38 Proportional Change 



rouse fhc general opinion of his extra- 

 ordinary talents, but to mitigate the 

 severity of the judgments which had 

 sometimes been passed on his moral 

 delects." In the second item we have 

 anotlier testimony to the auto-biogra- 

 phic talents of tlie race of the Bour- 

 bons ; and of the royal good taste and 

 skill with which they can appeal toihe 

 sympathies of the world on such dire- 

 ful calamities as being "actually 

 reduced to ti»e necessity of oceasion- 

 ally eating off China, — an extremity 

 which is thus touchingly recorded : 

 ' This was the Orst time that a daugii- 

 ter of the King of Spain, accustomed 

 to be served in gold and silver, saw 

 lierselfohligetl to eat off porcelain !' " 



The rear of the political articles, 

 and of the present Number of this 

 Review, is brought up by a candid and 

 judicious disquisition (spiced a little, 

 it is true, with Whig panegyric,) on 

 Oliscroations on the Judges of the Court 

 of Chanceiy, mid the Practices and 

 Delays complained (f in that Court ; 

 a grievance which has been of late so 

 much discussed, that it is not neces- 

 sary for us to descant. Our cars, it is 

 true, in theatres and other places of. 

 public resort, have long been habi- 

 tuated to panegyrics on the laws, 

 tjualificd however with pointed sar- 

 casms on the jiervcrtiiig knavery of 

 1 the iHiictitioncrs of the law. But it is 

 lime we should open our eyes to the 

 unprejudiced eonviclion, that the root 

 r of the evil is in the entanglement and 

 perplexity of the laws themselves; 

 wliieii in many respects are such, that 

 the only wonder is that the lawyers 

 are so honest as Ihcy are. 



'J'he arlicies on siilijecis of polite 

 literature iu this Number are only 

 three. Art. 4, the Select Melodies of 

 Scotland, interspersed with those of Ire- 

 land and Wales, by George Thomson, 

 F.A.s. lidin. iu which, together with 

 some judicious observations on the 

 consonant principles of melody and 

 liarmony, we have some equally just 

 r<!marks on the inlhience of national 

 songs on national.eharacter, and some 

 merited panegyric on the Ijrical poesy 

 of Scotland, &c. — Art. 8, Travels 

 through Denmark, Sweden, Lapland, 

 Finland, Norway, and Russia, by the 

 late Dr. Clarke; an article which we 

 wish we had space to pursue through 

 the eighteen pages that are not unwor- 

 thily devotl'd to it ; and Art. 9, on the 

 Siciindarfi Scottish Mot'els,—Amials of 

 the raiiffi, aud eleven others, the 



in the Occupation [Feb. I, 



majority of which arc by the same 

 author ; upon which we are not dis- 

 posed to be loquacious, being of 

 opinion that the public are beginuiug 

 to feel that they have had so nearly 

 enough of the first-rate productions of 

 this school, as not to be very desirous 

 of reiterated criticism on those of 

 secondary merit. 



The otdy remaining article, the 

 tenth, is upon a subject more profound 

 and philosophical, — Buckland's Reli- 

 qui(B Diluviana;, or Observations on the 

 Organic Remains, ^'c. and on other 

 Geological Phenomena, attesting i/te 

 Action of an universal Dehtye ; an 

 article upon which, if we entered at 

 all in any shape of controversy, we 

 nnist extend our observations to a 

 length from which we are precluded 

 by the sjiace we have allotted to a 

 subject upon which the generality of 

 our readers, perhaps, will feel a more 

 present interest tlian in the eiujuiry, 

 whether the universal deluge was 

 simultaneous or successive, whether it 

 began in Europe or iu Asia, or whether 

 Cuvicr, Deluc, or Buckland, have 

 been most successful in supporting 

 " the cause of Revelation," by a sys- 

 tematic arrangement of the fossil bones 

 " I'ouud in caves and fissures, and 

 diluvial gravel." The article is writ- 

 ten in the temperate and tolerant spirit 

 of genuine philosophical enquiry ; 

 and, as such, at least is entitled to 

 commendation. And the whole of the 

 present Number, though evincing lit- 

 tle either of the profundity to whicli 

 the Edinburgh lleview onto pretend- 

 ed, or of the ihishy versatility and 

 sarcastic ptmgcncy it once displayed, 

 will be read with pleasure by those 

 who, in i)ublicatious of this descrip- 

 tion, look mere for political dis(iuisi- 

 tions than for a review of the state 

 and progress of general literature. 



To the Editor of the Monthly Magazine. 



NOTWITHSTANDING the nu- 

 merous illustrations of the popu- 

 lation of Great Britain, which have 

 appeared in your Magazine since the 

 liist return to Parliament in the session 

 of 1822; the eternal interest of the 

 subject will doubtless justify a recur- 

 rence to it, as long as an additional 

 spark of light can be elicited : a cor- 

 rect enumeration of the peojilc is 

 un(|uesliouably the (irst step to a just 

 administration of their interests. It is 

 recorded by Sir John Malcolm, in his 

 " Memoir 



J 



