twenty-five minutes, I produced the very lines which now commence it. The judicious critic will notice that absence of the plain and trite style which marks the passage I refer to; nor am I so uncandid to deny the powerful efficacy of mist, darkness, and obscurity, on the sublime and mysterious topics I there touch on.-It cannot fail also to strike the intelligent observer, that the expression so much commented on, of "No echoing car," was obviously suggested by that very car in which I myself was then seated.Finding, however, that, together with the increased density of the overshadowing cloud, the coldness also was proportionably increased, so as at one time to freeze my ink completely over for near twenty minutes, I thought it prudent, by means of opening the valve at the vertex of my balloon, to emit part of the ascending power. This occasioned a proportioned descent very speedily: but I must not overlook a phenomenon which had previously occurred.-It was this: on a sudden the nibs of all my pens (and I took up forty-eight, in compliment to the number of my Sovereign's years), as if attracted by the polar power, pointed upwards, each pen erecting itself perpendicu

lar, and resting on the point of its feather: I found also, to my no small surprise, that during the whole of this period every one of my letters was actually cut topsy-turvywise; which I the rather mention, to account for any appearance of a correspondent inversion in the course of my ideas at that period,

On getting nearer the earth, the appearances I have described altogether ceased, and I instantly penned the second division of my Ode; I mean that which states his most excellent Majesty to be the patron of the fine arts. But here (for which I am totally at a loss to account) I found myself descending so very rapidly, that even after I had thrown out not only two volumes of my History of Poetry, but also a considerable portion of my pig, I struck, nevertheless, with such violence on the weathercock of a church, that unless I had immediately parted with the remainder of my ballast, excepting only His Majesty's Speech, one pen, the paper of my Ode, and a small inkbottle, I must infallibly have been aground. Fortunately, by so rapid a discharge, I procured a quick re-ascension; when immedi ately, though much pinched with the cold,

the mercury having suddenly fallen twentytwo inches, I set about my concluding: stanza, viz. that which treats of His Majesty's most excellent chastity. And here I lay my claim to the indulgence of the critics to that part of my Ode; for what with the shock I had received in striking on the weathercock, and the effect of the prunes, which I had now nearly exhausted, on a sudden I found myself very much disordered indeed. Candour requires my just touching on this circumstance; but delicacy must veil the particulars in eternal oblivion. At length, having completed the great object of my ascent, I now re-opened the valve, and descended with great rapidity. They only who have travelled in balloons, can imagine the sincere joy of my heart, at perceiving Dr. Joseph cantering up a turnip-field, near Kidlington Common, where I landed exactly at a quarter after -two o'clock; having, from my first elevation, completed the period of five hours and fifteen minutes; four of which, with the fraction of ten seconds, were entirely devoted to my Ode.-Dr. Joseph quite hugged me in his arms, and kindly lent me a second wig (my own being thrown over at the time

of my striking), which, with his usual precaution, he had brought in his pocket, in case of accidents. I take this occasion also to pay my thanks to Thomas Gore, Esq. for some excellent milk-punch, which he directed his butler to furnish me with most opportunely, and which I then thought the most solacing beverage I ever had regaled withal. Dr. Joseph and myself reached Oxford in the Dilly by five in the evening, the populace most handsomely taking off the horses for something more than the last half mile, in honour of the first Literary Aëronaut of these kingdoms

As witness my hand this 22d of May, 1785, THOMAS WARTON.

CERTIFICATE.

County of Oxford to wit, THIS is to certify, to all

22d of May, 1785.

whom it may concern, That the aforesaid Thomas and Joseph Warton came before me, one of His Majesty's Justices of the Peace for the said county, and did solemnly make oath to the truth of the above case.

His

Sworn before me, JOHN † Weyland,
Mark,

LAUREAT ELECTION,

On the demise of the late excellent Bard, William Whitehead, Esq. Poet Laureat to His Majesty, it was decidedly the opinion of His Majesty's great superintendent Minister, that the said office should be forthwith declared elective, and in future continue so; in order, as well to provide the ablest successor on the present melancholy occasion, as also to secure a due preference to superior talents, upon all future vacancies: it was in consequence of this determination, that the following Public Notice issued from the Lord Chamberlain's Office, and became the immediate cause of the celebrated contest that is recorded in these pages.