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cola, in his third campaign, or rather expedition, as Tacitus properly calls it, he pushed his ravages. Mr. C. confounds a proper name with an appellative. When the Latin writers speak of a thing as coming under any class of general terms, or terms common to whole classes of things, they use the words vox, voco, vocabulum, appello. Nomen, and nomino, denote an individual belonging to a common class, genus, or species; an individual object of which it is the proper or peculiar name. For example, the appellative by which the character or profession of a bard is distinguished: "Quem Barditum vocant," Tacit. Germ. cap. 3. "Manet adhuc Boiemi nomen," do. cap. 28. Ejus numinis nomen Alcis," do. 43. "Peucini, quos quidam Bastarnas vocant," do. .46. 66 Idque apud, imperitos humanitas vocabatur," Tacit. Agric. cap. 22. When Tacitus means to tell us that such a thing was called by the barbarians so and so, he tells us so in proper Latin. For example, "Vel ipsorum vocabulo frameas," Tacit, Gerin. cap. 6. In like manner, had he meant to express that he came to an estuary, which, by the Britons was called Tau, he would have said, Ad æstuarium, (vel ipsorum vocabulo taum), or he would have used some other word of the same import.

His ignorance of the distinetion between a proper name and an appellative, has led the indefatigable Mr. Chalmers, in forming a plan of military operations for Agricola, into a maze of error. And as it is on the explanation of nomen astuario est, that his system rests, it may be pro-per, not for convincing any one even moderately conversant with Latin, but Mr. C. himself, to illustrate still farther the difference between the

meaning of the terms between nomen, nomino, and that of vox, vocabulum, voco, appello. ---- Julius Caesar, speak ing of an annual magistrate among the Edui, says, "Quem Vergobretum appellant," Bell. Gall. lib. v. cap. 20. "Flamen Sabin, quod supra nominavimus," Bell. Gall. lib. 11. cap. 13. Speaking of a particular town belonging to the Rhemi, he says, "Nomine Bibrax," Bell. Gall. lib. 1. cap. 6. But, speaking of a town, or towns in general, he says, "Oppidum autem Britanni vocant quum sylvas impeditas vallo atque fossa munièrunt," Bell. Gall. lib. 5. cap. 20. It is universally allowed, that the celebrated historian, poet, and philosopher, Buchanan, entered most completely into the genius of the Latin tongue. In purity and elegance of style he is not surpassed by any of the Roman writers; nor, indeed, equalled by many of them. On the subject of the antient inhabitants of Britain, he tells us, that they were called by all the Greek and Latin writers "Britanni.” “ Sine discrimine Britannos vocabant.-Rer. Scotic. lib. prim." But, speaking in his geographical description of Scotland and the isles adjacent, he says of the island of Jura, "sunt qui existiment eam antiquitorus eram fuisse nominatam," do. Of the island of Islay he says, "Amnem aquae dulcis habet nomine Laiam," do.

From these observations, any one who has a sinattering of Latin, and is capable of looking into the best Latin writers, will be satisfied that the taum of Tacitus was not the Solway Frith, but the Tay, according "to the common and hitherto received interpretation. Why should Tacitus, or rather Agricola, be supposed to have been ignorant of the proper name of the stuary of the Solway,

any

any more then of the proper names of the Friths of the Forth and the Clyde? Or, if he judged it to be unnecessary to say any thing more than that he came to certain estuaries, or, if Mr. C. pleases, Taus, why did he men tion the proper name in two instances, and omit it in one?

The great line, or points of support, on which the Roman generals conducted their operations in Britain, was not the western, but the south and east coasts. This was called “proxima pars Britanniæ;" Tacit. Agricol. cap. 147. for the same reason that the Frith of Forth was called, as he had mentioned before, "propior sinus."

At a very early period of the Roman government in Britain, the capital of the province, the grand mart of commerce, and centre of their military and naval, as well as political power, was London. In the reign of the emperor Claudius, forts were erected on the Severn, the Avon, and the Nen, and the country on the south of these rivers was reduced to a Roman province. Under Vespasian the Roman dominion was extended to the north from Lincolnshire over Yorkshire, Durham, and Northumberland, inhabited by the Brigantes. Just before the arrival of Agricola in Britain, the Ordovices, inhabiting North Wales, had thrown off the Roman yoke. The Roman general, collecting the legions dispersed in different quarters, marched against them, and cut off the greater part of the nation. Without giving the enemy time to recover from this overthrow, be immediately set about the reduction of the Isle of Anglesey, which had been lost by the revolt of Boadicea, queen of the Iceni. Being destitute of ships, he detached a chosen body of auxiliaries, who knew the fords, and were accustomed to manage

their horses and arms in water. Mark well the circumstance, that he was destitute of ships. "Naves deerant," Tacit. Agricol. cap. 18. From not adverting to this circumstance, Mr. C. has all along supposed that Agricola, on the west coast, was accompanied by his fleet, and that by means of this fleet he crossed the Solway Frith, which, on the strength of his acquaintance with the Gaelic, he boldly assumes to have been the Taum of Tacitus. This fundamental error is sufficient, alone, to overturn Mr. C.'s whole system. Agricola's fleet was stationed on the east coast of Britain, and employed in various excursions there, as far as the river Tay. Up to that natural boundary nations were defeated and dispers ed, and countries ravaged; and, beyond these, new regions and nations were opened to his view. "Vastatis usque ad Taum (æstuario nomen est) novas gentes aperuit," Tacit. Agricola. cap. 22.-Against these nations, it was, beyond the river Forth, at the point where it touches on the Ochills, (or more properly the Aichil hills,) that Agricola, in the seventh year of the campaigns, carried his arms northward, having first dispatched his fleet to sail northward, and make descents on the countries beyond the Tay, part of Perthshire, with Argus and Kincardineshire; the real country (not Fife) of the Horestii. The fleet having turned the most northerly point of Britain, and discovered the Orkneys, returned to port, Trutulinsem portum, on the Humber, ora river that falls into it; having sailed along the whole eastern coast of Britain: "Proximo latere Britanniae lecto," Tacit. Agric. cap. 28. So that we always find the Roman fleet, where indeed it might well be expected to be found, on the east, not on the west coast of Britain; on the side of

the

the Tay, the Taum of Tacitus; not that of the Solway Frith, called Taw, for the first time by Mr. Chalmers.

All military commanders, especially in the invasion of unknown countries, are particularly careful to avoid the intricacies of woods, morasses, hille, and mountains, and to keep the open plains. Mr. C. completely inverts this system of conduct. He brings the Romans from Cumberland to the Locher Moss, in Dumfriesshire, twelve miles and three broad. Through this morass, and the hilly district bevond it, he marches them into Galloway, and then turning them back on their steps, for some time, to the east, he gives them a northerly direction through the forest of Etterick, and the whole of the mountainous country between the Aunan and the Clyde. From Fife, "the hostile land of the Horesti, (as Mr. C. calls it,) Agricola, in like manner, led his army to the roots of the Grampions, through Glen-Devon and Glen-Eagles. The pass at Glen-Eagles, at the entrance, on the north side, where it looks to the Grampians, is narrowed to two or three hundred yards, at most, by a stupendous rock, the habitation of eagles, on the one hand, and a hill rising suddenly from its base to a considerable height on the other. In front, and fast by the entrance into the glen, on that side, there was then a morass, near two miles in length from east to west, and little less than a mile in breadth; as appears from the nature of the ground at this day, which the industry of the proprietors has not yet been able completely to drain. In addition to all this, the hills, through which Mr. C. conducts VOL. XLIX.

the Romans, was covered with woods. Though most authors, approximat ing the old Caledonian words to English idioms, write Ochills, and sometimes Oakhills, the true etyinology and orthography, preserved by oral tradition, and the unvaried speech of all Scotland for ages, is neither Ochills, nor Oakhills, nor yet Aichills: but the Aichil hills, that is, the woody hills Chulé, in the Celtic language, signifies a wood. Never would thirty thousand Caledonians, so vigilant, alert, and conversant with various stratagems of war, as Tacitus represents them, have remained quietly on the slope of Benvoirloch, only two or three miles from the pass of Glen-Eagles, and have suffered the invaders to march through both Glen-Devon and GlenEagles unmolested!! The Romans were not more completely surrounded and taken by the Samnites, at the Caudine Forks*, than they would have been in a narrow and intricate pass through the woody Ochills.Mr. C.'s great sheet-anchor is Taum, (id nomen æstuario). It is a strange fancy in Mr. C. to suppose that he can make up for his ignorance of Latin by a knowledge of se!

Though it cannot be said that Mr. Chalmers's topographical observations have added much to the stores of historical knowledge, they have, in many instances, confirmed and illustrated its truth, and must afford not a little entertainment to a native of North Briton; while his descriptions of manners, customs, and the general state of society, will probably, with most readers, atoue in some measure for his style and manner, though both extremely disgusting, We are par3 T

The narrowest and darkest valley of the Appennines.

ticularly

ticularly pleased with the concluding chapter of the second book: which chapter relates to the introduction of christianity into North Britain. It gives an account of the arrival of monks, and the establishment of monasteries; the sincerity, the zeal, and the perseverance of those christian missionaries; and the benign influence of christianity on rugged chiefs and a savage people. And the recollection of all this is enlivened by references to monuments existing at this day. So also is that of many other historical facts mentioned in this volume.

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Writers on government and political economy, differing from one another in many points, have agreed, with one accord, in this; that in every system, or plan of government, regard is to be paid to the advancement of population. Not so Mr. Malthus:he considers the rapid progress of population as a most formidable evil; and there is nothing he dreads so much as that it should outrun the means of subsistence, so inadequate, he thinks, to the principle of propagation in man, and all animal nature.

"The principal object of the present essay," says Mr. M." is to examine the effects of one great cause intimately united with the very nature of man, which, though it has been constantly and powerfully operating since the commencement of society, has been little noticed by the writers who have treated on this subject. The cause to which I allude, is

the constant tendency in all animated life to increase beyond the nourishment prepared for it. That population has this constant tendency to increase beyond the means of subsistence, will sufficiently appear from a review of the different states of society in which man has existed. But before we proceed to this review, the subject will perhaps be seen in a clearer light, if we endeavour to ascertain what would be the natural increase of population, if left to exert itself with perfect freedom; and what might be expected to be the rate of increase in the productions of the earth, under the most favourable circumstances of human industry. A comparison of these two rates will enable us to

judge of the force of that tendency in population to increase beyond the means of subsistence which has been stated to exist.

"In the northern states of America, where the means of subsistence have been more ample, the manners of the people more pure, and the checks to early marriages fewer, than in any of the modern states of Europe, the population was found to double itself for some successive periods every twenty-five years; yet even during these periods, in some of the towns, the deaths exceeded the births, and they consequently required a continued supply from the country to support their population.

According to a table of Euler, calculated on a mortality of 1 in 36, if the births be to the deaths in the proportion of 3 to 1, the period of doubling will be only 12 years; and these proportions are not only possible suppositions, but have açtually occurred, for short periods, in more countries than one. Sir Wm. Petty supposes a doubling pos

sible in so short a time as ten years. But to be perfectly sure that we are far within the truth, we will take the slowest of these rates of increase; a rate in which all concurring testimonies agree, and which has been repeatedly ascertained to be from procreation only. It may safely be pronounced, therefore, that population, when unchecked, goes on doubling itself every 25 years, or increases in a geometrical ratio; (suppose a population of one million of people, in one period of 25 years they will increase to two millions, in the second period to four millions, in the third to eight, and so on); but the increase of subsistence cannot be at the same rate; if, by good management, the quantity be doubled in 25 years, in the next period of 25 years it cannot be quadrupled. The rate of doubling in the population is geometrical, but in the subsistence it is only arithmetical.

"The necessary effects of these two rates of increase, when brought together, will be striking. Let us call the population of this island 11 millions, and suppose the present produce equal to the easy support of such a number; in the first 25 years the population will be 22 millions, and the food being also doubled, the means of subsistence would be equal to this increase; in the next 25 years the population would be 44 millions, and the means of subsistence only equal to the support of 33 millions; in the next period the population would be $8 millions, and the means of subsistence just equal to the support of half that number; and, at the conclusion of the first century, the population would be 176 millions, and the means of subsistence equal only to the support of 55 millions, leaving

a population of 121 millions totally unprovided for. The human species would increase as the numbers 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, 256; and subsistence, as 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9. In this supposition no limits whatever are placed to the produce of the earth, yet still the power of population being in every period so much superior, the increase of the human species can only be kept down to the level of the means of subsistence by the constant operation of the strong law of necessity, acting as a check upon the greater power.".

The way in which this acts may be classed under two general heads -the preventive, and the positive: by the preventive, is understood celibacy: by the positive, is comprehended "all unwholesome occupations, severe labour and exposure to the seasons, extreme poverty, bad nursing of children, great towns, excesses of all kinds, the whole train of common diseases and epidemics, wars, pestilence, plague and famine; to these are added, promiscuous intercourse, and unnatural passions, violations of the marriage-bed, and improper acts to conceal the consequences of irregular connexions."

Such are the checks which keep down the population of the world to the subsistence in it, and which may be resolved into moral restraint, vice, and misery. With three such powerful agents at command, Mr. Malthus lays down the following propositions: "1. Population is necessarily limited by the means of subsistence. 2. Population invariably increases where the means of subsistence increase, unless prevented by some very powerful and obvious checks. 3. These checks, and the checks which repress the superior power of population, and keep its 3T 2

effects

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