points he differed from Mr. Cumberland about Lord Sackville; but as I neither knew him, nor had read the pamphlet, I could not at all enter into the subject. Mrs. Delany then mentioned something of Madame de Genlis, upon which the King eagerly said to me, 66 Oh, you saw her while she was here ?" "Yes, sir." “And—did she speak English ?” "Yes, sir." "And how ?" 66 Extremely well, sir; with very great facility." "Indeed? That always surprises me in a foreigner that has not lived here." "Her accent is foreign, however; but her language is remarkably ready." He then spoke of Voltaire, and talked a little of his works, concluding with this strong condemnation of their tendency : "I," cried he, "think him a monster-I own it fairly." Nobody answered. Mrs. Delany did not quite hear him, and I knew too little of his works to have courage to say anything about them. He next named Rousseau, whom he seemed to think of with more favour, though by no means with approbation. Here, too, I had read too little to talk at all, though his Majesty frequently applied to me. Mrs. Delany told several anecdotes which had come to her immediate knowledge of him while he was in England, at which time he had spent some days with her brother, Mr. Granville, at Calwich. The King, too, told others, which had come to his own ears, all charging him with savage pride and insolent ingratitude. Here, however, I ventured to interfere; for, as I knew he had had a pension from the King, I could not but wish his Majesty should be informed he was grateful to him. And as you, my dear father, were my authority, I thought it but common justice to the memory of poor Rousseau to acquaint the King of his personal respect for him. "Some gratitude, sir,” said I," he was not without. When my father was in Paris, which was after Rousseau had been in England, he visited him, in his garret, and the first thing he shewed him was your Majesty's portrait over his chimney." The King paused a little while upon this; but nothing more was said of Rousseau. The sermon of the day before was then talked over. Mrs. Delany had not heard it, and the King said it was no great loss. He asked me what I had thought of it, and we agreed perfectly, to the no great exaltation of poor Dr. L Some time afterwards, the King said he found by the newspapers, that Mrs. Clive was dead. Do you read the newspapers, thought I. O, King! you must then have the most unvexing temper in the world, not to run wild. This led on to more players. He was sorry, he said, for Henderson, and the more as Mrs. Siddons had wished to have him play at the same house with herself. Then Mrs. Siddons took her turn, and with the warmest praise. "I am an enthusiast for her," cried the King, "quite an enthusiast. I think there was never any player in my time so excellent—not Garrick himself; I own it!" Then, coming close to me, who was silent, he said "What? what?"-meaning what say you? But I still said nothing; I could not concur where I thought so differently, and to enter into an argument was quite impossible; for every little thing I said, the King listened to with an eagerness that made me always ashamed of its insignificancy. And, indeed, but for that I should have talked to him with much greater fluency, as well as ease. From players he went to plays, and complained of the great want of good modern comedies, and of the extreme immorality of most of the old ones. "And they pretend,” cried he, " to mend them; but it is not possible. Do you think it is ?-what?" "No, sir, not often, I believe ;-the fault, commonly, lies in the very foundation." 66 Yes, or they might mend the mere speeches ;-but the characters are all bad from the beginning to the end." Then he specified several; but I had read none of them, and consequently could say nothing about the matter ;-till, at last, he came to Shakspeare. "Was there ever," cried he, "such stuff as great part of Shakspeare? only one must not say so! But what think you ?—What ?—Is there not sad stuff? What?-what ?" 66 'Yes, indeed, I think so, sir, though mixed with such excellences; that—” "Oh!" cried he, laughing good-humouredly, " I know it is not to be said! but it's true. Only it's Shakspeare, and nobody dare abuse him." Then he enumerated many of the characters and parts of plays that he objected to; and when he had run them over, finished with again laughing and exclaiming, "But one should be stoned for saying so!" "Madame de Genlis, sir," said I, "had taken such an impression of the English theatre, that she told me she thought no woman ought to go to any of our comedies." This, which, indeed, is a very overstrained censure of our drama, made him draw back, and vindicate the stage from a sentence so severe; which, however, she had pronounced to me, as if she looked upon it to be an opinion in which I should join as a thing past dispute. The King approved such a denunciation no more than his little subject; and he vindicated the stage from so hard an aspersion, with a warmth not wholly free from indignation. This led on to a good deal more dramatic criticism; but what was said was too little followed up to be remembered for writing. His majesty stayed near two hours, and then wished Mrs. Delany good night, and having given me a bow, shut the door himself, to prevent Mrs. Delany, or even me, from attending him out, and with only Miss Port to wait upon him, put on his own great coat in the passage, and walked away to the lower lodge to see the Princess Elizabeth, without carriage or attendant. He is a pattern of modest, but manly superiority to rank. The reader will be startled at the royal critic's heretical remarks on Shakspeare. Whether, not wearing a crown, he will dare to coincide with them, is doubtful. For our parts, we say nothing,-except that such revelations of royal table-talk deserve to rank among the most rare and curious of the curiosities of literature, and that the volume which contains them will, in virtue of them alone, speedily find its way into the farthest corners of the land. THE CONFESSIONS OF AN AVARICIOUS MAN. BY THE LATE HENRY D. INGLIS, ESQ. AUTHOR OF SPAIN IN 1830," 66 (6 THE TYROL," RAMBLES IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF DON QUIXOTE," &c. &c. [The author has often thought, in reading autobiography, that the interest would be increased were it possible to suppose a memoir written after death. In fiction all things are possible; and it is to gain this supposed advantage for the confession of the avaricious man, that the introductory part is written.] INTRODUCTORY. No sooner had the last obsequies of my revered preceptor been performed, than I hastened to his scrutoire, to possess myself of the legacy he had bequeathed to me, designated in his will, "The Confessions of the Dead and the Living." I found thirty-one rolls: twenty-one of these written in the handwriting of the day, though for the most part antiquated in its form, and comprising the greater number of the European, and two or three of the Asiatic languages. The ten remaining writings were in characters with which I was not only totally unacquainted, but which, I had every reason to believe, were not in use among any one people upon earth. Once, several years before the death of my preceptor, I had surprised him with these writings before him. He at that time frankly communicated to me the history of those which were written in intelligible characters, but when I would have inquired further, his countenance assumed a mysterious and solemn expression that forbade more questioning. These, I think, were nearly his words: "The writings that are in known characters are the fruits of unwearied perseverance in a search after wisdom and happiness; they are the chronicles of the lives of men, written when life was drawing to its close, and contain that which may profit the inexperienced: those that are written in strange characters are as dark to me as they are to you. How I obtained them, cannot concern you to know; they shall all one day be yours; and if, when I depart from this world—” But here he abruptly stopped, and from that hour these writings had never been mentioned; and now, when I spread out before me these mystical rolls, and called to mind the conversation I have alluded to, and the designation of the legacy in my preceptor's will, "the confessions of the dead and the living," I could entertain little doubt that I looked upon the confessions of the dead-but how emitted-how obtained-or how to be interpreted, were questions with which it was idle for me to occupy my mind. With a feeling of solemnity, therefore, I rolled them up, and returned them to the place where I found them; but as there was no mystery attached to the history of the other writings, them, I severally unfolded, and read successively the titles of "the Confessions of an Improvident Man," "the Confessions of an Ambitious March.-VOL. LXIV. NO. CCLV. 2 E Man," ," "the Confessions of a Goodnatured Man," "the Confessions of a Cunning Man," "the Confessions of a Jealous Man,” "the Confessions of an Idle Man,' "the Confessions of a Wary Man," "the Confessions of a Vain Man," the Confessions of a Scholar, of a Gambler, of a Beggar, of an Upstart, of a Sycophant, of a Villain, of a Coquette;-and having locked the scrutoire containing the ten mysterious writings, I carried the others to my own apartments, to examine them at my leisure. Curious as I felt to peruse the writings which I was able to decipher, it will readily be believed that those whose meaning was impenetrable, were uppermost in my mind, and that like many others of my fellowmen who neglect the enjoyments that are within their reach, but rather press on to those that are precarious and perhaps unattainable, I would have relinquished possession of the twenty-one rolls that lay before me, could I but have obtained the key to one even of the ten that were sealed. I tried to bring my mind under better regulation; I called to memory the lessons of wisdom delivered to me by my preceptor; his excellent instructions upon the legitimate subjects of human inquiry, the limits to which human curiosity ought to submit, and the folly as well as the sinfulness of attempting to be wiser than is consistent with our condition; and so far were my endeavours successful, that I had unfolded one of the rolls that lay before me, and was beginning to read the title, when again the unfinished sentence of my preceptor recurred to my mind-" If when I depart from this world," and my mind wandered from this world to those who had left it, and to the condition of the departed, and to the possibility of their fulfilling intentions formed upon earth, until daylight had long faded away, and the hour of repose having arrived, I suspended the gratification of my curiosity until morning. I retired to rest, my mind full of conjectures and strange fancies, and soon fell asleep; and when I awoke, the ten rolls were to me no longer a sealed book. This was my vision; I stood in a great arched hall, the walls and the roof were of stone, and a stone table was in the centre; twelve stone chairs were ranged round it; upon each of the chairs sat the likeness of a man, and upon one of them I saw my late preceptor. All the twelve wore the semblance of living men, but I knew that they had all-many of them centuries ago-passed into the world of spirits. The whole company was silent, and an outspread roll, which I recognised as part of my legacy, lay upon the stone table before each. I thought I stood for some time contemplating the assembly: one wore a kingly robe, and bore on his countenance the impress of kingly rule; another was clothed in a sacerdotal garb that told of ages long since passed, and the contracted lip and vindictive eye proclaimed at once the sway of bigotry and cruelty; a third was clad in plain and primitive apparel, but in the countenance I could read the proud heart, and trace the corrupt passions that abode there; a fourth was clothed in a flowing robe of white, upon which were seen representations of flames and devils, and in his countenance sat heavenly composure, resignation and happiness. Beside him was one in tattered garments; and in his face, also, there shone a pleasing serenity, while opposite to him sat another in like garments, but in his keen eye and sharp visage I knew that I beheld the miser. I had fixed my eye upon another, in whose countenance there was something inexpressibly horrible, when my preceptor made a sign for me to approach the table. I obeyed; and pointing to the writings that lay around, while all the four-and-twenty eyes were fixed upon me, he, in one word-a word which I felt was never to be uttered, or revealed-gave me the key to the language of the dead. When I raised my eyes the twelve chairs were vacant, and in the same instant I awoke. It was yet the gray morning-but I sprung from bed, anxious to apply my knowledge, yet nothing doubting the revelation of my vision. Having opened the scrutoire, and taken the rolls from their concealment, with a feeling of even greater awe than I had deposited them, believing, as I now certainly did, in their mystic origin, I unfolded them, and instantly read their titles: The Confessions of a King, the Confessions of a Bigot, the Confessions of a Hypocrite, the Confessions of a Martyr, the Confessions of an Avaricious Man, the Confessions of an Atheist, the Confessions of a Coward, the Confessions of a Murderer, the Confessions of a Curious Man, the Confessions of a Philosopher. For a few moments I was undetermined with which of these to commence my inquiries; but I resolved to take the first that should present itself, and accordingly I unfolded THE CONFESSIONS OF AN AVARICIOUS MAN. CHAP. I. In the world of life, of which I was once a part, I bore the character of a miser. This character I obtained because I was perceivable by -the eye of the world; but had the world been able to look into my heart, or could it even have known the privacies of my life, it would have fixed upon me the character, not only of an avaricious man, but also of an unjust man—of an unmerciful man—of an unnatural man -of an unholy man, for all of these I was. Let none suppose that the only sin of a miser is an inordinate love of riches: avarice, that it may be gratified, will trample down every virtue-will break through every tie of nature-will close the avenues to mercy, and charity, and kindness-will absolve from the most sacred obligations-will dissolve the most holy connexions, and will make the man, whom it has subjugated to its power, a hater of man, and a contemner of God. But let the following history of my life and actions prove the truth of my self-ac cusation: I was born in the City of London, in the year 1641. My parentage was respectable, my father being an eminent tanner, and my mother, who, I have heard, brought her husband a fortune of 5007., being the daughter of a ship-builder. My father was a penurious man, and a greedy man; but his penurious habits were never carried so far as to fix upon him the character of a miser; nor did his greediness ever betray him into any direct violation of honesty, though it taught him to avail himself of those tricks of trade, between which, and downright dishonesty, the world has falsely made a distinction. As for my mother, she was a person of quite a different character: as greedy as my |