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ficiently distant to admit of his Lordship's receiving the sentiments of the county meetings. The bill was, accordingly, transmitted to the several counties. Now it was that they saw the matter in a serious light. The alarm was first sounded, we believe, by the county of Ayr. It spread rapidly; and, at the general county meetings in April last, the proposed measure was taken into consideration-not, however, as was intended, that they might amend and correct it, so as to render it as perfect as possible, but with the avowed intention, as appears from the resolutions of a great majority, of rejecting it in toto. Nay, some of the counties even went so far as to declare the proposed act not only improper, but altogether unnecessary. The gentlemen of the county of Stirling resolved, " 4thly, That the means of cure are much inore likely to prove efficacious in the lunatic asyfums already existing in several of the most considerable towns in Scotland, especially in Edinburgh and Glasgow, where the ablest medical assistance is to be had, than they could be in the proposed district asylums, some of which must necessarily be placed in the smaller towns, where the medical attendants cannot be supposed equally eminent in their profession." All this may be very true; but are the lunatic asylums already existing capable of receiving the number of patients that require treatment? From a document in the appendix to Dr Halliday's letter, we observe that there are only four public asylums at present existing in Scotland, viz. those of Edinburgh, Glasgow, Montrose, and Aberdeen; and that these, when perfectly full, can only contain 255 patients, while, at the most, only 100 of these can be of the poorer classes, or what may be considered parish paupers. At Dundee an asylum has been built by subscription, which, when completed, will accommodate 40 more. Dumfries Infirmary has accommodation for 12, and the Inverness County Hospital cells for 4, so that, in all the public establishments in the kingdom, there is only accommodation for 311. At Edinburgh, where the accommodation at present is only for 20, no patient can be received for a less board than one guinea per week,-a sum which we conceive few parishes would agree to pay for their poor. At Glas

The

gow, where they have accommodation for 120, the governors expressly state that the plan of their institution proceeds upon the principle that the income is to equal the expenditure; and unless, therefore, a very great majority of the patients are of the higher classes of society, the benefit which it can afford to paupers must be very trifling. Of these facts we conceive the gentlemen of Stirling must have been ignorant when they formed such a resolution as that quoted.

We shall not refer here to the resolutions of the same county with regard to idiots, or, as they are called in the law language of Scotland, fatuous persons. It is sufficient for our purpose to observe, that, from the summary printed by order of the House of Commons, it appears that there are not less than 622 furious lunatics in 740 parishes in Scotland. How then, we would ask, are they to be treated in asylums that can only accommodate 311, even supposing the parishes were willing to pay for their board ?-But enough of this. The ferinent continued great and general, and, as de magnis majora loquuntur, it was considered nothing short of imposing a poor's rate upon the country; and the representatives of almost every county in Scotland were instructed to oppose the bill in every stage of its progress through the House. Ainidst all this opposition, it is pleasing to reflect, that the enlightened county of Edinburgh held a very different conduct. The gentlemen of this county met indeed, but not to throw obstacles in the way of such an important and necessary measure. We know that they canvassed the printed act paragraph by paragraph, suggesting such alterations and improvements as they thought it required; and, instead of publishing their resolutions in the newspapers, they sent their detailed statement and remarks to the benevolent mover of the bill. Such conduct merits the highest praise. After the second reading, the bill was withdrawn altogether, and towards the end of the session an amended bill was introduced by the same indefatigable philanthropist. It was read a first time, ordered to be printed, and is now in the hands of the county gentlemen for their consideration. What may be its fate we know not; but to us it appears to be free from all those enact

*

ments which seemed to give so much offence in the first act; and we would fain hope that it will meet with the decided approbation of at least a great majority of the nation, as we are satisfied it will meet with no opposition in either House of Parliament. During the last session, a Committee was appointed on a motion of the Right Honourable Robert Peel, to inquire into the state of lunatic asylums in Ireland; and, from the report of that Committee, a bill was brought in by the same gentleman, (which has passed into a law,) authorizing the Lord-Lieutenant and Privy Council to establish district asylums in that kingdom; so that Scotland is now the only portion of the British empire where no legal establishments exist for the custody and cure of the most helpless of our afflicted fellowcreatures. Are we poorer than our neighbours? or have we less humanity? We are certain that neither the one nor the other can be fairly alleged. We would rather impute the opposition which the measure has met with to ignorance, and to the distressed state of the country at the time; and we flatter ourselves, that the detail which we have now given will clear up many doubts, and tend not a little to enlighten some, while the distress which prevailed so universally shall have passed away. We have read over the proposed act with some attention, and the whole, except perhaps one clause, has our fullest approbation. The clause to which we allude, is that by which it is enacted that parishes are to bear the expence of their insane poor in the district asylums. Now, though we are aware that this is merely a repetition of the existing law of the land, yet we think that many evils would be obviated by making it a county measure; and we are sure that it would be more palatable to our countrymen, who have a just abhorrence of every thing like parish rates. Under Mr Wynne's act for the establishment of lunatic asylums in England, vagrant lunatics are supported by the county at large; and it is the opinion of the best informed inthat part of the kingdom, that the insane poor of every description ought to be supported in the same manner.

VOL. I.

57th Geo. III. cap. 106.

We would earnestly recommend Dr Halliday's letter to the perusal of such of our readers as may wish for further information. It contains the sentiments of one who has attended a good deal to the subject, and will, we trust, convince them, as it has done us, not only of the importance, but of the absolute necessity of public asylums in Scotland, where the insane poor may be received and properly treated. We regret that we have not room for the remarks which we intended to have offered on the improvements which have taken place in the treatment of insanity. But on this subject our readers will find much valuable information in the minutes of evidence taken before the Select Committee, as well as in the reports of the principal asylums in this kingdom, which are submitted annually to the public. It is now no longer to be considered an incurable disease; and we do not hesitate to affirm that, under proper management, ninetynine out of a hundred of the cases which have been allowed to degenerate into hopeless idiotism, might have been cured, and the individuals, who are now for ever lost, restored to reason and to society. Some strong remarks, in the concluding page of Dr Halliday's letter, led us to pay a visit to the Bedlam of this city a few days ago, and we were both delighted and highly gratified to witness the improvements which have taken place in that abode of wretchedness within the last twelvemonth. We cannot call it an asylum for the cure of lunatics, as we could not find that any attention had been paid by the medical attendant to the disease for which the patients had been sent there; but, as a place of confinement, we will venture to pronounce it as comfortable and well regulated as any in the world; and every attention which humanity can suggest, seems to be paid to the unhappy inmates; yet, as we trust the time has passed when confinement was considered all that was necessary in the case of a madman, we would recommend to the governors of the charity work-house to inculcate upon their medical attendant the necessity of applying himself to the cure of the primary complaint,-a duty for which he is so eminently qualified by his extensive practice in one of the best regulated private establishments in Euk k

rope, which is under his own immediate management; and where, if we are rightly informed, more cures are accomplished than in any other establishment in the kingdom. The old part of the building upon the city wall, which is no longer inhabited, ought, in our opinion, to be removed altogether. It would make a considerable addition to the men's court, or airing-ground. In its present state, it can only be considered as a receptacle for vermin; and, from the number of neat comfortable apartments which have been lately fitted up, we are convinced that the cells in the old building will never again be required. We intended to have concluded our remarks here, when a resolution passed by the freeholders, &c. of the county of Perth, at their Michaelmas meeting, caught our attention. It appears that the gentlemen of that wide and important county (we mean the freeholders) are still determined to oppose Lord Binning's bill, even though they grant that it is purged of all the iniquities of his first measure. We confess that we feel utterly at a loss to account for this opposition, more particularly in a county, where, from an accidental circumstance, the sum necessary to be raised by assessment for building an asylum would be very small indeed. A poor family in the town of Perth came into the possession of a very large property by the sudden death of a gentleman who was on his way home from India. One of the sons of this family, who earned a subsistence as a common weaver, shortly after he came into possession of his wealth, burst a blood-vessel. He lingered for about twelve months in very bad health, when he died, leaving a sum of money for the purpose of building a lunatic asylum in his native town. This sum, as directed by his will, was to accumulate for eight years, when, from some other additions which it was to receive, it would amount to about L.20,000. A few years have still to run of this prescribed period. But with such a sum, left expressly for a lunatic asylum, we conceive that the county of Perth would have to contribute a very trifle. Yet we repeat, the freeholders of that county have resolved to oppose the measure! Is it possible that party politics could thus blunt those fine feelings, which we trust will ever reign paramount in the nature of man?

We have made a very extensive, and, we will venture to add, a very accurate calculation of the probable expence of the district asylums, (it is not intended to propose more than five, some say three,) and we find that the sum which the largest landed proprietor in Scotland would have to contribute will not exceed twenty pounds!!! It therefore cannot be the dread of the expence which has excited such an alarm.

Poems. By JOHN KEATS. London,

12mo. pp. 121. Ollier, 1817.

He

Or the author of this small volume we know nothing more than that he is said to be a very young man, and a particular friend of the Messrs Hunt, the editors of the Examiner, and of Mr Hazlitt. His youth accounts well enough for some injudicious luxuriancies and other faults in his poems; and his intimacy with two of the wittiest writers of their day, sufficiently vouches both for his intellect and his taste. Going altogether out of the road of high raised passion and romantic enterprise, into which many ordinary versifiers have been drawn after the example of the famous poets of our time, he has attached himself to a model more pure than some of these, we imagine; and, at the same time, as poetical as the best of them. Sage, serious" Spencer, the most melodious and mildly fanciful of our old English poets, is Mr Keats's favourite. takes his motto from him,-puts his head on his title-page,and writes one of his most luxurious descriptions of nature in his measure. We find, indeed, Spencerianisms scattered through all his other verses, of whatsoever measure or character. But, though these things sufficiently point out where Mr K. has caught his inspiration, they by no means determine the general character of his manner, which partakes a great deal of that picturesqueness of fancy and licentious brilliancy of epithet which distinguish the early Italian novelists and amorous poets. For instance, those who know the careless, sketchy, capricious, and yet archly-thoughtful manner of Pulci and Ariosto, will understand what we mean from the following specimens, better than from any laboured or specific assertion of ours.

"Linger awhile upon some bending planks That lean against a streamlet's rushy banks,

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"Sometimes goldfinches one by one will drop

From low hung branches; little space they stop;

But sip, and twitter, and their feathers sleek;
Then off at once, as in a wanton freak;
Or, perhaps, to shew their black and golden
wings,

Pausing upon their yellow flutterings.
Were I in such a place, I sure should pray
That nought less sweet might call my
thoughts away,

Than the soft rustle of a maiden's gown
Fanning away the dandelions down;
Than the light music of her nimble toes
Patting against the sorrel as she goes.
How she would start and blush thus to be
caught

Playing in all her innocence of thought.
O let me lead her gently o'er the brook,
Watch her half smiling lips and downward

look;

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On one side is a field of drooping oats, Through which the poppies shew their scarlet coats;

So pert and useless that they bring to mind The scarlet coats that pester human kind. And, on the other side, outspread is seen Ocean's blue mantle streaked with purple and green.

Now 'tis I see a canvass'd ship, and now Mark the bright silver curling round her prow;

I see the lark down-dropping to his nest,
And the broad wing'd sea-gull never at rest;
For when no more he spreads his feathers
free,

His breast is dancing on the restless sea.
Now I direct my eyes into the west,
Which at this moment is in sun-beams
drest;

Why westward turn? "Twas but to say adieu!

"Twas but to kiss my hand, dear George, to you."

dent fancies of an aspiring and poetiThis is so easy, and so like the arcal spirit, that we have a real pleasure in quoting, for the benefit of our readers, another fragment of one of Mr Keats's epistles:

"Oft have you seen a swan superbly frowning,

And with proud breast his own white sha. dow crowning,

He slants his neck beneath the waters bright,

So silently it seems a beam of light
Come from the galaxy: anon he sports,
With outspread wings the Naiad Zephyr

courts,

Or ruffles all the surface of the lake,
In striving from its crystal face to take
Some diamond water drops, and them to

treasure

In milky nest, and sip them off at leisure. But not a moment can he there insure them,

Nor, to such downy rest can he allure them;

For down they rush as though they would be free,

And drop like hours into eternity."

All this is just, and brilliant too,though rather ambitious to be kept up for any length of time in a proper and fitting strain. What follows appears to us the very pink of the smart and flowing conversational style. It is truly such elegant badinage as should pass between scholars and gentlemen who can feel as well as judge.

"But many days have past since last my heart

Was warmed luxuriantly by divine Mo

zart;

By Arne delighted, or by Handel maddened;

Or by the song of Erin pierc'd and saddened:

What time you were before the music sitting,

And the rich notes to each sensation fitting. Since I have walk'd with you through shady lanes

That freshly terminate in open plains,
And revell'd in a chat that ceased not,
When at nightfall among your books we
got:

No, nor when supper came, nor after that,
Nor when reluctantly I took my hat;
No, nor till cordially you shook my hand
Mid-way between our homes: Your ac-
cents bland

Still sounded in my cars, when I no more Could hear your footsteps touch the grav❜ly floor.

Sometimes I lost them and then found again;

You changed the footpath for the grassy plain.

In those still moments I have wished you joys

That well you know to honour: "Life's

very toys

With him," said I, "will take a pleasant

charm;

It cannot be that aught will work him harm. These thoughts now come o'er me with all their might Again I shake your hand,-friend Charles, good night."

These specimens will be enough to shew that Mr K. has ventured on ground very dangerous for a young poet;-calculated, we think, to fatigue his ingenuity, and try his resources of fancy, without producing any permanent effect adequate to the expenditure of either. He seems to have formed his poetical predilections in exactly the same direction as Mr Hunt; and to write, from personal choice, as well as emulation, at all times, in that strain which can be most recommended to the favour of the general readers of poetry, only by the critical ingenuity and peculiar refinements of Mr Hazlitt. That style is vivacious, smart, witty, change ful, sparkling, and learned-full of bright points and flashy expressions that strike and even seem to please by a sudden boldness of novelty,-rather abounding in familiarities of conception and oddnesses of manner which shew ingenuity, even though they be perverse, or common, or contemptuous. The writers themselves seem to be persons of considerable taste, and of comfortable pretensions,

who really appear as much alive to the socialities and sensual enjoyments of life, as to the contemplative beauties of nature. In addition to their familiarity, though,-they appear to be too full of conceits and sparkling points, ever to excite any thing more than a cold approbation at the longrun-and too fond, even in their favourite descriptions of nature, of a reference to the factitious resemblances of society, ever to touch the heart. Their verse is straggling and uneven, without the lengthened flow of blank verse, or the pointed connection of couplets. They aim laudably enough at force and freshness, but are not so careful of the inlets of vulgarity, nor so self-denying to the temptations of indolence, as to make their force a merit. In their admiration of some of our elder writers, they have forgot the fate of Withers and Ben Jonson, and May: And, without forgetting that Petrarch and Cowley are hardly read, though it be decent to profess to bear in mind the appalling doom admiration of them,-they seem not which awaits the faults of mannerism or the ambition of a sickly refinement. To justify the conclusions of their poetical philosophy, they are brave enough to sacrifice the sympathetic enthusiasm of their art, and that common fame which recurs to the mind with the ready freshness of remembered verse,-to a system of which the fruits come, at last, to make us exclaim with Lycidas,

"Numeros memini, si verba tenerem."

If Mr Keats does not forthwith cast off the uncleannesses of this school, he will never make his way to the truest strain of poetry in which, taking him by himself, it appears he might succeed. We are not afraid to say before the good among our readers, that we think this true strain dwells on features of manly singleness of heart, or feminine simplicity and constancy of affection,-mixed up with feelings of rational devotion, and impressions of independence spread over pictures of domestic happiness and social kindness,-more than on the fiery and resolute, the proud and repulsive aspects of misnamed humanity. It is something which bears, in fact, the direct impress of natural passion,-which depends for its effect on the shadowings of unsophisticated

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