fome pleafing exceptions; but, in general, Laufanne has appeared moft agreeable in my eyes, when we have been abandoned to our own fociety. I had frequently feen Mr. Necker, in the fummer of 1784, at a country houfe near Laufanne, where he compofed his Treatife on the Administration of the Finances. I have fince, in October 1790, vifited him in his present refidence, the castle and barony of Copet, near Geneva. Of the merits and measures of that statesman various opinions may be entertained; but all impartial men must agreein their efteem of his integrity and patriotism.

In the month of Auguft 1784, Prince Henry of Pruffia, in his way to Paris, paffed three days at Laufanne. His military conduct has been praised by profeffional men; his character has been vilified by the wit and malice of a dæmon"; but I was flattered by his affability, and entertained by his converfation.

In his tour of Switzerland (September 1788) Mr. Fox gave me two days of free and private fociety”. He feemed to feel, and even to envy, the happiness of my fituation; while I admired the powers of a fuperior man, as they are blended in his attractive character with the foftnefs and fimplicity of a child. Perhaps no human being was ever more perfectly exempt from the taint of malevolence, vanity, or falhood.

My tranfmigration from London to Laufanne could not be effected without interrupting the course of my hiftorical labors. The hurry of my depar ture, the joy of my arrival, the delay of my tools,

fufpended their progrefs; and a full twelvemonth was loft before I could refume the thread of regular and daily industry. A number of books most requifite and least common had been previously felected; the academical library of Lausanne, which I could use as my own, contained at least the fathers and councils; and 1 have derived fome occasional fuccour from the public collections of Berne and Geneva. The fourth volume was foon terminated, by an abftract of the controverfies of the Incarnation, which the learned Dr. Prideaux was apprehenfive of exposing to profane eyes. It had been the original defign of the learned Dean Prideaux to write the hiftory of the ruin of the Eastern Church. In this work it would have been necef fary, not only to unravel all thofe controverfies which the Chriftians made about the hypoftatical union, but also to unfold all the niceties and fubtle notions which each fect entertained concerning it. The pious hiftorian was apprehensive of exposing that incomprehenfible mystery to the cavils and objections of unbelievers; and he durft not, "seeing "the nature of this book, venture it abroad in fo wanton and lewd an age "."

In the fifth and fixth volumes the revolutions of the empire and the world are most rapid, various, and inftructive; and the Greek or Roman hiftorians are checked by the hoftile narratives of the barbarians of the Eaft and the West".

It was not till after many defigns, and many trials, that I preferred, as I ftill prefer, the method of grouping my picture by nations; and the feeming

neglect of chronological order is furely compenfated by the fuperior merits of intereft and perfpicuity. The ftyle of the first volume is, in my opinion, fomewhat crude and elaborate; in the second and third it is ripened into eafe, correctness, and numbers; but in the three last I may have been seduced by the facility of my pen, and the conftant habit of fpeaking one language and writing another may have infufed fome mixture of Gallic idioms. Happily for my eyes, I have always clofed my ftudies with the day, and commonly with the morning; and a long, but temperate, labor has been accomplifhed, without fatiguing either the mind or body; but when I computed the remainder of my time and my talk, it was apparent that, according to the feafon of publication, the delay of a month would be productive of that of a year. I was now ftraining for the goal, and in the laft winter many evenings were borrowed from the focial pleafures of Laufanne. I could now with that a paufe, an interval, had been allowed for a ferious revifal.

I have prefumed to mark the moment of concep tion: I fhall now commemorate the hour of my final deliverance. It was on the day, or rather night, of the 27th of June 1787, between the hours of eleven and twelve, that I wrote the laft lines of the last page, in a fummer-house in my garden. After laying down my pen, I took feveral turns in a berceau, or covered walk of acacias, which commands a profpect of the country, the lake, and the mountains. The air was temperate, the sky was ferene the filver orb of the moon was reflected from the

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waters, and all nature was filent. I will not diffem. ble the first emotions of joy on the recovery of my freedom, and, perhaps, the establishment of my fame. But my pride was foon humbled, and a fober melancholy was fpread over my mind, by the idea that I had taken an everlafting leave of an old and agreeable companion, and that whatsoever might be the future date of my Hiftory, the life of the hiftorian must be fhort and precarious. I will add two facts, which have feldom occurred in the com. pofition of fix, or at least of five, quartos 1. My fitft rough manufcript, without any intermediate copy, has been fent to the prefs. 2. Not a fheet has been seen by any human eyes, excepting thofe of the author and the printer: the faults and the merits are exclufively my own ".

I cannot help recollecting a much more extraordinary fact, which is affirmed of himself by Retif de la Bretonne, a voluminous and original writer of French novels. He labored, and may ftill labor, in the humble office of corrector to a printing house; but this office enabled him to transport an entire vol. ume from his mind to the prefs; and his work was given to the public without ever having been written with a pen.

After a quiet refidence of four years, during which I had never moved ten miles from Laufanne, it was not without fome reluctance and terror that I undertook, in a journey of two hundred leagues, to crofs the mountains and the fea. Yet this formidable adventure was achieved without danger or fatigue; and at the end of a fortnight I found my.

felf in Lord Sheffield's house and library, fafe, hap py, and at home. The character of my friend (Mr. Holroyd) had recommended him to a seat in parliament for Coventry, the command of a regiment of light dragoons, and an Irish peerage. The fenfe and fpirit of his political writings have decided the public opinion on the great questions of our commercial intereft with America and Ireland'.

The fale of his Obfervations on the American States was diffufive, their effect beneficial; the Navigation Act, the palladium of Britain, was defended, and perhaps faved, by his pen; and he proves, by the weight of fact and argument, that the mothercountry may furvive and flourish after the loss of America. My friend has never cultivated the arts of compofition; but his materials are copious and correct, and he leaves on his paper the clear impreffion of an active and vigorous mind. His "Ob"fervations on the Trade, Manufactures, and pre"fent State of Ireland, were intended to guide the industry, to correct the prejudices, and to affuage the paffions of a country which feemed to forget that she could be free and profperous only by a friendly connexion with Great Britain. The concluding obfervations are written with fo much ease and spirit, that they may be read by those who are the least interested in the subject.

He fell (in 1784) with the unpopular coalition; but his merit has been acknowledged at the laft general election, 1790, by the honorable invitation and free choice of the city of Bristol. During the whole time of my refidence in England I was entertained at