MUIRHEAD’S TRAVELS IN THE LOW COUNTRIES, &c. 
let; or the verse of Falconer. We be- 
lieve there is not a /ubberly phrase to be 
found in it. In some parts perhaps it 
| is exclusively calculated for a seaman’s 
taste. 
. It were needless to dwell upon the 
merits of this volume, after the extracts 
which have been adduced to exemplify 
them. Yet, to use the words of our old 
and delightful poet, W. Browne of Ottery, 
That wheresoe’er we true deserving find, 
To give 9 silent praise is to detyact. 
59 
We have read the book with pleasure, 
and shall with pleasure recur to it. It 
appeafs in the course of the volume, 
that Mr. Davis once designed to publish 
his voyages to the East Indies: we hope 
he will resume and compleat that inten- 
tion, for possessing as he does thé eye 
that can see nature, and the heart that 
can feel nature, we doubt not that it 
is in his power to produce a -work 
that would interest and instruct the 
public. 
Arr. XI. Fournals of Travels in Parts of the late Austrian Low Conntries, France, 
the Pays de Vaud, and Tuscany, in \787 and 1789, By Locuarr Muiruean, 
| J do bear this mind, 
| 
‘es A.M. 8vo. pp. 440. 
MR. MUIRHEAD’ preface is same- 
what stately, 
€© To mark the occurrences of a journey 
is no unpleaging or unprofitable exercise. 
Succession a objects at once quiekens and 
multiplies our conceptions ; whilst a desire 
to register new appearances agreeably be- 
guiles the ennui of monotonous motion, 
of lounging at inns, and of waiting upon 
waiters. Future leisure may give to hurried 
notes the regular form of diaries. These we 
_ peruse with interest—perhaps, with strange 
emotion, at distant and vacant hours. A 
single line may, not unfrequently, revive 
some faded impression, or recall, in all the 
fondness of reerct, the sensations of delight 
r melancholy that are past. The narrative 
4: attract the attention, or awake the feel- 
ings of a friend, or impart instruction or 
amusement to a fellow-creature. 
«© The continent of Europe, it is true, 
has been often traversed, and often describ- 
ed, but is, by no means, so exempt from 
yicissitude, that the accounts of one gene- 
ration should preclude those of another.— 
Besides, extended tracts of territory, adapted 
to the systems of modern society, involve 
such a complication of detail, that the tour- 
ist is usually content to select those observa- 
tions which most readily present themselves, 
er which are most congenial to his taste 
or habits of thinking. Hence, acomplete pic- 
- ture of one country has never, perhaps, been 
‘exhibited to another, and hence, each tra- 
b veller, though he should add much, may 
ee, leave more to be added. In proportion, too, 
___ 4s we accumulate remarks on desig parts, 
we enable the philosopher to widen his 
__ basis of comparisons and inductions, to cor- 
_ tect and modify his statements, and thus, 
_ gradually to approach to truth. 
«© The imperfections, then, not the sub- 
_ ject, of the following pages, require to be 
prefaced in the language of apology.” 
ut 
‘The same studied and sentertious 
style characterizes the journal. We like 
the author better when he relaxes. 
Mr. Muirhead landed at Ostend. He 
describes neatly the first foreign cos- 
tumes that excite his attention. 
¢ As | awaited dinner in the coffee-room, 
two boys, apparently of twelve or thirteen 
years of age, wrapt in warm surtouts, took | 
their seats with great composure, and called, 
in Flemish, each for his tobacco-pipe and 
tumbler of punch. Like grave louugers, 
they conversed, smoked, and tippled, with- 
out attracting the attention or ridicule of 
any in the room, except of the nouveau 
délarqué 
«« Having been recommended to Mons. 
B. I did myself the pleasure of waiting 
upon him in the evening, and found him 
writing ex role de chamlrve in a counting- 
room, hung with old arras, and divided by 
antique skreens. These are trifling circum- 
stances, but mark a country which is not 
British.’ 
The common style of building in 
Flanders, houses having their ends to 
the street, with arched gateways, may 
still be traced, he observes, in some of 
the decayed towns of Scotland, formerly 
connected by trade with Bruges and 
Antwerp. Ostend wants water: it is 
either supplied from rain cisterns, or 
with what is brought in casks froma 
considerable distance. Mr. Muirhead 
regrets, that the sum expended upon its 
fortifications had not been bestowed 
upon water-conduits ; or that the king 
of the Romans had not constructed an 
queduct. Every little city of the 
Romans had its aqueduct, and many a 
one continues, at this day, to be most 
essentially useful, where every other 
monument of their empire has disap- 
