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1796.]

Arguments in Favour of Small Farms.

which I hope will be marshalled in your next Number.

I wish he may think it proper to fhow why bis adjectives alone may plead an exemption from comparatives; but should he think it proper to exclude thefe de grees entirely from our language, he will doubtlefs enfure the thanks of every fchool-boy. I must confess, I think he has reduced himself to a dreadful alternative, the total expulfion of comparatives from our grammar, or the continuance of them as "as cuftom wills in all things."

August 10, 1796. ANTI-SIN BORON.

To the Edior of the Monthly Magazine.
SIR,

MUCH has been faid of late for and against large farms, but the grand objections to them feem to have been unnoticed. As I live in a part of the country where the farms in general run finall, and have feen, for fifty years together, great mifchiefs arifing from their being engroffed, my thoughts are fent you on that head.

In the first place, a monopoly of farms is a difcouragement to induftry, frugality, and fobriety, in fervants of hufbandry. Their grand ambition is to occupy a small farm; when that profpect is taken away, the generality of them have no inducement to faving; the money, which heretofore was hoarded up with that view, is fquandered away at alehoufes, in rioting, drinking, and gambling. By fuch means a habit of idleness is contracted, they become enervated, and lefs capable of work, and their morals are corrupted.

Secondly, if fome few, of a better difpofition, are fo provident, as to lay by fomewhat for a rainy day, what is the confequence? They at length marry, and become labourers to fome wealthy monopolizing farmer, in the neighbourhood. In confequence of having got a little before-hand to begin the world with, they live better for a few years than others, who have nothing but their labour to depend upon. By this time they have probably got two or three children, when, the man finding himself no longer able to live by his labour, application is made to the parifh for relief. Could he, at first fetting out, have procured a fmall farm, he probably by his own and wife's induftry, might have continued to live comfortably throughout life, and have fupported a family of five

857

or fix children, without any expence to the public.

Again; the children of the little farmer are in common fufficiently inftructed to make useful members of the community, when thofe of the labourer, through want of ability in their parents to give them any education, too frequently turn out an offence to decency, and become a nuisance to the public. The former of thefe, too, by having fome property, acquire an attachment to the English conftitution; the latter, having nothing to lofe, become indifferent who governs them: I may better myfelf, but cannot be worfe off, is the common language of these people.

Such are fome of the mifchiefs attending the agricultural part of the fociety; but there are others, of no fmall moment, that affect the community at large. In a neighbouring parish, as I am informed, no less than thirteen farms are occupied by three perfons only, not one of whom keeps more than three cows, and all the butter they make is fpent in their own families. When they were in feparate hands, each farmer was able to maintain two cows on an average, and three-fourths of the butter, at leaft, went to market. What an amazing lofs is here to the public, in one fingle article! All the poultry they bring up is for their own table; but under the occupation of different tenants, five times the number, on a modeft computation, were bred by them, and all the chickers, together with the eggs, were fold to others. But we are told, in the Reply to Mr. Wright's Addrefs, it is bad management in the holders of fmall farms to rear fowls, as by the misconduct of their wives, in fquandering away the barley, they are often fold at a lofs. This opinion indeed feems to be countenanced by the engroffing farmer, who feldom breeds more than can be fupported at his barn door. But, if the one can, in this manner, rear up enough for his own use, furely the other, without any wafte being committed, can maintain fome for the ufe of others.

But the little farmer, this anonymous writer tells us, are as bad managers of their affairs, as their wives are of their chickens; they cannot go to market to buy a fingle beaft, without being at as great, nay, greater expences, than the great one, who buys twenty. This how. ever he will find much difficulty to prove. Is it not poffible for him to purchase one cow in his neighbourhood, without going to any market? But fhould he be reduc

ed

ed to that neceffity, cannot he do his bufinefs, and after d inking a glafs or two of beer, return to his own houfe, when the other may probably fit for fome hours, indulging himself with wine? Being determined at all events to extol the one, and deprefs the o her, the addreffer does not hefitare to declare that the purchase, when made, must be of an inferior kind, notwithstanding common fenfe tells us a man with fifty pounds in his pocket may buy a fingle bu lock of as good a kind, as he could had he a thousand pounds.

Throughout the whole of the Addrefs, the great farmer is made a bafhaw, and the little one a beggar; the former is endued with all understanding, and the latter devoid of common fenfe. Both being equal in abilities and education, one may furely manage the tillage of fifty acres, as well as the other can five hundred: the prefumption, if on either fide, is in favour of the little tenant.

It is farther contended, the little man cannot poffibly grow fo much corn on an acre of land, as the great one can, but why? because he cannot manure it fo well. If he can make enough of his land to keep himself and family from becoming a charge to the parish, we have all we contend for. But, in fact, the allegation is not true; one man may be as able to manure fifty acres, as another can nanure a thoufand.

the fubftituting of Cyder for Port Wine. In confirmation of what was then fuggefted it might have been added, that in the brewing of Port wine (for it is palpable that great quantities of it have been brewed, or compounded, in this inland) cyder has generally been adopted as the bafe of the compofition, or the principal ingredient used. I obferve, however, a trifling typographical error, about the middle of page 446, which, indeed, moft of your readers will correct for themfelves: what I had written arid, is printed acid, spirit. Your ready infertion of the communication above alluded to, induces me to offer you my thoughts on another fubject, equally interefting to the public:

Notwithstanding the numerous laws concerning them, and the vigilance of our magiftrates and police officers after them, the numerous claffes of beggars, and vagrant poor, are a serious nuifance to this country. It is acknowledged by travel'ers, that we are more infefted with them, than almost any kingdom or ftate on the continent of Europe: and yet, in none of them, are there more ufeful eftablishments, more heavy taxes, or more charitable donations made for the poor than in this kingdom. The whole country, as well as our towns, fwarms with beggars, to the great inconvenience of the inhabitants. and the difgrace of our national character. All this, it may be faid, is indeed too true; but why bring forward to public view an evil which every body experiences, unless at the fame time you point out a remedy? This, fir, is what I now propose to do, through the medium of your widely-extended Magagine; and if the plan I propofe be as generally adopted, as your Mifcellany is likely to communicate it, I am perfuaded that it will ftrike more at the root of the evil than any extenfion of the vagrant laws, or practice of coercive meafures, whatever. The public have the power in their own hands, and they need only a little cool refolution to exert it. The practice of indifcriminate charity has drawn on the evil; a prudent direction of charitable donations would correct it. To remove this inconvenience, we muft do as Mr. Pitt did to prevent the fmuggling of tea; i. e. make it not worth while to continue the practice. And this. is to be effected, not by hardening the heart, clofing the purfe, or stopping the ears at the cry of the poor, but by layIN your Magazine for July, Numbering down a general rule for the difpofing: VI, page 445, you have favoured me of, our charitable donations. with the publishing of a few thoughts on. You will readily, obferve, fir, that I make

To leave no stone unturned, the addreffer goes on to urge, that a team fufficient to cultivate a hundred acres. muft be kept to plow fifty only, and this mut be a great drawback. Let his profits be more or lefs, they are generally fufficient, with good management, to main his independence. But the neceflity for keeping a whole team is denied; as it is no uncommon thing for a little farmer to keep half of one only; to join another in like circumftances, and for each to, affift in plowing the other's lands, to the mutual advantage of both.

Upon the whole, by the means of fmall farms, industry and frugality among fervants will be encouraged; parishes relieved in their poor rates; and the mar kets better fupplied with poultry, butter, and eggs. I ain, your humble fervant, Nov, 10, 1796. CANTIANUS.

To the Editor of the Monthly Magazine.

SIR,

idle

1796.] make a wide distinction between the honeft laborious poor, and the diffolute vagrant. Of the former, every man has enough in his own neighbourhood, and may, by a little enquiry and obferva. tion, easily appreciate their feveral merits, or afcertain their refpective wants. To fuch of thefe as may be found truly deferving, I would have the heart as open as charity herfelf can expand it. But the latter defcription of poor, are to be met with at horse races, at the entrances to all places of public amufement, at the corners of all our streets, dinning our ears with their doleful cries; fometimes exhibiting fores, diftorted limbs, &c. with a quantity of filth and rags, applied, fecundum artem, to draw money from the occafional paffenger; which, at night, is generally fquandered in cellars, or in houfes of ill fame. The one are objects of charity, the other are objects for the whipping-poft. I have made ufe of the term fecundum artem, because it is palpable that the fqualid appearance of most of our vagrants is voluntary. Out of their gains, they might drefs more cleanlily, if they were fo difpofed; but this they apprehend would injure their trade; for it is indeed too general a notion, that poverty must be accompanied with an external appearance of extreme wretchedness. I lay it down, therefore, as a general rule (to which, however, I acknowledge there may be a few exceptions) that a perfon may appear too miferable to be a real object of charity. That they might much meliorate their own appearance is certain, from a calculation of their general receipts, two inftances of which have been well authenticated to me: one of a converfation between a beggar and a working mechanic in Birmingham. The latter ftated, that he could easily earn a guinea per week by his labour. The former boafted that he could beg through thirty ftreets a-day; that he thought that a very bad ftreet which would not produce him two-pence; and that Sunday was always confidered as a double day. Here now the beggar, by his whining importunity, raifes twice the fum that the induftrious artift can procure, by his labour. The other was the affertion of a beggar in my own neighbourhood, "that if he could not make fourfcore pounds per annum by begging, he would leave off his trade." What, fir, thall idlenels and vagrancy produce the double or treble of industry and ia bour? What an affront upon, what a grofs mifapplication of charity! My mode MONTHLY MAG. No. XI.

On the Impropriety of relieving Beggars.

859

therefore, is, though not my own fug geftion, for it is the apoftle Paul's, "to lay by in ftore, as God hath profpered me, on the first day of the week," fuch a fum as 1 may expend in affifting the indu trious poor; and when a cafe occurs that requires affiftance, I always advance it in filver. A fhilling, beftowed on a fick labourer, is certainly a much better directed act of charity, than twentyfour halfpence to twenty-four vagrants. A fatisfaction alfo arifes from reflecting, that, in the one inftance, a real benefit has been bestowed, and will probably be ufeful in reftoring an active member to fociety; which, in the other cafe, is not only highly problematical, but almost impoffible. It may also be added, as a fecondary confideration, that fuch a general procedure would confiderably tend to throw out of circulation a very large fum of bafe and counterfeit copper coin; which is the chief fupport of vagrancy. The value of an halfpenny, particularly a bad one, is fo very small, that it is readily beftowed, to filence the importunity of a cry, if from no worthier motive. And thus, thousands of ufeless mouths are daily fed among us; ufelefs hands are confirmed in idlenefs; and fome hundred pounds-worth of bafe coin is kept in circulation, to the injury of the fair trader.

These reflections have arifen from
hearing of a plan adopted by the young
ladies of the first boarding-fchool in this
town, whose benevolence was perpetual-,
ly folicited by improper objects; nor
were their folicitations used in vain, till
they became too troublefome to be longer
borne. They, therefore, have difcarded
their old penfioners, and have made a
ftock purse, to which each fubfcribes, ac-
cording to the proportion of her weekly
allowance, for the relief of fuch poor
as may be well recommended to them;
and they have lately experienced the
heartfelt fatisfaction of liberally contri-
buting to the relief of a poor widow in
the neighbourhood, with five children,
who has loft her all by fire. What a
charming example for imitation !
I am, fir,

With much refpeét, and best wishes,
A CONSTANT READER.

For the Montoly Magazine.
ON THE POETRY OF SPAIN AND
PORTUGAL.

ILAVATER had contemplated the por-
trait of Lope de Vega, without know-
ing whom it reprefented, he would cer-
tainly have pronounced him an extraordi
5 R

nary man; but he would not have fufpected him to have been a poet. The Spaniards have well characterised his genius by its monflrufidad, a word which muft literally be rendered monftruofity: no other term could fo well have delineated it. Lope de Vega is never fublime, feldom pathetic, and feldom natural; rarely above mediocrity in any of his writings, he has attained to celebrity by their number.

Purity of language and harmonious verfification diftinguith all the poems of this indefatigable Spaniard. Born and educated at Madrid, if he had beheld no ftream but the Manzanares, and no country but the melancholy plains of Caftille, we might have expected dullnefs; but the fecretary and favourite of the duke of Alva must have accompanied his maf ter to Villa Franca and to Oropesa; and the tranquil and majestic beauty of the one, and the wild fublimity of the other, would have awakened all the enthufiafm of poetry, if Lope de Vega had been indeed a poet.

When a fchool-boy, he bartered his verfes with his fchool-fellows, for hymns and prints: when a young man, he wrote eclogues, and a comedy, in praife of the Grand Inquifitor; and a paftoral, in honour of the duke of Alva. From thefe fymptoms, one who knew the human heart might have prophefied, that the young poet never would attain to excellence. The Dutch idea of bartering his verfes could not have entered the mind of the enthufiaft: the young enthulaft carefully conceals his feelings from obfervation, and he who is not an enthusiast must never expect to be a poet.

Is there who ne'er those mystic tranfports felt
Of folitude and melancholy born?
He needs not woo the Mufe!

Were it not for the reverenee which fashion has attached to their names, we fhould yawn over Virgil and Horace, when they prostitute poetry to panegy ric. No great or good man ever encouraged a rhymer to befpatter him with praife; panegyric has, therefore, ufually been employed on the weak and the wicked, on thofe whom we defpife and deteft; but, among the villains whofe deeds pollute the page of hiftory, the duke of Alva ranks in the firft clafs. This man united in himfelf the bigotry of the priest, the duplicity of the politician, and the brutality of the foldier; and to this man did Lope de Vega write 2 paftoral! Arcadia and the duke of

Alva! Madness never produced a more monftrous association!

The Arcadia of Lope de Vega is one of the innummerable imitations that fwarmed in Spain, after George of Montemayor published his Diana. The age had been accustomed to extravagance by their books of chivalry; compared with which, the paftoral romance appcared natural. That this fpecies of compofition may poffefs very great beauty, has been fumciently proved by Florian, in his alteration of the Galatea of Cervantes, and more particularly in his Eftelle. I know of no work in the English language that can properly be claffed under this head, though a very interefting one might be produced on the model of Florian, if the French frippery of fentiment, which infects even his writings, were avoided.

I never toiled through the Arcadia of Lope de Vega. After penetrating fome thirty or forty pages into the little volume, I found that a few fcattered concents could not atone for its intolerable dullness. Great ftrength of imagination only can reconcile the reader to a total want of tafte, but the imagination of this indefatigable Spaniard was not ftrong, and his tafte may be judged of by a fentence relating to the heroine of his Arcadia: "the rays of Belifarda's eyes fhone upon the water like the reflection of the fun upon a looking-glafs."

Of his longer poems, I have never feen the Jerufalen Conquistada: I am, however, well enough acquainted with the ftyle and powers of Lope de Vega, fully to credit Mr. Hayley, when he fays, that it is, in every respect, infinitely inferior to the work of Taffo, which it attempted to rival. Of his "Beauty of Angelica," a complete analyfis, with fpecimens fufficiently copious, may foon be expected in a promised work upon Spain and Portugal. His Dragontea is very bad. It is reported, that Mr. Polwhele has likewife chofen Sir Francis Drake, as the fubject of an epic poem. Francis Drake was a good failor; he makes a very refpectable figure in the naval hiftory of England; but he is but a forry hero for the poet! A privateer is only a legalized pirate, which old Fuller calls the devil's water rat, and the worft kind of fea vermin.

Sir

Diogo de Soufa, in his celebrated fatire called the Journey of Diogo Camacho to Parnaffus, has made a happy allufion to the rivalry of Lope de Vega with Taffo, and his lamentable inferiority. Ca

macho

1796.]

Life and Writings of Lope de Vega.

macho calls on the Spanish poet to beg a letter of introduction to Apollo. Lope replies:

My father for Arcadia is departing,
(Where I have been myself) and he hall write
Your introduction firit. He journeys there
To feek fome tidings of a certain lord,
By name Anfrifo: it is now fome time
Since we have heard ought of him, and we
doubt

Whether he lives or not. I anfwer'd him,
Senhor, I would not have you venture there,
Nor truft yourself in Paleftine unmask'd
And heedlefs; for the very children fay,
That, as Torquato did enrich those parts,
So you have ruin'd them!

His comedies are faid to delineate characters well, and faithfully to reprefent the manners of the age he lived in. This commendation they could not have obtained without, in fome degree, meriting it; and there is a livelinefs in the lighter pieces of Lope de Vega, which shows him beft qualified for fuch fubjects. He himfelf excufes his total neglect of all dramatic rules, by alledging the taste of the age. "I have written better (fays he); "but feeing what monftrous productions pleafe the women and the mob, I have locked up all my precepts, and turned Plautus and Terence out of my library. Surely it is just that, as the public pay, the public fhould be pleafed." A childith and ridiculous defence, which deferves not a refutation !

66

The burlefque pieces of this univerfal author were published by him, under the name of the Licentiate Thome de Burguillos, perhaps, because he thought them little confonant to his ecclefiaftical character; perhaps, because he was ashamed. of a fpecies of poetry fo defpicable. An

Ode to a Flea was printed in one of those works to which he affixed his name, but never avowed himfelf to be the au

thor of it. The editor of the Parnaffo Efpanol calls it a witty and ingenious compofition; it difplays, however, little ingenuity, and lefs wit. The poet tells the Flea where he goes, and what he feeds upon, and calls him a greater Turk than Amurath, because he fpares nobody.

The Spanish poets appear to have been little envious of each other's reputation. In his Laurel de Apolo, Lope de Vega has liberally praifed his contemporaries; and poems of the fame nature have been compofed by Gil Polo, Vicente Espinel,

* One of the characters in Lope de Vega's Arcadia,

861

and the great Cervantes. They satirized each other's faults, but they honeftly allowed each other's merits; the abilities of Lope de Vega and of Gongora were acknowledged by those who most strongly expofed the careleffnefs of the one, and the affectation of the other.

I have read nearly two hundred of his fonnets. As might be expected, many of them contain parts that are beautiful; none of them are perfect as wholes. The following is a fair specimen :

Το

go, and yet to linger on the way:

To linger, and look back; and yet to go,
To hear a fyren's pleasant voice, and know
The winds of Fortune waft you far away;
To build gay fabrics in the baseless air;
Like Lucifer, to fall precipitate

From Heaven's high blifs, even to a demon's
ftate,

To fink defpairing; nor regret despair;
From Friendship's voice affectionate to fly;
Wildly to rove, and talk in folitude;
To think each paffing hour eternity;

All ill expecting, not to hope for good;
And all the hell of jealoufy to prove,
Is to be abfent from the maid we love.

On the 25th of August 1635, died Lope de Vega, in the 73d year of his age; full of honours as of days. If not the best of poets, he was the most fortuhim happy in life, and the ufe he made of nate; the wealth he acquired rendered

it cheered him in death. He died honour. ed by the great, celebrated by the learned, and regretted by the poor. His reputation ftill flourishes in his own country; and though the impartial judgment of foreigners cannot rank his producbered, that he never was excelled in intions above mediocrity, let it be rememduftry as an author, or in liberality as a

man.

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ON THE DEATH OF LOPE DE VEGA.

LOPE! like fome fair Syren in a fea Of tears, thy Mufe was heard! her wond'rous fong

Could ftill the memory of the dead prolong, Bailing oblivion by her harmony. Even Death, aftonish'd at that powerful strain, Heard its enchanting mufic with alarm;

And trembled, left his defolating arm Should give no victims to oblivion's reign.

He came, he conquer'd-furely at fome hour,

When o'er the eye-lids of thy mighty Mufe Sleep thed the poifon of her poppy dews: He had not conquer'd elfe that waking power, 5 R 2

He

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