more experienced proficient in the law, may reap advant age from thefe volumes, where they will find a well-connected recital of all the ancient ftatutes, and an hiftorical digeft of all the fundamental doctrines contained in the treatifes of our first law-writers, fuch as Glanville, Bracton, Fleta, Britton, and the Mirrour of Magiftrates; authors, whofe black-letter pages in barbarous Latin, bad English, and worse French, however venerable they may look, opportunely dif played upon a table, we believe to be neither fo generally nor fo attentively studied by modern lawyers as they deferve. The prefent attempt to render them more extenfively known, entitles Mr. Reeves, in our eftimation, to the thanks of all who wish well to the advancement of legal science. [Corresp.

Sketch of a Tour into Derbyshire and Yorkshire, including Part of Buckingham, Warwick, Leicester, Nottingham, Northampton, Bedford, and Hertford-fhires. By William Bray, F. A. S. Second Edition. 6s. in Boards. White.

8vo.

THE

'HE firft edition of this Sketch, comprised in a half-crown pamphlet, has formerly been noticed in our Review *. The work is now fo much extended as to form a moderate volume in large octavo. To give a regular detail of the narrative, would be to relate the author's progress and observations through the whole of the Tour: and though this might perhaps be no difagreeable task, it is fuch a one as must be precluded by the neceffity of accommodating the limits of our Review to a variety of other fubjects. In performing this Tour the author has proceeded by Buckingham, Banbury, Edge-hill, Warwick, Coventry, Leicester, Derby, Matlock, Buxton, Sheffield, Leeds, Rippon, and Afkrig; whence, he returned through the wilds of Yorkshire, called Craven, and by Mansfield, Nottingham, Northampton, Woburn, and St. Alban's.

For the gratification of fuch of our readers as are unacquainted with the beauties of Stowe, we fhall lay before them Our author's account of those gardens, in delineating which he has chiefly followed the description of the late Mr. Whately.

In the front of the house, which ftands on the brow of a gentle rife, is a confiderable lawn, open to the water, beyond which are two elegant doric pavilions, placed in the boundary of the garden, but not marking it as fuch, though they correlpond to each other; for, ftill further back, on a rifing ground

* Crit. Rev. vol. xlv. p. 159.

without

without the inclofure, ftands the Corinthian arch, which is feen in the approach.

I fhall not attempt to defcribe all the buildings, which are very numerous, but shall mention fome of the principal fcenes. 'On entering the garden, you are conducted to the left by the two Doric pavilions, from whence the magnificent front of the houfe is full in view. You pass by the fide of the lake (which, with the bafon, flows about ten acres) to a temple dedicated to Venus, looking full on the water; and over a lawn, up to the temple of Bacchus, to which you are led by a winding walk. This laft building stands under cover of a wood of large trees. The lawn, which is extenfive, is bounded by wood on each fide, and flopes down to the water, on the fite fide of which is the very elegant temple of Venus, juft mentioned, thrown into perfpective, by being inclined a little from a front view. Over the tops of the furrounding wood is a view of the diftant country, terminated by Brill-hill, near Oxford; and Quainton-hill, near Aylesbury.

oppo

From hence you cross the lawn by the front of the house, which is nearly in the centre of the gardens, dividing them as it were into two parts. In the latter divifion, the tower of the parish church, bofomed in trees, the body of it wholly concealed from view, is one of the first things which strikes the eye, and you are uncertain whether it is more than one of the ornamental buildings. Paffing by it you enter the Elyfian fields, under a Doric arch, through which are feen, in perfpective, a bridge, and a lodge in the form of a caftle. The temple of Friendship is in fight; and within this fpot are thofe of Ancient Virtue and of the British Worthies, adorned with bufts of various eminent men, and infcriptions, mentioning their particular merits. Here is alfo a roftral column to the memory of captain Grenville, brother of the late earl, who was killed in that fuccefsful engagement with the French fleet in 1747, when Mr. Anfon took the whole of the convoy. In the bottom runs a ftream, which, with the variety and difpofition of the trees difperfed over gentle inequalities of ground, make this a very lively and beautiful scene.

Clofe to this is the Alder-grove, a deep recefs in the thickeft fhade. The water, though really clear, is rendered of a dark blue colour by the over-hanging trees: the alders are of an uncommon fize, white with age; and here are likewise some large and noble elms. At the end is a grotto, faced with flints and pebbles, in which the late earl fometimes fupped. On fuch occafions this grove was illuminated with a great number of lamps, and his lordship, with a benevolence which did him honour, permitted the neighbourhood to fhare the pleasure of the evening with him and his company, the park gates being thrown open.

The temple of Concord and Victory is a most noble building. In the front are fix Ionic columns fupporting a pediment

filled with bas-relief, the points of which are crowned with ftatues. On each fide is a beautiful colonade of ten lofty pillars. The infide is adorned with medallions of thofe officers who did fo much honor to their country, and under the auspices of his lordship's immortal relation, Mr. Pitt, carried its glory to fo high a pitch in the war of 1755; a war most eminently diftinguished by Concord and Victory. This temple stands on a gentle rife, and below it is a winding valley, the fides of which are adorned with groves and clumps of trees, and the open space is broken by single trees, of various forms. Some tatues are interfperfed. This valley was once flowed with water, but the fprings not fupplying a fufficient quantity, have been diverted, and it is now grafs.'

On the oppofite fide of this vale is the Lady's Temple, on an elevated fpot, commanding the diftant views. Below is a ftream, over which is thrown a plain wooden bridge.

On another eminence, divided from this by a great dip, ftands a large Gothic building, fitted up in that tafte, and furnished with fome very good painted glafs.

The Temple of Friendship is adorned with elegant marble bufts of fome 'whofe friendship did real honour to the noble

owner.'

In treating of Banbury, Mr. Bray obferves that Puritans were always numerous in the town. Camden speaks of it as a place famous for cakes and ale; and when Holland tranflated his Britannia without his confent, he played him a trick: getting at the printer, he changed cakes and ale, into cakes and zeal, which alteration got Holland many enemies.'

The feat of lord Scarfdale, at Kedleston, affords our author a large subject for architectural defcription; but for an account of this magnificient building, as well as of Chatfworth, already well-known, and of Wentworth Caftle, we must refer to the work; in which the reader will meet with an agreeable mixture of anecdote and topographical delineation, accompanied in fome places with etchings.

The Life of Cervantes: together with Remarks on his Writings, by Mr. de Florian. Tranflated from the French by William Wall beck. Small 8vo. IS. Bew.

MR. we executed his task as tranflator very ably. And I think, when you have perufed the Life of Cervantes and the remarks upon his writings, you will agree with me that the Frenchman has evinced no lefs good fenfe, than liberality and candour: and, if he is not quite a Rouffeau or D'Alembert, he is a good writer, and no defpicable critic.'

R. Florian, we now ufe Mr. Wallbeck's words, will be

We have tranfcribed these words, because they are well fitted to characterife, this fhadow of a fhade," the tranflation

from

from Florian. If we change the name, the fable will fuit Mr. Wallbeck and his work. In the dedication to the count of Lemos, our author feems not to know the meaning of the Great Bernard; but we must tranfcribe the note, to make the deficiency more generally known.

• What fort of a work the "Garden Calendar” was, its title explains but, I confefs, I am at a lofs to guess what Saavedra means by "The Great Bernard ;" and the more fo because Mr. De Florian has not thought proper to canonize it. I fufpect, however, that it refers to that well-known mountain, called "The Great Saint Bernard," on the confines of Switzerland and Piedmont; which is upwards of fix thousand feet, perpendicular height, above the Leman-lake, and is covered with eternal fnow. If Saavedra ever visited this mountain, or beheld only from a distance its towering fummit, well might he deem it worthy celebration.

If I am wrong in this conjectural elucidation, which I propofe with great diffidence, I fhall think myfelf particularly obliged to any body who will be at the pains of fetting me right, through the channel of the Reviews, Gentleman's Magazine, or any other refpectable periodical work. Poffibly the Spanish edition of Cervantes's Life, which I have no opportunity of confulting, may of itself be fufficiently clear.'

;

We have looked into the Life of Cervantes, in the fplendid edition which is here mentioned, and perceive that, among the unfinished works, was one which they call Il Bernardo but we do not find the flightest information of its purport: and, at this time, we know not where to apply for more fatisfactory information. Whatever the work was, it is probably loft.

The English reader is acquainted with Cervantes, as a fatirift and a novel writer; but knows little of him as a dramatic author; fo that we shall extract from this production the short account of his plays.

Whether the number of plays Cervantes wrote was twenty or thirty, is immaterial; for to judge of thofe which are loft by thofe which remain, we have no cause of regret. I have read through the eight he published with great attention; and not one of them is fo much as tolerable. The ground plots are neither interefting in themselves, nor well wrought. We meet frequently with flashes of wit, but never with verfimilitude. Such are their general characteristics.

In the one which is entitled "The Fortunate Lecher," the hero, in the first act, is the greatest rascal in all Seville; in the fecond he is a Jacobine monk, at Mexico; and is a pattern of piety. He has frequent contefts with the devil, upon. the ftage; and always comes off victorious. Called in to pray by a woman at the point of death; one who had led a very profligate life; father Crux (for fo he is called) exhorts her to contefs; which fhe, defpairing of pardon, refuses to do. The zealous confeffor, to fave her from confequent impenitency,

pro

proposes to make an exchange with her, his merits against her fins. The bargain is ftruck; and a contract figned in due form. The woman confeffes, and expires: angels appear to take away her foul; and the devil comes to lay in his claim to the monk who, to his aftonishment, finds himself grown all over leprous. In the third act, he dies, and performs miracles. Such is the plot of a play written by the author of "Don Quixote:" and perhaps the best play he ever wrote.'

As a fpecimen of the notes of the tranflator we shall extract that which this account has fuggefted.

What an eccentric genius Saavedra's was! Who would think it poffible that the compofer of fo fine a dramatic story, as "Don Quixote," could fo deviate from all manner of beauty and order; and pen fo execrable a farce! If it had not been published by himself, there is but one circumftance by which we could have gueffed it to have been his: that is the boldness with which he has lifted his fatiric hand against the all-fufficient clergy. Not, probably, that it was done in so direct, and unqualified a manner, as thefe outlines of the comedy might lead us to fuppofe; but by covert fatire; by irony, if not finely imagined, at least fo happily expreffed, that it would bear the construction of obfequioufnefs, or even adulation. The fpies, elfe, of that infernal tribunal, called the Holy Inquifition, would certainly have reported Saavedra. And yet, how grofs must have been the ignorance, how rank the stupidity of thofe times, not to have detected the burlesque of fuch a repre fentation !

Taking the comedy in one fenfe, or rather one word of it, in (I fear) its only fenfe, literal or figurative, I wish that Cervantes had not been jefting; but had written it in good and fober earnest. The word which I advert to is "Crux;" which he has cafually taken, for the confeffor's name. I do not affect to be over-righteous, (God-alas!-knows, how very, very far I am from that,) but I cannot, and who, that has the leaft fenfe of religion can, bear to fee "the cross,"-that precious memorial of our redemption, applied as a fit name for a ludicrous. character.

• I marvel much how that word flipped from Saavedra's pen; unless through careless hafte. From his head, or heart, assuredly it never came: for, if ever writer of a work of humour took pains to inculcate religion, it was the author of "Don Quixote." There is not a chapter in the book that does not abound in religious and moral precepts. And the hero of the romance, whatever other extravagancies he is guilty of, never forgets his God. Acquitting Saavedra, which I certainly do, of any intention of blafphemy, I would not have fixed the reader's attention upon it, but by way of hint to writers in general, to be exceedingly cautious in the ufe of words, the injudicious application of which may, centuries after their death, bring their religious character in question.'

An