more like slaves, than like a distressed people which they pretend to relieve as their friends; or even as conquered enemies. Otherwise, men would not leave their wives, families, relations, and friends, to seek protection in an English fleet, and there wait a time to be sent to England, and from thence to follow their Prince to such a distance as the Brazils The French are not satisfied with robbing alf the churches, .convents, public buildings, &c. of all the gold and silver they contain, and exacting heavy contributions from all the inhabitants, but they must oblige the Portu guese army to march into Spain, to fight their battles against the English; and, as is given out, to attack Gibraltar. They have ordered a conscription of 40,000 men, from 18 to 30 years of age, to be raised immediately, for the same purpose. The magazines belonging to the French army have been filled with provisions and stores, when there is every want and misery felt by the inhabitants; and if they dare to complain of the oppression of the French, they are imprisoned, or put to death, as traitors, their houses filled with French takes possession of a country pretty quietly, promising protection and happiness to all who shall bow their heads at the name of the invincible Napoleon: but as soon as the generals and their troops are comfortably settled in the best quarters the place can afford, and every precaution taken against the possibility of surprise or resistance; then, and not till then, the fiends of rapine and extortion make their appearance in the shape of Imperial agents, commissaries, sub-commissaries, prefects, &c. ;-then the grand work of havoc and desolation begins; all the arts of ingenious rapacity are exercised; every cord, spring, and pully of the complicated machine of confiscation is set to work without intermission; authorities, civil and military, vie with each other in extorting from the wretched inhabi tants every thing beyond what is absolutely necessary for their bare existence, and after the avidity of the collectors has been blunted to a certain degree, the fruits of this friendly and protecting visit are sent to replenish the coffers, which insatiable ambition had exhausted, and from whence they will be drawn again to glut the maw of the ever-crav-soldiers, who pillage, and act as they please; ing monster, when next it calls for a fresh meal. The rainy season had already set in, and the French troops suffered prodigiously from fevers and dysenteries in their march from Salamanca to Lisbon. General G. was heard to say, that in the course of one day he had waded through thirty streams on the plains of Golgao. An eye witness assured me, that the country, from the frontiers to Abrantes, is one scene of ruin and devastation. The peasants abandoned their cottages, and fled with their wives and children to the neighbouring mountains, and the enemy, disappointed in many respects, by this unexpected flight, set fire to those peaceful dwellings, and marked their progress by such a line of desolation, as might have served to retrace the march of the most savage barbarians. In various parts of this pamphlet is given a full and interesting refutation of the calumnies heaped on the Royal emigrants of the House of Braganza. The following is an extract, verbatim, of a letter from one of our correspondents: our readers will perceive that it strongly corroborates the foregoing statements-it is dated off the Tagus, April 3. The poor Portuguese continue to emigrate to us from Lisbon: we have near forty on board this ship; four of them officers, the rest privates and sailors. From all accounts I have heard, the French behave in a most shameful manner. They treat the Portuguese and no one must presume to obstruct them.. You therefore cannot be surprised at these poor oppressed Portuguese flying to us for protection; most of them without a second garment, or a sous in their pocket. Notwithstanding this conduct of the French, is it not astonishing that there should be Englishmen, nay, even British senators, who extol Buonaparté as the greatest man that ever existed? I have no patience with these friends of the merciless tyrant; he would not favour them more than others, was he ever to get a footing in England. CHIMNEY SWEEPERS. To the Editor of the Literary Panorama. The success which has attended the use of Sussex's house, is a very favourable circumstance for this practice, as the example of people in high stations of life is more likely to be followed than of those in lower situations. Several occurrences have lately happened which will in all probability tend to promote the use of this apparatus, and to improve the condition of the climbingboys. The Society for superseding the necessity of climbing-boys, &c. although very far yet from having obtained their principal object,-the entire abolition of climbing, have been the means of introducing a great number of machines in various parts of the metropolis, and likewise in the country, the great use they are found to be of for extinguishing chimnies on fire, is well worth the attention of the public, for their own safety, as well as for the benefit of the poor boys, who are sometimes sent up in such cases. A remarkable instance of this happened about two years ago, at a banking-house in the Strand: the boy had crawled along a chimney, which was built over an arch, and having pushed down the soot on fire behind him, and there being more on fire before him, he could neither climb up nor get back again, so that he was literally between two fires. An opening was made into the chimney and the boy taken out, which had he not been speedily, there was a great chance of his being killed. Such accidents should be enquired into and made public. A report of very barbarous usage to a climbing-boy has lately been circulated, by which it appears that he having remained a long while in a chimney, a faggot was set fire to, (by his companions) and some sout thrown over it, for the purpose of stifling him down. I am Sir, Yours, &c. AN ACCIDENTAL CORRESPONDENT. BITE OF A SEA-SNAKE MORTAL. The following extraordinary case of the effects of the bite of a SEA-SNAKE, is a comunication from Dr. Meek, of Calicut, to his friend, Mr. Keir, of Bombay. "A melancholy proof against the too prevalent but mistaken idea of the harmless nature of the comninon sea-snake, has been clearly evinced in the following fatal occurrence, which took place in this vicinity a few days ago, and which I deem it expedient to communicate to you, with the view that it may be rendered public, should you consider it of sufficient importance. Early in the morning of the 24th ult. a stout young man, a muequa, or fisherman, belonging to Poodiangurry, a small village in the neighbour hood, about two miles from the shore, about 9 4. m. upon hauling in his net, found a common sea-snake entangled in it. He seized the snake by the back to disengage it from his net, conceiving it to be perfectly harmless, when it instantly bit him on the point of the middle finger of the right hand; he threw the snake into the sea, and thought nothing of the bite. He came on shore about an hour afterwards, when he complained of a slight pain in the affected finger, and which extended along the inside of the right arm. He walked home, about half a mile from the beach, but towards the latter part of the journey, complained of giddiness and a weakness in his loins and lower extremities, and was obliged to be supported by his comrades the rest of the way. "Soon after he reached home, his friends procured a native doctor of his own cast to administer to him; but even then, neither the person who was bitten, nor any of those around him, possessed the most remote idea of danger, or in fact that any serious consequence was likely to result from the bite. About three p. m. he complained of very great pain in the wounded finger, and all along the right arin; shortly after this, the upper and lower extremities were seized with violent spasms, accompanied with giddiness, nausea, vomiting, and a dimness of sight." Towards night all the symptoms increased, attended with great restlessness and excruciating pain in the right hand and arm. About two o'clock in the following morning, he became comatose, and was occasionally seized with convulsions, until he died, which was about 24 hours from the time he had been bitten. About cleven a. m. of the 25th, his friends called upon me for assistance, when I immediately accompanied them, but much too late, for the unfortunate man appeared to have been dead some time. The native doctor who attended, appeared to have done little more than to have besineared the body with oil and woodashes, and applied the warm blood of a young fowl to the affected finger. On inspection, there appeared upon the joint of the middle finger of the right hand, a mark just sufficient to shew that he had been bitten, but no swelling about the finger, hand, or arm, nor were the axillary glands of the right arm at all enlarged. There appeared a much greater rigidity about the body, for so recent a corpse, than I ever recollected to have seen, but no diseased enlargement of the body, pou examining the people who were in the boat with the unfortunate sufferer, they all, declared having seen the snake, and that it appeared to them to be exactly of the same kind as they are accustomed to see numbers of daily, when employed fishing, but never, unul the bas present, an instance been known of any serious consequence following from the bite of these snakes. "Twelve p. m. of the 30th. Just as I finished the above account, another case was brought on shore from one of the boats to my house. The man had been similarly employed, and was bitten on the back of the fore finger of the right hand, about one hour before he was brought to me; the wound was very distinct, but as yet unattended with material pain. Knowing the fate of his friend a few days before from a similar accident, he laboured under great agitation and alarm. I placed a tight ligature upon the arm, scarified freely the wounded part, and rubbed it smartly for some time with a strong solution of lunar caustic, administering liberally the spirit am monia internally. He suffered very severe pain in the affected hand, from two o'clock until about six, but towards night this pain moderated, and the medecine he had taken threw him into a most profuse perspiration ; about 10 o'clock that night, as there appeared no symptom indicative of the poison having entered the system, 1 left off the medicine, and found him next morning quite well, though weak; from which circumstance I feel rather disposed to believe, that in this case the remedy I had recourse to, combined with his own fears, was perhaps more the cause of his suffering than the effect of any deleterious matter deposited in the wound. The snake was described to be of the same kind as the former, but much smaller.-S. MEEK. "Calicut, 7th July, 1807.” POETRY. An Extempore Effusion by a Lady. The world detects not gold's o'ervalued worth, ELIZA Sonnet.-In Memory of Mr. H. K. White, whose Poetical Works have recently been published. "'Tis now the dead of night," and I will go To where the brook, soft-murmuring, glides along In the still wood; yet does the plaintive song Of Philomela through the welkin flow; And while pale Cynthia carelessly doth throw Her dewy beams the verdant boughs among, Will sit beneath some spreading oak-tree strong, And intermingle with the stream my woe : Hush'd in deep silence every gentle breeze; No mortal breath disturbs the awful gloom; Cold, chilling dew-drops trickle down the trees, And every flower withholds its rich perfume. "Tis Sorrow leads me to that sacred ground Where Henry moulders in a sleep profound! J. G. THE HOPELESS MARINE, A REAL PICTURE. Why live I to languish ?-Why longer forbear? Come, Death, thou last refuge of hopeless despair! Seize thy prey! longer life will his sorrows increase, But spare him whose vengeance has ruin'd my peace! The cause of my anguish I seek not to hide, brow; And her smile was my transport-but what is she now? Her beauty, how fade, how wan are her cheeks, Like me has a son, or a consort belov'd; years Shall be spent to his honour; mysoft flowing tears Alas! fleeting vision, thy phantoms deceive! Shrewsbury, April 5th, 1808. Having innocently picked up several bits of old metal, of the value of two-pence, his master. threatened him with a prosecution if he would not inlist for a soldier; in consequence of which he had formed the dreadful resolution of destroying himself, rather than leave his wife, child, and aged mother. A subscription has been set on foot. for the poor marine, and fifty guineas sent to the marine pay office for his discharge, to the credit of the hon. H, G. Bennet, who has interested him self very much in the poor sick, and disconsolate fellow's case. It is more than probable his discharge will be speedily obtained. [Vide Le Siège de la Rochelle, Vol. I] Sur la rive et sur la colline, Hélas à peine l'hyménée Par des nœuds si saints et si doux Eh quoi dans la même journée Recevoir sa foi, ses adieux, ⚫Et, des fleurs d'hymen couronnée, Le voir s'éloigner de ces lieux ! Entendre à la fois du rivage Le bruit des danses et des jeux, Et son vaisseau, malgré l'orage, Fendre les flots tumultueux! Ah! sur ces plages étrangères Cet enfant, chéri renouvelle Des Indes l'or et la richesse Ne sauroient payer mes tourments. Reviens dissiper ma tristesse, 4 Les vrais trésors sont dans nos champs. On a Child playing at Blindman's Buff, and carried to a Lady with a Candle in his Hand, by Mons. Montbilliard, Nous avons rencontré Un enfant égaré, Ayant sur les yeux un bandeau, Tenant dans ses mains un flambeau ; Nous l'avons pris pour l'enfant de Cythère, Et nous l'amenons à sa mère. "O happy day that made thee mine, O mournful day that made rae thine, My husband ploughs the main. "What dazzling scheme or magic shore "This lovely boy renews my pangs, And seems to share them too : While round me thus he crying hangs, He calls, my love, on you. Can India's wealth my tears repay, Or ease one anxious fear? O! then return! chace gloom away, And seek your treasures here." An Invitation to his Friends, by Mons. Montbilliard, written over his Door. Paix, gfité, sentiment, venez dans ma cabane, A translation of these jeux-d'esprits of Mons. Montbilliard is requested. EPILOGUE TO THE WORLD,'. SPOKEN BY MR. ELL STON. The play is done; and now a pause ensues, Before your verdict saves or damns the Muse : An awful pause! for which of you can hear The verdict given, and not turn pale with fear? When from yon roof the cloth of green shall fall, Which from your sight divites us :— surely all Must feel their brows with Terror's dews impearl'd, To see the curtain clos'd upon the World! Yes, Ladies, yes! my blood runs cold to say, Perhaps (some few short moments roll'd away) Perhaps those words, those dreadful words may rend Your ears and ours, "The world is at an end How can I, ward its fate?-Oh, deign to hear, Ye lovely nymphs! my suit with fav'ring ear! Far from your grateful hearts be censure hurl'd; "Twould shock us all to hear you damn the World: The World, the adoring World, which joys to view It's brightest gems, and sweetest flowers in you! Ye thrifty fathers, who would gladly shun The dread expenses of a travelling son, Now clear your brows, and be your purses furl'd, Here for six shillings all may see the World. થવું. And you, ye modish dames! whose ruling passion Is to collect at routs the mob of fashion, And see all London in your chambers cramm'd, Crush'd, crouded, squeez'd, squash'd, jolted, jostled, jamm'd; Where beau to belle, and belle to beau opposes, In Fancy's glass, what the World thinks of you: But now we'd know, from gallery, boxes, pit, Not what it thinks of you, but what you think of it. Yet, if you love youselves, our bard may say, You'll surely shew some mercy to this play;, Repressing hiss and hoot, and cough and groan,For know, this drama's fate involves your own! Then while applause our anxious doubts dispels, Applaud, ye beaux-make them applaud ye OBSERVANDA EXTERNA. AFRICA. State of the Western Coast.-The Gold Coast of Africa presents a scene of the greatest distress. The immense army of the Ashantees, who had come from the interior for the purpose of making war on the Fantees, who reside along the Coast, where the British forts are situated, has been visited by the small-pox, which has taken off great numbers of them. The Slave Trade having terminated, very little traffic of any kind was going on, in consequence of which, the white residents were very generally leaving the country. Col. Torraine, the Commander in Chief, was dead. Upon the whole, it is greatly to be apprehended that the remaining persons in the service of the African committee, will leave the country. Should this be the case, we shall lose a footing in this quarter of the world, that has hitherto proved, and might yet prove, of invaluable benefit to our country. DENMARK. Death of the King. The King of Denmark died suddenly, on the 13th of March. On the 16th, the Crown Prince was proclaim ed King, by the title of Frederick the VIth, on the parade, but there was not the least acclamation nor appearance of joy on the occasion. who fell on board the Prince Christian FreLieutenant Villemoes.-Among the Danes derick, (74) lately taken by the Nassau and lemoes. He was killed by one of the last Stately, we understand was Lieutenant Vilshots fired in the action. This gallant officer is thus noticed in an interesting little work entitled, A Tour in Zealand in 1802; “ Last, though not least, is Mr. Villemoes, a second lieutenant, who commanded the floating battery, No. 1. Much has been said about his skill in manoeuvring his raft, which consisted merely of a number of beams nailed together, with a flooring laid to support the guns. It was square, with a breast-work full of port-holes, and without masts. I shall not take upon myself to argue how far it were possible to manage such a log, but merely say, the manner in which Villemoes manoeuvred his guns, and ultimately saved his raft, attracted the notice of Lord Nelson, whose ship lay, for some time, opposite the floating battery. The Admiral is said, in the handsomest manner, to have noticed to the Prince Royal, how much the country, on future occasions, might fairly expect from the abilities of young Villemoes. This trait flower in the wreath which nilitary talents of his Lordship I consider as a never fading and success have twined around his brow." |