ton's Geography, but of the size called Atlas, so as to correspond with the celebrated works of D'Anville. These maps will be delineated with all the superiour advantages afforded by the late improvements in geographical precision, and engraved with the utmost beauty that the state of the arts can admit, so as to be a national and perpetual monument, worthy of the first commercial country in the world, and from whose exertion and enterprise have arisen the most recent and important discoveries. Each map will be drawn under Mr. Pinkerton's own eye, revised with the utmost care; and will form, like the works of D'Anville, a complete record of the state of science at the time of publication. Table lands, chains of mountains, and other features which belong to the natural geography of each country, will be indicated in a new manner, and with an exactness not to be expected from geographers who are unacquainted with that branch of the science, which is, however, so essential, that without it no country can be truly represented, nor works on natural and civil history perfectly understood. In the other parts, which illustrate civil history, equal care shall be exerted, not to insert obscure hovels and villages, while places remarkable in historical record are totally omitted. Instead of careless positions, arising from the blind imitation of antiquated maps, the greatest attention shall be bestowed, that every position be conformable to the latest astronomical observations, and, in default of these, to the result of the best itineraries, and other authentick documents. The expence and labour of drawing and engraving such an Atlas, must necessarily be very great, and only capable of being repaid by a country in the first state of opulence. But while the merely ornamental arts have

met with a most liberal encouragement, in the publication of literary monuments of great expense, it may be hoped, that the work, uniting great and lasting util ity with beauty and magnificence, will not be neglected by a discerning publick. It is supposed that the whole expense of this Atlas, executed in a more capital style than has ever been before attempted, may be about 20 or 25 guineas; and it is proposed that it shall be published in numbers, each containing

two or three maps.

A new edition of Warton's valuable

History of English Poetry is prepar

ing for the press; it will be continued to the time of Pope by an editor of celebrity.

EDITORS' NOTES.

IN this number we present our readers the memoir of the Boston

Athenæum. Our most confident hopes and warmest wishes have been gratified by the ample patronage, which has been bestowed on the institution, by the munificent merchants and liberal gentlemen of all professions in this town. Subscriptions for more than one hundred and thirty shares, at $300 a share, have already been obtained; so that the sum already subscribed amounts to more than 39,000 dollars. Several valuable donations in books have been made to the institution within the last fortnight, and the list of annual subscribers has been much increased.

useful to our city and to our country, On this event, so honourable and we congratulate the publick. The bands of society are multiplied by literary and social institutions. Real patriotism can exist in the hearts of those only, who have been accustomed to venerate and cherish with affection those establishments which are the ornament and support of civil society. It has been justly observed by Edmund Burke, that if we would love our country, we must render our country lovely.

All the newspapers and periodical publications we receive in interchange for the Anthology are deposited in the Athenæum. We cannot therefore urge too powerfully on the printers of the newspapers and literary journals in the different parts of our country to attend particularly to the early and regular transmission of their publications. We shall also be very grateful to booksellers and printers in any part of the United States, who will have the goodness to send to us any books or pamphlets immediately on their publication. Catalogues of publick libraries, of museums, and botanical institutions, literary projects, &c. &c. are also most respectfully solicited.

MR. OLDSCHOOL, TRAVELLING through the U.States of America, a foreigner, but not a stranger, and solicitous to make accurate remarks, that he might draw correct inferences, the delineator of the Picture of Boston confides in the accuracy of his outline, and that the individual features he has portrayed closely resemble the original; however the tints may fail in felicity of colouring, or be considered deficient in the distribution of light and shadow. The painter has, at least, seen and studied what he describes, and, at the present moment, having in his design nothing beyond a sketch, true in character, though possibly deficient in finishing, as such it is presented for engraving to The Port Folio: happy in being given to the American world through the medium of a publication which would confer honour, and obtain patronage, in any country where letters are appreciated and native talents estimated, beyond the adventitious acquirement of wealth, and the assumed aristocracy of its vulgar pretensions.

CARADOC.

Beneath thy temple's holiest veil retired, See the blest preacher, by his God inspir'd,

Warm from his lips the words of life descend,

Yet these the coldness of neglect attend.

Though Kirkland all the lore of truth disclose,

And Lowell's heavenly voice instructive flows,

M'Kean, of feeling heart, with soul refin'd,

Rich in the glowing energies of mind, Powerful, yet mild as the transcendent light,

That radiant rules those speaking orbs of sight;

With him so loved—the wanderer from thy clime

Ere his green years had bloom'd is manhood's prime,

WE insert from the Port Folio the preceding lines and prefatory remarks, not, as the judicious will readily see, from any claim of merit in either their object or execution; still less from a wish to in crease the mortification of those, our beloved and respected townsmen, who have had the misfortune to be made the subjects of this Caradoc's praise. But our sense of justice will not permit such gross and groundless aspersions to circulate concerning a city, deserving very different treatment from truth and genius. It neither excites our pity nor restrains our indignation,that these miserable ca lumnies are crutched upon rhyme, and hobble about, in the measures of poetry, stilted, but not elevated. Caradoc is not the first, who has mistaken lying for a liberty of Parnassus, and used the free air of that region, as though he were thereby released from all restraints of decency and of morals. 'quidlibet audendi,' however, which the Roman poet claims for his tribe, has, according to his own concession, many limitations; and among these, not the least, is a scrupulous observance of truth and of nature

The

Veras hinc ducere voces.

Nor does he make any exception in favour of lines such as Caradoc's, though he expressly speaks of this species of poetry

-Versus inopes rerum, nugæque ca

noræ.

In this 'Picture of Boston,' as it is called, its inhabitants are represented in some uncommon degree the slaves of avarice, and its tradeful sons' without other hope than gold,' are said to suffer genius and worth to pine in poverty and neglect; having neither the sense to prize, nor the spirit to contribute, to the encouragement of individual merit, or of general science.

Had this picture' possessed merely the merit of caricature, it should not by us have been made the subject of reprimand. It should even have received our welcome. We require not from the satirist any nice discrimination in appor tioning chastisement to guilt. We only demand, that the vice, or the foible, exist in the individual, he selects; and that also in a degree somewhat peculiar. In the particular, on account of which he is brought under the lash, he must be really deficient, something be

low, not that scale of ideal perfection, we can imagine, but the ordinary standard of that class of beings, to which he belongs. If the asperities of Caradoc had been justified by any such general considerations, we should not have censured lines, which truth would never have permitted us to praise. In the belief that his design was honourable, we should not have disturbed its repose in that page, which was at once its cradle and its grave, nor have exposed a second time to any mortal eye his flaccid muscle; poorly propped as it is by ill concealed fragments, pilfered from real poets.

It is our duty, however, not to permit the metropolis of NewEngland to be thus wantonly calumniated. We should deem ourselves guilty of a failure in moral obligation, if we allowed to pass without comment, assertions, of the falsity of which we have almost daily evidence. We pretend not that the practice of our fellow citizens has reached that extreme limit of liberality, beyond which neither religion nor morals urge men to advance. Imperfect in its best estate is all human virtue. Rarely does wealth discharge the debt it owes to benevolence, with out much mean defaication. Here, as well as elsewhere, the ignoble passions throw many obstacles in the way of voluntary bounty. The stream of individual munificence is not always in proportion to the waters in the fountain. Some men, like lakes in deep vallies, receive all the bounties of heaven, and the rich tribute of every neigh bouring hill, yet cream and mantle,' in selfish fullness, stagnate with unproductive accumulation; yield nothing to the general prose perity; and circulate the blessings they possess, not enough to pro

·

mote healthful action in their own system; others, like springs on some mountain's top, swell in perpetual overflowings, and gladden with their timely dispensations, all the sphere beneath their influence. Diversities such as these, are inseparable from every association of human beings. From general infirmities we neither pretend to be exempt, nor do we deem their existence the just occasion of satire or of censure. The weakness of our common nature is the proper subject for ingenuous lamentation; and ought to be the frequent topick of friendly admonition, and of fraternal warning. But the harsh discipline of the satirist is due, solely, to flagrant offenders; to such as sink below the general standard; to such as, more than ordinarily, abuse their means, or neglect their opportunities. It is in this view that we pronounce the work, we have above transcribed, to be both false and malignant. Because the most ordinary inquiry would have led its author to a very different result. It would have taught him, that, in the liberal appropriation of individual wealth to purposes of general utility, whether the object be charity, or piety, or literature, in proportion to its wealth and its numbers, the town of Boston need not shrink from a comparison with any proud, pretending city, in this, or in any other country. This is not the language of ostentation. We utter it reluctantly. The vir tues, of which we speak, take no delight in blazoning. It is the charm of their character to be Not obvious, not obtrusive, but retired.

Something, however, is due to justice, and to that sense of reputation, which we should cherish, scarcely less in a collection, than in an. individual capacity.

The