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THE SABBATH : A POEM.

fland. He died in his colony, in 1683, from laziness, but succeeding bards

in the 84th year of his age.

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ART. 27.

never presumed to take the same liberty. With the exception of these trivial faults, which, however, it was incumbent on us as reviewers to point out, we can recommend this poem to every class of readers. It has simplicity eNew-York, printed by Collins, nough to be intelligible to the il

The Sabbath, a poem.

The first American edition, to which are Sabbath Walks. now added,

Perkins, & Co. pp. 168.

1805. 12mo.

THIS little poem is written with great simplicity and considerable purity of style, excellencies the more welcome, as the more uncommon in the present degeneracy of taste, when a studied magnificence has driven nature from our prose, and sound without sense characterizes our verse. I

This poet, who writes in blank verse, has one peculiarity in his versification, which, from its frequent recurrence, he undoubtedly thinks a beauty, but which strikes us, as in the highest degree harsh and inharmonious. He often employs eleven syllables in a line.

His iron-armed hoofs gleam in the morning ray.'

In air, soaring heaven-ward, afar they float.'

The record of her blossoming age appears.

The authority of Milton is not sufficient to justify a license of this nature, and from the refinement

literate, and sufficient sentiment and poetry to gratify the learned. As the style of the poet is equa ble, without any occasional flights above its uniform tenor, we have no choice in selection, and shall therefore quote the first forty lines of the poem, as a specimen of the

writer's manner.

How still the morning of the hallowed day?
Mute is the voice of rural labour, hushed
The ploughboy's whistle, and the milkmaid's
song.

The scythe lies glittering in the dewy wreath
Of tedded grass, mingled with fading flowers,
That yester morn bloom'd waving in the breeze.

Sounds the most faint attract the ear, the hum

Of early bee, the trickling of the dew,
The distant bleating, midway up the hill.
Calmness seems thron'd on yon unmoving cloud.
To him who wanders o'er the upland leas,
The blackbird's note comes mellower from the
dale;

And sweeter from the sky the gladsome latk
Warbles his heav'n-tun'd song; the lulling brook
Murmurs more gently down the deep-sunk glen;
while from yon lowiy roof, whose curling smoke

O'ermounts the mist, is heard, at intervals, The voice of psalms, the simple song of praise.

With dove-like wings Peace o'er yon village
broods:

The dizzying mill-wheel rests; the anvil's din
Hath ceas'd; all, all around is quietness.
Less fearful on this day, the limping hare

of modern times, and the improve- Stops, and looks back, and stops, and looks on

ment of our language, we expect from a poet of the present day, at least, smoothness of versification. He also indulges once in a hemistick, or half-verse.

Beyond the empyreal.' Virgil, who died before his Eneid was completed, left many lines unfinished, and this is the only instance, which we have yet found, where an imperfection has

man,

Her deadliest foc. The toil-worn horse, set free*
Unheedful of the pasture, roams at large;
And, as his stiff unwieldy bulk he rolls,
His iron-arm'd hoofs gleam in the morning ray.

But chiefly Man the day of reft enjoys.
Hail, Sabbath! thee I hail, the poor man's day.
On other days, the man of toil is doom'd
To eat his joyless bread, lonely, the ground
Both seat and board, screen'd from the winter's
cold,

And summer's heat, by neighbouring hedge of tree;

But on this day, embosom'd in his home,
He shares the frugal meal with those he loves;
With those he loves he shares the heart-felt joy

been imitated from choice. Dry- of giving thanks to God,-not thanks of form,

den indeed adopted the practice

A word and a grimace, but rev'rently, With cover'd face and upward earnest eye.

What we have said of the Sabbath is equally applicable to the short poems that follow it, entitled Sabbath Walks. A body of notes is subjoined to the whole, chiefly relating to the persecutions formerly experienced by the Scotch presbyterians. As their fanaticks, however, suffered no more than they, or their ancestors under John Knox, had inflicted, whatever sympathy they may excite in Scotland, they cannot expect to inspire much interest here. The character of Bonaparte, drawn with no inconsiderable ability, though in a style, perhaps a little too turgid, will be much more gratifying to the American reader.

The character of Bonaparte will furnish a specimen of more monflrous moral deformity, than was ever exhibited in the hiftorical mufeum. Poffeffing the power of conferring on mankind a great er portion of happiness than ever depended on the will of one man, he has been the author of miferies incalculable. He could have given liberty to France : he affumed abfolute power to himself. He could have given peace to Europe: he concluded an infidious truce. He could have emancipated Switzerland: he rivetted the chains, which the Directory had forged. In St. Domingo, his conduct was a complication of the most fottish impolicy, the most favage cruelty, the most knavish perfidy, that ever difgraced the annals of human nature. By this felf-created monarch, was Touffaint, the elected ruler of a free people, fwindled into a treaty, kidnapped during the peace that fucceeded, torn from his wife and children, tranfported in irons to France, immured in a dungeon, and, finally, affaffinated, (if uncontradicted accufation deferve any credit,) in a mode perfectly fuitable to the commencement and progrefs of the horrid hiftory,-poifon under the difguife of medicine. Yet this masked murderer this druggift-affaffin prefumes to exclaim against the the uplifted arm of an Arena or a Georges. His effrontery can only be furpaffed by his hypocrify. Compared to him, Cromwell was a mere

novice in the art.-As to military talents, how infinitely inferiour is he to Moreau! Moreau faved, he facrificed his foldiers. Moreau, deftitute of re

fources, accomplished a retreat more fplendid than the Corfican fwindler's most celebrated victories. Moreau conducted his foldiers to their homes: the Corfican deferted his in a diftant, hoftile, peftilential region.--His fuccefs in Italy (and there only he was fuccefsful) was a matter of arithmetical, rather than of military tacticks. In the cause of liberty each individual of the French army fican's troops were in his estimation, and were in reality, as fo much ammunition. Not a barrel of powder, not a caion, was more entirely at his disposal, than were the lives of his men. He had

was felf-devoted to death. The Cor

only to calculate, whether he or his adverfary was moft abundantly fupplied with this human ammunition. It was a calculation of carnage. He was in truth the chief broker in the vendue-room of victory, and he carried off the beft lots, by outbidding his competitors in the blood of the foldiery.-At laft, this puny mimick of Charlemagne, bedizened with the motley panegyricks of fawning senators, obedient lari-makers, and affenting tribunes, has erected his throne on the yet trembling crater of the revolutionary volcano. From this hollow eminence, his felf-filled eye looked upward to his gorgeous canopy of flate, but difcerned not the still more extended cano

PY of the world's derifion. Nor could his fancied exaltation be complete, without the actual degradation of the humbled wearer of the Papal tiara, who, by his fufferance, is ftil! permitted to retain the fhadow of a mighty name. This miferable chief of an expiring fuperftition, dragged like another conscript to the Capital of Continental Europe, and

drilled to the minutia of the coronation

manual, has been compelled to place an imperial diadem on that head fo much more worthy of a Damien's crown. To confummate the abfurd wickedness of the atchievement, the Sabbath, the day holy of the Lord, honourable, has been prostituted to this facrilegious pantomime. Compared to fuch things as thefe, the former atheism of the Corfican creedmonger was fanctity itself.

ART. 28.

A new Map of the United States of America, including part of Louisisiania. Drawn from the latest authorities. Boston, published and sold by John Sullivan, jun.

its

1806.

THE Science of geography owes progress to the assistance of maps, as in a less degree history is indebted to painting; for of the senses the eye is the most important, and the objects it embraces in the acquisition of knowledge are most extensive. The ideas received through this medium are generally clear and distinct; the impressions they make are strong and lasting, and seldom require an after operation of the mind to connect or arrange them. It comprehends at once all the proportions, numbers, and divisions of a painting, or piece of architecture; the beauties are equally stamped upon the mind, and time, although it may weaken, can never obliterate the images.

These reflections were suggested by inspecting the new map, lately presented to the American publick, by Mr. John Sullivan, jun. It comprehends, on a sheet of 4 by 44 feet, the whole of the United States, with part of Louisiana, the Floridas, and part of the British provinces of Canada, and furnishes a very distinct and valuable exposition of the political divisions and boundaries of the states.

To give an exact and comprehensive map of the United States was certainly a great and laudable undertaking, and such as the publick, if well executed, ought to encourage by something more than an affectation of patronage. The small maps in Morse's Gazetteer, the scarcity of Bradley's and the dearness of Arrowsmith's, and the

progress of civilization and improvement towards our Western frontiers, rendered the publication of the new map peculiarly interesting.

Gazetteers are serviceable to

show with facility the qualities of soil, institutions, population, climates, productions, arts, manners, and customs of different countries; but we must look to maps for their relative situations, and the connexion, that one district or territory has with another, the extent, situation,and direction of rivers, mountains, &c.

In the compilation of a map, made up of different surveys and descriptions of small sections of the country, difficulties and embarrassments occur, which are not obvious to a cursory observer. By diminishing large, and protracting small maps of the several states and territories, and comparing the variable surveys and correcting the anomalies, which are found in them, the publisher is liable to commit many errours, and becomes, in a great measure, answerable for the inaccuracies of his predecessors, whose works he is obliged to join and associate to form an aggregate of the whole. Nor are the materials easily obtained. If he trusts to the numerous small maps in circulation, most of which are extremely defective, his imprudence is inexcusable; and if he looks for assistance to original surveys, he will generally find them incomplete. Nor can an accurate map of the United States be expected, without efficient aid from government. Maps of some of the states have been published by authority; but instead of surveyors being employed to fix the exact position of prominent objects, the bearings of which would correct other surveys, the compiler has been obliged to

collect plans of towns and small districts, and to make a patch-work whole of these discordant materials. Sometimes it would be necessary to bend or straighten a river, to protract or shorten its course; but this was not considered of much importance, and, to give the whole a pretty appearance, a range of mountains might be easily added for a boundary line. Nor can we blame the compiler for not going to an expense, that our economical governments will not incur. A society in this town was offered the privilege of making and publishing the maps of Massachusetts and Maine, and they would have had the volunteer assistance of many scientifick gentlemen; but government, by striving to drive too hard a bargain, lost the opportunity of obtaining accuBut we must not expect the encouragement of govern ment to maps, when every seaman complains, that there is not a chart of the extensive shores of New-England, upon which he can rest the safety of his ship.

rate maps.

To give a plain delineation of the several states, as a kind of chart, by which we may study the political ties and interests that unite, or ought to unite us, under a general government, must be the greatest advantage resulting from this map. Accuracy in this respect is required, and not a particular location of small and inconsid.erable towns. This, as it is not expected, only endangers the credit of the work; and here Mr. Sullivan has hazarded much. In Virginia, for instance, and in Massachusetts and other New-England states, the map appears crowded, and the centres of towns are not noted definitively by small circles, as is usually done in good maps. Had he, therefore, paid less atten

tion to this part, and more explicit ly marked the post-roads and towns, which are certainly of great consequence, and perhaps coloured them, he would have turned some of his industry to better account.

The meridians and parallels might have been more accurately and truly drawn, and the graver guided by a more skilful hand. The execution should have been under the superintendance of an experienced engraver, rather than, as would seem from its aspect, have been put into the stiff and unpractised hands of an apprentice. It is a pity the valuable labour of two years, spent by the compiler in collecting and arranging so much useful information, should be dressed out with so little taste and skill. The work would have found a more welcome reception, if, in addition to the science of the proprietor, the map had presented a better specimen of the ingenuity and proficiency of American engravers.

The colouring is neat and judicious, and affords at one glance a better knowledge of the boundaries of the several states, than could be gained by months devoted to study. In some parts omissions and inaccuracies occur, which are not, however, unpardonable. Mountains are laid down in different places, with precision and a good relief; but Monadnock, in New-Hampshire, and Wachusett, in Massachusetts, two great landmarks in New-England, are quite forgotten; they are not noticed on the map. As longitude is sometimes reckoned from London or Greenwich, and sometimes from Paris, notice ought always to be given, from what meridian we are to count; but, as the degrees are marked on this map without a reference to the first meridian, we

hope a new edition will be supplied, at top or bottom, with " Longitude West from London.”

When many sheets are to be joined to form a large map, much care and practice are requisite to make the various lines meet,& unite them correctly. The " New Map of the United States" furnishes evidence, either of the difficulty of this part of the work, or the carelessness of the workmen.

We have examined the longitude and latitude of many places, and, from the inquiries we have made, the map is as accurate as can be expected. It would be ungrateful to demand a minute attention to towns and small districts, when the whole Union on so small a sheet is pendent on the walls of our countingrooms and studies. The postroads are laid out with exactness, though indistinctly, and the great rivers of North-America pursue their sinuous courses and empty their mighty waters, where nature has commanded. The Mississippi, Mobile, Missouri, Illinois, and Ohio, all have their proper range, and, with Mr. Sullivan's efforts,

proclaim the value and richness of countries yet untrodden beyond the Appalachian mountains, countries unequalled for agricultural and inland commercial advanta ges. That section, comprizing Louisiana, is almost a blank; and such for many years will probably be every accurate representation of that country.

Two very valuable tables are placed upon the map. The first shews the number and names of ports of entry in the United States; those being particularly designated, which are such for vessels from and beyond the Cape of Good Hope. The second contains the length and breadth of all the States, with their chief towns, their distance from the city of Washington, and an estimate of the population of the Union.

Notwithstanding its imperfections, the new map claims the attention of the publick. It fur nishes all the knowledge, which a work of the kind is intended to convey, and perhaps is as accurate as any map of the United States yet published, and may be procur ed at comparatively small expense.

ACCOUNT OF THE TOTAL ECLIPSE OF THE SUN, JUNE 16TH, 1806.

A TOTAL Eclipfe of the fun is a rare and interesting occurrence. In May, 1706, there was one obferved in Switzerland and in the fouthern parts of France. On the 22d of April, 1715, the fun was totally eclipfed at London. Accounts of both thofe eclipfes were published in the tranfactions of the Royal Society. The laft was obferved by Dr. Halley, who remarks, that there had not before heen feen a total eclipfe of the fun at London, fince the 20th March, 1140. « Having found," fays Dr. Halley, "by comparing what had been formerly obferved of folar eclipfes, that the whole fhadow would fall upon England, I thought it a very proper opportunity to

get the dimenfions of the fhade afcer tained by obfervation, and accordingly I caused a small map of England, de fcribing the track and bounds thereof, to be difperfed all over the kingdom, with a request to the curious to obferve what they could about it, but more efpecially to note the time of continuance of total darkness." It is to be regretted, that fome fuch method had not been a dopted in this country, previous to the remarkable eclipse which we have recently witneffed. We hope we shall be pardoned, when we remark, that our Savans appear to have been fomewhat remifs in omitting to invite and direct the publick attention on this interesting oc

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