To a by-stander, indeed,' the report observes, it would appear preposterous that the poor should be in danger of perishing for want of sustenance, while we are surrounded by an abundant and inexhaustible supply of a wholesome and nutricious aliment; and yet the difficulty of introducing fish into common use has been greater than could be at first imagined.' It is a singular fact that the proportion of fish consumed by the inhabitants of these islands, is very considerably less than the consumption of our continental neighbours, with whom it formis a principal article of food.

• But if one-fourth only of the sustenance of this country were derived from fish (the other three parts being chiefly composed of corn, meat, and potatoes) and a large surplus were properly prepared and exported, in exchange for the corn and other produce of foreign countries, it would not only provide for a great additional population, but would supply the whole of the inhabitants of Great Britain, with a more nutritive and palatable diet than they now possess ; as the saving in butchers' meat by the middle classes might allow a greater proportion of it for the poor, instead of their present scanty and too general sustenance of bread, water, and tea.'

Yet, for this very article, with which Providence has supplied us in wonderful variety and inexhaustible abundance, we have indolently had recourse to foreign seas; and have actually been paying the Dutch for fish with which our own shores abound.

The banks of the North Sea, the rocky coasts of the Orkneys, and the eastern shores of Britain, afford, in abundance, two articles of luxury for the London market, though but sparingly drawn from these sources: we allude to the turbot and lobster. For a supply, however, of the former, we have always had recourse to the Dutch, to whom we paid about 80,000l. a year; and for about a million of the latter, taken on the coast of Norway, the Danes drew from us about 15,0001. a year; for eels we gave the Dutch about 50001. “a year. These fisheries are calculated to give employment to not less than 10,000 seamen. Even the oyster fishery supplies the market of the metropolis with an article of nutricious food for eight months in the year; and if cultivated with the same care in the neighbourhood of Chichester, Portsmouth, Southampton, Plymouth, the coasts of Wales, and among the Hebrides, as at Colchester, Milton, Feversham, &c. there is not a town in Great Britain which might not be as abundantly supplied with oysters as the London márket.'*

The other fish which surround our coasts are the herring, the

* It is not very usual for us to avail ourselves of the labours of other periodical writers, but we have great pleasure in referring our readers for much valuable and interesting information on the subject of the British Fisheries, to the 1t article of the 18th number of the Quarterly Review, from which the above extract is taken,

cod-fish, and haddock; the plaice, the sole, the whiting, the mackerel, the pilchard, and, above all, the salmon, with which no part of Europe is more bountifully supplied. There is no doubt that after supplying the home consumption, our fisheries might furnish enough for exportation, to cover all our imports of corn, and become an important source of national wealth.

In regard, however, to the importance of the British fisheries in a national point of view, we have not room to do justice to the subject. Their neglect has always formed the subject of complaint, and has at different periods engaged the attention of the legislature. The failure of the different projects which have been formed for extending them as to home consumption, is to be chiefly attributed to a want of those facilities which would create a steady demand, and ensure to the fisherman a certain and ready sale for his produce.'

The great value of Mr. Hale's experiment, (continues Sir Thos. Bernard,) is, that it affords practical information on a very important subject, and supplies a moral remedy for increasing population, and the vicissitudes of commerce and manufactures. The general use of wheaten bread-a great number of horses kept for parade-wasteful habits of life-increase of manufactures-and the supply of our fleets and armies in a necessary war-have so augmented the demand for wheat corn, that every succeeding year seems to require a degree of miraculous plenty, or a ruinous importation from foreign countries. When any thing is wanted in England, nothing is so easy or so natural as to order it to be imported; forgetful that the effect of reliance on such importation, may be a diminution of national wealth, a depreciation in the rate of exchange, and a dependance on foreign nations for the supply of the necessary articles of life. In the year 1800 and 1801, the money remitted to other countries for the purchase of corn for our home consumption, amounted to 18,905,0931.; and above forty-two millions of money have been sent out of England, for the purchase of foreign corn, in the period between 1800 and 1810 inclusive.

That species of speculation which reduces the quantity to a small part of what may be easily obtained, and enhances the price far above what will make a profitable and satisfactory recompence to the persons employed, is the worst and most pernicious speculation that can exist in any country. Speculators in grain serve to check the consumption in the time of plenty, and to provide a store against the period of scarcity but speculators in fish waste and destroy the abundance which God has intended for the use of man, and deprive us of that food which is essential to our existence.' pp. 13, 14.

:

The excellence of the plan suggested by Mr. Hale, consists in the fixing a maximum price, sufficient to repay the fishermen for their exertions, while the market is left uncontrouled. By this simple expedient, at little more than the expense of sending the fish from Billingsgate, an unheard of supply was procured,

which was eagerly purchased by the poor. In the neighbourhood of Spitalfields only, from 200 to 1700 weight of corned cod was sold per day, besides corned herrings from five to seven a penny. Some exertion, on the part of a few gentlemen in their respective neighbourhoods, is all that is necessary to produce a similar benefit-to place a good meal within the reach of every family possessed of even a trifling weekly stipend, and thus to advance, most effectively, the amelioration of the condition of the poor.

In regard to the prejudices of the poor, who are unaccustomed to this food, matter of fact seems to present sufficient answer to the objection. To this may be added the consideration, that it is not proposed to them as the sole article of food, or in substitution of any article they at present enjoy, but only in addition to what they now have. It is too well known that a large proportion of the poor have been almost entirely debarred by the high price of provisions, from all butchers' meat. The re

Association for the relief of the Manufacturing Poor, unfolds a mournful detail of the distress and want with which many large and populous districts have been visited. The perusal is calculated to make a salutary impression on every heart, that does not substitute to itself feeling for virtuous exertion, on every one who recognizes the duties which the happy owe to the unhappy,' among the first which devolve upon social man.

We intended to notice, more particularly, the Reports of the Fish Association, which principally respect the removal of the present impediments to supply and distribution; but we can only now recommend them to the attention of the public, in the hope that their continued and successful exertions may furnish occasion for our again introducing the subject to our readers. We shall conclude with an extract from one of the homilies lately published by the PRAYER BOOK AND HOMILY SOCIETY, which correctly and truly points out the line of conduct which it is incumbent on us to pursue.

• Concerning our duties which be here dwelling in England, environed by the sea as we be, we have great occasion in reason to take the commodities of the water, which Almighty God by his divine Providence, hath laid so nigh unto us: whereby the increase of victuals upon the land may be better spared and cherished, to the sooner reducing of victuals to a more moderate price to the better sustenance of the poor.'

I

Art. XIII. Lives of Marcus Valerius Messala Corvinus, and Titus Pomponius Atticus, the latter from the Latin of Cornelius Nepos. With notes and illustrations. To which is added an account of the Families of the five first Cæsars. By the Rev. Edward Berwick, author of the translation of the Life of Apollonius of Tyana, 8vo. pp. 173, Longman and Co. 1813.

FOR the publication of this elegant, but unostentatious little volume, Mr. Berwick assigns the following reasons. The idea of collecting the particulars scattered in history, respecting Messala, being first suggested to him, by a note in the History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, he thought these biographical gleanings would not be unacceptable to any man versed in classical learning. To this memoir, he added a new version of the life of Atticus, with more appropriate illustrations than had been given by former translators; because Atticus was the contemporary of Messala, and because such a work might not be deemed unacceptable at a time when integrity and independence of character are so necessary to give stability to the state, and energy to the constitution. The historical sketch of the five first Cæsars he subjoined, because it is illustrative of the times in which Messala and Atticus lived, and demonstrates to Sovereigns, that they cannot support their authority without

virtue.

Leaving our readers to form their own judgment of these reasons, we shall add a word or two on the contents of this volume. In putting together the scattered notices of Messala's life and character, Mr. Berwick has done every thing that reading and diligence could effect, and by sketches of contemporaneous bistory and biography, reflections and quotations, has contrived to fill upwards of eighty pages with various matter, on the whole rather interesting. Many of the parts, however, have but a slender connexion with the principal subject, and might have been attached to the life of any other man with as much pertinence as to that of Messala. As a memoir, indeed, this essay is very imperfect; the incidents relative to Messala being extremely scanty, and conjecture a bad substitute for historical verity. It will not fail to suggest itself, that Mr. Berwick undertook a task in which success was scarcely to be expected. If a man's life is not written by his contemporaries, he who sets about composing it after the lapse of fifty years before tradition becomes silent and ephemeral records have perished, will seldom satisfy public curiosity. What would be so difficult at the close of fifty years, must be incalculably more so at the close of nearly two thousand. The following extract will give our readers some idea of the shifts to which recourse has been had in working up this life to the requisite length:

After the battle of Phillippi, which happened in the latter end of the year 711, in the consulate of Marcus Æmilius Lepidus and Lucius Munatius Plancus, history mentions not the name of Messala till the year 713. As he joined the arms of Antony, it is to be supposed that he followed his fortunes and his pleasures in his first progress to the East. All writers, ancient and modern, who have noticed Antony's eastern tour, have celebrated the interview which he had at Tarsus with Cleopatra, whose irresistible charms, at the age of fifteen, are known to have captivated the eldest son of Pompey the Great, and at one and-twenty to have subdued the soul of Julius Cæsar*! When the Egyptian queen entered he Cydnust, the was in all the bloom of youth and beauty, and the uncontrouled dominion she held over the mind of Antony from that time till her death, in the 39th year of her age, was felt and regretted by the Roman people. After Cleopatra's departure, Daphne + was chosen by the Triumvir, as his next place of residence; and for some time he indulged in all the luxuries of that delicious abode; careless of the disturbances raised at Rome by his wife Fulvia, and unmindful of the unsettled state of Asia, and the Parthian war. Whilst he tarried on the banks of the Orontes, we are told a deputation f of Jewish ambassadors waited on him, praying a redress of grievances against the usurpations of Faisail and Herod, the two sons of Antipater, the Idumean, a man who was illustrious by his birth, his riches, and abilities. A day was appointed by Antony for the solemn hearing of the cause; the ambassadors of the Jews appeared at the head of a most respectable body of lawyers ||, and charged the two brothers, who were present with many acts of despotic power and oppression. Herod was fortu

* See BLACKWELL, vol. ii. p. 228.

+ Agrippa, Royal Wench,

She made great Cæsar lay his sword to bed.

Enob. The barge she sat in, like a burnished throne,

Burnt on the water.

Mecanas. Now, Antony must leave her utterly.

Enob. Never, he will not.

Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale

Her infinite variety.-ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA.

The temple and village of Daphne, near Antioch, are described by Gibbon in his happiest manner. See his Roman History, vol. iv. p. 106. Sir Walter Raleigh speaks of Daphne as a place of delight. Aliquantum agrorum Daphnensibus dedit Pompeius, quo lucus ibi spatiosior fieret, delectatus amenitate loci, et aquarum abundantia. EUTROPIUS, lib. 6.

This was a second deputation: Antony had received a deputation on a similar aceount some time before when quartered in By. thinia.-BLACKWELL, vol. ii. p. 208, At which time, adds Josephus, Herod was in such favour with Antony, that the ambassadors could not even obtain a hearing.

Blackwell says, they were an hundred of the most powerful men in the nation, who carried with them some of the ablest lawyers aud best speakers of their country.-Vol. ii. p. 241.