tions, attracted so much the attention of their wits as collections of anecdotes, and what were announced under the various titles of Curiosities of Literature, Gleanings, or Beauties, or Elegant Extracts; and the inanity of their tastes was such, and whatever was solid or valuable in the books that had been the subjects of these selections had been so cautiously and dextrously avoided, that future editions might be much improved and purified by these negative instructions, and might at once reduce their compass, and enhance their value, by striking out, with a similar caution, the adoptions of these busy purgators.

T

I had not been long engaged in this examination, in one of the largest shops in the city, before there flocked round me a great number of persons of both sexes, of whom each presented me with a long list of names, purporting to be the names of subscribers to works in contemplation to be published. I answered them with a bow and a smile, and made the best of my way into the street, where my obliging conductor paid me a handsome compliment upon my pene

tration.

In the course of my perambulation, it was impossible not to take notice of the many airy equipages which were passing to and fro; and, to judge from the multitude of ducal and other coronets which were painted thereon, there seemed to be a mighty number of most noble and right honourable peers: and my conductor told me, that so many of this number had been recalled, that I should find, on my return, the coachmakers' warehouses full of the second-hand, carriages of the nobility; and should be able to call a state-coach from the stand at Charing Cross, and ride in it to St. Paul's for eighteenpence.

As there happened to be a stoppage of the ballooncoaches, in a narrow street called Frippery Row, I had leisure to observe the different faces of those who were carried along in them, and was pleased at recognising some very noisy members of our house of commons. There were also a great many sleek faces in full-bottomed wigs, and a vast deal of lawn and prunella, in many of these floating carriages.

I own I could not help being a little scandalised at the prodigious number of "Lookers-on" that choked up the streets; but my guide assured me that these were no observers of men and manners, but received from what was passing before them a sort of idiotic gratification, or such a pleasure as children experience in beholding a sky-rocket or catharine-wheel. "The most serious parts of these men's lives," said he, "are spent in assisting at dinners, or walking in processions; and it is surprising what numbers of this description have been recalled by our edict from the country to which you belong." Here I interrupted my guide, and begged to know the hour of the day; but he told me that no watches or clocks could be made to go in that country, owing to some quality in the air which relaxed their springs; a circumstance, however, the less to be regretted, as a people that had nothing to do, could have no great reckonings with time. He added, that they generally told the days of the week by the length of the men's beards in the market-places.

I remarked to my friend, as we continued our walk, the prodigious noise of tongues, which seemed to issue from almost every third house we passed; and was surprised at being told that there was no less a number than five thousand debating-clubs in the city of Tintinabia; and that, in a part of the town called Rag-Street, Echo Square, there was a

perpetual rumbling, like the sound of hackneycoaches in London. I did not forget to pay my visit to some of the churches, which were all crowded like every other public place, and where all seemed to be talking as loud as they could, but the clergyman (with the help of his sounding-board) louder than them all; and I could observe a great number of pious and plump devotees throw quantities of oystershells and rotten nuts into the poor's boxes.

W

In regard to the buildings, I could not but take notice, that they seemed throughout of a similar construction, and consistency to those new rows of houses which have lately been pasted together in the suburbs of London; and the place altogether looked more like the model of a city, or such a one as the pastry-cook in Cornhill will build for a lordmayor's dinner, than a real and habitable metropolis.

I shall give the remaining part of the history of my vision in a future paper, which will contain a description of my travels up the country, and my introduction at court.

Discrepet his alius. Geminos, horoscope, varo
Producis genio.

Under the self-same planet born, we see

E'en twins will in their natures disagree.

PERS. Sat.

My constant attention to the various descriptions of characters into which mankind distribute themselves,

has brought me acquainted with several smaller classes and subdivisions, which pass unobserved by those who watch these diversities less narrowly than myself. In my profession of a Looker-on, there is a skill in classing and arranging, not unlike that which is expected from the botanist in the detail of his particular science. It will often happen, that a curious individual among men, like a rare specimen among plants, will pass for a non-descript with those who have pushed their researches to but a moderate extent; while others, who have prosecuted their inquiries with greater accuracy and ardour, and have taken richer and wider views of their subject, will have no difficulty, for the most part, in referring to some separate division each fresh particular, and gaining a property in their new discoveries by thus bringing them within a sort of inclosure.

In the course of my observations, there have started up in my way a set of men who are occupied through all the prime part of their lives in hunting after their own genius without success; who, with unwearied pertinacity, are forcing their faculties into every channel but the right, and, after torturing their minds a thousand ways, yield to the depression of constant disappointment, and sink into barren despondency, or the ruinous resources of vulgar dissipation. Those who are without the restlessness of ambition, or the promptitude of talents, may easily find their proper level, and have only to live in harmless inoccupation, or toil under the directions of an active task-master: but such as feel a consciousness of ability, and a spirit to exert it, have a strong interest in discovering the employment most congenial to their characters, and proportionate to their capacities. Under this latter description the greater part of us most certainly may rank; for, happily, the instances

are not common, wherein nature has sent mere blanks into life, of which no application can be made to the general advantage: and I am apt to think, that many of the least gifted among us, have fire enough within us to yield a spark, if our destiny do but bring us into collision with the proper object.

I remember, about five-and-thirty years ago, at college, a youth of a fair face, a plump condition, and a vivacity of deportment, who was most sanguinely bent upon discovering that particular spot, in the whole range of human excellence, which nature had designed him to illuminate, and where his genius might claim a sort of home and inheritance. Dick Addle, without being obliged to Plato, had accidentally fallen upon the ancient doctrine of reminiscence; and it was a blind opinion of his, that if we could but hit upon the pursuit that corresponded with the stress and tendency of our genius, we should have little else to do but to exert the faculty of memory in resuming those ideas which had been given us at our births, and which only needed to encounter their congenial objects to be summoned into life and activity.

Dick set out on his discoveries with amazing ardour, and proceeded with uncommon perseverance: all the ocean of his intellect was sailed over, and its shallows ascertained with plummet and line; but Dick saw nothing but a barren sea, a ποντος ατρύγετος: and still, as he urged his course, there was opened before him a wider and more disconsolate expanse sullen uniformity. I used to pity this young gentleman very much, on the account of his repeated failures; and could not help lamenting that so much good meaning should meet with so much ill luck.

of

But Dick was indefatigable in his endeavours: sometimes he was an author, sometimes a patron,