cumstance be not competent to account for the accelerations in the mean motions? The present treatise of Professor Vince does not require the recommendation which the use and dignity of the science of astronomy confer;-yet on its use and dignity we could willingly expatiate, though we are not so enthusiatię as to think with Anaxagoras "that man was born to observe the heavens." Within a less period than two hundred years, the science of geometry was carried in Greece to its highest perfection:that of astronomy has exacted and is still to exact the labour of many ages; especially as small derangements have lately been calculated, which are not to be verified within a short period of time. We cannot therefore but applaud the liberality of those who have founded and endowed establishments for the purpose of advancing the science of astronomy; and the present Astronomer Royal supports most ably the honour of his nation. In the title-page of the present work, we find the author styled • Plumian Professor of Astronomy;' and to us the volume appears truly a munus professorium, which advances his own reputation and justifies the choice of his electors. In examining, however, the list of astronomical professors which the university has produced, we find that one or two have neglected to discharge the duties of their office; at least we are yet to be informed what are the benefits which a ***** or a * ** has conferred on science. Their labours may indeed silently and solemnly repose within the archives of their colleges: but we can only judge of those things which are publici juris. "Romam nactus es, hanc orna," is a maxim which every professor may understand, and which should be the rule and spring of his conduct. The emoluments of an office are desirable, but the discharge of its duties confers the greatest honour. ART. II. A Tour in Switzerland; or a View of the present State of the Governments and Manners of those Cantons: with comparative Sketches of the present State of Paris. By Helen Maria Williams. 2 Vols. 8vo. 12s. Boards. Robinsons. 1798. T HE literary reputation of this fair writer has long shone with considerable lustre, and the present volumes are certainly well calculated to maintain or even to augment it. The work, however, is not, according to the title-page, so much a view of the actual governments and manners of Switzerland, as a description of its rural beauties, picturesque scenery, and those magnificent natural objects which have existed throughout all ages, and which have been frequently described. After having finished her journal, Miss Williams says that 'she recollected, with regret, that the paths which she had delighted to tread had been trodden before; and that the objects on which she had gazed with astonishment had been already described.' This recollection probably suggested the design of giving novelty and interest to her work by intermixing the moral condition of the country, and connecting a view of the manners and customs of the Swiss towns with a comparative picture of the present state of Paris. In the progress of our analysis, the reader will be able to determine whether this plan can be regarded as judicious; and whether, to justify such an undertaking, the French and Swiss manners are sufficiently connected by the relations either of similarity or of contrast, In flying from the tyranny of Robespierre, under which she had suffered the horrors of imprisonment at Paris, and entering Switzerland, Miss Williams experienced a transport of pleasing enthusiasm; believing that she should here see liberty smiling on the hills, and decorating the vallies; and that she should find, in the uncorrupted simplicity of the Swiss, a firmer barrier than in the cragginess of their rocks, or the snows of their glaciers. A short residence at Basil, in the first canton that she visited, dispelled this illusion. She heard of nothing there but the comparative value of louis and assignats; and if she had not seen the Rhine rolling majestically past her windows, she might have fancied herself in 'Change-Alley, or in the Perron of the Palais Royal.-Basil is a town of clubbists, containing not less than twelve tabagies, or smoking societies, each composed of about sixty members; who, having toiled in the drudgery of money-getting during the whole forenoon, meet in the evening to arrange their commercial dealings, to strike bargains, and vigorously to pursue that main chance which appears to be "their being's end and aim." From the plodding stock-jobbers of Basil, Miss W. makes a natural transition to the commerce of France before and since the revolution; and thence she rather nimbly skips to the amusements of Paris during the reign of terror; Tivoli, Elysium, Bagatelle; Bals, suppers, and particularly the Bals à la victime; those unhallowed orgies to which no one was entitled to be admitted, who could not produce a certificate of having lost a father, mother, husband, wife, or brother, on the guillotine. The traveller now passed hastily through Soleure and Zurich, in order to view the famous cataract of the Rhine at Schaffhausen. Her account of this phenomenon, which is elegant and spirited, may serve for a specimen of her descriptions in general; which display less the objects themselves, than their effects on on the beholder; and which must therefore be pronounced rather sentimental than informing. • When we reached the summit of the hill which leads to the fall of the Rhine, we alighted from the carriage, and walked down the steep bank, whence I saw the river rolling turbulently over its bed of rocks, and heard the noise of the torrent, towards which we were descending, increasing as we drew near. My heart swelled with expectation -our path, as if formed to give the scene its full effect, concealed for some time the river from our view; till we reached a wooden balcony, projecting on the edge of the water, and whence, just sheltered from the torrent, it bursts in all its overwhelming wonders on the astonished sight. That stupendous cataract, rushing with wild impetuosity over those broken, unequal rocks, which, lifting up their sharp points amidst its sea of foam, disturb its headlong course, multiply its falls, and make the afflicted waters roar-that cadence of tumultuous sound, which had never till now struck upon my ear -those long feathery surges, giving the element a new aspect that spray rising into clouds of vapour, and reflecting the prismatic colours, while it disperses itself over the hills - never, never can I forget the sensations of that moment! when with a sort of annihilation of self, with every past impression erased from my memory, I felt as if my heart were bursting with emotions too strong to be sustained. Oh, majestic torrent! which hast conveyed a new image of nature to my soul, the moments I have passed in contemplating thy sublimity will form an epocha in my short span!-thy course is coeval with time, and thou wilt rush down thy rocky walls when this bosom, which throbs with admiration of thy greatness, shall beat no longer! • What an effort does it require to leave, after a transient glimpse, a scene on which, while we meditate, we can take no account of time! its narrow limits seem too confined for the expanded spirit; such objects appear to belong to immortality; they call the musing mind from all its little cares and vanities, to higher destinies and regions, more congenial than this world to the feelings they excite. I had been often summoned by my fellow-travellers to depart, had often repeated "but one moment more," and many "moments more" had elapsed, before I could resolve to tear myself from the bal cony. We crossed the river, below the fall, in a boat, and had leisure to observe the surrounding scenery. The cataract, however, had for me a sort of fascinating power, which, if I withdrew my eyes for a moment, again fastened them on its impetuous waters. In the back-ground of the torrent a bare mountain lifts its head encircled with its blue vapours; on the right rises a steep cliff, of an enormous height, covered with wood, and upon its summit stands the Castle of Lauffen, with its frowning towers, and encircled with its crannied wall; on the left, human industry has seized upon a slender thread of this mighty torrent in its fall, and made it subservient to the purposes of commerce. Founderies, mills, and wheels, are erected on the edge of the river, and a portion of the vast bason into which the cataract falls is con. fined by a dyke, which preserves the warehouses and the neighbouring huts huts from its inundations. Sheltered within this little nook, and accus. tomed to the neighbourhood of the torrent, the boatman unloads his merchandice, and the artisan pursues his toil, regardless of the falling river, and inattentive to those thundering sounds which seem calculated to suspend all human activity in solemn and awful astonishment; while the imagination of the spectator is struck with the comparative littleness of fleeting man, busy with his trivial occupations, contrasted with the view of nature in all her vast, eternal, un controlable grandeur *.' We shall not detain the reader with Miss W.'s long digression concerning the Swiss M. Lavater, and the French M. la Harpe: both of whom most of our readers will probably be inclined to consider as belonging to the same class of visionaries, though to two very different species of that fertile genus: we firmly believe Lavater to be a very good man. We also pass over the funeral ceremonies of the French and Swiss, as well as the description of the government, manufactures, and curiosities of Basil; and we shall transport the reader at once to the lake of Lucerne, or rather the lake of the four Cantons, the scene of most of the great events that have happened in Switzerland; and also that part of the country in which the characteristic beauties of those mountaineers and pastoral republics shine with peculiar brilliancy. • At the distance of three miles from Lucerne the lake opens on both sides, stretching away on the left to the Canton of Zug, and on the right to that of Underwalden. On the one side Mount Pilate, rising abrupt from the waters, displayed its sublime and uncovered head: on the other the lofty but more humble Rigi poured down its numerous torrents, illuminated by the sunbeams, like silvered lines * Mr. Coxe.estimates the height of the cataract of the Rhine at only fifty feet; Mons. Ramond, his elegant French translator, adds the following note to this observation:-" The quantity of water, which varies according to the season, has some influence upon the height, and a considerable effect upon the aspects of this fall. Those who have seen it at the period when the snows dissolve, will admit that description to be exact which Mr. Coxe thinks exaggerated, and only true of remote times. I have been assured that the height of the cataract, in these circumstances, is not less than eighty feet. A stranger can scarcely, without temerity, judge from his simple ob. servation, and if he does so, he will be sure to be below the truth. I have ascertained, and Mr. Coxe himself makes the same remark, that it requires the eye of a Swiss to judge of certain dimensions, which, exceeding all we have before seen, find no model of proportion in the mind. Those who have travelled for the first time in Switzerland, have often found, to their great surprise, that instead of exaggerating the heights and the distances, they have diminished them one-half, or two-thirds, till long habit taught them to expand their ideas, by furnishing them with fit objects of comparison." in swift succession, at which we gazed with delight, while we were passing along tremendous rocks, whose vast shadows fell back upon the clear azure of the waters. Before us the mountains swelled majestically, clothed with a luxuriancy of trees; but as we proceeded the rocks narrowed, and seemed to forbid our progress. At this point the breadth of the lake is very inconsiderable; but having passed these straights a turn of the rock discovers another ample sea, whence we discerned the lofty hills of Uri on our right; and to the west a considerable portion of the refluent lake that washed the rocks of Underwalden. On the left, beneath the inaccessible and encircling craggs of the Rigi, is situated the independent state of Gersau, where we dis embarked. • This Republic comprehending its regency, single, double, and triple councils, treasurer, grand sautier, secretaries, judges, ministers, officers, naval and military force, and the governed of all descriptions, contains from nine hundred to a thousand souls. Cavalry makes no part of the strength of this territory, since the lofty ramparts of rock, by which it is divided from the main land, are inaccessible to horses. It possesses, however, a numerous fleet of boats, which rode at anchor before the port, and prevented for some time the entrance of our vessel. Having on our landing sauntered to one part of the state to take a survey of its edifices, our ears were assailed by a tumultuous noise, which proceeded from the tuneful throats of a multitude assembled in the church at the other end of the republic, celebrating the praises of Saints Zeno and Bridget. • The chief import of this republic is raw silk, which is manufactured for Basil and Zurich; its exports are principally fruit and fish, in the capture of which the fleet is employed which we saw moored in the harbour. Gersau allied itself to the Democratic Cantons in the beginning of the fourteenth century, and adopted their form of government. The history of the wars and treaties, domestic and foreign, of this small republic, though it make no considerable figure in the history of the world, fills many a page in the records of the Lake of the four Cantons. The earliest warlike atchievement of Gersau appears to have been directed against Lucerne. Discontented with a decision given by the Canton of Zug, as arbitrator, in favour of the Lucernois, the Gersovians, like Homer's heroes, began hostilities by stealing the cattle of their neighbours of Wigis, " When from their fury fled the trembling swains, POPE'S ILIAD, Book xi. Reprisals were made, and the contest might perhaps have been as bloody as that of the Pylian Sage with the Epian powers, had not the allied Cantons interfered, and imposed a heavy retribution on the Gersovians. • This |