the object of the poem, but confift of compliments to many gentlemen in the country-all which may be well merited by them, and very grateful on the part of the author, but are not very entertaining to the public-to the country banks in his vicinity-allufions to the fhade of his mother, to his own children, and to various other local circumftances and events; and, although much piety and ingenuity be evinced in their introduction, unless peculiarly illuftrative of his fubject, they have nothing to do with at poem profeffedly didactic. Thus much we have felt it our duty to fay on the great outlines of the compofition, and in which we think it is highly defective. We will now fpeak of it in detail; and offer fome quotations which we think will justify the opinion we entertain of Dr. B, namely, that he has much of the fpirit, the fancy, the fenfibility, the piety of a poet, but is deficient in that foundness of judgement, extent of information, and accuracy of discrimination, fo eminently requifite, to be able to write in letters of gold, the moft univerfal and precious rules of any art or fcience.'

This poem commences, like most others, with a dedication, and an invocation to the various powers of nature, for their affiftance in the great labour before him: he then points out the afpect of the Hop-Garden, which he recommends~~

"Should meet the fouthern or the western ray."

He then proceeds to the foil, manure, &c. which he defcribes in very good poetry: his opinion on the subject of narrow wheels is in unifon with that of the best farmers; we will transcribe it as a fpecimen of the dress which a poetic mind can give to a very com→ mon fubject:

"Ere winter's frigid hand a snowy robe
Caft o'er the earth, indurating its glebe,
Let the well-practifed ploughman, to and fro',
Drive deep the fhare with spiky harrow next,
Sever the clods 'till level be the space
Selected for thy purpose. Compoft then,
Putrefcent, draw on wains with broadeft wheels
Abolish'd be the harrow from the land--

Marring thy fields fmooth furface, and much more.
The roads, which link in wide extending chains
The peopled haunts of men.---Machines accurft!
Wearing vile ravines, dangerous and deep,
Impeding commerce, and to those whofe aims
Quickness demand---impracticable bar,
O might fome falutary law reftrain,
Wifely fevere, th' incalculable ills
Which ampleft revenues, and ceafelefs toil,
Unable are to cure---Ne'er let fuch wains
Injure thy paftures, nor, deftructive, grind

Thy public ways, thy own exhaufted team
Diftreffing, merciless, and oft thy gear
Snapping incontinent; or deep in mire,
Thine axle 'prifoning---perchance upfet,
Its load down frightful precipice o'erthrown!
Then imprecations blafphemous, and loud,
Bellows the angry driver. Far from home,
No wifhed affiftance vifible or near,

And night's dark fhadows gath'ring faft around---
Paffion and grief alternate swell his breast,
And many a wealing ftripe, and many a curse
Beftows he on his innocent, poor brutes---
More brutal he; nor guiltless thou thyfelf,
The cause of the disafter.---Ah, these ills
Avoid, by fuch machines, more useful far,
As o'er earth's furface almoft printless roll,

Like fledge imooth gliding, or Kamikatca's fnow, &e."

He next proceeds, after the choice of the kind of hop, through the operations of planting and tran planting, weeding, and training, to the poles. In his defcription of the laft, he has the following lines :--

"Or round the maples rough indented arms,

Teach the young hop in dalliance fweet to climb."

"The village-poor (and chief, that tender fex,
For arduous toils ne'er deftined) introduce
To wed with rufhy rings the amorous bines

To their expectant mates."

Did the author never fee the " Purfuits of Literature?" If not, we recommend to his notice the character there given of Darwinian poetry; after reading the two following lines, we tuft, if he write again, he will ceafe the use of fuch meretricious or

nament:--

"In fweet Tetrandian, Monogynian, ftrains,
Pant for a peftil in botanic pains."

Through much amufing matter, and tolerable verfification, embellished with many affecting tales and apt fimilies, we approach the joyous feafon of the "hop-picking." We could, if the fp ce we allow for publications of this nature would permit us, offer to our readers many beautiful felections from this little poem. The following, however, we think so very characteristic, that we cannot refufe ourselves the pleasure of giving it: it is the defcription the wandering magician Mikelan

"Then vefper meal concluded, yon fmooth lawn

Invites the fmiling ragged crew (the hop pickers) to meet,
With minftrelfy, as rude and little tun'd

As is their nature.

See! a poor blind man,

Gg 4

Bending

Bending with age,---perhaps fome fourfcore years,
His fandals cobbled c umfily, and cut
In yielding wide inte tices acrofs,

To eafe his crippled fe t, infirm and old!
His doublet, fercely ought of what it was,
When fitted firft for other back, long fince,
Now patch'd with various fcraps of various dyes,
The boon of many a village,---remnants, all
Of garments worn e 'rewhile by 'fquire and clown,
Curate and parish Clerk, grown rufty now,
And lack nap, through fervice long perform'd,
Beneath a fpreading elm he fits; a dog
(His faithful leader) near him, fkilled to earn
By many a winning prank, fuch fcanty fare
As lowly poverty has power to give;
Swept by an hoary beard---a violin,

Old like its owner, and the worfe for wear,
Pours forth its merry mufic, unchastised

By critic rule, or scientific art;

Yet not to vulgar ears devoid of charm,

His income hence, and paffport through the world."

With the feast of the hop-pickers, which is naturally and pleafantly told, he concludes his poem.

To this publication is added, what the author terms a Sequel Poem to the Hop-Garden," being a Poem on the fubject of that true Britifh beverage," Ale." He thus begins:

I, who late fung the culture of the Hop,
And led the Planter through each anxious ftage
That marks its growth, from earliest infancy
To ripened bloom, now close the varied fong
No unappropriate clofe to fuch a theme-
Hops potent effence, ale; bring hither, boy!
That Imiling goblet, from the cafk juft brimm'd,
Where floats a pearly ftar *, by it inspired,
No purple wine, no mufes aid I afk

To nerve my lines and bid them smoothly flow.

This is fpirited and poetic. In fuch lines as the above he ceeds to enumerate the feafons, and occafions, when Britons, "With fuited beverage from their native plains Brifk cyder or invigorating ale,"

pro

aelebrate the various feftivals of the year, which are both happily chefen, and well defcribed. As true Englishmen, fondly, and ardently attached to the ancient and hofpitable manners of our country, and as friends devoted to the fupport of its religion as " by

* The proof of its strength and freshness.

law

law established," we are delighted to meet with a mind congenial to our own. The favage refinement of French principles hath erafed from the calendar every diftinctive mark of times and feafons, which the piety of their ancestors had fet apart for the commemoration of facred events, or of thofe hiftoric or political changes by which the nation had been benefited. And this total abandonment of experienced good for vifionary improvement is one of the mischievous effects which have intruded themselves into this country. That pious gravity, and pleafing melancholy, which diftinguifhed the obfervation of the feafon of Lent, and Eater; the joyous feftivity and innocent recreation with which Christmas was celebrated; the revelry and happiness which attached to the twentyninth of May, and the regret and horror which the calamity of the 30th of January excited in our fathers, are all fwept away in one ftupid and unvaried found of thoughtlefinefs, extravagance, and diffipation; infpired by the principles of the times; or if one day is more marked than the ret, it is a day infamous in our annals either for rebellion or bloodshed. Dr. Booker is not among the latter clafs of thinkers-contrat his account of Christmas, as it was, with Christmas as it is

Gladly I greet thee, Christmas! then benign;
Tho' winter bring thee in his icy car,
When not a fountain murmurs, or a bird
Affays his fong; when ftretches wide and far
A fnowy profpect, and thro' funless skies
Infuriate tempefts roll. Thrice welcome all
The heralds of thy coming-twilight days
Curtail'd and shadow'd by dun mifty clouds;
The curfew peal at eve; and, when falt fleeps
A bufy world, the nightly ferenade

Of Vigil-band-now diftant heard-now loft
The strain foft dying, on the wakeful ear,
Stol'n by th' enamour'd breeze.-

-How fweet the founds

Of mufic, when the world is hufh'd in fleep!
When filence paces with unfandall'd foot
The moffy lawn by Cynthia's filver light,
And Echo vainly liftens in her cave
For fomething to repeat! At that ftill hour
Not yoid of charm is fimplet minstrelsy
The carrol ditty fung from door to door,
Hymning a Saviour born.-Return, return,
Ye hallowed happy times! when festive glee
Cheered every dwelling-e'en the ftraw-roof'd hut
By affluence bounty blefs'd. Unfelt, the storm
Then blew, for plenty and a blazing hearth
To poverty and hoary age, fupplied

A kind nepenthe for each out-ward ill.
Then, fliced in ample bowl, the yule-bùn fwam
In newly broached October, &c. &c.

With this extract we will conclude. As a poet, as a divine, and as a man of found principles, Dr. B. has our beft wishes for fuccefs. If we think we perceive fome deficiencies in his works, they are fuch as, in no way, to effect his reputation in either of the above characters; and he may be fatisfied with the reflection that has fatisfied many wife and great men, that univerfal excellence is the lot of few.

ART. XVII. Poems by Edward Atkyns Bray. Pp. 240. Rivingtons.

THIS little volume confifts of Ballads, Tales, Sonnets, &c. written, as it feems, by a young man, as the amufement of his leifure hours." Although the author of thefe poems appears by no means deficient in poetical fpirit, we were not pleafed to find his two firft Ballads taken with little variation of ftory, from

Alphonfo the brave, and the fair Iphigene," and the German ftory of" Leonora *" Indeed, many others of them, remind us of what we have formerly read, the Tale of "Bernard and Martha," is to us, at leaft, original, and is very interesting. We decline making any extracts from the volume before us, as it would be difficult to felect any, which would do the author more credit than the reft. A famenefs pervades the whole, never reaching the high flights of fancy, nor falling into that ftupid infipidity, which difgufts his readers. Though the public may not be much edified by this work, we have no doubt the immediate friends of the author have been gratified by this proof of his ingenuity and difinterestedness; for the file in which it is given to the world, precludes every idea that emolument is the object of publication.

*We had flattered ourselves that Mr. Coleman's little Ballad of "Lord Hoppergollop's Country Houfe," had cured our modern writers of the rage for imitating fuch vile trafh as the German Stories of this day exhibit. Rev.

MISCELLANIES.*****

ART. XVIII. The British Flora, or a Linnean Arrangement of Bri tifh Plants, with their generic and specific Characters, felect Synonyms, English Names, Places of Growth, Duration, Times of Flowering, and References to Figures. By John Hull, M. D. Member of the Corporation of Surgeons, and of the Phyfical Society of London; of the Natural Hiftory Society of Edinburgh; and Secretary of the Literary and Philofophical Society of Manchefter. Part 1. 8vo. Pr. 449. Price 8s. 6d. Bickerstaff, London, 1799.

THE method which Dr. Hull has adopted, in this Arrangement of British Plants, is best explained by himself in his Preface; in addition to which we have only to fay, that, as far as we have been able

to