ple; any of that pure and holy principle, which leads the heart to admire with gratitude the benevolence of an omnipotent Deity, and to receive with thankfulness the blessings of an indulgent providence. All was dark and gloomy, and terrible. Confidence between man and man was destroyed, and people glared upon each other with eyes of suspicion and malevolence. The witches themselves were considered altogether as hags, -That for a word, or look,

Denial of a coal of fire, kill men,

Children, and cattle;

and the peevish malediction of an irritable old woman infused terror and dismay, even into the bravest bosoms.

The disgraceful proceedings which we have thus endeavoured faithfully to narrate happened, for the most part, in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries; but a period was approaching, when all the detestable jugglery of witchcraft was to be overthrown, no less by the flourishing luxuriance of literature and science, than by the benevolent firmness of the English judges. In 1604, and the four succeeding years, only eleven persons were tried for witchcraft, and every one was acquitted by Chief Justice Holt. So changed," observes a modern writer, "were the times, that even confession failed to produce conviction, and the absurdities of a disordered imagination sunk to their real worth." The decisions of my Lord Holt appear to have been the first effectual effort that was made to cut short the career of this prevailing delusion; and the witchfinders were consequently greatly discouraged. Their proceed ings received another check shortly afterwards, from the declaration of Lord Chief Justice Parker, whose humanity made them somewhat more sparing of their cruelties towards the

suspected witches. "At the summer assizes, held at Brentwood, in Essex," says Dr. Hutchinson, "our excellent Lord Chief Justice of England, the Right Honourable the Lord Parker, by a just and righteous piece of judgment, hath given all men warning, that if any dare, for the future, make use of the experiment of swimming the witches, and the party lose her life thereby, all they that are the cause of it are guilty of wilful murder."

But, notwithstanding these humane and judicious provisions, the popular belief in the existence and power of witches was not to be easily overthrown. The vulgar still continued to look upon the aged and the ugly with the eye of hatred and prejudice; and it was not till knowledge became more extensively disseminated, by the writings of the learned of the reign of Anne, that witchcraft became an object of but little importance to the people. The salutary effect which the diffusion of knowledge produced was followed by the abolition of the existing laws against witchcraft; and in the ninth year of the reign of George the Second, the mischievous statutes were repealed, in consequence of the following occurrence. In the year 1751, a publican, named Butterfield, residing at Tring, in Hertfordshire, giving out that he was bewitched by one Osborne and his wife (who were harmless people above seventy), had it cried at several market-towns in the county, that they were to be tried by ducking on such a day. A vast concourse of people being thus collected together, the poor wretches were seized, and stripped naked by the mob, their thumbs tied to their toes, and then dragged two miles, and thrown into a muddy stream. Osborne escaped with his life, though dangerously bruised, but his wife expired under the hands of her brutal persecutors. One of the ringleaders of this atrocious outrage was convicted of the murder, and hung in chains near the spot where the crime was perpetrated.* Since this horrible occurrence, little has been heard of the spells of witches, and the skill of mortals in the occult sciences has degenerated into the palmistry of the gipsey, or the vague prediction of the vagabond conjuror. The relicts of actual witchcraft, it is true, still lingered among the people, but in a condition too trivial and innocuous to be attended with any ill effect. It is probable, indeed, that even at this period some scattered particles of the delusion exist, more especially in the retired districts of the kingdom. We ourselves have a distant recollection of an aged individual,

who resided, several years ago,

amidst the green and secluded hills of North Wales. She was a very old and singular-looking woman, and was always to be seen in fine weather, sitting with her distaff and spindle amidst her bees in a little garden, which occupied the declivity of a "Sunny Knoll," behind her humble cottage. Here would she sit, basking in the sun, and holding converse with no living creature except her bees, to which she was par

ticularly attached; and it was believed that these bees, which buzzed about her person with perfect liberty, were the unhallowed ministers of her will and pleasure. She was a harmless, and, we have heard, a goodnatured being; but had, by her singular habits and taciturnity, established a degree of fame among the peasantry, of which she seemed perfectly conscious. The cause of this singularity was never known, but many conjectured that some evil doings in early life (for she was not a native of the village) had rendered her thus unsocial and secluded. Thus it often happens, that a slight deviation from the common course of life is sufficient, even in this enlightened age, to impress on the minds of the untutored and superstitious, an awful idea of supernatural power.

We have thus laid before our readers a brief, but, we believe, a

sufficiently complete account, of a system of deception and persecution which claims no unimportant place in the history of the human mind. We have endeavoured to illustrate the effects of fear and delusion, by references to examples at once tragical and ridiculous; and we are not aware, that we can close this long detail of credulity and ferocity, more appropriately than with the following citation from Reginald Scot, containing a convenient Pharmacopœia of approved antidotes.

"But now it is necessary to show you how to prevent and cure all mischief wrought by charmes and witchcraft. One principal way is, to nail a horse-shoe at the inside of the outermost threshold of your house, and so you shall be sure no witch shall have power to enter thereinto. And if you mark it, you shall find that

rule observed in many countrey houses. Otherwise, let this triumphant title be written crosswise in every corner of the house thus: Jesus Nasarenus + Rex + Judæorum. Memorandum. You may join herewithall the name of the Virgine

Mary,

or of the foure Evangelists;

or

Otherwise, in

some countreys, they naile a wolve's head to the doore. Otherwise, they hang scilla (which is a root, or rather in this place garlic) in the roofe of the house, for to keepe away witches and spirits; and so

they do Alicium also. Otherwise a perfume made of the gall of a black dog, and. his bloode besmeared on the postes and walles of the house, driveth out of the doores both devills and witches. Otherwise, the house where herba betonica is sown is free from all mischeefes. Otherwise, it is not unknown, that the Romish church allowed, and used the smoke of sulphur to drive spirits out of their houses, as they did frankincense and water hallowen. Otherwise, Apuleius saith, that Mercury gave to Ulysses, when he came called verbascum, which, in English is called mullein, or tapsus barbatus, or longwort, and that preserved him from the enchantments. Otherwise, Pliny and Homer both do say, that the herb called moly is an excellent herb against enchantments; and all say that thereby Ulysses escaped Circe's sorceries and inchantments. Otherwise, diverse waies they went to worke in this case, and some used this defensive, and others that preservative against incantations." + B. 12. ch. 18. R.

THE SCHOOL FOR SCANDAL. Miss Grimani-cum multis aliis. THIS fine comedy, the School for Scandal, has, within the last month, been played at both houses; at Covent Garden, with all the aid of good actors, and full houses; and at Drury Lane, with all the drawbacks of empty benches, and raw, inexperienced performers. The School for Scandal (that School, which knows no vacation in this world!) can never want for scholars, so long as life, and wit, and elegant satire, are permitted to house together. The School for Scandal, indeed, must live! What can be more delightful, more spirited, more airy, than this inimitable comedy, with its rich contrasting characters, and pungent dialogues? In it, life seems to have resolved itself into an essence, and conversation to have lost all its " outward limbs and flourishes," and to have become a spirit only. All the glancing lights and shades of character are caught; all the ingenuities and intricacies of situation are fixed, and made thrice interesting and effective; all the points of a conceit are touched at to perfection. The author has boxed the compass of wit. To remember the personages of this caustic and exquisite play, is to revive the recollections of brave wits and elegant satirists, and to keep the best and the brightest company. There is Charles Surface, the easy, gentlemanly, ruined, airy Charles Surface; with his delightful picture-sale, and his tenderness for "the little ill-looking fellow over the settee!" What a relish is he on the lips of Scandal, with his handsome person, his youth, his graceful halfmelancholy love for Maria, and "his most blest conditions!" Then, as a fine contrast, there is Joseph (what a name!) Joseph, with his cold, calculating, sententious morality, the plotting, avaricious, heartless Joseph, with his luckless amours, and French plate charities. Then, can there be a richer personage than old Sir Peter? falling out of his batchelorship, late in life, as if he had met with an accident; and tumbling, through the fond anxieties of a florid and healthy old age, into all the turmoils and ter

How

rors of the marriage state. utterly does he appear to have broken the neck of his happiness over a young giddy wife! What a lecture is his passion! What lessons are couched in his alternate tetchy tendernesses and jealousies! How his hopes seemed to wave in the tossings of Lady Teazle's feathers! How his will seems to turn with her "remarkably elegant turn of the head!" What dear fretful family quarrels is he eternally embroiled in! The fall of the screen appears to be the downfall of his house! And can any thing be better than his varying use of the word "Joseph," before and after the luckless discovery? In the last act, it drags on his lip like a fly in honey! Old Sir Oliver, -Sir Noll,-is round and cozey as his name! You at once see the rich Indian uncle, the Nabob, returning up to his ears in rupees and powder, and glorying in getting into the thick of his relations and generosities! Lady Teazle, with her gallant powers of scandal; her virtue, wavering through thoughtlessness; her charming self-restoration, and her constant inimitable spirit, is an elegant comedy in herself! She is the Divina Commedia, not of Dante, but of womanhood! There is in her a slight touch of the country hoyden, softened down by the graces of polished life, that carries her through her scandal, her domestic broils, and her pleasures, with a vivacity and a spirit perfectly enchanting! In all these characters, all that is perfect in wit and spirit is concentrated, and then by what a circle are these delightful creatures surrounded! They themselves are indeed bright stars; but, oh! how bright satellites attend them! After the Teazles and the Surfaces, come a goodly troop. All the scandal schoolboys and school-girls,-bitter little Crabtree, -Sir Benjamin Backbite, with his puny weakling of an epigram, honest Master Rowley, Trip, the Servant, with his " post obit on the blue and silver,"-quiet tiny Moses,-Careless, and Sir Harry, two empty, walking, claret-flasks!

and wicked, orderly Mr. Snake.What a company! - The ladies too are no less curious. Easy, natural Mrs. Candour, who gives the medicine of scandal in honey itself; and poor lost Lady Sneerwell, with a heart "bitter as the dregs of Coloquintida!" Maria is, perhaps, a little insipid, but what chance has she in such a biting throng? She is scarcely better off for companions than Polly in the Beggar's Opera!

It is not the place here, neither have we the time or the space, -to dissert upon the beauties of the most interesting and spirited scenes in this matchless comedy. But we cannot refrain from just hinting at that brilliant scandal meeting, in which Lady Teazle, like the lovely Marcia, "towers above her sex," and at which Sir Peter stands, contemplating the terrible scandal storm, "like one just blasted by a stroke from heaven!" Characters in this cutting scene are conjured up, beaten, snipped, pinched, and cuffed, by the whole party, and finally damned into nothing by a finisher from one of the set. The auction of pictures, and the screen-scene, are never to be surpassed, or we know nothing of perfection! The first, for its gay brilliancies of dialogue; the last, for its highly wrought interest. Perhaps the finest piece of wit in any modern English play is contained in the following snatch of dialogue.

Lady Sneerwell. Ha! ha! ha! Well said, Sir Peter! But you are a cruel creature, too phlegmatic yourself for a jest, and too peevish to allow wit in others!

Sir Peter Teazle. Ah! Madam! True wit is more nearly allied to good nature than your Ladyship is aware of.

Lady Teazle. True, Sir Peter; I believe they are so near akin that they can never be united!

We have said a great deal more about our admiration of this play than there was any occasion for; but having been led to see the New Drury-lane actress, Miss Grimani, and being called upon in our critical capacity to notice her Lady Teazle, we could not resist the opportunity of indulging in a few reminiscences, common enough perchance, yet pleasanter than a thousand living thoughts of things present or to come. We are loth to speak ill of a lady, but we must, as in duty bound, confess that Miss Grimani is the very worst Lady Teazle it was ever our misfortune to witness. We

never saw Miss Farren, who received a title for her performance! Miss Duncan (we will not weaken her acting by saying Mrs. Davison) was harsh and bread; but she was at the same time spirited and natural. Others have failed on the side of ardour, eagerness, vigour; but it fell to Miss Grimani's lot alone, to make the joyous, generous, easy, whimsical Lady Teazle, a sententious and sober-solemn lady of sentimental comedy. Miss Grimani appears to be a quiet, and not insensible person; but she is no more calculated to play Lady Teazle than we are to dance the tight-rope at Astley's, or to ride upon four horses at once. She has a slight, yet not altogether ungraceful person; and her features are strongly marked, but neither her person nor her features become Lady Teazle. Her voice is drawling and monotonous. This lady may improve in other characters; and if she should succeed, we will instantly notice her achievements. But, as Lady Teazle, we can, as just judges, hold out to her no hopes.

mon

a

The other characters in the comedy were badly filled. Elliston made an amusing Charles, allowing for little gout,-say - indolence,-tenderness, -call it what you will; but Mr. Cooper, in Joseph, made us wish that even Mr. Winston had been allowed to read the part. Has this same good gentleman, Mr. Cooper, no feeling of his work, that he dresses, acts, and speaks the part so miserably, so despicably? Why, a conplay-struck apprentice would know better than to clothe Joseph Surface in a dress-coat, with a modern vulgar red under-waistcoat. And we would eat our two-and-twenty pens, if even Claremont would indulge in a clownish scratching of his hair (we will not say head) through the refined scenes of the School for Scandal, and in the finished part of Joseph Surface. We might say to Mr. Cooper, what old Hardcastle says, while drilling his raw servants -"Take your hand out of your pocket, Sir, and out of your hair!" Munden was admirably dressed in Sir Peter Teazle, in light blue,-the gentlemanly colour of the old school; but he seemed puzzled with his own countenance, for he has made faces so long, that his faces are now really

M