1830.] Affairs in General 695 



time of dinner, or the differential of tea according to the longitude, with 

 more philosophical accuracy. The captain did his duty gallantly, filling 

 his table-books with figures of the most imposing regularity. We should 

 like to know what has become of those labours, or of the blundering 

 instrument with which he made his erroneous observations. And yet 

 all those triflers actually consider themselves as first-rate personages, 

 terribly injured by being still unpensioned, unribboned and unlorded. 

 Is there one of them who deserves the slightest notice from government, 

 or from any body else? "We pause for a reply/' Then we have an 

 astronomer royal. We should like to know how many blunders there 

 are in the Nautical Almanack this year less than the last ; or how often 

 the professor ventures to look at a star without a letter from Olbers of 

 Bremen, assuring him in the first instance that it is a star, and not a 

 Congreve rocket. 



We ask, is there one man among all those pompous persons who makes 

 any figure among the continental philosophers ? is there one of them 

 within a hundred degrees of Lagrange or Euler? or if those names set all 

 their competition at defiance, is there one who is fit to hold up the skirts 

 of Arago or Biot ? And yet those persons are all for knighthoods and 

 pensions. They are fit for squabbling at the Royal Society, and that " is 

 their vacation, Hal." 



The papers say, that Sir Walter Scott has refused the pension offered 

 to him by government to make up the difference between his full salary, 

 as Clerk of Session, and his retired pension. We are glad to hear of this 

 refusal, and hope that the example will be followed. A statement of Sir 

 Walter's affairs has lately been given, by which it appears that Ballan- 

 tyne and Co., with whom he was concerned, and who fell with the fall 

 of Constable's house some years ago, have been enabled, through Sir 

 Walter's means, to pay 54,000, of which the Ballantynes furnished but 

 7,000. A post obit bond of 22,000 is further in the hands of the 

 creditors, on which Sir Walter has paid the policy of insurance ; and the 

 new edition of his novels, with his notes, &c., has already produced 

 30,000. It is further said, that the creditors are to have a proposal 

 made to Sir Walter, to take back his library, manuscripts, and plate, 

 which of course had become their property. All this is as it ought to 

 be, and we expect that as Sir Walter has dealt honestly, his creditors 

 will deal generously. 



We hope that the new ministers will learn wisdom from their own 

 experience, and offend the public feelings by none of the follies of their 

 predecessors. The yeomanry are called out again by the necessity of 

 the case ; and this too, by the individual who, more than any other man 

 in the empire, wished to supersede all other force by the standing army. 

 The Bucks yeomanry under the Marquis of Chandos, have been called out, 

 and have gone on duty into Hampshire. All the other yeomanry ought to 

 be called out in the same manner. Riots and burnings may go on for 

 ever in the face of a standing army, with its embroidered staff, pompous 

 reviewing generals, and all the solemn incumbrances of the service ; but 

 the only force equal to put down domestic disturbance of the present 

 kind is the yeomanry. It was one of the errors of the amphibious 

 administration, in which the Marquis of Lansdowne was Home Secre- 

 tary, to extinguish the yeomanry. 



