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committee of the national assembly of France upon their Newfoundland fisheries, presented and adopted on 3 May, 1851, states, in recommending a continuance of the large bounties theretofore granted, "It is not, therefore, a commercial law we have the honor to propose to the assembly, but a maritime law a law conceived for the advancement of the naval powers of this country. It is in her fisheries that at this day repose all the serious hopes of our maritime establishments. No other school can compare with this, in preparing them so well, and in numbers so important, for the service of the navy."

Notwithstanding this heavy blow and discouragement to British interests, the British fishermen and merchants have struggled for some years to hold their own, with that tenacity and perseverance which only our countrymen can show, when overmatched by opponents and not fairly dealt with by those at home. But the superior intelligence of the French government has met this contingency.

There was an opening for raising a dispute as to the interpretation of some treaties respecting the fishing boundaries. What, if the French government should advance a claim, excluding the British from the best fishingground, and should prevail on the British government to sanction it! It was an old story, and an often refuted claim, that of the exclusive right of the French to the best fisheries on a British coast, but it was worth trying, and so this modest claim was advanced in 1838 by Count Sebastian to Lord Palmerston. The English minister, in his reply of July 16, 1838, wrote as follows: "Exclusive rights are privileges which, from the very nature of things, are likely to be injurious to parties, who are thereby debarred from some exercise of industry in which they would otherwise engage. Such rights are therefore certain to be at some time or other disputed, if there is any maintainable ground for contesting them; and, for these reasons, when negotiations have intended to grant exclusive rights, it has been the invariable practice to convey such rights in direct, unqualified, and comprehensive terms, so as to prevent the possibility of future dispute or doubt. In the present case, however, such forms of expression are entirely wanting; and the claim put forward on the part of France is founded simply on inference, and on an assumed interpretation of words.

After this answer, the claim disappeared for some years. But since the accession of the present emperor of the French, a new activity has been infused into the whole question, a new perception has arisen of the

necessity of a further development of this nursery for the French fleet, and consequently of the withdrawal, removal, or rejectment (friendly, and by treaty interpretation, of course) of the British from their own fisheries. The French government succeeded during the Duke of Newcastle's occupancy of the Colonial Office in 1856, in obtaining a recognition of the pretensions which had been advanced, with a different result, to Lord Palmerston in 1838. The consummation, however, of the wholesale sacrifice was prevented by the determined resistance of the colonists, who, taking their stand on treaty rights, and on the clear exposition of them by the English foreign minister in 1838, exercised the veto which the Constitution gave them. The French government met this by a measure very nearly approaching to an act of force. They issued orders to their commandant on the Newfoundland station, to use his naval force, if necessary, to compel the Newfoundland British to resign their own fisheries and their own land. In this somewhat menacing state of things, Sir E. B. Lytton succeeded to the Colonial Office. The injury done to British interests in a commercial point of view by the French bounties was a fait accompli. The final blow of granting to the French the exclusive right to the best fisheries, and to British soil, had happily been so far averted. The question to be dealt with was twofold: first, as to facts, viz., unjustifiable intrusion; secondly, as to interpretation of treaties, from that of Utrecht downward. On both points, the colonial minister, after having diligently and minutely examined the evidence, came to the conclusion at which no impartial or intelligent person could help arriving; viz., that the French claims were wholly untenable, and their conduct in the highest degree usurping and unjust. Lord Cowley was instructed to re-open the matter with the French government, and to propose the sending out of a joint commission to inquire, on the spot, into the facts. The French government consented, but with the reservation by Count Walewski, that "the difficulties raised by the Newfoundland question appear to the emperor's government to proceed solely from a difference in the interpretation of treaties, and it cannot, therefore, share in the confidence which her Britannic majesty's government feels in the result of the proposal. (5th January, 1859.)"

The commission, however, went out to prosecute its inquiries, and its report will shortly be laid before Parliament.

It is of the highest consequence, sir, that public attention should be directed to this matter, and correct information afforded.

In the debate on Lord Bury's motion last The only escape from the consequences of year, a lamentable ignorance was exhibited the weak and ignorant concessions made in by some leading members of Parliament, the interim will be, to take stand on the both as to the facts of the case, the treaty principles laid down by Lord Palmerston in rights involved, and the deep importance of 1838, departure from which by subsequent the question to Great Britain as bearing on minutes has been the cause of the greater her naval interests. One thing may be con- part of this mischief and danger. fidently affirmed, that the more the matter is sifted, the stronger will be found the case of Great Britain, both as to the facts of intrusion and usurpation alleged, and as to the just interpretation of the treaties involved.

I had intended making some remarks on the treaties bearing on this subject from that of Utrecht; but this letter has already extended itself to too great a length. I am, sir, your obedient servant, A COLONIST.

A PASSAGE in A Tour Through the whole Island of Great Britain, attributed to Daniel De Foe, satisfactorily answers, I think, the Query put by Mr. Hotten in your last number :

committed; but Nicks, proving by the lord mayor that he was as far off as Yorkshire on that day, the jury acquitted him on a bare supposition that it was impossible the man could be at two places so remote on one and the same day."

W. H. W.

"ROCK OF AGES."-Before attempting to decide whether the priority is due to Toplady's hymn, or to its Latin counterpart forwarded by your Rev. correspondent, one would wish to know whether the latter has ever appeared in print, and, if so, when and where. It is worthy of observation, however, that the first stanza of the hymn, as will be evident on comparison, very closely corresponds with a passage in Daniel Brevint's learned and pious tractate entitled The Christian Sacrament and Sacrifice :

"We see nothing remarkable here but Gad'sHill, a noted place for robbing of seamen, after they have received their pay at Chatham. Here "Just on the declivity of the hill on the west it was that a famous robbery was committed in side" must be not many yards from Gad's Hill or about the year 1676, which deserves to be Place, the property of Charles Dickens. mentioned. It was about four o'clock in the-Notes and Queries. morning, when a gentleman was robbed by one Nicks on a bay mare, just on the declivity of the hill, on the west side. Nicks came away to Gravesend, and, as he said, was stopped by the difficulty of getting the boat near an hour, which was a great discouragement to him; but he made the best use of it, as a kind of 'bate to his horse; from thence he rode cross the country of Essex to Chelmsford. Here he stopped about half an hour to refresh his horse, and gave him some balls; from thence to Braintree, Bocking, Wethersfield; then over the Downs to Cambridge; and from thence, keeping still the cross roads, he went by Fenny Stanton, to Godmanchester and Huntingdon, where he and his mare 'bated about an hour; and as he said himself, he slept about half an hour; then holding on the North Road and not keeping at full gallop most of the way, he came to York the same afternoon; put off his boots and riding-cloths, and went dressed, as if he had been an inhabitant of the place, to the Bowling Green, where among other gentlemen was the lord mayor of the city. He singled out his lordship, studied to do something particular, that the mayor might "O Rock of Israel, Rock of Salvation, Rock remember him by; and then takes occasion to struck and cleft for me, let those two streams of ask his lordship what o'clock it was, who, pull-blood and water, which once gushed out of thy ing out his watch, told him the hour, which was a quarter before or a quarter after eight at night. "Upon a prosecution for this robbery, the whole merit of the case turned upon this single point; the person robbed swore to the man, to the place, and to the time in which the fact was-Notes and Queries.

"Rock of ages, cleft for me,
Let me hide myself in thee!
Let the water and the blood,
From thy riven side which flow'd,
Be of sin the double cure,

Cleanse me from its guilt and pow'r!"

Surely, when Toplady wrote these well-known lines, he must have had before him Brevint's devout and solemn aspiration :

side. . . bring down with them salvation and
holiness into my soul!" (Ed. 1679, p. 17.) A
copy of this old edition, which is the third, will
be found in Dr. Williams' library, Redcross
Strect.
THOMAS BOYrs.

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From The Athenæum.

Life of Edmond Malone, Editor of Shak-
speare, with Selections from his Manu-
Script Anecdotes. By Sir James Prior.
Smith, Elder, & Co.

CAW me, caw thee! Stick to your order. A book about every man of letters. Write it, yea or nay, needful or needless, says Sir James Prior: 'It forms a debt of honor, if not of gratitude, which literary men are bound to bestow upon each other." We hope Sir James is not in earnest. Why should every antiquary, every commentator, have a big book laid upon his ashes? We forget kings. We forget generals, admirals, secretaries of state; we forget fox-hunters, six-bottle men, champions of the prize-ring; why should we not be allowed, without imputations on our honor or on our gratitude, to give up to the eternal silences contentious editors of Shakspeare and undistinguished fellows of the Society of Antiquaries?

dogma. Where would the paper come from? Think of the demand for rags! Every gentleman now writes. If every mummy is to be swathed in paper, new Manchesters must arise to produce the tissues. If any thing could atone for the enunciation of this dangerous dogma, it would be the manner in which Sir James has achieved his own peculiar task of gratitude. He has contrived to make what might appear a superfluous work, a pleasant and indeed an amusing book.

The life of Edmond Malone appears at first thought scarcely worth the cost of 470 pages of type. Edmond Malone, editor of Shakspeare,-born 1741, died 1812,-his biography might be thrown into the head-line of a tombstone. But besides editing Shakspeare and buying old plays and poems, Malone, with the industry of a scribe and the information of a man of letters, made notes of stories and conversations heard by him during many years. These notes of stories and Our life is but a dream and a forgetting. conversations have a higher value than the What constitutes the debt of honor? Who personal facts of Malone's life. For about is bound to repay it? Is it to be simply a ten years, he jotted down the good things case of caw me, caw thee? Does the biog-which flowed round good men's feasts somerapher of Goldsmith write a life of Malone in what constantly; afterwards, less regularly, order to create in the next generation the necessity for a biographer of Prior? Think of the consequences to the public, should the dogma ever be received in practice, that a book ought to be written upon every man who has written, or who has even edited, a From this heap of gossip on men and book! Conceive the pleasant amplitude of books we shall borrow somewhat largely. volumes, also conceive the jovial anecdotes, Many of the facts set down by Malone as the sparkling wit, the kindly humor, the the news of his day-the sly, secret history inconceivable generosity and tenderness to of his times-are now the common property be stored away in type for future use, in a of the world. Much that is told of Pope, of series of two or three hundred Lives of Burke, of Johnson, has been gathered in from Shakspeare's editors and commentators, from other quarters by the tribe of biographers. Hemmings down to Mr. Collier and Mr. Yet a good deal remains with a certain freshDyce! How much we may lose by not col-ness and character upon it. Even those paslecting and preserving the retort courteous sages, of which the substance is already to -the quip modest-the blast and counter-be found in Mr. Croker's "Boswell," or in blast of all these worthies-our own columns Mr. Carruthers' "Pope," have often an inand the columns of our contemporaries are in this month of March bearing only too

abundant witness!

though still occasionally; and the mass of gossip thus gathered up by him is now given for the first time in a full and continuous stream as he set it down. It forms a very large appendix to Sir James' Life.

terest of their own, either as proving the general soundness of Malone's information, or for some slight incidental touch of manner, which adds, if not a fact, a sort of perfume, to the tale.

Sir James Prior's principle would beat even the famous Society for Mutual Worship. The club in which every man calls his neigh- As the subjects of Malone's table-talk bor a wit, a poet, an artist, a general, a man have often little or no connection with cach of the world, on the very easy and pleasant other, we shall not trouble the reader much condition of being allowed his choice of the about the order in which the paragraphs apepithet to be applied by others to himself,-pear. His convenience may be best conis a private affair, only distressing, or amusing, as the humor goes, to the accidental friend and guest of the club. But Sir James Prior's principle of bestowing a book on every dead antiquary who may have written himself down an ass, has a far wider and more menacing scope. We think Sir James has not considered the consequences of his

sulted by our throwing the chit-chat and anecdotes into a few simple groups, just as they seem to illustrate the particular person

on the scene.

We begin with a few words about Lord Mansfield :

"Lord Mansfield told Mr. W. Gerrard Hamilton this winter (1782), that what he most re

LIFE OF EDMOND MALONE.

once every year to the first form of Westminster
School forever; and that the testator would by
this means ensure eulogiums and Latin verses
to the end of the world."

Again :

"Pope had an original picture of Bishop Atterbury painted by Kneller. Of this picture he used to make Worsdale the painter make copies for three or four guineas; and whenever he wished to pay a particular compliment to one of his friends, he gave him an original picture of Atterbury. Of these originals, Worsdale had painted five or six.-(From Mr. Walpole.)" Again

gretted to have lost by the burning of his house (at the time of the riots, set on foot about three years ago by that wicked canting hypocrite, Lord George Gordon) was a speech that he had made on the question how far the privilege of Parliament extended; that it contained all the eloquence and all the law he was master of; that it was fairly written out; and that he had no other copy. Mr. Daines Barrington informed me that the book here alluded to contained eight speeches made in the House of Lords; all fairly written for the press, and now irreparably lost. When Lord Mansfield (then Mr. Murray) was examined before the Privy Council, about the year 1747, for drinking the Pretender's health on his knees (which he certainly did), it was urged against "Soon after Pope's acquaintance with Warhim, among other things, to show how strong a burton commenced, and the latter had pubwell-wisher he was to the cause of the exiled family, that, when he was employed as solicitor-lished some of his heavy commentaries on that general against the rebels who were tried in 1746, poet, his friend Lord Marchmont told him that he had never used that term, but always called he was convinced he was one of the vainest men 'How so?' says Pope. Because, you living. to them unfortunate gentlemen. When he came his defence he said the fact was true; and he little rogue,' replied Lord Marchmont, it is manifest from your close connection with your should only say that 'he pitied that man's loyalty new commentator you want to show posterity who thought that epithets could add to the guilt what an excellent poet you are, and what a quantity of dulness you can carry down on your back without sinking under the load.''

of treason!'-an admirable instance of a dexterous and subtle evasion.

"Lord Mansfield told Mr. Hamilton that what Dr. Johnson says of Pope, that he was a dull He was very lively companion,' is not true. and entertaining when at his case; and in a small company very communicative.'

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Elsewhere we read (note the characteristic query of Malone) :

"Mr. Hamilton once observed to Bishop Warburton that he thought Pope was a cold

On this last assertion of the great jurist man, notwithstanding all his talk about friend

Malone has a characteristic comment:

"Lord Mansfield's account is different from He is not every other, and I believe not true. to be trusted on this head; for he must then have been greatly flattered by being in Pope's company. Besides, his own conversation was never very brilliant, and he was always very fond of bad jokes and dull stories, so that his taste and judgment on this subject may be suspected."

ship and philosophy. No,' said the bishop, 'you are entirely mistaken; he had as tender a heart as any man that ever lived.' (Query.Is the bishop a fair and impartial witness on this point?)"

From the description of Sir Joshua, we have a pencilling of Pope's personal appearance, more minute and curious than the passage in Northcote, on this very scene, would lead us to expect :

"Sir Joshua Reynolds once saw Pope. It Further on, we have another story of was about the year 1740, at an auction of books Mansfield, served up with Malone-sauce :"When Sir. J. Reynolds, Mr. Garrick, Mr. or pictures. He remembers that there was a Burke, and others went to Lord Mansfield's lane formed to let him pass freely through the house to bail Baretti, his lordship, without pay-assemblage, and he proceeded along bowing to ing much attention to the business, immediately and abruptly began with some very flimsy and boyish observations on the contested passage in This was by Othello, Put out the light,' etc. way of showing off to Garrick; whose opinion of him, however, was not much raised by this impotent and untimely endeavor to shine on a subject with which he was little acquainted. Sir J. Reynolds, who had never seen him before (who told me the story), was grievously disappointed in finding this great lawyer so little at

the same time."

Among sayings and stories connected with
Pope we give the following:-

-

"Pope, talking once to Lord Mansfield about posthumous fame, said that the surest method of securing it would be to leave a sum of money to be laid out in an entertainment to be given

those who were on each side. He was, according to Sir Joshua's account, about four feet six high; very humpbacked and deformed; he wore a black coat; and according to the fashion of that time had on a little sword. Sir Joshua adds, that he had a large and very fine eye, and a long, handsome nose; his mouth had those peculiar marks which always are found in the mouths of crooked persons; and the muscles which run across the cheek were so strongly marked as to appear like small cords."

About Chatham, we read :—

"The late Lord Chatham (when Mr. Pitt) on some occasion made a very long and able speech in the Privy Council, relative to some naval matter. Every one present was struck by the force of his eloquence. Lord Anson, who was no orator, being then at the head of the admiralty, and differing entirely in opinion from Mr. Pitt,

got up, and only said these words,- My lords, Mr. Secretary is very eloquent, and has stated his own opinion very plausibly. I am no orator, and all I shall say is, that he knows nothing at all of what he has been talking about.' This short reply, together with the confidence the council had in Lord Anson's professional skill, had such an effect on every one present, that they immediately determined against Mr. Pitt's proposition.

according to Lord Lyttleton, he was very eloquent, speaking with great fluency and authority on every subject, and generally in the form of harangue, rather than colloquial table-talk. His company all looked up to him, and very few dared to interrupt or contradict him.-Dec., 1787."

Of Garrick :

"Mr. Garrick always took care to leave com"A few weeks before Lord Chatham died, pany with a good impression in his favor. AfLord Camden paid him a visit. Lord Chatham's ter he had told some good story, or defeated an son, the present celebrated W. Pitt, left the antagonist by wit or raillery, he often disaproom on Lord Camden's coming in. "You see pointed people who hoped that he would conthat young man (said the old lord); what I now tinue to entertain them and receive the praise say, be assured, is not the fond partiality of a and admiration they were ready enough to give. parent, but grounded on a very accurate exam-But he was so artificial that he could break away ination. Rely upon it, that young man will be in the midst of the highest festivity, merely in more distinguished in this country than ever his order to secure the impression he had made. On. father was." His prophecy is in part accom- this part of his character it was well said by Coleplished. At the age of twenty-four he was man, that he never came into company without chancellor of the exchequer; and before he laying a plot for an escape out of it. The part had attained his twenty-fifth year, had been of- of The Clandestine Marriage' which he wrote fered, and refused, the place of first minister." was Lord Ogilby and Mrs. Heidelberg, as Cautherly who was in his house at the time, told Mr. Kemble. Cautherly was employed to transcribe the parts for the use of the theatre. In The Jealous Wife' he assisted by writing the charac ter of Major Oakley. In that play, as written originally, the whole of the farce of The Musi cal Lady' was introduced; but Garrick persuaded Coleman to leave it out."

About Charles Townshend, of whose brilliant power of repartee we have heard so much, but of whose spoken sarcasms we possess so few, there is here a little story :"When the late Mr. Harris of Salisbury made his first speech in the House of Commons, Charles Townshend asked, with an affected surprise, who he was? He had never seen him. Ah! you must, at least, have heard of him. That's the celebrated Mr. Harris of Salisbury, who has written a very ingenious book on grammar, and another on virtue.' What the Devil then brings him here? I am sure he will neither find the one nor the other in the House of Com

mons.'

Malone kindly adds :—

"Mr. Townshend knew Mr. Harris well enough; but it was a common practice with him, as with other wits, to lay traps for saying good things."

Here is a dismal bit of contemporary gossip on Sterne :

Garrick is no great favorite with Malone. The point of the story is generally turned against the comedian's breast. Here is a tale of a dull day, passed under Garrick's hostship at Hampton-a tale told to Malone, it should be seen, by Sir Joshua Reynolds, one of the heroes of the fête :

"It happens sometimes to celebrated wits, by too great an effort to render a day from which much was expected quite abortive. Not long before Garrick's death he invited Charles Fox, Mr. Burke, Mr. Gibbon, Mr. Sheridan, Sir Joshua Reynolds, Mr. Beauclerc, and some he began to read a copy of verses, written by others to dine at Hampton. Soon after dinner

himself on some of the most celebrated men of "The celebrated writer, Sterne, after being the time, including two or three of those who long the idol of this town, died in a mean lodg-were present. They were not very well satisfied ing, without a single friend who felt interest in his fate except Becket, his bookselier, who was the only person that attended his interment. He was buried in a graveyard near Tyburn, belonging to the parish of Marylebone, and the corpse being marked by some of the resurrection men (as they are called), was taken up soon afterward, and carried to an anatomy professor of Cambridge. A gentleman who was present the dissection, told me he recognized Sterne's el the moment he saw the body." 18 Bolingbroke, we read :— ing,

friena Burke told me a few days ago, that the Prior's Lyttleton informed him that Lord every dece never wrote down any of his works, himself dohem to a secretary. This may acmore menacinndless tautology. In company, has not conside

with their characters, and still less when describ ing Lord Thurlow, who was not present, he introduced the words 'superior parts.' Mr. Burke, speaking of his own character, said afterwards to Sir Joshua Reynolds, that he was almost ready to have spat in his face. Garrick, finding the company uncommonly grave, in consequence of his unlucky verses, before they had drank half a dozen glasses of wine proposed to adjourn to his lawn, where they would find some amusement. When there, the whole amusement consisted in an old man and a young one running backwards and forwards between two baskets filled with stones, and whoever emptied his basket first was to be the victor. Garrick expected that his guests would have been interested, and have betted on the runners; but between illhumor with his verses and being dragged from

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