was present when a child, at the death of Captain Cook, and that extraordinary event had made an indeliable impression on his memory; he was one of a group of women and children, who stood aloof, spectators of the fray.

In answer to my inquiries, the Captain told me, that this man and another he had taken on board from another ship at sea: on what terms or with what motives they left their native country was not explained, but this one (he shortly after parted with the other) has been the mirror of good nature, cheerfulness and fidelity ever since. He has never betrayed the slightest uneasiness at his situation, nor expressed the least desire to return. His country and all its concerns are to him like the dream of infancy; they are seldom called back to remembrance, and appear to produce no emotion when they are remembered.

He made his appearance last winter on the New-York Theatre, in a drama, exhibiting the death of Captain Cook, and displayed with great applause, the peculiar dress, weapons, and exercises of his country....Here was an actor, such as falls to the lot of but few Managers to obtain.

If it be a blessing to enjoy perfect health, a chearful temper, an affectionate heart, and a robust frame, "James Cook" deserves to be envied. His understanding does not appear to be an improveable one. He has more resemblance to Omai than to Prince Leboo, and joins the docility of a child to the vigour of a

man.

and more health than probably has ever fallen to the lot of the same number of men in any situation for the same period.

Such a thing is happiness, which the poet defines to be "health, peace, and competence," but which, if resolvable into any one thing, must be traced to a temper constitutionally cheerful. As to health, it is, at best, only certain degrees of it, that are necessary to tranquillity: as to peace, there is too much ambiguity in this expression if mental peace be meant, it mounts to no more than what had previously been said, "that happiness is happiness." If external circumstances be meant, it still amounts to nothing, for no term can be more vague and indeterminate, as descriptive of personal conditions. As to competence, happiness su ely consists in the pursuit of competence rather than in the enjoyment, and the happiest faces are those animated by hope, and eager in the pursuit of a distant object.

Among all my acquaintance, the poorest and most dependent, the least qualified for gaining allience and dignity among a civilized race of men, and, at the same time the man whose hours fly away in most gaiety of heart, is my friend James Cook, the Owyhee man.

LEGIBILITY IN WRITING.

I have just received an applicaTM tion in writing from a writingmaster, which it has cost me some trouble to decypher. He professes to teach many valuable arts, and, among other things," a free, easy On board of this ship, two hun- and elegant hand." This letter is, dred and fifty persons have resided no doubt, designed as a specimen four months, and traversed three of penmanship, and it cannot be thousand miles of ocean; they are denied to be free, easy and elegant. of all ages and sexes; many have It is free, that is, the strokes are been born on board: yet they all almost horizontal, and the words have enjoyed, within such narrow are very near together, while the compass, with the recollections of lines and letters are very wide an home forever abandoned, and apart; it is easy, inasmuch as the with the prospect of years of ser- pen flew like a glance of lightning vitude to unknown masters in a from one side of the sheet to the strange land, as much cheerfulness, other, and what a pian perforius

VOL. I....NO.II.

LEGIBILITY IN WRITING.

with ease, he generally does quick: it is elegant, because the ink is very black and brilliant, and the strokes, at the same time, are the most graceful curves, and are "slender by degrees and beautifully less." Unluckily, however, and as the consequence of this freedom, ease, and elegance, his words occupy four times more space upon the paper than is necessary, and are scarcely legible.

It is very strange that custom should thus consecrate a manifest defect, and that writing should be generally condemned, in proportion as it accomplishes the very end of writing, which consists in being read. To occupy as small a space as is consistent with distinctness, and to adopt that size and form of letters which is most easily read, is the legitimate excellence of writing, and ought to be exclusively studied by all teachers. Any other elegance than that arising from uniformity is spurious and pernicious. Lines straight, parallel, and equal in width: and letters uniform in size, figure, and relation to each other, constitute the genuine elegance of writing.

I believe it will be found that those who write with most excellence, according to my notions of excellence, have taught themselves, because such are most likely to copy printed books, and typographical characters are far superior, in general, to written ones, in the property of being legible.

I have often been amused in observing the vast difference between writing and printing. miserable scrawling hand, never to A be decyphered but by the study of the context, ragged paper of all textures, colours, and sizes, filled with interlineations and blots, and the nice adjustment of points and capitals totally neglected, is metamorphosed by that magical machine, the press, into the perfection of beauty, regularity, and accuracy. It is like the form of a Dorick temple, rising, at the waving of an omniac wand, from a chaotic heap of spars and brick-bats: and the

contents of a score of huge mishapen and gigantic pages are reduced to the limits of a few octodecimos, as Milton's infernal giants were reduced to pigmics.

have seldom any mercy upon the Those who write for the press, eves of the poor devils, the printers. They, who are careless and hasty on other occasions, are doubly so on this, alleging, forsooth, that all pains are thrown away upon a paper nutes, and then cast away forever. which is to be used for a few mi

without more than usual deliberaBad writers cannot write well, tion and delay, and this is the great cause of their continuing to scrawl. I wish it were possible to convince them that, abstractedly co sidered, it is as easy to form characters correctly as incorrectly, and that the most distinct and legible hand is written, by some persons, who are well instructed, with as much facility and expedition, as they themselves disp.ay. Habit is as necessary to make us write zig-zag lines and horizontal strokes with dispatch, as on straight lines and upright letters.

DISPUTATION.

rit of disputation, in cases where
ALL the errors, and all the spi-
the parties have been limited to pen
and ink, have been exemplified
in the controversy which has been
carried on for several years in the
United States, on the origin and
nature of the yellow fever. During
appeared, at first, to have languish-
the present season the controversy
ed, but the example of one of our ga-
and the fever was not suffered whol-
zettes gradually inflamed the rest,
ly to pass without a renewal of the
warfare.
with the perusal of a newspaper
I have just been amused
essay on this subject, in which the
writer reasons with great force
and ingenuity, in favour of foreign
origin, but in which he is betrayed,
by the strengh of his own con-
viction, into the usual invectives
against his adversaries.

he) to these facts (those which he
For instance.... Reference (says
had just descanted on....) are sufh-

HAPPINESS.

respect, in some degree defective,
and tempers, harmless by them-
selves, are frequently pernicious by
being unhappily sorted.

This unhappiness, however,
though occasionally intense, allows
of bright intervals: there are for-
tunate moments when such minds
meet without collision; in which
their thoughts and feelings are
alike. To such, therefore, happi-
ness, though a rare visitant, and
frequently turned out of door by
humour and caprice, is not utterly
a stranger. Pure and uninterupted
misery belongs only to a couple
whose minds are unimpaired: so un-
equal to each other in capacity and
dissimilar in feelings, that they are
never permitted to recognize a kin-
dred spirit, and to whom the compa-
ny of each other is the worst solitude.
Nothing is more common than such
marriages as this. Whether it be
the incurable defect of human na-
ture, which forbids men and women
to resemble each other sufficiently
for their mutual happiness, or the
folly and precipitance of youth in
the marriage choice, is a point easi-
ly debated, but hard to decide.

My friend J....... endeavours to console himself under his late disappointment, by insisting on the impossibility of any permanent harmony in marriage, or any sufficient coincidence between the tempers and understandings of men and women. He pretends not to set himself up as an immaculate example, but admits with facility, that his own temper and habits would be incompatible with matrimonial felicity. However vague and hollow the pleasures he derives from indulging a fertile imagination on this topic, and creating a wife and a woman to his fancy, he thinks greater happiness is to be expected from this source than from any actual marriage. In his waking dreams, he can model his own person and temper, and those of his wife and children as he pleases; but the real wife, and the

real children, and his own actual temper, and person, and manners, are beyond his power to bend and mould agreeably to any imaginary standard.

and had two amusing instances of I spent this evening at C.......'s, matrimonial character before me. The lady was very unhappy. She could not rid herself for a moment of an air of apprehension and disquiet. On inquiry, I found that all this discomposure arose from the absence of her husband, who was gone ten miles out of town, and contrary to expectation was to stay thought I, is the company of her the night abroad. How necessary, husband to this lady's happiness, since his absence for one night is so intolerable; but I quickly ceased she proceeded to inform me that to wonder at this impatience, when this was the first night which they had passed under separate roofs, during the eleven and an half years of their marriage.

of attachment to her husband, nor
This lady's impatience is no proof
of the happiness his company af-
fords her. Were there no other
proofs of their mutual affection and
domestic harmony, I should more
readily infer an unhappy, than an
happy life, since many must be the
occasions of repining to one, whom
a day's absence of an husband makes
miserable.

I was much amused with the
and experience bore to those of
contrast which the lady's sentiments
captain L......., who happened to
be present. After expressing his
surprise at her emotion, he shewed
breathed the utmost cheerfulness
us a letter from his wife which
not seen him during the last eigh-
and good humour, though she had
teen months.
crossed the Atlantic several times,
In this time he had
but always returning to a port, dis-
tant from his wife's residence, he
found it most convenient to defer
visiting her till his next voyage was
accomplished.

Mrs. C. expressed her surprise, that any woman could endure such an absence from a man she loved.

My wife (returned the captain) is a very excellent woman, and loves her husband as well as the common run of women. There is not an happier couple breathing, when we are together.

I suppose, said I, your interviews are too short to allow you to be tired of each other.

By no means. I have been at home above three weeks at a time.

And pray, said I, what has been your longest absence from her?

Three years and an half is the very most....The captain proceeded to tell me, that he had had seven children, not one of whom he had ever seen, and explained this seeming paradox by observing, that each of his children had come into the world in his absence, and gone out of it again before his return; one of them, it seems, was two years and an half old at its death.

What conceivable purpose of marriage was answered by an union of persons in these circumstances? It is commonly supposed, that people marry in order to live together; and that marriage is a curse, instead of a blessing, to those who are obliged

to be separate.

An ill assorted couple, indeed, can only find their happiness in separation, and to such, absence and forgetfulness are the highest goods. But there are many well disposed men, among sailors, who seem to have much humanity and milkiness of disposition, and who are fortunate in tender and amiable wives, and yet find home insupportable. After being a few weeks on shore, the uniformity and stillness of the scene becomes intolerable, and they pine after storms and billows with as much intensity, as some other people sigh after a quiet fire-side, the caresses of a wife, and the dignity and comforts of home.

For the Literary Magazine.

THE PERUVIAN RELIGION.

To the Editor, &c.

SIR,

I wish some of your correspondents would inform me where I must look for an accurate acquaintance with the Peruvian religion. The very brief abstract to be found in Dr. Robertson, serves rather to whet curiosity than to gratify it. The books to which the historian alludes, are chiefly Spanish, and some of these, perhaps, are translated, but which of them has been made accessible by an English translation, I am desirous of knowing.

I should be still better pleased, if some ingenious scholar would supply me and the world with an account of this religion, compiled from original writers as fully and circumstantially as these authorities would admit. Should he carry the spirit of Robertson into this subject he would produce a very interesting performance.

The Peruvian religion is the most extraordinary form of worship known in the world. The nation, indeed, in every point of view, is the most singular and most like the creature of a romantic invention, of any to be found in the records of history, and deserves much more attention from philosophical inquirers than it has hitherto obtained. The true circumstance in this religion, most worthy of note, appears to be the selection of the sun...." of this great world both eye and soul"....as the only object of worship, and the use of flowers and fruits, as offerings to this divinity. Unbloody sacrifices, and the adoration of the great luminary, is a species of idolatry the least absurd and pernicious that can be imagined, and the influence of this religion on the manners of Peru, justifies this opinion.

I hope some of your readers will attend to this request.

0.