rental authority having dissolved their juvenile engagements, Mr. Day offered to Honora his philosophic hand. She admired his talents; she revered his virtues; she tried to school her heart into softer sentiments in his fayour; she did not succeed in the attempt, and ingenuously told him so. Her sister, Elizabeth Sneyd, one year younger, was very pretty, very sprightly, very artless, very engaging, though countless degrees inferior to the endowed and adorned Honora ;-To her the yet love-luckless sage transferred the heart, which Honora had with sighs resigned. Elizabeth told Mr. Day she could have loved him, if he had acquired the manners of the world, instead of those austere singularities of air, habit, and address.

He began to impute to fickleness, the involuntary iciness of the charming Honora, as well as that for which her sister had accounted. He told Elizabeth, that, for her sake, he would renounce his prejudices to external refinements and try to acquire them. He would go to Paris, and commit himself to dancing and fencing masters. He did so; stood daily an hour or two in frames, to screw back his shoulders, and point his feet; he practised the military gait, the fashionable bow, minuets, and cotillions; but it was too late; habits, so long fixed, could be no more than partially overcome. The endeavour, made at intervals, and by visible effort, was really more ungraceful than the natural stoop and unfashionable air ;neither was the showy dress, in which he came back to his fair one, a jot more becoming.

Poor Elizabeth reproached her reluctant, but insuppressive ingrati tude, upon which all this labour, these sacrifices had been wasted. She confessed, that Thomas Day,

blackguard, as she used jestingly to style him, less displeased her eye than Thomas Day, fine gentleman.

Thus again disappointed, he re sumed his accustomed plainness of garb, and neglect of his person, and went again to the continent for another year, with pursuits of higher. aim, more congenial to his talents and former principles. Deviating from the usual mode of fashionable tourists, he fixed his residence for sometime in particular spots; mak ing himself thoroughly acquainted with the way of life followed by classes of society seldom known to travellers, and finding occupation for his benevolence in the relief of their distresses. Returning to England in the year 1773, he saw Honora Sneyd united to his friend Mr. Edgeworth, of Edgeworth's-town in Ireland, who was become a widower; and in the year 1780, he learned that Elizabeth Sneyd, was also, after the death of Honora married to Mr. Edgeworth. It was singular that Thomas Day should thus, in the course of seven years, find himself doubly rivalled by his most intimate friend; but his own previously re nounced pursuit of those beautiful young women, left him without either cause or sensation of resentment w their account.

From the year 1773 this hitherto love-renounced philosopher resided chiefly in London, and amid the small and select circle which he visited there, often met the elegaut Esther Mills of Derbyshire, who, with modern acquirements, and amongst modish luxuries suited to her large fortune, had cultivated her understanding by books, and her virtues by benevolence. The again unpolished stoic had every charm in her eyes,

" She saw Othello's visage in his mind," But from indignant recollection of

hopes so repeated baffled, Mr. Day looked with distrust on all females; and it was not for many years that be deigned to ask Miss Mills, if she could, for his sake, resign all that the world calls pleasures, all its luxuries, and all its ostentation. If, with him, she could resolve to employ, after the ordinary comforts of life were supplied, the surplus of her affluent fortune in clothing the naked, and feeding the hungry; retire with him into the country, and shun, through remaining existence, the infectious taint of human society..

To proposals so formidable, so sure to be rejected by a heart less than infinitely attached, Miss Mills gladly assented; but something more remained. He insisted that her whole fortune should be settled on herself, totally out of his present or future controul; that if she grew tired of a system of life so likely to weary a woman of the world, she might return to that world any hour she chose, fully empowered to resume its habits and its pleasures.

They married, retired into the country about the year 1780: no carriage, no appointed servant about Mrs. Day's own person; no luxury of any sort. Music, in which she was a distinguished proficient, was deemed trivial. She banished her harpsicord and music books. Frequent experiments upon her temper, and her attachment, were made by him, whom she lived but to obey and love; over these she often wept, but never repined. No wife, bound in the strictest fetters, as to the incapacity of claiming separate maintenance, ever made more absolute sacrifices to the most imperious husband, than did this lady, whose independence had been secured, and of whom, nothing was demanded as a duty. Thus he found, at last, amid the very class he dread

cd, that of fashionable women, a heart whose passion for him supplied all the requisites of his hightoned expectations.

Sabrina remained at school three years, and gained the esteem of her instructress; she grew feminine, elegant, and amiable. She proved one of the many instances that those modes of education, which have been sanctioned by long experience, are seldom abandoned to advantage by ingenious system-mongers, When she left school, Mr. Day allowed her fifty pounds annually. She lived some years near Birmingham, and afterwards in Shropshire: wherever she resided, wherever she paid visits, she secured to herself friends. Mr. Day corresponded with her parentally; two years after his marriage and in her twenty-sixth year, his friend Mr. Bicknel, proposed himself; that very Mr Bicknel who went with Thomas Day to the foundling hospital at Shrewsbury, and by whose suretyship for his upright intentions the governors of that charity permitted Sabrina and Lucretia to be taken from thence. More from prudential motives, than affection, Sabrina accepted Mr. Bicknel's addresses, yet became one of the best of wires. Mr. Day gave her the promised dower of five hun dred pounds.

Mr. Bicknel, without patrimonial fortune, and living up to his professional income, did not save money; his wife brought him two boys; when the eldest was about five years old, their father was seized with a paralytic stroke, which in a few weeks terminated fatally. His widow had no means of independent support for herself and her infants. Mr. Day allowed her thirty pounds annually, to assist the efforts which he expected she would make for the maintenance of herself and children. To have been more bounteous must

surely have been in his heart, but it was not in his system. The sum of eight hundred pounds was raised among the gentlemen of the bar, for Mrs. Bicknel and her sons. This excellent woman lived many years with Dr. Burney of Greenwich as his housekeeper and assistant in the cares of his academy; she was treat ed by him and his friends with evey mark of esteem and respect due to a gentlewoman, and one whose virtues entitled her to universal approbation.

Mr. Day's residence after mar riage was first in Essex, and afterwards in Surry, where he occupied a considerable farm, in the experimental processes of which he large ly employed the neighbouring poor. From extensive knowledge, ready eloquence, and undaunted spirit, he was well calculated to take a part in political life; but he was void of ambition. The national circum stances, however, called him out in 1780, to make a public opposition to the American war, which he had execrated at its commencement; he joined with this object that of parlias mentary reform, which, indeed, he considered as the basis of every other political reformation. He join ed his friend Mr. Bicknel in writ ing the "Dying Negro," a poem intended to interest the feelings against slavery. His strain of poetry was nervous and animated; his imagery striking, and versification cor. rect. He painted the horrors of war very strongly in his poem entitled "The desolation of America." In 1782, he published a pamphlet on the state of England and the independence of America, strongly recommending the termination of the #dispute. We must pardon his phi lippic against the Americans, when we consider that generous indigna tion at the slave trade practiced without remorse in the southern co

lonies of North America, induced him to refuse them all credit for the patriotic virtue of that resistance to new and unconstitutional claims, which threatened their liberties. In 178+ he published a "Fragment of a letter on the slavery of the negroes:" This had been written some years before at the instigation of an American gentleman, but the publication had been suspended during the war. Its tenor may be inferred from the following passage; "If there be an object truly ridiculous in nature, it is an American patriot, signing resolutions of independence with one hand, and with the other bran dishing a whip over his affrighted slaves."

Another kind of writing by which Mr. Day displayed his zeal for the good of mankind, was the composition of books for children. His "Sandford and Merton," of which the first volume appeared in 1783, and the third in 1789, proved one of the most popular in this class, and is by wise parents put into every youthful hand. It powerfully inculcates all the manly virtues of courage, activity, temperance, independence and generosity, and contains many useful instructions in the principles of science. Perhaps "Sandford and Merton" errs in proposing a mode of education too little accommoda. ted to the actual state of manners, and which shows that Thomas Day was rather a speculator in this point than a practitioner. He never had children of his own, or he would most likely have found theory and practice widely different.

Mr. Day's constitutional fault like the amiable Cowper's, seemed that of looking with severe and disgusted eyes on those errors in his species, which are mutually tolerated by mankind. This stain of misanthropy was extremely deepened by his commerce with the world, restrain

ed as that commerce had ever been. Sarcastic and discerning, it was not easy to deceive him; yet in a few instances, he was deceived by the appearance of virtues congenial to his own.

"For neither man nor angel can discern Hypocrisy, the only evil that walks Invisible, except to God alone." About eight or ten years after his marriage, the life of this singular being became, in its meridian, a victim to one of his uncommon systems. He thought highly of the gratitude, generosity and sensibility of horses; and that whenever they were disobedient, unruly, or vicious, it was owing to previous ill-usage from men. He had reared, fed, and tamed a favourite foal; when it was time it should become serviceable, disdaining to employ a horse-breaker, he would use it to the bit and burthen himself. He was not a good horseman. The

animal disliking his new situation, heeded not the soothing voice to which he had been accustomed: he plunged, threw his master, and then, with his heels, struck him on the head, an instantly fatal blow. Thus he died a victim to his enthusiastic ideas of hu. manity, in his 42d year. It was said that Mrs. Day never afterwards saw the sun; that she lay in bed, into the curtains of which no light was admitted during the day, and she only rose to stray alone through her garden, when night gave her sorrows conge. nial gloom. She survived this adored husband two years, and then died, broken-hearted, for his loss. Mrs. Bicknel's name was not mentioned in Mr. Day's will, but Mrs Day con tinued the allowance he had made her, and bequeathed its continuance from her own fortune, during Mrs. Bicknel's life.

BMPLOYMENT OF A WOMAN IN CON

STANTINOPLE.

From Olivier's Travels.

TO please her husband, to detain him in the harem as long as his affairs permit, to take care of her children, to occupy herself with her dress, and very little with her family, to pray at the hours prescribed by religion, and to pass a part of the day without doing any thing, another in smoking, drinking coffee, receiving female friends, relations, or women under her protection; such are the duties and pleasures of a Turkish woman. seldom can read, and scarcely ever write; she has learnt to sew and embroider, prepare comfits and dain ties, and make sherbet; but she

She

finds it more pleasant to do nothing, to remain quiet on her sofa, and roll between her fingers a chaplet of coral or agate. She considers it as a delightful employment to hold, from time to time, a dish of coffee in one hand, a pipe in the other, and to carry them alternately to her mouth, at the same time inhaling the vapour of the one, and retaining as long as possible that of the other; what afterwards gratifies ber the most, is to have it in her power to display to the eyes of the women whom she receives, some rich triakets, and a robe of great value.

"A mussulman is very poor if he have not several slaves to wait on his wife, and the latter is very unskilful if she do not soon convert in

to dresses and trinkets the greatest part of the husband's fortune."

We are often surprized at the relations of travellers, while conduct almost entirely similar passes unobserved among ourselves.

Might not an attentive observer, who joined a turn for sarcasm, with acute observation, find at home some who wasted their time in the apparent employment, but real idleness, of embroidery and ornamental needle work, who if they read, deal only in novels and light reading, and carry a large portion of their husband's property to public places in jewels, or waste it at card tables? Turkish women are not the only triflers.

WORLDLY PRUDENCE OF ARCHBISHOP

USHER.

Many great characters have striking blemishes. Cranmer recanted through fear, and if the following account can be implicitly relied on, Usher suppressed his real sentiments, through the temporizing motives of worldy prudence:

"Mr. Bernard, of Batcombe, Somerset, was a presbyterian divine of some note. He is said by Ludlow, [8vo. 1. 104.] to have been an acquaintance of Archbishop Usher's, and that when the said Mr B. earnestly pressed him "to deal faithfully with the king, in the controversy which was between him and the parliament concerning espiscopacy, according to his own judgment in that manner, which he knew to be against it, representing to him the great and important service he would thereby do to the church of God." The archbishop answered, that if he should do as Mr. B. proposed, he should ruin himself and family, having a child and many debts. Of this story, Ludlow was assured by one who had his information from Mr. Bernard himself. Ludlow's application of the anec

BELFAST MAG. NO. XXXIV.

dote reads a very serious lecture to all such mala fide churchmen, who, if the allusion were not too homely, might be compared to boatmen looking one way, and rowing another. Ludlow was a brave suldier, and an honest man, even in the judgment of his enemies. The royalists desired his political conversion, and hoped that a conference with Archbishop Usher might effect it. The conference was declined by Ludlow. Ludlow. "For this reason," says he, "because those arguments which could not prevail with me, wh.n used by others, were not likely to be of more efficacy from him, who, in a business of such concernment, had been diverted from the discharge of his duty, by such low and sordid considerations."

MAN DIFFERS FROM HIMSELF AT DIFFERENT PERIODS OF HIS LIFE.

Thomas More in his Utophia wrote well and liberally. He declared himself freely and fully against putting thieves to death. Yet this same man suffered himself to be influenced by bigotry, and a spirit of persecution. "But he was a notable tyrant," said old Luther, indignantly, and justly. "He was one of the bitterest enemies," says Burnet, "of the new preachers, not without great cruelty when he came into power, though he was otherwise a very good-natured man;" and though in the opinion of Dr. Jortin "he had once been free from that bigotry which grew upon him afterwards in life." Yes, the philosophy, the sagacity, the piety, the benevolence of More, did not preserve him from the reigning prejudices of his day against the crime of heresy; and they who will consult Mr. Lyson's excellent work on the environs of London, will be led to many serious'reflections upon human infirmity, when they read the wanton cruelties which in More's presence, or even by his

Eee