milder fway, Oh thus would heav'nly Peace, once more, Her ever-fav'rite throne, appear :- And thus would that fell demon, war, And fome more friendly region find. Hence from thy lovely darling plains; Let awful, dark oblivion bind Too long alas! has famine shed It's baneful influence o'er the land; Too long has defolation dread Triumph'd at tyranny's command; Long then fhall plenty bless the land, Her coafts with grateful commerce smile; Clonmell, Jan. 1, 1808. D. HICCEUS. For the Ancient Hibernian Magazine. for beauty is their own; Soft-fhooting o'er the face diffufes bloom, Breathing delight ;- -the fnowy fwell- The look refiftlefs, piercing to the foul, And by the foul inform'd, when dreft in love, She fits high-fmiling in the conscious eye! Mifs D-k-n. G's-ft. THE lovely young D-k-n has long Been faireft of the fairer throng; Her shape-her air-her all confpire, To make the gazing world admire ! Mifs O'G- -y. G's-ft. Mifs K-g-1. G's-ft. Such beaut'ous look-such innate grace, Let Mira all her charms difplay, mind! Mifs R-f-d. Do. Her proper ftature gives delight, Slight is the wound which Chloe gives, eye : We fee, we love-but oh!—we die! Mifs O'B-n. Bing-S-h-ol, Do. Mifs T--n. Do. Lovely as fancy can exprefs, Mifs D-ne. Do. Mifs F. D-ne.' Do. Mifs A. W--1. Do. Το |