-Perring, Esq. ditto. The Reverend Edward Hoblyn, Mr. Richard Walters, Tavistock. Mary-Tavy Parsonage. Mr. William Rundle,' Hurdwick, near ditte. John Gill, Esq. Tavistock. Mr. Saunders Hornbrook, ditto. Mr. Edward Edgecombe, ditto. George Bridgman, Esq. Solicitor, ditto. The Reverend William Elford, ditto Mrs. Douglas, ditto. Mr. W. H. Harness, ditto. Mr. William Hugh Croker, ditto. Mr. Edward. J. Chamberlain, ditto. John H. Gill, Jun. Esq. ditto. The Reverend Peter Sleeman, Whitchurch, near ditto. Mr. Samuel Chubb, Jun. Lamerton. Mr. A. Freeman Denis, Tavistock. Mrs. Carpenter, Mount-Tavy, near ditto. John Carpenter, Esq. ditto, ditto. The Reverend William Evans, Kilworthy, near ditto. Jonas Morgan, Esq. Woodovis, near ditto. Mr. E. Northey, Tavistock. Miss Robins, ditto. Miss Murray, ditto. Mr. Cornish, Lamerton. Mr. Rowe, ditto. William Hawke, Esq. ditto. Mr. John Weeks, Bradstone. Mr. Webb, Tavistock. The Reverend John Jago, D. D. Milton-Abboti. The The Reverend Henry Woollcombe, North Tawton. The Reverend Thomas Darke, Kelly Parsonage. Thomas Phillips, Esq. Eton College. The Reverend Samuel Harness, Rector of St. Sydenham, THE THE DEVONSHIRE ADVENTURER. AUGUST 26, 1814. SECTION 1. A N Author seldom presents himself to the Public without feeling the difficulty of his satuation, and dreading the weight of his subject. In this case, should a friend step forward to relieve him of part of the load, that person must be considered not only as worthy of thanks and gratitude, but as a sort of storehouse or garner, from whose treasures requisitions may be from time to time made. From the following letter, I am indeed led to expect much, as well account of the copiousness of the subject proposed, as from the singular spirit and boldness of my correspondents first address. He signs himself Durotrigius, whence I may conclude that he is a native of Devonshire, though I fancy by his tone, that he has migrated now and then from the soil of his forefathers to see how things are managed elsewhere. I have granted him the first section of my first Number, not with the design of continuing him always in that foremost station, but as a ready method of convincing him that I approve of his correspondence and am willing to receive his lu cubrations. His first letter is very short, and he concludes it in a manner too abrupt for politeness, but I trust that he will amend the next time. Let him now speak for himself. To SIK, To the Devonshire Adventurer, If you like my correspondence, let me see myself in print as early as possible; and while my head and my pen (both of which fail me sometimes) are consenting, I promise to supply you with lucubrations upon education and domestic economy. These you will say are trite subjects, but my treatment of them may not be so common. As you are an Adventurer, you must sometimes mix with strangers, whose fashions may not be like your own. It is probable, I am one of those strangers. You know Mr. Locke says, that "the imputation of novelty is a terrible charge among those, who judge of men's heads, as they do of their perukes, by the fashion, and can allow none to be right, but the received doctrines." Whether or not you, Mr. Adventurer, are to be numbered with these sort of personages, I know not; but at all events, I think it right to advertise you and my readers of every description, that mine is one of those strange heads, which dares to appear out of the fashion. Should you conceive offence at this avowal, you have nothing to do but to cast me aside, and betake yourself to better employment. But if on the contrary you should be disposed to listen to me, I am prompt to confess how many fears I entertain of the conveniency and approbation of what I am about to say. In fact, I doubt it will be difficult to find a set of auditors willing to give me the hearing. For the young, my mind has no unison with their ardent speculations, and o'erleaping desires. Did I indeed propose to write the life of an Opera dancer, to recount the particulars of a notorious Crim. Con. to relate the delicate distres→ ses of some trembling and love sick virgin, or the exploits of a hardened voluptuary; had I any intention to patronize luxury and extravagance, to suggest new modes of killing time, or to record the honours of those who have chiefly excelled in that art: in such case I might promise myself the countenance and support of the whole juvenile world. Did I possess the happy faculty of dipping my pen alternataly in honey honey and gall, so that I might lash and praise without justice or mercy; had I any wish to exasperate religious factions to extol the ingenious arts by which men slaughter their fellow creatures, or to propose any new scheme for that purpose, by which a vaster desolation could be made with a greater facility; then indeed my prospects might be flattering, and not only my native country, but all Europe might resound my praises. But unfortunately for my interest, all these things fill me with concern or abhorrence, and I cannot bring my mind by any means to approve them. If I call to my aid the old and experienced, whose passions have cooled, and who shake their heads at the rising generation, I shall only expose myself to new difficulties. Prejudice in the old will be as fatal to me as passion and delusion in the young. I shall be branded with the name of a Reformer, one who declaims rather than proves, and thinks himself wiser than the rest of the world. I shall be reproached for adding to the list of Innovators, and be told with all the gravity of magisterial censure, that the things which be are best. Under all these disadvantages, my great consolation rests in the sincerity of my intention, though at the same time, I am very sensible that good intention is quite insufficient for success. Both the old and the young must therefore please to take me as they find me, and I trust they will not like the worse for warning them before hand of the eccentricity of my course. I am, Mr. Adventurer, Thus have I one devoted Servant already. But I fear his services will expose me to the necessity of putting up with mach surly bluntness and cynical severity. In anticipating the title of a Reformer, I think he is not wrong; I only wish that he may avoid the fault of most Reformers, too much heat in their arguments, and too little skili and consistency in their schemes of amendment. SECTION |