No. 11.

to such of our fair countrywomen, as honour these essays with perusal. Our FLORA, on this occasion, has bound her cheerful brow with myrtle and placed the white rose in her bosom.* We have moreover selected for a motto a passage from that accomplished scholar and friend of the sex, ADDISON, as containing a charming sentiment, every way proper to precede the history of a female, who not only shone with uncommon splendour as an artist and a botanist, but was rendered still more conspicuous by the additional lustre of conjugal affection, which virtue she exercised at the darkest periods and during the most distressful pangs of human calamity.

Our fair readers will pardon us, if we should fail in celebrating conjugal affection, the groundwork of all the domestick virtues. Teachers of righteousness them selves may excuse us, if we cast a look of regret towards this too much neglected portion of moral philosophy. We have colleges

* Plants facred to love in ancient mythology, Vol. II. No. 9. Kkk

ence. We have minute directions in gardening and in agriculture. We have numberless books on the doctrine of business; on self policy, or the art of rising in life; on oratory, and on politicks; while that which is worth them all, the doctrine of domestick happiness, is left comparatively uncultivated,....yet this is that philosophy, spoken of by Lord Bacon, which of all others" comes home to men's business and bosoms."

The history of every civilized nation, hay every man's own recollection, affords abundant proofs, that the female mind is equally capable with that of the male. It is situation and circumstances, that rouse the latent energies of the female soul. Whence is it, that the children of widows become generally better men and better women, than children brought up in conjunction with a father? It is, because afflictive circumstances have called forth the dormant

energies of heroick woman, and perfected a virtue peculiar to the sex; a virtue, which originated in conjugal affection. Can this

approved so highly of them, as to encourage her to prosecute a work, by the profits of which she is said to have procured her husband's liberty, after a confinement of two years. Dr. Isaac Rand was at that time Demonstrator to the Company of Apothecaries, in the garden at Chelsea. By his advice she took up her residence opposite the Physick Garden in order to facilitate her design by receiving the plants as fresh as possible. He not only promoted her work with the publick, but, together with the celebrated Philip Miller, afforded her all possible direction and assistance in the execution of it. After she had completed the drawings, she engraved them on copper and coloured the prints with her own hands. During her abode at Chelsea, she was frequently visited by persons of quality and many scientifick people, who admired her performances and patronized her undertaking.

On publishing the first volume, in 1737, she obtained a recommendation from Dr. Mead, Dr. Sherard, Dr. Rand, and others, to be prefixed to it. And being allowed to present, in person, a copy to the College of Physicians, that body made her a present, and gave her a publick testimonial of their approbation; with love to prefix it to her book. The second volume was finished in 1739, and the whole published under the following title: "« A curious Herbal, containing 500 Cuts of the most useful plants which are now used in the practice of Physick, engraved on folio copper-plates, after drawings taken from the life. By Elizabeth Blackwell. To which

is added, a short description of the Plants, and their common uses in Physick. 1739." 2 Vol. fol.

The drawings are in general faithful; and if there is wanting that accuracy, which modern improvements have rendered necessary in delineating the more minute parts, yet, upon the whole, the figures are sufficiently distinctive of the subject. plate is accompanied with an engraved page, containing the Latin and English officinal names, followed by a short description of the plant, and a summary of its qualities and uses. After these occur the name in various other languages. These illustrations were the share her husband took in the work. This ill-fated man, after his failure in physick, and in printing, became an unsuccessful candidate for the place of secretary to the Society for the Encouragement of Learning. He was made superintendant of the works belonging to the Duke of Chandos, at Cannons, and experienced those disappointments, incident to projectors. He formed schemes in agriculture and wrote a treatise on the subject, which we are told was the cause of his being engaged in Sweden. In that kingdom, he drained marshes, practised physick, and was even employed in that capacity for the king. At length he was involved in some state cabals, or, as some accounts have it, in a plot with Count Tessin, for which he suffered death, protesting his innocence to the last.*

So respectable a performance as Mrs. Blackwell's attracted the

Dr. Pulteney's historical and biographie sketches of the progress of Botany in Eng and

attention of physicians on the continent. It was translated into German and republished at Norimberg in 1750. To this edition was prefixed a most elaborate and learned catalogue of botanical authors. In 1773 a supplemental volume, exhibiting plants omitted by Mrs. Blackwell, was published under the direction of Ludwig, Rose, and Boehmer. In this form the work of this learned and ingenious lady surpassed

all that had been published. We hope the patrons of botany, that beautiful handmaid of medicine, will gratify the ladies of America with a sight of these splendid books, not merely as a valuable treasure of botanical knowledge, but to show the men to what degree of perfection the other sex may ascend, when their talents are called forth sublimed by conjugal affection.

No. II.

DEAR FRIEND,

I WILL not wait for an answer to my letter, but continue to write while I have any thing to say; as I have the vanity to think, that nothing, which I might esteem worthy of saying, will ever be unacceptable to you. I endeavoured in my last to give you some notion of the great gallery here. I said much of Raphael, and much of Paul Veronese. I promised also to send a word or two concerning Titian and Rubens. Of the latter's works almost the whole of the Luxembourg gallery is composed; so that one may have the advantage of gathering his character, as an artist, from a variety and number of pictures, which are no where else to be seen collected of any one painter. The subjects of this series of his works, I suppose, you are acquainted with. They are all allegorical; a branch of the art

story; but such a story as would not reward curiosity to know. Yet such is the splendid, overpowering fascination of his pencil, that every picture rises from his hand with a magnificent prodigality, that seemingly could only flow from stores extracted from the richest sources. Most painters elevated themselves on the grandeur of their subjects; but it was Rubens' delight to raise dignity from meanness. No man ever possessed such a power of commanding; he enchains the attention even where he has nothing to say. Like a mighty orator his very looks, his very gestures, are significant; they awe us into silence and inspire us with expectation; and if his words should not be to the purpose, they are such, as at least, to extort admiration; if they do not convict us with arguments, they, at least, enrapture us with their melody,

splendour.

Thus o'er his Art indignant Rubens rear'd

His mighty head, nor critick armies fear'd.

His lawless style, from cold subjection free,

Impetuous rolling, like a troubled sea, High o'er the rocks of reason's ridgy verge

ing surge

Breaks o'er the bound, the under-ebb of

taste

Back from the shore impels the watry waste.*

SMELFUNGUS.

I suppose you well know that on the sea shore every breaker forms a returning current, which makes its way under the succeeding waves, and of course impels them back towards the ocean.

BAYLE in one of the notes to the life of Tavernier has justly remarked, that an author, who publishes his work, becomes a party in a publick trial for his literary reputation. This is a metaphor, so striking in its applicability, that it singularly involves argument and illustration. In the opening number of a series of essays, I have therefore determined to avoid all apology; not that apology is unnecessary, but because it is useless. Excuse is indeed the ordinary refuge of guilt, and necessity of explanation implies mysteriousness of conduct; but though perfectly conscious of literary weakness, to excuse I shall not resort, to explanation I shall not condescend. In the early feudal ages the juramentum expurgationis, either of the party or the vicinage, was high testimony of innocence; but society has changed; we live in a different age, andmust therefore submit to different institutions. [ When a new production in lite rature is presented to the publick, they have a right to know the object, which it proposes to attain,

Auc. ad HEREN.

and the principles, on which it is established. This right has generally been acknowledged by authors, in every department of letters, without any dispute; but, by the writers of regular unconnected essays alone, the obligation is lost in the pleasure of the act, and the simple duty is transmuted into a refinement of elegant courtesy. This difference of conduct is curious, and its cause deserves investigation. It results partly from diversity of temper, which alone is mighty in operation among the affairs of men, and principally from the diversity of literary pursuits. The writer of short unlaboured speculations commonly inculcates the excellence, advantages, and necessity of practical ethics; his literary opinions and criticisms are light, easy, and sparkling, without deep erudition or perplexing abstruseness; sometimes he may examine the solid foundations of morality; and religion sometimes receives from his aid new reasons of obligation and new enforcements of obedience. He who discusses these beautiful or su