voyage of Columbus, when the first glimpses of the new world broke upon the adventurers, possesses almost enough of imagination to rank it with poetry.

Of the various historical works of Dr. Robertson, his 'History of Scotland' holds, perhaps, the first rank. It possesses the interest, and something of the character, of a memoir of Mary, Queen of Scots. That unfortunate princess forms the great attraction of the work; and though the author is not among the number of her indiscriminate admirers and apologists, he labors to awaken the sympathies of the reader strongly in her behalf. The luminous historical views and retrospects in which this historian excels, were indicated in his introductory chapter on Scottish history, prior to the birth of Mary. Though a brief and rapid summary, this chapter is finely written, and equally remarkable for elegance and perspicuity. The 'History of America' is full of the deepest interest. The discovery of so vast a portion of the globe, the luxuriance of its soil, the primitive manners of its natives, the pomp, magnificence, and cruelty of its conquerors, all form a series of historical pictures and images that powerfully affect the mind. The 'History of the reign of Charles V. wants the natural romance of the two preceding works, but the knowledge displayed by the historian, and the enlarged and liberal spirit of his philosophical inquiries, are scarcely less worthy of commendation. The first volume, which describes the state of Europe previous to the sixteenth century, contains the result of much study and research, expressed in language often eloquent, pleasing, and harmonious. From this fine historical writer we select the following extracts:—

CHARACTER OF MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS.

To all the charms of beauty and the utmost elegance of external form, she added those accomplishments which render their impression irresistible. Polite, affable, insinuating, sprightly, and capable of speaking and of writing with equal grace and dignity. Sudden, however, and violent in all her attachments, because her heart was warm and unsuspicious. Impatient of contradiction, because she had been accustomed from her infancy to be treated as a queen. No stranger, on some occasions, to dissimulation, which, in that perfidious court where she received her education, was reckoned among the necessary arts of government. Not insensible of flattery, or unconscious of that pleasure with which almost every woman beholds the influence of her own beauty. Formed with the qualities which we love, not with the talents that we admire, she was an agreeable woman rather than an illustrious queen. The vivacity of her spirit, not sufficiently tempered with sound judgment, and the warmth of her heart, which was not at all times under the restraint of discretion, betrayed her both into errors and into crimes. To say that she was always unfortunate will not account for that long and almost uninterrupted succession of calamities which befell her; we must likewise add that she was often imprudent. Her passion for Darnley was rash, youthful, and excessive. And though the sudden transition to the opposite extreme was the natural effect of her ill-requited love, and of his ingratitude, insolence, and brutality, yet neither these nor Bothwell's artful address and important services can justify her attachment to that nobleman. Even the manners of the age, licentious as they were, are no apology for this unhappy passion; nor can they induce us to look on that tragical and

infamous scene which followed upon it with less abhorrence. Humanity will draw a vail over this part of her character which it can not approve, and may, perhaps, prompt some to impute her actions to her situation more than to her dispositions, and to lament the unhappiness of the former rather than accuse the perverseness of the latter. Mary's sufferings exceed, both in degree and in duration, those tragical distresses which fancy has feigned to excite sorrow and commiseration; and while we survey them, we are apt altogether to forget her frailties; we think of her faults with less indignation, and approve of our tears as if they were shed for a person who had attained much nearer to pure virtue.

With regard to the Queen's person, a circumstance not to be omitted in writing the history of a female reign, all contemporary authors agree in ascribing to Mary the utmost beauty of countenance and elegance of shape of which the human form is capable. Her hair was black, though, according to the fashion of that age, she frequently wore borrowed locks, and of different colours. Her eyes were a dark gray, her complexion was exquisitely fine, and her hands and arms remarkably delicate, both as to shape and colour. Her stature was of a height that rose to the majestic. She danced, she walked, and rode with equal grace. Her taste for music was just, and she both sung and played upon the lute with uncommon skill. Towards the end of her life she began to grow fat, and her long confinement and the coldness of the house in which she had been imprisoned, brought on a rheumatism, which deprived her of the use of her limbs. 'No man,' says Brantome, 'ever beheld her person without admiration and love, or will read her history without sorrow.'

CHIVALRY.

Among uncivilized nations, there is but one profession honourable-that of arms. All the ingenuity and vigour of the human mind are exerted in acquiring military skill or address. The functions of peace are few and simple, and require no particular course of education or of study as a preparation for discharging them. This was the state of Europe during several centuries. Every gentleman, born a soldier, scorned any other occupation. He was taught no science but that of war; even his exercises and pastimes were feats of martial prowess. Nor did the judicial character, which persons of noble birth were alone entitled to assume, demand any degree of knowledge beyond that which such untutored soldiers possessed. To recollect a few traditionary customs which time had confirmed and rendered respectable, to mark out the lists of battle with due formality, to observe the issue of the combat, and to pronounce whether it had been conducted according to the laws of arms, included every thing that a baron who acted as a judge, found it necessary to understand.

But when the forms of legal proceedings were fixed, when the rules of decision were committed to writing and collected into a body, law became a science, the knowledge of which required a regular course of study, together with long attention to the practice of courts. Martial and illiterate nobles had neither leisure nor inclination to undertake a task so laborious, as well as so foreign from all the occupations which they deemed entertaining or suitable to their rank. They gradually relinquished their places in courts of justice, where their ignorance exposed them to contempt. They became weary of attending to the discussion of cases which grew too intricate for them to comprehend. Not only the judicial determination of points, which were the subjects of controversy, but the conduct of all legal business and transactions, was committed to persons trained by previous study and application to the knowledge of law. An order of men, to whom their fellow-citizens had daily recourse for advice, and to whom they looked up for decision in their most important concerns, naturally acquired consideration and influence in society. They were advanced to honours which had been considered hitherto as the peculiar re

(

wards of military virtue. They were intrusted with offices of the highest dignity and most extensive power. Thus, another profession than that of arms came to be introduced among the laity, and was reputed honourable.

The functions of civil life were attended to. The talents requisite for discharging them were cultivated. A new road was opened to wealth and eminence. The arts and virtues of peace were placed in their proper rank, and received their due recompense.

While improvements, so important with respect to the state of society and the administration of justice, gradually made progress in Europe, sentiments more liberal and generous had begun to animate the nobles. These were inspired by the spirit of chivalry, which though considered commonly as a wild institution, the effect of caprice, and the source of extravagance, arose naturally from the state of society at that period, and had a very serious influence in refining the manners of the European nations. The feudal state was a state of almost perpetual war, rapine, and anarchy; during which the weak and unarmed were exposed to insults or injuries. The power of the sovereign was too limited to prevent these wrongs, and the administration of justice too feeble to redress them. The most effectual protection against violence and oppression was often found to be that which the valour and generosity of private persons afforded. The same spirit of enterprise which had prompted so many gentlemen to take arms in defence of the oppressed pilgrims in Palestine, incited others to declare themselves the patrons and avengers of injured innocence at home. When the final reduction of the Holy Land, under the dominion of infidels, put an end to these foreign expeditions, the latter was the only employment left for the activity and courage of adventurers. To check the insolence of overgrown oppressors; to rescue the helpless from captivity; to protect or to avenge women, orphans, and ecclesiastics, who could not bear arms in their own defence; to redress wrongs and remove grievances, were deemed acts of the highest prowess and merit. Valour, humanity, courtesy, justice, honour were the characteristic qualities of chivalry. To these were added religion, which mingled itself with every passion and institution during the middle ages, and by infusing a large proportion of enthusiastic zeal, gave them such force as carried them to romantic excess. Men were trained to knighthood by a long previous discipline; they were admitted into the order by solemnities no less devout than pompous; every person of noble birth courted that honour; it was deemed a distinction superior to royalty; and monarchs were proud to receive it from the hands of private gentlemen.

This singular institution, in which valour, gallantry, and religion, were so strangely blended, was wonderfully adapted to the taste and genius of martial nobles; and its effects were soon visible in their manners. War was carried on with less ferocity when humanity came to be deemed the ornament of knighthood no less than courage. More gentle and polished manners were introduced when courtesy was recommended as the most amiable of knightly virtues. Violence and oppression decreased when it was reckoned meritorious to check and to punish them. A scrupulous adherence to truth, with the most religious attention to fulfil every engagement, became the distinguishing characteristic of a gentleman, because chivalry was regarded as the school of honour, and inculcated the most delicate sensibility with respect to those points. The admiration of these qualities, together with the high distinctions and prerogatives conferred on knighthood in every part of Europe, inspired persons of noble birth on some occasions with a species of military fanaticism, and led them to extravagant enterprises. But they deeply imprinted on their minds the principles of generosity and honour. These were strengthened by every thing that can affect the senses or touch the heart. The wild exploits of those romantic knights who sallied forth in quest of adventures are well known, and have been treated with proper ridicule. The political and permanent effects of the spirit of chivalry have been less observed. Perhaps the humanity which accompanies all

the operations of war, the refinements of gallantry, and the point of honour-the three chief circumstances which distinguish modern from ancient manners, may be ascribed in a great measure to this institution, which has appeared whimsical to superficial observers, but by its effects has proved of great benefit to mankind. The sentiments which chivalry inspired had a wonderful influence on manners and conduct during the twelfth, thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth centuries. They were so deeply rooted, that they continued to operate after the vigour and reputation of the institution itself began to decline.

EDWARD GIBBON, by birth, education and manners, an English gentleman, was born at Putney, in Surrey, on the twenty-seventh of April, 1737. His father was of an ancient Hampshire family, of wealth and influence, and Edward, in consequence of the delicacy of his constitution, received his early education at home. At the age of fifteen, his health having improved with his years, he entered Magdalen College, Oxford. He had previously been a close student, and carried with him to the university, a vast amount of erudition; but after having spent fourteen months, in comparative idleness, devoting himself chiefly to the works of Bossuet and Parsons the Jesuit, he became a convert to the Roman Catholic religion. He went to London, and at the feet of a priest, solemnly though privately abjured the errors of heresy.' His father, in order to reclaim him, placed him, for some years, at Lausanne, in Switzerland, under the charge of M. Pavilliard, a Calvinistic clergyman, whose judicious conduct prevailed upon his pupil to return to the bosom of the Protestant church. On Christmas day, 1754, he received the sacrament in the Protestant church at Lausanne. 'It was here,' says the future historian, 'that I suspended my religious inquiries, acquiescing with implicit belief in the tenets and mysteries which are adopted by the general consent of Catholics and Protestants.'

At Lausanne Gibbon became, by a regular and severe course of study, familiar with the Latin and French languages, and with general literature. In the twenty-second year of his age he returned to England, and three years afterwards appeared as an author in a slight French treatise, an Essay on the Study of Literature. He next accepted the commission of Captain in the Hampshire militia; and though his studies were interrupted, the discipline and evolutions of a modern battle,' he remarks, 'gave him a clearer notion of the phalanx and the legion, and the captain of the Hampshire grenadiers was not useless to the Historian of the Roman Empire.'

On the peace of 1762, Gibbon was released from his military duties, and paid a visit to France and Italy. He had long been meditating some historical work, and whilst at Rome, in 1764, his choice was determined by an incident of a striking and romantic nature. As I sat musing,' he says, ' amidst the ruins of the Capitol, while the bare-footed friars were singing vespers in the temple of Jupiter, the idea of writing the decline and fall of the city first started to my mind.' Many years, however, elapsed before he carried his intentions into effect. On his return to England, in 1765, he seems to have passed some years in fashionable idleness; but the death of

his father, which occurred in 1770, made it necessary that he should form some independent plan of life. The estate which he inherited was much involved, and he therefore determined to quit the country and reside permanently in London. Here, being thrown comparatively on his own resources, he now undertook the composition of the first volume of his history. 'At the outset,' he remarks, all was dark and doubtful; even the title of the work, the true era of the decline and fall of the empire, the limits of the introduction, the division of the chapters, and the order of the narrative; and I was often tempted to cast away the labor of seven years. The style of an author should be the image of his mind, but the choice and command of language is the fruit of exercise. Many experiments were made before I could hit the middle tone, between a dull tone and a rhetorical declamation : three times did I compose the first chapter, and twice the second and third, before I was tolerably satisfied with their effect. In the remainder of the way, I advanced with a more equal and easy pace.'

In 1774, Gibbon was returned for the borough of Liskeard, and sat in parliament eight sessions during the memorable contest between Great Britain and the American colonies. Prudence, he says, condemned him to acquiesce in the humble station of a mute; the great speakers filling him with despair, and the bad ones with terror. In 1776, he published the first volume of his history, the success of which was, for a grave historical work, almost unprecedented. 'The first impression was exhausted in a few days; a second and a third edition was scarcely adequate to the demand, as the book was found on every table and almost on every toilette.' His brother historians, Robertson and Hume, generously greeted him with warm applause. Whether I consider the dignity of your style,' says Hume, the depth of your matter, or the extensiveness of your learning, I must regard the work as equally the object of esteem.'

6

6

There was a still stronger bond of union than that which the admiration for genius could create, between the English and the Scottish historian. Gibbon had insidiously, though too unequivocally, evinced his adoption of infidel principles. The various modes of worship which prevailed in the Roman world, were all,' he remarks, 'considered by the people as equally true, by the philosopher as equally false, and by the magistrate as equally useful.' Some feeling of this kind constituted the whole of his religious belief; and hence in the fifteenth and sixteenth chapters of his work, he gave an account of the growth and progress of Christianity, which he accounted for solely by secondary causes, without a single reference to its divine origin. It is true, he nowhere avows his disbelief; but by tacitly sinking the early and astonishing spread of Christianity during the time of the apostles, and dwelling with exaggerated coloring and minuteness, on the errors and corruptions by which it afterwards became debased, the historian in effect conveys an impression that its divine origin is but a poetical fable, like the golden age of the poets, or the mystic absurdities of Mohammedanism.

The second and third volumes of Gibbon's great work appeared in 1781;