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the colony could not extingush. He was the father and the leader of his people-shared in all their hardships-endured with them severe privations--met with them opposing foes-penetrated with them the distant regions of the Indian tribes-exposed himself repeatedly to the winds and waves for their advantage, and all this, not only without recompense or emolument, but at his own expense, and to the absolute detriment of his private and pecuniary interests. But we will let those who hnew him best proclaim his praise.

"Whether it is owing," says a contemporary publication, "to an affectation of being thought conversant with the ancients, or the narrowness of our minds, I know not, but we often pass over those actions in our contemporaries which would strike us with admiration in a Greek or a Roman. Their histories, perhaps, cannot produce a greater instance of public spirit than what appeared in an evening paper of Saturday, the 18th instant, that 'James Oglethorpe, Esq., one of the Trustees for establishing the colony of Georgia, is gone over with the first embarkation at his own expense.' To see a gentleman of his rank and fortune visiting a distant and uncultivated land, with no other society but the miserable whom he goes to assist-exposing himself freely to the same hardships to which they are subjected, in the prime of life, instead of pursuing his pleasures or ambition-on an improved and well-concerted plan, from which his country must reap the profits-at his own expense, and without a view, or even a possibility of receiving any private advantage from it; this too, after having done and expended for it what many generous men would think sufficient to have done to see this, I say, must give every one who has approved and contributed to the undertaking, the highest satisfaction; must convince the world of the disinterested zeal with which the settlement is to be made, and entitle him to the truest honor he can gain, the perpetual love and applause of mankind."*

Many have expressed their surprise, that some royal mark of distinction was not conferred upon Oglethorpe that he was not, like his father, knighted, or even elevated to the peerage, for his noble services and conduct. But Oglethorpe was not sufficiently orthodox in his political creed to suit the tastes of the house of Brunswick, or of that splendid ministerial paradox, Sir Robert Walpole. The attachment of his ancestors and relations to the house of the Stuarts, and the interest of France, was too well remembered. It was not forgotten, that one of his brothers was aid-de-camp to the Duke of Ormond, one of the leaders of the Pretender's party-that two of his sisters had married French noblemen; and that of one of them, Bolingbroke, (after he had crossed

"Memorials," p. 350.

over from the same side,) writing to Mr. William Wyndham, describing the cabinet he had just forsaken, said,

"No sex was excluded from this ministry; Fanny Oglethorpe whom you must have seen in England, kept her corner in it, and Olive Trant was the great wheel of our machine."

Nor was the impression produced by the narrative of Frances Shaftoe, which represented the pretended prince of Wales as the son of Sir Theophilus done away. It was not forgotten that his mother was at one time the medium of communication between Oxford and Bolingbroke and Queen Anne herself, with the exiled Stuarts; and that his sister was domesticated with them-nor did they forget, that on the motion for the banishment of Bishop Atterbury, for proclaiming, on the death of Queen Anne, Charles Stuart in the capitol in full canonicals, Oglethorpe opposed the ministry, and denounced the measure.

These points must have greatly operated against him, and it cannot be doubted that they were instrumental in preventing the bestowment of those favors which were so freely granted to others of far less merit and pretensions. It is true, that when Charles landed in Scotland in 1743, and raised his royal standard, that Oglethorpe remained firm in his fealty to George II., and being promoted to the rank of major-general, led four companies of cavalry against the rebellious invaders. It was policy in the king and ministry to put him there, for marching, as the army was, into the disaffected countries of the north of England, it was supposed, and with much probability, that the known connexion of his family with the family of the pretender, while he himself was now going to battle against him, would have its influence with many of the Jacobite party, and deter them from joining a standard against which Oglethorpe was fighting. But this very campaign, added to the causes already existing to deter the king from conferring on him any order of distinction. The cruelties which he saw inflicted on the rebels by the Duke of Cumberland's army, and the unnecessary vigor which he exercised towards them, roused his feelings of humanity, and he firmly remonstrated with the duke, and his brother generals, Cope and Hawley, for while he expressed his willingness to put down, as far as he was able, the rebellion, he refused to be a party in those barbarities which were perpetrated upon the adherents of Charles. For this, the conceited Horace Walpole, stigmatized Ogle

thorpe as "always a bully," but he who could term Washington "an excellent fanfaron," was not capable of rising to the loftiness of Oglethorpe's sentiments, or of appreciating the generous emotions of his heart. Irritated probably by the humane views of Oglethorpe, the Duke of Cumberland took the earliest opportunity to place him under arrest, in order to rid himself of his presence. He was tried by a court martial—was honorably acquitted of every charge and specification, and though in a year or two after, promoted to the rank of Lieutenant-General, he was honored by no order of knighthood or patent of nobility. But he needed not stars, nor ribbons, nor a peerage, to give him a distinction and a nobility, greater than them all. Georgia will preserve his memory and history, and as she tells of his generous and heroic deeds, will point him out as the founder of the first colony, which benevolence had ever planted, eithar in ancient or modern times. His will give a lustre to his name, when the titled minions of wealth and power which then surrounded and perhaps eclipsed him, shall be utterly forgotten.

It is one of the interesting facts connected with Oglethorpe, that he lived to see his infant colony become a great and free State; so that the celebrated Burke might with truth tell him

"That he looked upon him as a more extraordinary person than any he had ever read of, for he had founded the Province of Georgiahad absolutely called it into existence, and had lived to see it severed from the empire which created it and become an independent State."

He died at Cranham Hall, in June, 1785, having lived within three years of a century, and having, for many years been the oldest General of all His Majesty's forces on the staff.

The "Georgia Historical Society" deserve much praise for their zeal in getting out, so soon, these two interesting volumes. Their contents are of the last importance to the historian, and cannot fail of interesting even the casual reader. Its members have proved that they were not incorporated in vain, and we confidently hope, that the valuable volumes which they have already published, will be followed up by others, from the stores of Documentary History which have been gathered within its archives.

ART. IV.-An Introduction to the Study of the Civil Law. By DAVID IRVING, L.L. D. Fourth Edition. London:

1837. Origines du droit Francais Cherchees dans les symboles et formules du droit universel. Par M. MICHELET. Professeur a l'ecole normale, chef de la section historique aux archives du royaume. Paris: 1837.

WE opened these works hoping to find what has been long desired by the American Law Student-A condensed detail of the peculiar objects of the Civil Law Jurisdiction.

We are, however, frustrated. For though learned and interesting books, the first is only a historical review of the lives and labors of eminent writers upon this branch of juridical knowledge; and, the last, a most careful examination of the eccentricities, if we may so speak, of the original sources of French law, sought for in the symbols and forms of universal right.

The civil, or ancient Roman law, has exhibited its admirable proportions in the laws and constitutions of most civilized countries. And however these have varied, to suit the demands of new societies, and the improved philosophy of aged governments, their principles, or at least some of the best, are traced back to the elements of that system, which, in the idea of Hume, stood, unaffected by the follies of its age, while art and philosophy yielded to its superstitions.

The

The legislator of the present times, filled with enthusiasm when reflecting upon the revolutions which modern learning is supposed to effect in the sciences, dreams not that his fancied improvement in the department of the law, are only adoptions of the conceptions of the Roman counsellor. student, in the midst of the elementary works which surround him, learns that the civil is the Roman law—that it consists of the constitutions, pandects, novels and code-but rarely, if ever, discovers in the laws of his own day, the erudite fragments of the Roman jurisprudence.

The study of this law, per se, is obsolete—or, we should rather, as applicable to our own country, say, unborn. The common and statute laws, which have been engrafted upon the main trunk of the civil law, have, in England and America (if we except Louisiana) stifled the scions of the parent

root: aud though the latter sustains and invigorates the whole, its influence is lost and unknown in the super-abundant foliage, which spreads now over the temple of justice. Those who engage to enter this labyrinth, it seems, cannot afford, in this age of short lives, to prune away the excess. The fruits of the practice of the law, lie on the extremities, and whoever culls them, must be content with the branches within his reach, and not waste time in exploring the recesses of the system.

Most of the works upon the civil law, approachable by an English student, are, if not histories of its progress and improvement, too learned to answer the purpose of text books. Mr. Gibbon's brilliant outline traces its gradual rise and excellence; but, like some sparkling mineral fountains, only increases the thirst it is designed to subdue. Savigny's history of the revival of the civil law in the middle ages. Domat's "Les loix civiles dans leur ordre naturel ;" and Hieneccius' "Elementa juris civilis," are all too comprehensive in erudition, for the pursuits of the American bar, and, besides, are not easily obtained in the Southern States. From all of them, however, it appears to us, might be collected the prominent outlines of the system, most valuable to the American student, and we know of no person so competent to undertake the task, as Mr. Magureau, of Louisiana, a gentleman whose high character as a common lawyer and civilian reaches far beyond the circle of his personal acquaintance.*

It is a matter of regret, if not astonishment, that so little has been written upon the civil law by the English lawyers. It is no reproach to the American bar that it is not composed of civilians. The youthfulness of the profession and of the country, forbids that deep research into the recesses of Roman jurisprudence, necessary to a knowledge of its history and the extent of its jurisdiction. But for the English there is no apology. The civil law, as we have said, and as said by Hale, Holt, and others of their distinguished men, is the seed of the great fruits of their constitution and laws, and to

We have been informed, we know not whether correctly or not, that a work on the Roman Jurisprudence has been contemplated by a gentleman of the South, whose talents as a lawyer, whose erudition as a scholar, and whose genius as a writer leave him almost without a rival; a gentleman whose magnificent article on the Civil Law, in the late NewYork Review, proves that he is at least thoroughly acquainted with the subject.-ED. REVIEW.

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