propose,-1. That there might be compiled a grammar for the precepts, which (as it did the Romans, when Crates transferred the art to that city, followed by Diomedes, Priscian, and others who understood it) might only insist on the rules, the sole means of rendering it a learned and a learnable tongue. 2. That with this a more certain orthography were introduced, as by leaving out superfluous letters, &c. such as o in weomen, people; u in honour; a in reproach; ugh in thought, and the like. 3. That there were invented some new periods and accentuations, besides such as our grammarians and critics use, which might assist, inspirit, and modify the pronunciation of words and whole sentences, and stand as marks and warnings before them, how the voice and tone of the reader is to be governed; as in reciting plays, reading verses, &c., for regulating the key, and varying the tone of the voice and affection, not without some directions for the hand, and gesture of the body. 4. To this might follow a lexicon, comprehending by themselves all pure and genuine English words. Then derivatives with prime, certain, and natural significations. Then symbolical, so as no innovation be admitted or favoured, till there arise some necessity of a new edition amplifying the old on mature consideration. 5. That, in order to this, some were appointed to collect all technical words and terms, especially those of the more liberal employments, as the author of the 'Essais des Merveilles de la Nature et des plus Nobles Artifices' has done for the French; Monsieur Felibien, the mechanical; Mr. Moxon, for some of the English; and Fr. Junius, John Laët, and others, endeavoured for the Latin: but these must be gleaned from shops, not from books. 6. That things difficult to be translated or expressed, and such as it were, incommensurable one, to another, verbi gratia, determinations of weights and measures, coins, honours, national habits, arms, dishes, drinks, municipal constitutions of courts, old and abrogated customs, &c., were better interpreted than, as yet, we find them, in dictionaries, glossaries, and noted in the lexicon. 7. That a full cotalogue of exotic words and phrases, daily minted by our logodadali, were exhibited, and it were resolved on what should be sufficient to render them current ut civitate donata; since without some restraining that same indomitam novandi verborum licentiam, it must in time quite disguise the language. There are elegant words, chiefly introduced by physicians and philosophers, &c., worthy to be entertained: others, perhaps, fitter to be discarded, seeing there ought to be a law, as well as a liberty, in this particular. In this choice, some regard should be had to well-sounding and more harmonious words, and such as are numerous and apt to fall gracefully into their cadences and periods, and so recommend themselves, as it were, at the very first sight. Others, like false stones, will never shine or be set to any advantage in whatever light they are placed, but embase the rest. Here it may be noted, that such as continue long in universities greatly affect words and expressions nowhere in use besides, as may be observed, for Cambridge, in Cleveland's Poems; and there are some Oxford words, as I might instance in several used by others. 8. Previous inquiry should be made what particular dialects, idioms, and proverbs, are in use in several parts and counties of England; for the words of the present age being properly the vernacular, or classic rather, special regard is to be had of them; and this considera

tion alone admits of vast improvements. 9. It were haply not amiss that there were a collection of the most quaint and courtly expressions, by way of florilegium, distinct from provincialisms, &c. For we are exceedingly defective in our civil addresses, excuses, apologies, and forms, on sudden and unpremeditated, though daily encounters, in which the Frenchman, Italian, and Spaniard, have a kind of natural grace and talent, which furnishes the conversation, and renders it very agreeable. Here might come in synonyma, homonymia, &c. 10. Since there is likewise a manifest rotation and circling of words and phrases, which go out and come in, like the mode and fashion, books would be consulted for the reduction of some of the old laid-aside words and expressions, had formerly in deliciis; for our language is in some places barren by reason of this depopulation, as I may call it, and therefore such wastes and deserts should be cultivated and enriched, either with the former, if significant, or some other. For example, we have hardly any words that so fully express the French clinquant, naïvete, ennui, bizarre, concert, façonnier, chicaneries, consommé, emotion, deferes, effort, choc, tour, detaché. Ital. vaghezza, garbato, dvelto, cruppo, &c. We should therefore, as the Romans did the Greek, make as many of these do homage as are likely to prove good citizens. 11. Something might well be translated out of Cicero, Demosthenes, the Greek and Latin poets, and even of the modern languages, that so some judgment might be made concerning the elegancy of the style and colours, and so a laudable and unaffected imitation of the best and choicest recommended. Nor should there be wantin gcopia of epithets, and variety of expressing the same thing, several ways, such as the 'Poetiche Dictorie' of Tomaso Caraffa, for the help of poets, preachers, orators, &c. 12. Finally, there must be a stock of reputation gained by some public writings and compositions of the members of the assembly, that so, as I intimated in my letter to you, others may not think it a grace to come under the test, and accept them for judges and approbators, &c. Where the design thus far advanced I conceive a very small matter would despatch the art of rhetoric, which the French proposed as the next to be recommended to their academicians.— So much for this, and, I fear, too much, now I see how I have blurred; but 'tis not worth the writing fairer. I stayed, sir, at Lambeth with his grace till past four, being to return with the bishops, and go home, as I was engaged that evening. I called at your house, but you were gone forth, they told me, in your coach, which made (me conclude it was not to Lambeth, where I should have been sorry not to have waited on you. I have now gotten me a pair of new horses, but they are very young, and hardly broken to the coach as yet. So soon as I may trust them, and that the weather be a little settled, I shall not fail of waiting on you at Mr. Charleton's, and those other virtuosos."

Many of the worshipful and garrulous Secretary's letters are excellent in the way, and all of them characteristic. But we have no room for more than we have quoted, and must leave it to our readers to have recourse to the volumes themselves for their rich diversity; for no doubt circulating libraries will be supplied with the work, while no well appointed private collection will remain without it.

36

ART. V.-Narrative of a Three Months' March in India; and a Residence in the Dooab. By the Wife of an Officer in the 16th Foot. With Plates, from Drawings made on the Spot. London: Hastings. 1841. MRS. ASHMORE, the "Wife of an Officer in the 16th Foot," embarked at Gravesend for India, early in 1833, and sailed from Cal· cutta, on her return for England, early in 1838. Her notes extending over the whole of the interval, and her Narrative of the Three Months' March to Cawnpore, one of the largest military cantonments in British India, can hardly be expected to present any very striking novelty to persons at all acquainted with the history and condition of our Eastern possessions. Indeed the author does not pretend to more than to communicate the impressions made upon her own mind, when these were fresh, and thus to picture to the best of her power" the varied hues which gild the everchanging horizon of the traveller, and of the leading characteristics of those scenes into which so many of the youth of Britain now daily hasten to take a part." Passing over therefore the voyage, the notices of the Cape, of Madras, and their respective lions, we arrive at Calcutta, which we shall part from in a like summary manner, in order to come to the "March;" for we look upon her lively sketches and details of its scenes and incidents as characteristic of military life and encampments, and withal entertaining, beyond what the "Officer" himself would probably have given; and yet she had at first to experience the want which ignorance of the native language imposed.

It was in the beginning of December that the 16th was to commence its march, and of course a good deal of preparation was necessary. "Tents, baggage, elephants, hackeries, (bullock waggons) palkies, palkie-bearers, bangy wallahs, and etceteras ad infinitum, were in requisition." Mrs. Ashmore was the only lady belonging to the regiment, who purposed going by land, and therefore whatever might be the difference as regarded fatigue, we must suppose that she chose a mode of conveyance that would enable her the better to satisfy a praiseworthy curiosity; and this even without having the society of her husband, who was obliged to keep with the troops whilst they were in motion.

The first day's march, the encamping ground, &c. afford subjects for the fair writer's observation and description, and may be taken as our first specimen :

"When I reached the encamping ground, I beheld a busy scene; the regiment was in line, the elephants all assembled, hackeries arranged for inspection, with their attendant hackery wallahs and bullocks; a large space was covered with tents ready pitched, and a magnificent grove of mango trees filled up the back-ground of the picture. We had not much satis. faction, however, in viewing our own establishment: the tent, it is true,

was pitched, but no appearance of breakfast was there, and the man who had undertaken the charge of the fowls had let them all at liberty, by throwing their bamboo abode violently on the ground: with some trouble a number of them were recaptured, but several were irrecoverably lost, and flew off to the neighbouring jungle.

"Towards evening we walked to a Ghât at a short distance from the encamping ground, whence the view was beautiful; the tints of the declining sun were rich beyond what can be seen in England. An island lay before us in the river, and bore a good crop of indigo, and within a short distance from where we stood was the small but keen fire which was consuming the body of a Hindoo.

"The strength of our camp was calculated to be nearly as follows;-about six hundred soldiers, (the sick, with the women and children having been sent by water,) forty elephants, about four hundred officers' servants, to which may be added upwards of two thousand camp followers; I do not recollect hearing how many hackeries, but they were very numerous. No sooner did the regiment reach the encamping ground each day, than a temporary bazaar, or native market, was established: some of the suttlers continued with the regiment during the whole march, carrying with them whatever could produce a profit from being dealt out by retail, or providing themselves from the villages near which the route lay, and thus renewing their supplies for the next morning's market.

"At some places the villagers would bring fruit, vegetables, eggs, &c., and the meat was provided by the commissariat; upon the whole, no one had any reason to find fault with the fare which was to be obtained. We had provided ourselves with an excellent little Bengalee goat, which continued to give us milk during the whole march; and we had not failed to take plenty of biscuits, butter, sundry rounds of Hunter's beef, tongues, humps, a small cask of pickled herrings, sardines, sauces, rice, and flour. These of course swelled our baggage very considerably; besides, as there was no mess established by the officers, we were obliged to carry with us our wine and beer. Some boxes were exclusively appropriated to the package of plates, dishes, breakfast equipage, knives, forks, cruet stands, and the endless paraphernalia of daily requisites, in fact, to look back and think of what we were compelled to carry is terrific; but the accomplishment of it was comparatively easy, and the habit was soon formed of finding its own place for everything. The servants, too, who are accustomed to marching, if tolerably attentive, will soon relieve the unpractised traveller of all trouble; but the misfortune is, that 'Griffs,' or new comers, are always suspicious of the people who are around them, and in truth not without much reason, for they are generally pillaged without mercy during the first few months of their residence in the country; they are kept in a constant state of annoyance, unable to act for themselves, and fearful of being acted for, so that their safest, and in fact only reasonable, plan is to make themselves acquainted with the language as fast as possible. The Company's officers are compelled to do this; but the greatest portion of those in the Queen's regi ments refuse to take the least trouble about it, rather pride themselves upon only knowing a few offensive epithets, and go on beating and abusing their unfortunate domestics as long as they can persuade them to remain in their

service. This treatment is sure to meet with its reward, as none but bad servants will remain to be constantly maltreated, and they invariably return such uncourteous behaviour with cheating, lying, and plundering. An ignorance, too, of the language necessarily entails many misconceptions,-for the Indian servants always pretend to understand an order rather than incur the danger of irritating their masters by numerous questions, and consequently, in nine cases out of ten, do just what they were told not to do; at this even a kind master will become incensed occasionally, and the heat of the climate is but too likely to add to this ebullition of temper."

Not so ignorant and intractable are the elephants, if every due allowance be made; for Mrs. A. tells us that she was amused by the manner and readiness of their obeisance when met. "The mahouts of several ordered them to make their salaams, which they did by throwing their trunks above their head, and when the word was again given, they all marched off in regular order, to deposit their loads in the barrack-yard. These burdens consisted of young branches of trees, which they had fetched from a distance for their evening's repast."

Our next is a scene on the border of a small nullah which had to be crossed by means of boats, and which emptied its "turbid waters into the mighty Hooghly":

"The passage of the regiment across the nullah was an interesting sight. Groups of villagers had collected on its opposite bank, enveloped to the eyes in their winter cloathing; the hackeries had crowded together, whilst the elephants were lying down to be relieved of their burdens ; -some of them were in the water, the tips of their trunks being alone visible, and their drivers standing upon their backs more than half immersed, balancing themselves, and urging the animals forward with their long iron spikes. On emerging from the water, black and dripping with moisture, the elephants again lay down to be reladen; the baggage having been carried along the frail bridge upon hackeries. All was tumult and confusion, when, in the midst of it, the regiment appeared winding down the steep bank of the ravine, with band playing, and all in apparent haste to reach the encampment."

The incidents, in the shape of disasters which the fair writer witnessed or experienced, were petty, although of a nature to give annoyance to a good provider; such as breakages, books damaged by escaped liquids, small pilferings, &c. Centipedes too were sometimes rather near at hand; and even the docile, serviceable elephants made Mrs. A. often cry out "Khuburdar hat, hee,” (take care of the elephant). Indeed these ponderous brutes now and then took it into their heads to be cross and authoritative on the March. On one occasion a loaded hackery occupying the path which the monarch had a fancy to make his own, was unceremoniously scized by his trunk, and overturned, driver, bullocks, bag