proved system: but it carries with it the advantage, that it repeals all the former enactments; so that the bankrupt-laws are simplified, though otherwise not at all ameliorated Another most important act was that which raised the salaries of the Judges, in compensation for several descriptions of fees which they or their officers received, and for some patronage of which they were deprived. According to these regulations, the Lord Chief Justice of the King's Bench is to receive 10,000l. a year; the Lord Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, 8000l. a year; the Chief Baron of the Exchequer and Master of the Rolls, 7000l. a year each; and all the Puisne Judges, together with the Vice-Chancellor, 5500l. a year respectively. The combination-laws were also modified during this session: we fear we can hardly say that they were improved; for since the act was first meditated, combinations of workmen have been more numerous, more systematic, and more malignant, than during any former period in our history. Another important measure was the assimilation of the Irish currency to that of England: bank-tokens were ordered to be called in, and sterling to be the circulating medium and money of exchange for Ireland from and after the 1st of January, 1826.

The number of petitions for private bills presented to Parliament in the last session was 438; in consequence of which 286 acts were passed. Of these, 11 were for the establishment of Joint-Stock Companies; 23 for Enclosures; 3 for Draining; 2 for the Regulation of Tithes; 104 for the Improvement of Towns; 146 for the Improvement of Internal Communication by means of Rivers, Roads, and Canals; 24 for the Accommodation of Shipping, and of the Coasting Trade; 51 relating to Divorces, Private Properties, and other matters bearing no relation to public benefit or convenience.

We have thus given a concise summary of the most important proceedings in Parliament during the last session. The Appendix is far from being the least interesting part of the work: it presents, in an alphabetical list, the names of the members, the places for which they are returned, under what influence, and the manner in which each member has voted. The criticisms on some of the members we do not esteem of much value: but we cannot dismiss this work, as a whole, without honestly recommending it to all persons to whom the proceedings in Parliament are in any way objects of interest. The execution of this volume, as to its style, is not to be much commended: in this respect it stands in need of great improvement.

ART.

ART. IV. The Lives of Dr. John Donne, Sir Henry Wotton, Mr. Richard Hooker, Mr. George Herbert, and Dr. Robert Sanderson. By Izaak Walton. To which are added, the Autographs of those eminent Men, now first collected; an Index, and illustrative Notes. 12mo. Boards. 18s. Major. 1825.

Iz ZAAK WALTON's name is one which brings with it some of the most agreeable associations of any name in our literature. The quiet, easy gliding of his style puts us in mind of the calm brook along the banks of which he pursued his tranquil occupation; and in going through his works we feel as if we were enjoying a conversation with Piscator himself, angling through a pleasant country. The character of his works is impressed upon his good-natured and simple countenance, the expression of which we may well say represents

"Candida semper

Gaudia, et in vultu curarum ignara voluptas.”

His work on Angling is better known than that before us, and it is on that production that his fame is generally established. It has procured him the promise of immortality in a beautiful sonnet of Wordsworth:

"While flowing rivers yield a blameless sport

Shall live the name of Walton

- sage benign,
Whose pen the mysteries of the rod and line
Unfolding, did not fruitlessly exhort
To reverent watching of each still report
That nature utters from her rural shrine.
Oh! nobly versed in simple discipline,
Meek, thankful soul, the vernal day how short
To thy loved pastime given by sedgy Lea,

Or down the tempting maze of Shawford brook!
Fairer than life itself in thy sweet book

The cowslip-bank, and shady willow tree,

And the fresh meads, where flowed from every nook
Of thy full bosom, gladsome piety."

of

But though the Angler is the more famous at present, his lives of Donne and other eminent churchmen have not been neglected. In them we find the same characteristics which are so charming in his piscatory works applied to purposes higher mood. The men, whose lives he took upon him to record to posterity, were each of them remarkable in the most remarkable age of the church of England; and if Walton does not bring to his task learning sufficient to do justice to Hooker, or the courtier-like views which would elucidate many passages in the life of Wotton, yet he has given us a smooth and agreeable narration, in which all the good and amiable

19

amiable points in every character are set in their fairest and most engaging light. In short, these lives are something in the manner of the French elogés, in which the biographer thinks himself bound to exalt the fame of his subject. They differ, however, from the labored works of the Academy, in the great simplicity of their style, and the unostentatiousness of the praise which always falls on the quieter virtues, and the more retiring habits of those of whom they treat.

Dupont, in some Latin verses to Walton, well describes the book. They have been excellently translated by Mr. Tate for Dr. Zouch's Life of old Izaak, and are worth copying:

"And yet your pen aspires above
The maxim of the art you love;
The virtues faintly taught by rule
Are better learned in angling's school,
Where temperance that drinks the rill,
And patience sovereign over ill,
By many an active lesson bought,
Refine the soul, and steel the thought.
Far higher truths you love to start
To train us to a nobler art,
And in the lives of good men give
That chiefest lesson, how to live,
While Hooker, philosophic sage,
Becomes the wonder of your page;
Or while we see combined in one
The wit and the divine in Donne;
Or while the poet and the priest
In Herbert's sainted form confest,
Unfold the temple's holy maze,
That awes, and yet invites our gaze;
Worthies these of pious name
From your portraying pencil claim
A second life, and strike anew
With fond delight the admiring view;
And thus at once the peopled brook
Submits its captives to your hook,
And we the wiser sons of men
Yield to the magic of your pen,
While angling on some streamlet's brink
The muse and you combine to think."

It may be superfluous to make extracts from a work so well known, yet we shall venture on one or two.

We shall take his account of the apparition of Dr. Donne's lady to him ; a story which it is evident that Walton believed.

'At this time of Mr. Donne's and his wife's living in Sir Robert's house, the Lord Hay was, by King James, sent upon a glorious embassy to the then French King, Henry the Fourth; and

Sir Ro

Sir Robert put on a sudden resolution to accompany him to the French court, and to be present at his audience there. And Sir Robert put on as sudden a resolution to solicit Mr. Donne to be his companion in that journey. And this desire was suddenly made known to his wife, who was then with child, and otherwise under so dangerous a habit of body, as to her health, that she professed an unwillingness to allow him any absence from her; saying, "Her divining soul boded her some ill in his absence;" and therefore desired him not to leave her. This made Mr. Donne lay aside all thoughts of the journey, and really to resolve against it. But Sir Robert became restless in his persuasions for it, and Mr. Donne was so generous as to think he had sold his liberty, when he received so many charitable kindnesses from him; and told his wife so; who did therefore, with an unwilling willingness, give a faint contest to the journey, which was proposed to be but for two months; for about that time they determined their return. Within a few days after this resolve, the ambassador, Sir Robert, and Mr. Donne, left London; and were the twelfth day got all safe to Paris. Two days after their arrival there, Mr. Donne was left alone in that room, in which Sir Robert, and he, and some other friends, had dined together. To this place Sir Robert returned within half an hour; and as he left, so he found, Mr. Donne alone; but in such an ecstasy, and so altered as to his looks, as amazed Sir Robert to behold him; insomuch that he earnestly desired Mr. Donne to declare what had befallen him in the short time of his absence. To which Mr. Donne was not able to make a present answer: but, after a long and perplexed pause, did at last say, have seen a dreadful vision since I saw you: I have seen my dear wife pass twice by me through this room, with her hair hanging about her shoulders, and a dead child in her arms: this I have seen since I saw you." To which Sir Robert replied, "Sure, Sir, you have slept since I saw you; and this is the result of some melancholy dream, which I desire you to forget, for you are now ́awake." To which Mr. Donne's reply was, "I cannot be surer that I now live, than that I have not slept since I saw you; and am as sure, that at her second appearing, she stopped, and looked me in the face, and vanished.". Rest and sleep had not altered Mr. Donne's opinion the next day: for he then affirmed this vision with a more deliberate, and so confirmed a confidence, that he inclined Sir Robert to a faint belief that the vision was true. -It is truly said, "that desire and doubt have no rest ;" and it proved so with Sir Robert; for he immediately sent a servant to Drewryhouse, with a charge to hasten back, and bring him word, whether Mrs. Donne were alive; and, if alive, in what condition she was as to her health. The twelfth day the messenger returned with this account: That he found and left Mrs. Donne very sad, and sick in her bed; and that, after a long and dangerous labour, she had been delivered of a dead child. And, upon examination, the abortion proved to be the same day, and about the very hour, that Mr. Donne affirmed he saw her pass by him in his chamber.

I

• This

like an

This is a relation that will beget some wonder, and it well may; for most of our world are at present possessed with an opinion, that visions and miracles are ceased. And, though it is most certain, that two lutes being both strung and tuned to an equal pitch, and then one played upon, the other, that is not touched, being laid upon a table at a fit distance, will echo to a trumpet-warble a faint audible harmony in answer to the same tune; yet many will not believe there is any such thing as a sympathy of souls; and I am well pleased, that every reader do enjoy his own opinion. But if the unbelieving will not allow the believing reader of this story a liberty to believe that it may be true, then I wish him to consider, many wise men have believed that the ghost of Julius Cæsar did appear to Brutus, and that both St. Austin and Monica his mother had visions in order to his conversion.'

He follows up the argument by quotations from Scripture.

Walton, as might be expected from his maternal descent, which was from a niece of Archbishop Cranmer's, was a staunch adherent of the church of England, and he lived in a time when the sincerity of that love was vehemently tried ; being born in 1593, and living until 1683, the most stormy period of that church. His affection subsisted through good and evil report; and almost the last act of his life, at the age of eighty-seven, was to write a pamphlet in its defence. It is no wonder, then, that he laments over the success of the Presbyterian party at the end of the reign of Charles I.

And about this time the Bishop of Canterbury having been by an unknown law condemned to die, and the execution suspended for some days, many of the malicious citizens, fearing his pardon, shut up their shops, professing not to open them till justice was executed. This malice and madness is scarce credible; but I saw it.

The bishops had been voted out of the House of Parliament, and some upon that occasion sent to the Tower; which made many Covenanters rejoice, and believe Mr. Brightman-who probably was a good and well-meaning man- to be inspired in his "Comment on the Apocalypse," an abridgment of which was now printed, and called Mr.Brightman's "Revelation of the Revelation." And though he was grossly mistaken in other things, yet, because he had made the churches of Geneva and Scotland, which had no bishops, to be Philadelphia in the Apocalypse, "the angel that God loved," Rev. iii. 7-13., and the power of prelacy to be antichrist, the evil angel, which the House of Commons had now so spewed up, as never to recover their dignity; therefore did those Covenanters approve and applaud Mr. Brightman for discovering and foretelling the bishops' downfall; so that they both railed at them, and rejoiced to buy good pennyworths of their lands, which their friends of the House of Commons did afford them, as a reward of their diligent assistance to pull them down.

· And