ment and distress, became ungovernable. A stroke of the palsy deprived him of the use of his right hand, and he spoke and acted with such extravagant violence, that by many he was reputed insane. A temporary absence from England, however, calmed his temper, while the baths of Aix la Chapelle restored his injured health. Upon his return to London, in 1736, he set Dryden's 'Ode on Alexander's Feast' to music for Covent Garden, where it was so well received that overtures of accommodation were made to him from the Opera House, and he was engaged to supply, for the following season, two pieces, Faramondo' and 'Alessandro Severo,' which were rewarded with a present of 1000l. So rapidly did the hostile feelings from which he had suffered now subside, that he realised 1500l. by a benefit at the Haymarket in 1758. At this conjuncture, could he only have submitted to write for Farinelli, and consent to a becoming association with the other composers, who had the chief management of the opera, he might have restored his fortune and reputation with ease and rapidity. But dogged obstinacy was his severest enemy: he would yield nothing, and therefore received no favour. After bringing out some more Italian operas at Covent Garden, which fell very short of adequate success, he began the composition of those oratorios which constitute the great basis of his fame; and yet at the beginning they were far from returning satisfactory profits or praise. Nevertheless, he continued to produce them Lent after Lent, until the year 1741, when, disgusted at the cool reception of the Messiah, which has ever since been esteemed the finest of the series, he went over to Dublin. In that capital no professional jealousies or fas! 'onable prejudices clouded the sunshine of his talents, or marred the splendour of his entertainments, and the Messiah' was enthusiastically admired. These expressions of public favour induced the most beneficial consequences; for, upon his return to London, after a profitable absence of nine months, crowded audiences came to hear and applaud the composition. Sampson' was next put into rehearsal; and the reputation of the oratorios increased with every returning season. Among the circumstances which operated to quell the voice of this popular hostility, it is not improbable, that the tribute wnich Pope paid to his talents in the Dunciad availed much. Such was the just estimate in which Handel's great powers were held, when, in 1751, a gutta serena wholly deprived him of sight, a misfortune which had also befallen his mother some time before her death. Although unflattered by any promises of relief, he insisted that several operations should be made, which were as fruitless as painful. But this calamity, which, if not the severest, is perhaps the most pitiable of all that may be inflicted on human nature, had but little effect upon his spirits. He continued to perform in public with his accustomed precision and constancy, and even composed several new pieces, though he engaged an assistant for the general business of the orchestre. We are told, however, that the performance of his own melancholy air, Total Eclipse,' from the oratorio of Sampson, ever after used to agitate him strongly. Early in 1758, his health began to decay rapidly; his appetite, which had always been keen, then failed him; he abandoned all hopes of living, and reprobated the confidence of his physicians with peculiar warmth. On the 6th of April, 1759, he took his place as usual in the orchestre, but expired, after a few days' illness, on the 14th of the same month. The solemnity of his funeral, for which he provided in his will, was honourably performed. The bulk of his fortune, amounting to 20,0001., as he was never married, he bequeathed to a niece; but gave the copy-right of his works to Mr. Smith, the professor, who had latterly assisted him in the direction of the oratorio performances, which, it is universally known, have been repeated without intermission down to the present time. But a more honourable tribute of national respect for his name was given in 1785, when a musical commemoration, consisting of pieces chosen exclusively from his works, was held in Westminster Abbey. Five hundred instruments gave due effect to the selections; their late Majesties and family, attended by the principal nobility and gentry of the three kingdoms, added splendour to the scene, and the performances were justly pronounced the grandest ever exhibited to this country. Handel in person was large and ungainly; in manners rough; coarse in his general tastes; and gross in his appetite, which he always indulged to excess. He has been reproached with pe nuriousness, and evidently possessed a criminal temper; yet his heart seems to have been susceptible of much kindness, and he certainly performed acts of great liberality. He is said to have frequently relieved those who were friends to the poverty of his youth; he supported his aged mother, and the widow of his old master Zachaw, and would have provided for his son, but the man s dissipation was incorrigible. As a musician he stands alone; he founded a great style, and it has never been rivalled. Decent, grave and majestic, he was the Milton of music. The graces and refined variety of the Italian school, and the simplicity of our own national ballads, are not to be traced in his scores, yet he has an unadorned beauty peculiar to himself. Deep force and weighty spirit characterise all his productions; but his instrumental accompaniments, chorusses and fugues, are, beyond com. parison, energetic, full, and overwhelming. Some have shown more invention, and richer combinations; others may have more happily approached nature and breathed passion; but no one has so nobly proved the dignity of his art as Handel. JONAS HANWAY. In the north cross aisle of Westminster Abbey, is a monument to record the virtues of Jonas Hanway; it is a tribute defraved by voluntary subscriptions, and executed by Moore, the sculptor. The design consists of a sarcophagus surmounted by a pyramid which is topped with a lamp, and relieved by a medallion of the deceased. On the front of the sarcophagus, Britannia, decorated with the emblems of her state, is introduced in the act of distributing sailors' dresses to poor boys. The following is a copy of the inscription: Sacred to the memory of JONAS HANWAY, Who departed this life September the 5th, 1786, aged 74, Tut whose name liveth, and will ever live whilst active piety shall distinguish The CHRISTIAN, integrity and truth shall recommend The helpless infant nurtur'd through his care, Jonas Hanway was born on the 12th day of August, 1712, at Portsmouth, where his father was storekeeper in the dockyard. Upon the death of the latter, which took place with sudden violence, his widow removed to London, and there bred up four tender children, of whom the subject of this sketch was the oldest, with singular prudence and affection. After an ordinary education, in which he attained some proficiency in Latin, Jonas was bound apprentice in his seventeenth year, to a merchant in Lisbon, and was remarkable for the neatness of his person, and the punctuality of his conduct. In that city he subsequently entered upon the business of a factor on his own account, but, in all probability, with no great success, for he returned to London within a year or two after the expiration of his apprenticeship. No relation of his circumstances is preserved from this period until the year 1743, when he sailed from the Thames to St. Petersburg, and formed a partnership with a merchant. named Dingley. Events soon occurred which induced him to diverge from the immediate duties of this connexion, and the following is an abstract of the cause and consequences of the chang In the year 1738, one Elton, an enterprising sailor, who had roved for some time among the Tartars of Bokhara, submitted a proposition to the British factors in Russia, for introducing a trade into Persia by way of the river Volga, and the Caspian Sea. This project being favourably entertained, a cargo of goods was speedily entrusted to Elton, who completed the journey with a rapidity and success which gave universal satisfaction. An act of Parliament was therefore passed for the protection of the trade, and ships were built in which to carry it on; when Elton unaccountably deserted from the merchants, and went into the service of Nadir Shah, the Persian monarch, who made him superintendant of the coast along the Caspian. Such was the dilemma in which Hanway boldly offered to prosecute the undertaking: his terms were accepted with ready gratitude, and he set out from St. Petersburgh with a caravan of twenty loads of merchandise on the 10th of September, 1743. Taking Moscow and Astrachan in his rout, he reached Astrabad on the opposite shore of the Caspian in safety, during the month of December, and landed his goods with an assurance of protection. At this point, however, his good fortune abandoned him, and he was precipitated into a maze of danger and suffering, such as few would have had the fortitude to endure, or the address to overcome. An insurrection suddenly broke out in the city, and the ringleaders not content with seizing on the merchandize, robbed him of his money, and even deliberated upon the best means of carrying him off into the interior of the country. From this state of insult and cruelty he managed to effect a precipitate retreat; but, instead of flying to the ships and altogether forsaking the venture, he had the courage to pursue the beaten Shah, and obtain a compensation for the loss of the property committed to his charge. To follow him through all the privations he now submitted to, or the imminent risks he ran, would far exceed the limits prescribed for this sketch. It must therefore suffice to state, that after a perilous journey of two months, he came up to the camp in a most exhausted condition, and obtained a decree addressed to the General, who had by this time quelled the revolt, by the terms of which a delivery of all the merchandize, which it was presumed had now been recovered, was directed, and the payment of any deficiency was ordered out of the Shah's chancery. The favour of this grant involved & reiteration of all that fatigue and peril he had already encountered, but he retraced his steps with resolute patience, and had the satisfaction of receiving eighty-five per cent. upon the value of the whole cargo in the |