1770 7,736 1777 9,047 1783 11,166 1790 9,784 1795 1800 12,113 In 1770, the Sound duties amounted to 459,890 rix dollars; and they have probably been increased since that period to about half a million. To these sources of revenue are to be added, a capitation tax, a land tax, a tax on rank, a tax on places, pensions, and the clergy; the stamps, customs, and excise; constituting a revenue of 7,270,172 rixdollars.* The following is a table of the expenses of the Danish government. Rixdollars. The court 250,000 160,000 and hunting let to farm; from licenses granted to the | families; and as it does not include the army, the total farmers to distil their own spirits; from the mint, post, ought, perhaps, to be raised to 2,225,000. The preturnpikes, lotteries, and the passage of the Sound. sent population of the Danish states, calculating from About the year 1740, the number of vessels which the tables of life and death, should be about two millpassed the Sound both ways, was annually from 4000 ions and a half; the census lately taken has not yet to 5000; in 1752, the number of 6000 was considered been published. From registers kept for a number of as very extraordinary. They have increased since in years, it appears that the number of marriages were the following ratio :to the whole population, as 1 to 125; and the number of births to the whole population, were as 1 to 32 or 33; of deaths, as 1 to 38. In 1797, in the diocese of Vibourg, out of 8600 children, 80 were bastard: in the diocese of Fionia, 280 out of 1146. Out of 1356, dead in the first of these dioceses, 100 had attained the age of 80, and one of 100. In 1769, the population of the first of these years, the population of the country was towns was 144,105; in 1787, it was 142,880. In the 641,485; and in the latter, 667,165. The population of Copenhagen consisted, in the year 1799, of 42,142 males, and 41 476 females. The deaths exceeded the births, says Mr. Catteau; and to prove it, he exhibits a table of deaths and births for six years. Upon calculating this table, however, it appears, that the sum of the births, at Copenhagen, during that period,— exceeds the sum of the deaths by 491 or nearly 82 per annum; about of the whole population of the 707,500 city. The whole kingdom increases or nearly 231,000 202 in a year. There is no city in Denmark proper, 2,080,000 except Copenhagen, which has a population of more 1,200,000 than 5000 souls. The density of population in Den180,000 mark proper is about 1300 to the square mile.t The 300,000 proportion of births and deaths in the duchies, is the 27,000 same as in Denmark; that of marriages, as 1 to 115. 120,000 Altona, the second city in the Danish dominions, has 1,100,000 a population of 20,000. The density of population in 150,000 Marschland is 6000 per square mile. The paucity of inhabitants in Norway is not merely referable to the 6,525,500 difficulties of subsistence, but to the administrative system established there, and to the bad state of its civil and economical laws. It has been more than once exposed to the horrors of famine, by the monopoly of the commerce of grain established there, from which, however, it has at length been delivered. The proportion of births to the living, is as 1 to 35; that of So that the whole deaths to the living, as 1 to 49.‡ The minor branches of the royal family Secret service money and pensions Navy East India colonies Bounties to commerce and manufactures Buildings and repairs Total The state of the Danish debt does not appear to be well ascertained. Voyage des deur Francais makes it amount to 13,645,046 rixdollars. Catteau seems to think it must have been above 20,000,000 rixdollars at that period. The Danish government has had great recourse to the usual expedient of issuing paper money. So easy a method of getting rich has of course been abused; and the paper was, in the year 1790, at a discount of 8, 9, and 10 per cent. There is, in general, a great want of specie in Denmark; for, though all the Sound duties are paid in gold and silver, the government is forced to export a considerable quantity of the precious metals, for the payment of its foreign debts and agents; and, in spite of the rigid prohibitions to the contrary, the Jews, who swarm at Copenhagen, export Danish ducats to a large value. The court of Denmark has no great credit out of its own dominions, and has always experienced a considerable difficulty in raising its loans in Switzerland, Genoa, and Hol land, the usual markets it has resorted to for that purpose. In the census taken in 1769, the return was as Within the last twenty or thirty years, the Danes have done a great deal for the improvement of their country. The peasants, as we have before mentioned, are freed from the soil. The greater part of the cleri cal, and much of the lay tithes are redeemed, and the corvées and other servile tenures begin to be commuted for money. A bank of credit is established at Copenhagen, for the loan of money to persons engaged in speculations of agriculture and mining. The interest is 4 per cent., and the money is repaid by instalments in the course of from 21 to 28 years. In the course of 12 years, the bank has lent about three millions of rixdollars. The external and domestic commerce of grain is now placed upon the most liberal footing. The culture of potatoes (ce fruit modeste) has at length found its way into Denmark, after meeting with the same objections which it experienced at its first introduction from every nation in Europe. Hops are a good deal attended to in Fionia, though enough are not yet *Upon the subject of the Danish revenues, see Toze's Intro-grown for the supply of the country. Tobacco is culduction to the Statistics, edited and improved by Heinz, 1799, tivated in the environs of Fredericia, in Jutland, by the Oldenbourg and Delmenhurst This census was taken during the summer, a season in which great numbers of sailors are absent from their tom. xi. From this work Mr. Catteau has taken his information concerning the Danish revenues. See also the 19th cap. vol. ii. of Voyage des deur Francais, which is admirable for extent and precision of information. In general, indeed, this work cannot be too much attended to by those who wish to become acquainted with the statistics of the north of Europe. The average time in which old countries double their population is stated by Adam Smith to be about 500 years. The same rule is used here as in p. 279. This proportion is very remarkable proof of the longevity of the Norwegians. Ucalegon. industrious descendants of a French colony planted ments on the coast of Africa will become rather a there by Frederick IV. Very little hemp and flax are burden than a profit. What measures have been tagrown in the Danish dominions. They had veterinary ken to insure the abolition, and whether or not the phi schools previous to the present establishment of them lanthrophy of the mother country is likely to be dein Great Britain. Indeed, there was a greater neces-feated by the interested views of the colonists, are del sity for them in Denmark; as no country in Europe icate points, which Mr. Catteau, who often seems to has suffered so severely from diseases among its ani- think more of himself than of his reader, passes over mals. The decay of the woods begins to be very per- with his usual timidity and caution. The present year ceptible; and great quantities, both for fuel and con- is the period at which all further importation of nestruction, are annually imported from the other coun- groes ought to cease; and if this wise and noble law tries bordering the Baltic. They have pit-coal; but, be really carried into execution, the Danes will enjoy either from its inferior quality, or their little skill in the glory of having been the first to erase this foulest working it, they are forced to purchase to a consider- blot in the morality of Europe, and to abolish a wickable amount from England. The Danes have been ed and absurd traffic, which purchases its luxuries at almost driven out of the herring-market by the Swedes. the price of impending massacre, and present oppres Their principal export of this kind is dried fish ; though sion. Deferred revenge is always put out to compound at Altona their fisheries are carried on with more interest, and exacts its dues with more than Judaical appearance of enterprise than elsewhere. The dis- rigour. The Africans have begun with the French: tricts of Hedemarken, Hodeland, Toten, and Romerige -Jam proximus ardet are the parts of Norway most celebrated for the cultivation of grain, which principally consists of oats. The distress in Norway is sometimes so great that the Tea, rhubarb and porcelain are the principal arti inhabitants are compelled to make bread of the various cles brought from China. The factories in the East sorts of lichens, mingled with their grain. It has lately Indies send home cotton cloths, silk, sugar, rice, pep. been discovered that the Lichen rangiferus, or rein-per, ginger, indigo, opium, and arrack. Their most deer's moss, is extremely well calculated for that pur- important East Indian settlement is Fredericksnager. pose. The Norway fisheries bring to the amount of a Denmark, after having been long overshadowed by the million and a half of rixdollars annually into the coun- active industry of the Hanseatic towns, and embartry. The most remarkable mines in Norway are, the rassed by its ignorance of the true principles of comgold mines of Edsvold, the silver mines of Konigsberg. merce, has at length established important commerthe copper mines of Ræraas, and the iron mines of cial connections with all the nations of Europe, and Arendal and Krageræ, the cobalt mines of Fossum, has regulated those connections by very liberal and enand the black-lead mines of Englidal. The court of lightened principles. The regulations for the customs, Denmark is not yet cured of the folly of entering into published in 1791, are a very remarkable proof of this commercial speculations on its own account. From assertion. Every thing is there arranged upon the the year 1769 to 1792, 78,000 rixdollars per annum most just and simple principles; and the whole code have been lost on the royal mines alone. Norway evidences the striking progress of mercantile knowl produces marble of different colours, very beautiful edge in that country. In looking over the particulars granites, mill and whet-stones, and alum. of the Danish commerce, we were struck with the immense increase of their freightage during the wars of this country; a circumstance which should certainly have rendered them rather less disposed to complain of the vexations imposed upon the neutral powers du ring such periods. In the first six months of the year 1706, 5032 lasts of Danish shipping were taken up by strangers for American voyages only. The commercial tonnage of Denmark is put at about 85,000 lasts. The principal manufactures of Denmark are those of cloth, cotton-printing, sugar-refining, and porcelain; of which latter manufactures, carried on by the crown, the patient proprietors hope that the profits may at some future period equal the expenses. The manufactories for large and small arms are at Frederickwaerk and Elsineur; and at the gates of Copenhagen there has lately been erected a cotton spinning-mill upon the construction so well known in England. At Tendern, in Sleswick, there is a manufacture of lace; and very considerable glass manufactories in several parts of Norway. All the manufacturing arts have evidently travelled from Lubeck and Hamburg; the greater part of the manufacturers are of German parentage; and vast numbers of manufacturing Germans are to be met with, not only in Denmark, but throughout Sweden and Russia. There appears to exist in the kingdom of Denmark, according to the account of Mr. Čatteau, a laudible spirit of religious toleration; such as, in some instances, we might copy, with great advantage, in this island. It is not, for instance, necessary in Denmark, that a man should be a Lutheran, before he can be the mayor of a town; and incredible as it may seem to some people, there are many officers and magistrates, who are found capable of civil trusts, though they do The Holstein canal, uniting the Baltic and the North not take the sacraments, exactly in the form preSea, is extremely favourable to the interior commerce scribed by the established church. There is no doubt, of Denmark, by rendering unnecessary the long and however, of the existence of this very extraordinary dangerous voyage round the peninsula of Jutland. In fact; and if Mr. Catteau's authority is called in questhe year 1785, there passed through this canal 409 tion, we are ready to corroborate it by the testimony Danish, and 44 foreign ships. In the year 1798, 1086 of more than one dozen German statistics. The Dan Danish and 1164 foreign. This canal is so advanta- ish church consists of 13 bishops, 227 archpriests, and geous, and the passage round Jutland so very bad, that 2462 priests. The principal part of the benefices are, goods, before the creation of the canal, were very of in Norway, in the gift of the crown. In some parts of ten sent by land from Lubeck to Hamburg. The Denmark, the proprietors of the privileged lands are amount of cargoes despatched from Copenhagen for the patrons; in other parts, the parishes. The reveIceland, between the years 1764 and 1784, was 2,560-nues of the clergy are from the same sources as our 000 rix dollars; that of the returns, 4,665,000. The own clergy. The sum of the church revenues is comcommerce with the isles of Foeroe is quite inconsider-puted to be 1,391,895 rixdollars; which is little more able. The exports from Greenland, in the year 1787, than 500 for each clergyman. The whole court of amounted to 168,475 rixdollars; its imports to 74,427. Denmark is so liberal upon the subject of sectaries, None of these possessions are suffered to trade with foreign nations, but through the intervention of the mother country. The cargoes despatched to the Danish West Indies consist of all sorts of provisions, of iron, of copper, of various Danish manufactures, and of some East India goods. The returns are made in sugar, rum, cotton, indigo, tobacco, and coffee. There are about 75 vessels employed in this commerce, from the burden of 40 to 200 tons. *We should very willingly have gone through every branch of the Danish commerce, if we had not been apprehensive of extending this article too far. Mr. Catteau gives no general tables of the Danish exports and imports. A German work places them, for the year 1768, as follows:-Exports, 3,067,051 rixdollars; imports, 3,215,085.-Ur. Kunden, par Gatspari. To say nothing of the increased sale of Norway timber, out of 86,000 lasts exported from Norway, 1799, 76,000 came to Great Britain. The Jews, however, are still prohibited from entering the If the slave trade, in pursuance of the laws to that effect, ceases in the Danish colonies, the establish- kingdom of Norway. that the whole royal family and the Bishop of Seland and extravagance of a Dutchman; more breeched, assisted at the worship of the Calvinists in 1789, when more ponderous, and more saturnine. He is not often they celebrated, in the most public manner, the cente. a bad member of society in the great points of morals, nary of the foundation of their church. In spite of and seldom a good one in the lighter requisites of manthis tolerant spirit, it is computed that there are not ners. His understanding is alive only to the useful more than 1800 Calvinists in the whole Danish domin- and the profitable; he never lives for what is merely ions. At Christianfeld, on the frontiers of Selswick gracious, courteous, and ornamental. His faculties and Jutland, there is a colony of Northern Quakers, seem to be drenched and slackened by the eternal fogs or Hernhutes, of which Mr. Catteau has given a very in which he resides; he is never alert, elastic, nor se. agreeable account. They appear to be characterized rene. His state of animal spirits is so low, that what by the same neatness, order, industry, and absurdity, in other countries would be deemed dejection, proas their brethren in this country; taking the utmost ceeding from casual misfortune, is the habitual tenour care of the sick and destitute, and thoroughly persua- and complexion of his mind. In all the operations of ded that by these good deeds, aided by long pockets his understanding, he must have time. He is capable and slouched hats, they are acting up to the true spirit of undertaking great journeys; but he travels only a of the Gospel. The Greenlanders were converted to foot pace, and never leaps nor runs. He loves arithChristianity by a Norwegian priest, named John Ege-metic better than lyric poetry, and affects Cocker rathde. He was so eminently suscessful in the object of his mission, and contrived to make himself so very much beloved, that his memory is still held among them in the highest veneration; and they actually date their chronology from the year of his arrival, as we do ours from the birth of our Saviour. er than Pindar. He is slow to speak of fountains and amorous maidens; but can take a spell at porisms as well as another; and will make profound and extensive combinations of thought, if you pay him for it, and do not insist that he shall be brisk or brief. There is something, on the contrary, extremely plea There are, in the University of Copenhagen, seven sing in the Norwegian style of character. The Norprofessors of theology, two of civil law, two of mathe-wegian expresses firmness and elevation in all that he matics, one of Latin and rhetorick, one of Greek, one says and does. In comparison with the Danes, he of oriental languages, one of history, five of medicine, has always been a free man; and you read his history one of agriculture, and one of statistics. They enjoy in his looks. He is not apt, to be sure, to forgive his a salary of from 1000 to 1500 rixdollars, and are well enemics; but he does not deserve any; for he is hos lodged in the university. The University of Copen-pitable in the extreme, and prevents the needy in their hagen is extremely rich, and enjoys an income of wants. It is not possible for a writer of this country 3,000,000 rixdollars. Even Mr. Catteau admits that to speak ill of the Norwegians; for, of all strangers, it has need of reform. In fact, the reputation of uni- the people of Norway love and admire the British the versities is almost always short-lived, or else it sur- most. In reading Mr. Catteau's account of the convives their merit. If they are endowed, professors gealed and blighted Laplanders, we were struck with become fat-witted, and never imagine that the arts the infinite delight they must have in dying; the onand sciences are any thing else but incomes. If uni- ly circumstance in which they can enjoy any superiorversities, slenderly endowed, are rendered famous by ity over the rest of mankind; or which tends, in their the accidental occurence of a few great teachers, the instance, to verify the theory of the equality of human number of scholars attracted there by the repu- condition. tation of the place, makes the situation of a professor worth intriguing for. The learned pate is not fond of ducking to the golden fool. He who has the best talents for getting the office, has most commonly the least for filling it; and men are made moral and mathematical teachers by the same trick and filthiness with which they are made tide-waiters, and clerks of the kitchen. The number of students in the University of Copenhagen is about 700: they come not only from Denmark, but from Norway and Iceland: the latter are distinguished as well for the regularity of their manners, as for the intensity of their application; the instruments of which application are furnished to them by a library containing 60,000 volumes. The Danes have primary schools established in their towns, but which have need of much reform, before they can answer all the beneficial ends of such an institution. We should have been happy to have learned from Mr. Catteau, the degree of information diffused among the lower orders in the Danish dominions; but upon this subject he is silent. In the University of Keil there is an institution for the instruction of schoolmasters; and in the list of students in the same university, we were a good deal amused to find only one student dedicating himself to belles lettres. The people of Holstein and Sleswick are Dutch in their manners, character, and appearance. Their language is in general the low German; though the better sort of people in the towns begin to speak high German. In Jutland and the isles, the Danish language is spoken: within half a century this language has been cultivated with some attention: before that period, the Danish writers preferred to make use of the Latin or German language. It is in the island of Finland that it is spoken with the greatest purity. The Danish character is not agreeable. It is marked by silence, phlegm and reserve. A Dane is the excess - Mr. Catteau's description of Heligoland is entertaining In an island containing a population of 2000, there is neither horse, cart, nor plough. We could not have imagined the possibility of such a fact in any part of Europe. If we pass over Tycho Brahe, and the well known history of the Scaldes, of the chronicles of Isleif, Sæmunder, Hiinfronde, Snorro, Sturleson, and other Islandic worthies, the list of Danish literati will best prove that they have no literati at all. Are there twenty persons in Great Britain who have ever heard of Longomontanus, Nicholas Stenaonis, Sperling Laurenburg, Huitfeild, Gramn, Holberg, Langebeck, Carstens, Suhm, Kofod, Anger? or of the living Wad, Fabricius, Hanch, Tode, and Zaga? We do not deny merit to these various personages; many of them may be much admired by those who are more conver sant in Danish literature than we can pretend to be; but they are certainly not names on which the learned fame of any country can be built very high. They have no classical celebrity and diffusion: they are not an universal language; they have not enlarged their original dominion, and become the authors of Europe instead of the authors of Denmark. It would be loss of time to speak of the fine arts in Denmark: they hardly exist. We have been compelled to pass over many parts of Mr. Catteau's book more precipitately than we could have wished; but we hope we have said and exhibited enough of it, to satisfy the public that it is, upon the whole, a very valuable publication. The two great requisites for his undertaking, moderation and industry, we are convinced this gentleman possesses in an eminent degree. He represents every thing without prejudice, and he represents every thing authentically. The same cool and judicious disposi tion which clears him from the spirit of party, makes him perhaps cautious in excess. We are convinced that every thing he says is true; but we have been sometimes induced to suspect that we do not see the whole truth. After all, perhaps, he has told as much truth as he could do, compatibly with the opportunity of telling any. A person more disposed to touch upon critical and offensive subjects might not have submitted as diligently to the investigation of truth, with which passion was not concerned. How few writers are, at the same time, laborious, impartial, and intrepid! We cannot conclude this article without expressing the high sense we entertain of the importance of such researches as those in which Mr. Catteau has been engaged. They must form the basis of all interior regulations, and ought principally to influence the con-duct of every country in its relations towards foreign powers. As they contain the best estimate of the wealth and happiness of a people, they bring theory to the strictest test; and measure, better than all reasoning, the wisdom with which laws are made, and the mildness with which they are administered. If such judicious and elaborate surveys of the state of this and other countries in Europe, had been made from time to time for the last two centuries, they would have quickened and matured the progress of knowledge, and the art of governing by throwing light on the spirit and tendency of laws; they would have checked the spirit of officious interference in legisla tion; have softened persecution, and expanded narrow conceptions of national policy. The happiness of a nation would have been proclaimed by the fulness of its garners, and the multitudes of its sheep and oxen; and rulers might sometimes have sacrificed their schemes of ambition, or their unfeeling splendour, at the detail of silent fields, empty harbours, and famished peasants. THOUGHTS ON THE RESIDENCE OF THE CLERGY. (EDINBURGH REVIEW, 1803.) Thoughts on the Residence of the Clergy. By John Sturges, LL. D. astical residence, is to consult the convenience of the clergy in its construction, as far as is possibly con sistent with the object desired, and even to sacrifice something that ought to be done, in order that much may be done. Upon this principle, the clergyman should not be confined to his parsonage-house, but to the precincts of his parish. Some advantage would certainly attend the residence of the clergy in their official mansions; but, as we have before observed, the good one party would obtain, bears no sort of proportion to the evil the other would suffer. Upon the propriety of investing the bench of bishops with a power of enforcing residence, we confess ourselves to entertain very serious doubts. A bishop has frequently a very temporary interest in his diocese: he has favours to ask; and he must grant them. Leave of absence will be granted to powerful intercession; and refused, upon stronger pleas, to men without friends. Bishops are frequently men advanced in years, or immersed in study. A single person who compels many others to their duty, has much odiun to bear, and much activity to exert. A bishop is subject to caprice, and enmity, and passion, in common with other individuals; there is some danger, also, that his power over the clergy may be converted to a political purpose. From innumerable causes, which might be reasoned upon to great length we are appre hensive the object of the legislature will be entirely frustrated in a few years, if it be committed to episcopal superintendence and care; though, upon the first view of the subject, no other scheme can appear so natural and so wise. Dr. Sturges observes, that after all the conceivable justifications of non-residence are enumerated in the THIS pamphlet is the production of a gentleman who act, many others must from time to time occur, and inhas acquired a right to teach the duties of the clerical dicate the propriety of vesting somewhere a discreti character by fulfilling them; and who has exercised onary power. If this be true of the penalties by which that right, in the present instance, with honour to the clergy are governed, it is equally true of other pehimself, and benefit to the public. From the particu-nal laws; and the law should extend to every offence lar character of understanding evinced in this work, the contingency of discretionary omission. The ob we should conceive Dr. Sturges to possess a very pow.jection to this system is, that it trusts too much to the erful claim to be heard on all questions referable to sagacity and the probity of the judge, and exposes a the decision of practicable good sense. He has avail-country to the partial, lax, and corrupt administration ed himself of his experience to observe; and of his observation, to judge well; he neither loves his profession too little, nor too much; is alive to its interests, without being insensible to those of the community at large; and treats of those points where his previous habits might render a little intemperance venial, as well as probable, with the most perfect good humour and moderation. As exceptions to the general and indisputable principle of residence, Dr. Sturges urges the smallness of some livings; the probability that their incumbents be engaged in the task of education, or in ecclesiastical duty, in situations where their talents may be more appropriately and importantly employed. Dr. Sturges is also of opinion, that the power of enforcing residence under certain limits, should be invested in the bishops; and that the acts prohibiting the clergy to hold or to cultivate land, should be in a great measure repealed. We sincerely hope that the two cases suggested by Dr. Sturges, of the clergyman who may keep a school, or be engaged in the duty of some parish not his own, will be attended to in the construction of the approaching bill, and admitted as pleas for non-residence. It certainly is better that a clergyman should do the duty of his own benefice, rather than of any other. But the injury done to the community, is not commensurate with the vexation imposed upon the individual. Such a measure is either too harsh, not to become obsolete; or, by harassing the clergy with a very severe restriction, to gain a very disproportionate good to the commnuity, would bring the profession in to disrepute, and have a tendency to introduce a class of men into the church, of less liberal manners, edu cation, and connection; points of the utmost import. ance, in our present state of religion and wealth. Nothing has enabled men to do wrong with impunity so much as the extreme severities of the penalties with which the law has threatened them. The only method to insure success to the bill for enforcing ecclesi of its laws. It is certainly inconvenient, in many ca ses, to have no other guide to resort to but the unac commodating mandates of an act of Parliament: yet, of the two inconveniences, it is the least. It is some palliation of the evils of discretionary power, that it should be exercised (as by the court of chancery) in the face of day, and that the moderator himself be moderated by the force of precedent and opinion. A bishop will exercise this discretionary power in the dark; he is at full liberty to depart to-morrow from the precedent he has established to-day, and to apply the same decisions to different, or different decisions to the same circumstances, as his humour or interest may dictate. Such power may be exercised well under one judge of extraordinary integrity; but it is not very probable he will find a proper successor. To suppose a series of men so much superior to tempta tion, and to construct a system of church government upon such a supposition, is to build upon sand, with materials not more durable than the foundation. Sir William Scott has made it very clear, by his es cellent speech, that it is not possible, in the present state of the revenues of the English church, to apply a radical cure to the evil of non-residence. It is there stated, that out of 11,700 livings, there are 6000 under 801. per annum; many of those, 201., 301., and some as low as 21. or 31. per annum. In such a state of endow ment, all idea of rigid residence is out of the question. Emoluments which a footman would spurn, can hardly recompense a scholar and a gentleman. A mere palliation is all that can be applied; and these are the ingredients of which we wish such a palliation should be composed: 1. Let the clergymen have full liberty of farming, and be put in this respect exactly upon a footing with laymen. 2. Power to reside in any other house in the parish, as well as the parsonage-house, and to be absent five months in the year. 3. Schoolmasters, and ministers bona fide discharg. ing ministerial functions in another parish, exempt from residence. tain some doubts. At Gaza five of his companions fell sick and returned to Jerusalem. The second 4. Penalties in proportion to the value of livings, day's journey in the desert the carver fell ill also,and number of times the offence has been committed. returned to Gaza, where he was cured by a Samaritan,, 5. Common informers to sue as at present; though--and finding his way back to Jerusalem, hired some probably it might be right to make the name of one pleasant lodgings on Mount Sion. parishioner a necessary addition; and a proof of nonresidence might be made to operate as a nonsuit in an action for tithes. 6. No action for non-residence to lie where the benefice was less than 801. per annum; and the powers of bishops to remain precisely as they are. These indulgences would leave the clergy without excuse, would reduce the informations to a salutary number, and diminish the odium consequent upon them, by directing their effects against men who regard church perferment merely as a source of revenue, not as an obligation to the discharge of important duties. We venture to prognosticate, that a bill of greater severity either will not pass the House of Commons, or will fail of its object. Considering the times and circumstances, we are convinced we have stated the greatest quantum of attainable good; which of course will not be attained, by the customary error, of at. tending to what is desirable to be done, rather than to what it is practicable to do. The Travels of Bertrandon de la Brocquière, First Esquire- In the year 1432, many great lords in the dominions of Burgundy, holding office under Duke Philip le Bon, made a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. Among them was his first esquire-carver La Brocquière, who, having performed many devout pilgrimages in Palestine, returned sick to Jerusalem, and during his convalescence, formed the bold scheme of returning to France over land. This led him to traverse the western parts of Asia, and Eastern Europe; and, during the whole journey, except towards the end of it, he passed through the dominions of the Mussulmen. The execution of such a journey even at this day, would not be without difficulty; and it was then thought to be impossible. It was in vain that his companions at tempted to dissuade him; he was obstinate; and, setting out, overcome every obstacle; returned in the course of the year 1433, and presented himself to the duke in his Saracen dress, and on the horse which had carried him during the whole of his journey. The duke, after the fashion of great people, conceiving that the glory of his esquire-carver was his own, caused the work to be printed and published. Before he proceeded on his grand expedition over land, he undertook a little expedition to Nazarethhearing, first of all, divine service at Cordeliers, and imploring, at the tomb of our lady, her protection for his journey. From Jerusalem their first stage was Acre, where they gave up their intended expedition, and repaired to Baruth, whence Sir Samson de La laing and the author sallied afresh, under better auspices, to Damascus. He speaks with great pleasure of the valley where Noah built the ark, through which valley he passed in his way to Damascus ; upon entering which town he was knocked down by a Saracen for wearing an ugly hat-as he probably would be in London for the same offence in the year 1807. At Damascus, he informs us the Christians are locked up every night, as they are in English workhouses, night and day, when they happen to be poor. The greatest misfortune attendant upon this Damascene incarceration, is the extreme irregularity with which the doors are opened in the morning, their janitor having no certain hour of quitting his bed. At Damascus, he saw the place where St. Paul had a vision. 'I saw, also,' says he, the stone from which St. George mounted his horse, when he went to combat the dragon. It is two feet square; and they say, that when formerly the Saracens attempted to carry it away, in spite of all the strength they employed, they could not succeed.' After having seen Damascus, he returns with Sir Samson to Baruth; and communicates his intentions of returning over land to France to his com panions. They state to him the astonishing difficulties he will have to overcome in the execution of so extraordinary a project; but the admirable carver, determined to make no bones, and to cut his way through every obstacle, persists in his scheme, and bids them a final adieu. He is determined, however, not to be baffled in his subordinate expedition to Nazareth; and, having now got rid of his timid companions, accomplishes it with ease. We shall here present our readers with an extract from this part of his journal, requesting them to admire the naif manner in which he speaks of the vestiges of ecclesiastical history. surrounded on three sides by mountains, and on the fourth by 'Acre, though in a plain of about four leagues in extent, is the sea. I made acquaintance there with a Venetian merchant called Aubert Franc, who received me well, and procured me much useful information respecting my two pilgrimages, by which I profited. With the aid of his advice, I took the road to Nazareth; and, having crossed an extensive plain, came to the fountain, the water of which our Lord changed into wine at the marriage of Archétréclin; it is near a village where St. Peter is said to have been born. pitiful state. The church that had been there built is entirely destroyed; and of the house wherein our lady was when the angel appeared to her, not the smallest remnant exists. 'Nazareth is another large village, built between two mountains; but the place where the angel Gabriel came to anThe following is a brief extract of this valiant per-nounce to the Virgin Mary that she would be a mother, is in a son's perigrinations. 'After performing the customary pilgrimages, we went,' says La Brocquière, to the mountain where Jesus fasted forty days; to Jordan, From Nazareth I went to Mount Tabor, the place where where he was baptized; to the church of St. Martha, where Lazarus was raised from the dead; to Bethle the transfiguration of our Lord, and many other miracles took effect. These pasturages attract the Arabs who come thither hem, where he was born; to the birth place of St. with their beasts; and I was forced to engage four additional John the Baptist; to the house of Zachariah; and, men as an escort, two of whom were Arabs. The ascent of the lastly, to the holy cross, where the tree grew that mountain is rugged, because there is no road; I performed it formed the real cross.' From Jerusalem the first gen- on the back of a mule, but it took me two hours. The summit tleman-carver betook himself to Mount Sinai, paying is terminated by an almost circular plain of about two bowpretty handsomely to the Saracens for that privilege. shots in length, and one in width. It was formerly enclosed with walls, the ruins of which, and the ditches, are still visible: These infidels do not appear to have ever prevented within the wall, and around it, were several churches, and one the Christian pilgrims from indulging their curiosity especially, where, although in ruins, full pardon for vice and and devotion in visiting the most interesting evangeli- sin is gained. cal objects in the Holy Land; but, after charging a We went to lodge at Samaria, because I wished to see the good round price for their gratification, contented lake of Tiberias, where it is said St. Peter was accustomed to themselves with occasionally kicking them, and spitting upon them. In his way to Mount Sinai, the Esquire-carver passed through the Valley of Hebron, where he tells us, Adam was created; and from thence to Gaza, where they showed him the columns of the building which Samson pulled down; though, of the adentity of the building, the esquire seems to enter fish; and, by so doing, some pardons may be gained, for it was the ember week of September. The Moucre left me to myself the whole day. Samaria is situated on the extremity of a mountain. We entered at the close of day, and left it at midnight to visit the lake. The Moucre had proposed this hour to evade the tribute exacted from all who go thither; but the night hindred me from seeing the surrounding country. I went first to Joseph's Well, so called from his being cast |