bable you can gratify. By a careful attention to such origi nal articles as your friends may put in your hands, and a judicious felection from others, you may serve up a monthly Dish to the public, which may be useful to them, and refpectable for yourself. Nor do I know any one cause, why a Magazine published at Perth, may not be as well conducted, as at London or Paris.

I obferve your proposed accompaniments of Charles XII. and Hooper's Rational Recreations, which are both valuable books in their different line. An idea has occurred to me, of the practicability of which, you will however be the proper judge: as these two books are esteemed as ftandards in the literary world, and will always command a ready fale, independent of the Magazine; how would it answer to ftitch up a few copies of your Mifcellaneous Department without them, to be fold at Sixpence. This would accommodate two claffes of Readers-thofe who are already poffeffed of these books-and those who can spare Sixpence amonth, but not a Shilling.

Wishing you all fuccefs, I am,

Edinburgh,

6th Dec. 1800.

}

Sir,

Your most obed. fervant,
AMICUS.

THE Editor returns thanks to AMICUS for this early proof of his friendship. His fuggeftions as to the plan and execution of the work will ever be as acceptable, as any literary communications with which he may from time to time favor us; but the arrangement he proposes above, as to the feparate publication of the Mifcellany, would not answer the Publisher's purpose, for several reafons unneceffary to mention here.

JAMES HAY BEATTIE.

THE literary world have not received any thing in the Poetical department of more value, for some time past, than two little volumes that were published in the end of laft year, by the celebrated Dr Beattie. They contain his juftly admired "Minftrel" and other fmaller pieces; and the poems of James Hay Beattie, his fon, a youth of the greateft promife, who was fnatched from the cares of this world, while his name was hardly yet known to fame. We believe we could not chufe any fubject with which to commence our Mifcellany, that would be more fatisfactory to our readers, than the following fhort account of him, ex

tracte

tracted from the beautiful memoir, written by his father, prefixed to the poems.

JAMES HAY BEATTIE was born at Aberdeen the 6th of November, 1768. His infancy paffed without any thing remarkable, unless a mildnefs and docility of nature, which adhered to him through life, may be termed fuch. "The first rules of morality, I taught him," fays his father, were to speak truth, and keep a fecret; and I never found that in a fingle inftance he tranfgreffed either.

"The doctrines of religion I wished to impress on his mind as foon as it might be prepared to receive them; but I did not fee the propriety of making him commit to memory theological fentences, or any fentences which it was not poffible for him to understand. And I was defirous to make a trial how far his own reafon could go in tracing out, with a little direction, the great and firft principle of all religion, the being of God. The following fact is mentioned, not as a proof of fuperior fagacity in him (for I have no doubt but moft children would in like circumftances think as he did), but merely as a moral or logical experiment.

"He had reached his fifth (or fixth) year, knew the alphabet, and could read a little; but had received no particular information with refpect to the author of his being; because I thought he could not yet understand fuch information; and because I had learned from my own experience, that to be made to repeat words not understood, is extremely detrimental to the faculties of a young mind. In a corner of a little garden, without informing any perfon of the circumftance, I wrote in the mould with my finger the three initial letters of his name; and, fowing garden creffes in the furrows, covered up the feed, and fmoothed the ground. Ten days after, he came running to me, and with astonishment in his countenance told me that his name was growing in the garden. I fmiled at the report, and feemed inclined to difregard it; but he infifted on my going to see what had happened. Yes, faid I carelessly, on coming to the place, I fee it is fo; but there is nothing in this worth notice; it is mere chance; and I went away. He followed me; and, taking hold of my coat, faid with fome earnestnefs, it could not be by mere chance; for that fomebody muft have contrived matters fo as to produce it. I pretend not to give his words, or my own, for I have for gotten both; but I give the substance of what paffed be tween us in fuch language as we both understood.-So you think, I faid, that what appears fo regular as the letters of your name cannot be by chance. Yes, faid he

with

with firmnefs; I think fo. Look at yourfelf, I replied, and confider your hands and fingers, your legs and feet, and other limbs; are they not regular in their appearance, and ufeful to you? He faid they were. Came you then hither, faid I, by chance? No, he anfwered; that cannot be; fomething muft have made me. And who is that fomething? 1 afked. He faid he did not know. (F took particular notice, that he did not fay as Rouffeau fancies a child in like circumstances would fay, that his parents made him.) I had now gained the point I aimed at and faw that his reafon taught him (though he could not fo express it,) that what begins to be muft have a cause, and that what is formed with regularity must have an intelligent caufe. I therefore told him the name of the Great Being, who made him and all the world; concerning whofe admirable nature I gave him fuch information as I thought he could in fome measure comprehend. The leffon affected him greatly, and he never forgot either it or the circumftance that introduced it."

His studies and acquifitions in literature which the Doctor has minutely detailed, we fhall here pass over in filence. His industry was great, and his improvement such as might be expected. In April, 1786, he was admitted to the degree of Mafter of Arts; and in June, 1787, on the recommenda tion of the Marifchal College of Aberdeen, his Majefty was pleafed to appoint him Affiftant Profeffor of Moral Philofophy and Logick; his age at that time not quite nineteen. The duties of this office he performed with confiderable ability, but his usefulness did not continue long. In November, 1789, he was feized with a fever, from which he never recovered, but lingered near twelve months, and expired the 19th November, 1790.

Dr Beattie concludes his circumftantial and elegant narrative in the following fubmiffive and affectionate terms:

"I have loft the pleafanteft, and, for the last four or five year of his fhort life, one of the most inftructive companions that ever man was delighted with. But-THE LORD GAVE; THE LORD HATH TAKEN AWAY: BLESSED BE THE NAME OF THE LORD.-I adore the Author of all Good, who gave him grace to lead fuch a life, and die fuch a death, as makes it impoffible for a Chriftian to doubt of his having entered upon the inheritance of a happy immortality."

We fubjoin one of his odes, as it is fuppofed to have been written on visiting the magnificent fcenery of the cliffs of Kinnoul in our neighbourhood. It is thought to be a happy imitation of Gray's noble ode, written at the Chartreufe.

POWER

POWER of these awful regions, hail!
For fure fome mighty genius roves
With step unheard, or loves to fail

Unfeen along thefe clifts and groves.
O'er the wild mountain's ftormy wafte,.
The fhatter'd crag's impending breast,
And rocks by mortal feet untrod;
Deep in the murmuring night of woods,
Or mid the headlong roar of floods,

More bright we view the prefent God.
More bright than if in glittering state
O'er canopied with gold he fat,

The pride of Phidian art confefs'd.-
Hail, Power fublime! thy votary shield;
O liften to thy lay, and yield

A young but weary wanderer reft.
But if from reft and filence torn,

And these lov'd fcenes, I roam afar,
By fate's returning furge down born,
To tofs in care's tumultuous war;
Grant me fecure from toil and ftrife,
And all the vain alarms of life,

And all the rabble's feverish rage,
Remote in fome obfcure retreat,
At least to pafs, in freedom fweet,
The folitude of age.

THE KIRK WARDEN.

THE fubject of the following Poem, was a person of humble condition, but of primitive integrity. His heart was a fountain of philanthropy, and his face a mirrour of the feelings which paffed there :-He had no stores, no granaries; but what he had he liberally imparted:-His fnuffbox, the only part of his property which escaped the ravages of fortune, was ever open. The hoary fire and the ftayed matron, the beau and the coquette, were welcome to fhare of its contents: and fuch were the chearful manner and the natural politeness with which it was prefented, that few ever rejected this pulveriferous effufion of his benevolence. Its happy effects at church will long be remembered-Often has it filled a languid paufe in the parfon's preaching, arrefted the roving thoughts of the gay, and sneezed the lumbering finner

A 3.

into

into pious attention. The other features of the character are drawn from nature, and founded upon reality.

FRAIL man! while plying thro' life's various feas,
In vain he struggles against fate's decrees;
No fex, no age, not all the charms of youth,
Can ward death's mandate, or excite his ruth:
Not ev'n churchmen, virtue's modeft race,
Amidft their temp'rance, can elude his chace:
All! all muft vifit that dark dread realm,
Both paffengers and pilot at the helm.
Why then lament the gen'ral doom of man?
That ftill attends him fince the world began ;
But fifter definies indulge fome fighs,

Due to the venerable Warden when he dies.
Full many a year the good man trod this earth,
And many a death he faw, and many a birth:
Full many changes in his days were feen,
Yet ftill contentment gladden'd o'er his mien.
Did war or famine devaftation spread,
Or civil difcord rear his gorgon head,
He heard the found, as diftant thunders roll,
And still preferv'd the fun-shine of his foul:
Did malice, rancour, in this world fo rife,
Brew 'midft his neighbours to engender ftrife;
He never join'd-at distance from the fray
His placid moments fmoothly wing'd their way..
Tho' by profeffion he fhould joy to hear
The tale that draws the confcious female's tear,
So far remov'd from lucre was his view,

That ftill he forrowed when the tale was true:
And when, at length, at duty's call he hy'd
To feek the dwelling where the frail one figh❜d;
In mild demeanour he before her ftands,
And faultering utters the ftern Kirk's commands.
At that beheft, when grief reviv'd she felt,
In tender fympathy his foul would melt.

Tho' fair his character the mufe would draw,

To nature juft he had one fignal flaw,

Which vex'd the Parfon fore and warm'd his blood,-
The humble Warden was a man too good;
For tho' ftrict morals and the church difclaim,

He long would hide the female's growing fhame,
Was ftill the laft at feffion to unfold,

The well known fcandal, in the parish old.

There