under what dress soever it may appear; as there are no other authors whose province it is to enter so directly into the ways of men, and set their miscarriages in so strong a light.

Simonides, a poet famous in his generation, is, I think, author of the oldest satire that is now extant; and, as some say, of the first that was ever written. This poet flourshed about four hundred years after the siege of Troy; and shows, by his way of writing, the simplicity, or rather coarseness, of the age in which he lived. I have taken notice in my hundred and sixty-first speculation, that the rule of observing what the French call the Bienseance in an allusion, has been found out of latter years; and that the ancients, provided there was a likeness in their similitudes, did not much trouble themselves about the decency of the comparison. The satire or iambics of Simonides, with which I shall entertain my readers in the present paper, are a remarkable instance of what I formely advanced. The subject of this satire is woman. He describes the sex in their several charcters, which he derives to them from a fanciful supposition raised upon the doctrine of pre-existence. He tells us that the gods formed the souls of women out of those seeds and principles which compose several kinds of animals and elements; and that their good or bad dispositions arise in them according as such and such seeds and principles predominate in their constitutions. I have translated the author very faithfully, and if not word for word (which our language would not bear) at least so as to comprehend every one of his sentiments, without adding any thing of my own. I have already apologized for this author's want of delicacy, and must further premise, that the following satire affects only some of the lower part of the sex, and not those who have been refined by a polite education, which was not so common in the age of this poet.

"In the beginning God made the souls of womankind out of different materials, and in a seperate state from their bodies.

"The souls of one kind of women were formed out of those ingredients which compose a swine. A woman of this make is a slut in her house and a glutton at her table. She is uncleanly in her person, a slattern in her dress, and her family is no better than a dung-hill.

"A second sort of female soul was formed out of the same materials that enter into the composition of a fox. Such a one is what we call a notable discerning women, who has an insight into every thing whether it be good or bad. In this species of females there are some virtuous and some vicious.

"A third kind of women were made up of canine particles. These are what we commonly call scolds, who imitate the animals out of which they were taken, that are always busy and barking, that snarl at every one who comes in their way, and live in perpetual clamour.

"The fourth kind of women were made out of the earth. These are your sluggards, who pass away their time in idolence and ignorance, hover over the fire a whole winter, and apply themselves with alacrity to no kind of business but eating.

"The fifth species of females were made out of the sea. These are women of variable uneven tempers, sometimes all storm and tempest, sometimes all calm and sun-shine. The stranger who sees one of these in her smiles and smoothness, would cry her up for a miracle of good-humour; but on a sudden her looks and words are changed; she is nothing but fury and outrage, noise and hurricane.

"The sixth species were made up of the ingredients which compose an ass, or a beast of burden. These are naturally exceeding slothful, but upon the husband's exerting his authority, will live upon hard fare, and do every thing to please him. They are however far from being averse to venereal pleasure, and seldom refuse a male companion.

"The cat furnished materials for a seventh species of women, who are of a melancholy, froward, unamiable nature, and so repugnant to the offers of love, that they fly in the face of their husband when he approaches them with conjugal endearments. This species of women are likewise subject to little thefts, cheats, and pilferings.

"The mare with a flowing mane, which was never broke to any servile toil and labour, composed an eigth species of women. These are they who have little regard for their husbands, who pass away their time in dressing, bathing, and perfuming; who throw their hair into the nicest curls, and trick it up with the fairest flowers and garlands. A woman of this species is a very pretty thing for a stranger to look upon, but very detrimental to the owner, unless it be a king or a prince who takes a fancy to such a toy.

"The ninth species of females were taken out of the ape. These are such as are both ugly and ill-natured, who have nothing beautiful in themselves, and endeavour to detract from or ridicule every thing which appears so in others.

"The tenth and last species of women were made out of the bee; and happy is the man who gets such an one for his wife. She is altogether faultless and unblamable. Her family flourishes and improves by her good management. She loves her husband, and is beloved by him. She brings him a race of beautiful and virtuous children. She distinguishes herself among her She is surrounded with graces. She never sits among the loose tribe of women, nor passes away her time with them in wanton discourses. She is full of virtue and prudence, and is the best wife that Jupiter can bestow on man.”

sex.

I shall conclude these iambics with the motto of this paper, which is a fragment of the same author: "A man cannot possess

any thing that is better than a good woman, nor any thing that is worse than a bad one."

As the poet has shown a great penetration in this diversity of female characters, he has avoided the fault which Juvenal and Monsieur Boileau are guilty of, the former in his sixth and the other in his last satire, where they have endeavoured to expose the sex in general, without doing justice to the valuable part of it. Such levelling satires are of no use to the world; and for this reason I have often wondered how the French author abovementioned, who was a man of exquisite judgment, and a lover of virtue, could think human nature a proper subject for satire in another of his celebrated pieces, which is called "The Satire upon Man." What vice or frailty can a discourse correct, which censures the whole species alike, and endeavours to show by some superficial strokes of wit, that brutes are the most excellent creatures of the two? A satire should expose nothing but what is corrigible, and make a due discrimination between those who are, and those who are not the proper objects of it.

SEVERITY OF THE VENETIAN LAWS.

(From Dr. Moor's Travels into Italy.)

In the year 1400, while Antonio Venier was Doge of Venice, his son, having committed an offence which evidently sprung from mere youthful levity, and nothing worse, was condemned in a fine of one hundred ducats, and to be imprisoned for a certain time.

While the young man was in prison, he fell sick, and petitioned to be removed to a purer air. The Doge rejected the petition; declaring, that the sentence must be executed literally; and that his son must take the fortune of others in the same predicament. The youth was much beloved, and many applications were made, that the sentence might be softened, on account of the danger which threatened him. The father was inexorable,

and the son died in prison. Of whatever refined subsistence this man's heart may have been composed, I am better pleased that mine is made of the common materials.

Carlo Zeno was accused, by the Council of Ten, of having received a sum of money from Francis Carraro, son of the Seignior of Padua, contrary to an express law, which forbids all subjects of Venice, on any pretext whatever, accepting any salary, pension, or gratification, from a foreign Prince, or State. This accusation was grounded on a paper found among Carraro's accounts, when Padua was taken by the Venetians. In this paper was an article of four hundred ducats paid to Carlo Zeno, who declared, in his defence, that while he was, by the Senate's permission, Governor of the Milanese, he visited Carraro, then a prisoner in the Castle of Asti; and finding him in want of common necessaries, he had advanced to him the sum in question; and that this Prince, having been liberated some short time after, had, on his return to Padua, repaid the money.

Zeno was a man of acknowledged candour, and of the highest reputation; he had commanded the fleets and armies of the State. with the most brilliant success; yet neither this, nor any other considerations, prevailed on the Court to depart from their usual severity. They owned that, from Zeno's usual integrity, there was no reason to doubt the truth of his declaration; but the assertions of an accused person were not sufficient to efface the force against him. His declaration might be convincing to those who knew him intimately, but was not legal evidence of his innocence; and they adhered to a distinguishing maxim of this court, that it is of more importance to the state to intimidate every one from even the appearance of such a crime, than to allow a person, against whom a presumption of guilt remained, to escape, however innocent he might be. This man, who had rendered the most essential services to the Republic, and had gained many victories, was condemned to be removed from all his offices, and to be imprisoned for two years.

But the most affecting instance of the odious inflexibility of Venetian courts appears in the case of Foscari, son of the Doge of that name.

This young man had, by some imprudences, given offence to the Senate, and was, by their orders, confined at Treviso, when Almor Donato, one of the Council of Ten, was assassinated, on the 5th of November, 1750, as he entered his own house.

A reward, in ready money, with pardon for this, or any other crime, and a pension of two hundred ducats, revertible to children, was promised to any person who would discover the planner, or prepetrator, of this crime. No such discovery was made.

One of young Foscari's footmen, named Olivier, had been observed loitering near Donato's house on the evening of the murder. He fled from Venice next morning. These, with other

circumstances of less importance, created a strong suspicion that Foscari had engaged this man to commit the murder.

The

Olivier was taken, brought to Venice, put to the torture, and confessed nothing; yet the Council of Ten, prepossessed with an opinion of their guilt, and imagining that the master would have less resolution, used him in the same cruel manner. unhappy young man, in the midst of his agony, continued to assert, that he knew nothing of the assassination. This convinced the court of his firmness, but not of his innocence; yet as there was no legal proof of his guilt, they could not sentence him to death. He was condemned to pass the rest of his life in banishment, at Canea, in the island of Candia.

This unfortunate youth bore his exile with more impatience than he had done the rack. He often wrote to his relations and friends, praying them to intercede in his behalf, that the term of his banishment might be abridged, and that he might be permitted to return to his family before he died. All his applications were fruitless. Those to whom he addressed himself had never interfered in his favour, for fear of giving offence to the obdurate Council, or had interfered in vain.

He en

After languishing five years in exile, having lost all hopes of return, through the interposition of his own family, or countrymen, in a fit of despair he addresssed the Duke of Milan, putting him in mind of services which the Doge, his father, had rendered him, and begging that he would use his powerful influence with the state of Venice, that his sentence might be recalled. trusted his letter to a merchant, going from Canea to Venice, who promised to take the first opportunity of sending it from thence to the Duke; instead of which, this wretch, as soon as he arrived at Venice, delivered it to the Chiefs of the Council of Ten.

This conduct of young Foscari appeared criminal in the eyes of those Judges, for, by the laws of the Republic, all its subjects are expressly forbid claiming the protection of Foreign Princes, in any thing which relates to the Government of Venice.

Foscari was therefore ordered to he brought from Candia, and shut np in the State-prison. There the Chiefs of the Council of Ten ordered him once more to be put to the torture, to draw from him the motives which determined him to apply to the Duke of Milan. Such an exertion of law is, indeed, the most flagrant injustice.

The miserable youth declared to the Council, that he had wrote the letter, in the full persuasion that the merchant, whose character he knew, would betray him, and deliver it to them, the consequence of which, he foresaw, would be his being ordered back a prisoner to Venice, the only means he had in his power of seeing his parents and friends; a pleasure for which he had languished, with insurmountable desire, for some time