ever, a government, be it as bad as it may, will, in the exercife of a difcretionary power, difcriminate times and perfons; and will not ordinarily purfue any man, when its own fafety is not concerned. A mercenary informer knows no diftinction. Under fuch a system, the obnoxious people are flaves, not only to the government, but they live at the mercy of every individual; they are at once the flaves of the whole community, and of every part of it; and the worst and moft unmerciful men are thofe on whofe goodness they moft depend.

trefaction, corrupted himself, and corrupting all about him.

The act repealed was of this direct tendency; and it was made in the manner which I have related to you. I will now tell you by whom the bill of repeal was brought into parliament. I find it has been induftriously given out in this city (from kindness to me unquestionably) that I was the mover or the feconder. The fact is, I did not once open my lips on the fubject during the whole progrefs of the bill. I do not fay this as difclaiming my fhare in that measure. Very far from it. I inform you of this fact, left I should seem to arrogate to myself the merits which belong to others. To have been the man chofen out to redeem our fellow citizens from flavery; to purify our laws from abfurdity and injuftice; and to cleanfe our religion from the blot and stain of perfecution, would be an honour and happiness to which my wishes would undoubtedly af pire; but to which nothing but my wifhes could poffibly have entitled me. That great work was in hands in every refpect far better qualified than mine. The mover of the bill was Sir George Savile.

In this fituation men not only fhrink from the frowns of a stern magiftrate; but they are obliged to fly from their very fpecies. The feeds of deftruction are fown in civil intercourse, in focial habitudes. The blood of wholefome kindred is infected. Their tables and beds are furrounded with fnares. All the means given by Providence to make life fafe and comfortable, are perverted into inftruments of terror and torment. This fpecies of univerfal fubferviency, that makes the very fervant who waits behind your chair, the arbiter of your life and fortune, has fuch a tendency to degrade and abase mankind, and to deprive them of that affured and liberal ftate of mind, which alone can make us what we ought to be, that I vow to God I would fooner bring myfelf to put a man to immediate death for opinions I difliked, and fo to get rid of the man and his opinions at once, than to fret him with a feverish being, tainted with the jail-diftemper of a contagious fervitude, to keep him above ground, an animated mafs of pu

When an act of great and fignal humanity was to be done, and done with all the weight and authority that belonged to it, the world could caft its eyes upon none but him. I hope that few things, which have a tendency to blefs or to adorn life, have wholly escaped my obfervation in my paffage through it. I have fought the acquaintance of that gentleman, and have feen him in all fituations. He is a true genius; with an understanding

a more manly mind; a more firm and determined integrity. Affure yourselves, that the names of two fuch men will bear a great load of prejudice in the other fcale, before they can be entirely outweighed.

With this mover, and this feconder, agreed the whole houfe of commons; the whole houfe of lords; the whole bench of bishops; the king; the miniftry; the oppofition; all the diftinguished clergy of the establishment; all the eminent lights (for they were confulted) of the Diffenting churches, This according voice of national wisdom ought to be liftened to with reverence. To fay that all thefe defcriptions of Englishmen unanimoufly concurred in a fcheme for introducing the Catholic religion, or that none of them understood the nature and effects of what they were doing, fo well as a few obfcure clubs of people, whofe names you never heard of, is fhamelessly abfurd. Surely it is paying a miferable compliment to the religion we profefs, to fuggeft, that every thing eminent in the kingdom is indifferent, or even adverfe to that religion, and that its fecurity is wholly abandoned to the zeal of thofe, who have nothing but their zeal to diftinguish them. In weighing this unanimous concurrence of whatever the nation has to boaft of, I hope you will recollect, that all thefe concurring parties do by no means love one another enough to agree in any point, which was not both evidently, and importantly, right.

Adventures of Eyles Irwin, Efq; in a Voyage up the Red-Sea, and in a Journey through the Deferts of Thebais. From his Letters, 4to.

IN

N the year 1777, Mr. Irwin, a gentleman in the East-India Company's fervice, was fent from Madrafs with dispatches for England. He embarked on board the fnow Adventure, Captain Bacon, in company with three other gentlemen, Major Alexander, Mr. Hammond, and Lieutenant * a gentleman whofe name is kindly fuppreffed, for a reafon that will appear in due time; bound for Mocha on the coaft of Arabia Felix with a refolution, either to reach Suez by a voyage up the Red-Sea, or to proceed by land to the port of Alexandria, and thence to take fhipping for Europe. In eight weeks, owing to the lateness of the feason, they effected a passage to Mocha. Here the Eaft-India Company have a refident, and Mr. Irwin and his party ftaid till the fhip had laid in ftores for the voyage up the Red-Sea. Of the cuftoms of the country he gives the following account;

'The women in Arabia are kept in much. ftricter confinement, than thofe of their religion in India. The females of rank are fhut up.. in their apartments, and never flir abroad, except now and then, to accompany their husbands on an excurfion to the vallies. They are veiled at these times from head to

foot, and fent off upon horse-back under cover of the night. But this fimple recreation does not fall often to their lot. The civilized Arabs are of all nations the leaft inclined

to action; and it is to be fuppofed, that women born here live and die, without stirring out of the walls of Mocha; fuch is the tax that is laid on birth and greatness, even in the remote country of Arabia.

To thofe of a lower degree, there is fome deviation permitted from the feverity of this cuftom. Though there are no public Hummums for the women to refort to as in Turkey, they are indulged with the freedom of vifiting their neighbours, when the dusk of the evening can fkreen their perfons from obfervation: for the thick veils in which their faces are buried utterly preclude the poffibility of distinguish ing their features. We have met them ourselves in the streets, and have conceived a favourable idea of their faces, from the fymmetry of their figures.

Incontinence is held much more criminal among the fingle than married females. Though adultery is punished with a heavy fine, the feduction of a virgin is attended by a more ferious correction. In this they differ from the laws of more enlightened kingdoms, where an injury of this nature is not only unpunishable by any course of law, but the matter it felf is treated in a very light manner. And here the character of the Arabian Legislator rifes far beyond the boafted policy of European ftates. To his juftice it is owing, that the deftruction of innocence is held in fuch abhorrence; and to his rectitude of thinking, that the mere accomplice of a lewd woman fhould encounter lefs rigorous treatment, than the mean betrayer of unexperienced fimplicity.

We were furprized at the number of Chriftian renegadoes that refide at Mocha. Not, that the apoftacy of men, who perhaps had no fenfe of religion until they profelfed Mahometanifm, could provoke our wonder; but how their worldly interefts could be advanced by the change. Reduced to a pitiful fubfiftence, and held in deferved contempt by the natives, we should have furmifed their defection to be merely the effects of defpair; and that the fugitives from juftice alone fought their fafety at this price, had not the example of a Greek priest fomewhat fhaken our opinion. This prielt, by name Ananias, I remember to have heard mentioned in Bengal, as a miracle of piety. And yet in the feventieth year of his age did he publicly abjure the Chriftian religion, in the course of a pilgrimage to Mount Sinai. He was circumcifed, and received into the Mahometan church; and, to crown the whole of this ftrange proceeding, was led about the city for three days, according to cus tom, mounted on an afs, to receive the alms of the faithful, which every convert is entitled to on his admiffion to their myfteries. This happened during our fhort stay at Mocha; and is one of the greatest inftances of the infirmity of human nature, which has come within the fphere of my obfervation.

Having taken in proper provifions, they re-imbarked on a voyage up the Red-Sea to Suez, which is but a fhort journey from Grand Cairo. The paffage up the Red Sea, little known to Europeans, is rendered extremely dangerous by rocks and fhoals, and, the

wind

wind being against them, they could not run more than thirty miles upon one tack: their method was to make one fhore about fun-fet, then to tack and ftand over for the oppofite fhore until day-break.

When the veffel had beat up in that manner for fome time, they fuddenly found themselves about fun-fet on a hazy evening driven by the current among a line of rocks and fhoals on the Arabian coaft, and in imminent danger of deftruction. The flow Aurora had been loft in the fame place, about fix months before. After an anxious perilous night, and various intricate traverfes, they took refuge in the harbour of Yambo, that appeared in fight in the morning. Here they congratulated themfelves with a conclufion of their troubles, having heard of the hofpitality of the place, from the crew of the above fhip-wrecked vefiel, who had owed their fafety to the inhabitants. This port was in the neighbourhood of Medina; and as the Adventure had landed a confiderable fum of money at Mocha, being a prefent from the Nabob of the Carnatic to the temple of Mecca, they doubted not of receiving the most favourable treatment at Yambo.

was

Mecca, and in the mean time a guard was placed over them, and they were kept in ftrict confinement. In the evening, the vizier fent to the captain to defire he would order the fhip into the harbour. They now began to fufpect that fome black defign was in agitation, and their first resolution was to attempt to gain their boat by force, and return on board. But whilft they were confulting on this point, their boat's crew fent to the fame place of confinement, and the boat itself removed to fome fecret placc-fresh injunctions alfo were fent to the captain to order the fhip into harbour. As they had no doubts but that this was done with a defign to get the veffel into their power, and thereby prevent the difcovery of their villainy: they refolved, as the only chance of faving their lives, to fend pofitive orders to the mate to weigh or flip his anchor with the firft favourable wind, make the beft of his way to Judda, and acquaint the English fhips there with their fituation. This was accordingly done-a faithful Arabian who had been their interpreter, and had attached himself to them, carried the letter to the vizier his ignorance of our lan- ' guage favoured their defign, and the interpreter, paffed it off for an order to come immediately into harbour. For two days, the wind being unfavourable, they were in the most dreadful fufpence. length they faw the fhip getting under way; but the weather fuddenly changing, fhe ran amongst the breakers: the Arabians attacked her from the fhore, and the people on board were afraid of

At

defend