gratified and triumphant expression. Short triumph! Fugitive gratification! Some mischievous urchin claps a whin-bush beneath his charger's tail-back go his ears-up go his heels, and sound an alarm !" cries his trumpet from behind. Forward neck is pitched the romantic Bard, and off goes old Dobbin, alternately kicking and trotting, till the courser with two legs is ejected into a ditch by the courser with four,

on the

scraggy

and there lies in a breathless state of

agitation for a full hour, utterly disqualified from sitting with comfort for a fortnight to come.

But not alone is he poetical, where even ordinary men feel moved out of the common track of their commonplace modes of thought; but poetry seems inherent in his very nature, and pours itself out in a gushing tide, even on the dullest and most uninspiring objects. We have no doubt that his china teapot is to him a bubbling fountain of sweet and romantic fancies; his rusty old buckle lolls not its long tongue in vain, but discourses most eloquent music to his enraptu red ear, and even a piece of coal warms his fancy, as well as his shivering knees. Of this we have a beautiful example in the following lines:— "Behold yon ridge of height irregular, Where Doulting steeple terminates the view!

Barren and cold the Mendip range ap

Whence issuing clouds majestically roll,
As from a crater of volcanic gulf."

ing of a hill with a fractured side? What does the sumph mean by talkThe hill, we imagine, had got drunk, (probably on mountain-dew,) and, after quarrelling with his rival on the breadbasket, as fractured two or three other side, got such a punch under the unkind thing in a lime-kiln to lean on of his ribs. And what an exceedingly the hill's side, while in this mutilated, and, of course, painful situation! but

we don't believe it. It is a mere fabri

cation of a doting old schoolmaster; and if his whole body could be sold to

the for dissection for half-asurgeons crown, we would seriously advise the calumniated lime-kiln to prosecute the Rev. Francis Skurray for libel and defamation; but it would, we fear, be countable fellow we are! Here, for useless. But what a strange unaclaughing at a most contemptible vothe last eight tumblers, we have been lume, and talking of its author as if he had been our own familiar friend. willows unlaughed at, to wave their But we shall stop-we shall leave his dishevelled tresses "in elegant simplicity of grief," and himself to strut about his school with the reputation, among the younger boys and the boobies, of being a second Thomson. Still may his wife and children, and Betty the cook, consider, that "the master's' poems are only equalled by his ser mons! Still may he strut about as proud as a red-nosed bubbly-jock, the object of unmitigable contempt to the ill-natured, and of pity and commiseration to the good. For an individual, who forms such mistaken notions of things, as to consider Bidcombe Hill a poem; and the essay at the beginning, an Essay on Local Poe try, may very probably consider á sneer a concealed compliment, and think that laughter is sometimes assumed to conceal envy of his surpassing talents. Long may he think so! He has afforded us great amusement by his poem; and to shew that we are grateful for it, we shall drink his health the very first time we find any weak small-beer, frothy and maltless enough to do honour to the toast.

SIR EDWARD PAKENHAM, a brave, young, and eminently distinguished soldier, who had studied the profession of arms in the camp of the British Fabius, having arrived in Louisiana to assume the command of the British troops to be employed in that State, and having been joined by his expected reinforcements, prepared to attack the American army in position on both banks of the Mississippi, about five miles below New Orleans. On the right bank they had a force under General Morgan, and had constructed a battery of heavy cannon, which enfiladed the approach to their main body, stationed on the left of the river, and commanded by General Jackson. At this point the river is about nine hundred yards wide, and it was intended that, previous to the grand attack, this battery should be taken possession of; accordingly, after exertions almost incredible, and in which the navy took a most zealous and praiseworthy share, a passage was opened from the creek in which we landed,

by deepening a canal to the Mississippi. During the night of the 7th, a number of boats having been dragged into the river, on the morning of the 8th, the 85th regiment, under the command of Colonel Thornton, and a body of sailors and marines, were embarked, and reached the opposite bank without being opposed. In short, the preparations for the passage of the river were conducted in a manner so judicious, that the American General was not at all aware of the intention of the British leader; but as it almost invariably occurs, that in such operations there are delays, which the most skilful combinations cannot at times guard against, the morning was far advanced before this attack could commence, although it was the most anxious desire of the lamented commander of the forces, that it should have been made before daybreak.

The following sketch will give an idea of the position of the opposing armies :

The main body of the enemy, consisting of the 7th and 44th regiments, and a numerous force of every description of troops, were drawn up on a position of nearly a mile in extent; their right rested on the embankment of the river, along the side of which runs the main road to New Orleans; and the extreme left was a little thrown back in a swampy forest; from the river to the forest is a space of about three quarters of a mile, over an open plain; but along the entire front of this position, the American General had thrown up a strong breastwork, and there was a ditch of moderate depth and breadth ; and to add to the security of his line, upon which he had placed a powerful artillery, he had constructed on the main road a formidable redoubt, so connected, that the ditch and breastwork of the grand entrenchment formed an enclosure for its rear, and by its fire it enfiladed the entire approach to his line, and upon the whole, presented as good a position as one could possibly meet with in a flat country. The main road, besides, is pro tected from the inundation of the river, by a broad earthen embankment, from which, to the usual bed of the river, is a mud bank, sufficiently wide for the march of a column section in front.

The British army was drawn up in the following order: the 4th, 21st, 44th, and six companies of the rifle brigade, formed our right wing; the light companies of the 7th, 93d, and a company of the 43d light infantry, were in column on our left, and destined to storm the redoubt on the main road; a company of **** carried their scaling ladders and fascines; the re mainder of the 93d were in position near the road, and their movements were to be regulated by the progress made by the troops on the opposite bank; the nine companies each of the 7th and 43d, formed the reserve, and were to be employed as affairs might render expedient; several small batte

ries were placed along the line, and two black corps were a short distance in rear.

At daybreak, the signal rocket having been thrown up, our batteries opened, and the troops stationed on the left bank moved forward to the attack; the left column preceding a very little the right wing, on purpose to engage the enfilading fire of the redoubt, as well as that of the battery on the opposite bank, and having at its head the company of the 43d light infantry, advanced along the main road to storm the redoubt, under a very deadly fire of grape-shot and musketry from the main line of entrenchments, as well as from the redoubt. This small body of men, however, continued to press forward, and with such rapi dity, that they passed along the front of the powerful battery placed on the opposite bank without suffering from its fire; and although Captains Henry of the 7th, and Hitchins of the 93d light companies, and other officers, had already fallen by the grape-shot and musketry fire from the batteries on this side of the river; and in spite of the good conduct of the troops defending the redoubt, who, after the head of the column had descended into the ditch, continued their fire upon its rear; and although their scaling-ladders and fascines were not brought up, forced themselves, after a short but very severe contest, into the redoubt, which was defended by part of the 7th American regiment, the New Orleans rifle company, and a detachment of the Kentucky riflemen. But Lieutenant-Colonel Renny,t of the 21st, who, from his singular intrepidity, had been selected to command this attack, was killed in ascending by the first embrasure, two rifle balls entering his head; and it was only when the British soldiers were on the parapet and in the embrasures that the redoubt was yielded to us, and for a time the guns were in our possession: thus rendering the defence very honourable to the

enemy, and the more creditable to the brave troops who, under circumstances of very great difficulty, had succeeded in carrying the work. At this moment the contest was in our favour, the capture of the redoubt thus early having prevented its enfilading fire from being brought against the columns composing our right wing, in which was placed our principal force. But the right wing, being about to engage, on finding themselves, in consequence of the conduct of ****, deprived of the materials they considered absolutely necessary for the passage of the ditch, hesitated; and this being under the enemy's fire, was changed first into confusion, and afterwards into al most general retreat, causing a loss, in all probability, out of proportion to what would have been sustained, had they in a determined manner rushed forward in a body and stormed the entrenchments, crowning the crest of the glacis with light infantry; for, protected by their fire, it was quite possible to have accomplished the passage of the ditch without the assistance of either scaling-ladder or fascine. As these, however, were not brought up, confidence was lost, by even the very same soldiers who, under obstacles in a tenfold degree more difficult to be surmounted, had triumphantly planted the British standard on the ramparts of Badajos and St Sebastian. The feeling of regret at this failure was not a little increased, by the knowledge that there were intrepid men upon this point, who in an isolated manner pass ed not only the ditch, but gained even the parapet. Among other instances of conspicuous gallantry, Captain Wilkinson, of the staff, nobly fell on the slope of the parapet upon which he had at that moment gained a footing.

The brave and heroic Sir Edward Pakenham, who, in the fields of the Peninsula, and of the South of France, had acquired all the reputation that a soldier could desire, and who had, by the most skilful combinations, secured a most important conquest on the

right bank, and, by the well-timed attack along the main road, protected the columns of his grand attack from the enfilading fire of the redoubt on the left bank, while endeavouring to restore order, received a mortal wound; and about the same time, Generals Gibbs and Keane, two very distinguished officers, fell, the one mortally, the other severely wounded. To add to the mortification caused by these deplorable events, from the difficulties connected with the passage of the broad and rapid Mississipi, to conquer which the whole energies of the gallant men employed upon this point were brought into exertion, the attack on the opposite bank had not yet commenced; and the 93d therefore moved towards the right wing, only to share in the disaster of that ill-fated wing. Had circumstances admitted of support being moved to the left column, affairs, even yet, might have terminated differently on the left bank. By being in possession of the redoubt, an opening was gained between the embankment and the usual bed of the river, by which troops could have been thrown on the right flank of the enemy, and advantage taken of the want of discipline in a numerous body of men, thousands of them without bayonets. But, unfortunately, all having been thrown into confusion on our own right, and no support arriving, the few soldiers in the redoubt, the remnant of the only troops who had been engaged with the enemy's right, who were not rendered incapable by wounds, made their escape in the best manner they were able, the whole of their own immediate commanding officers being killed or disabled by wounds, and the enemy preparing to attack them with such means as they had no power of resisting.

But notwithstanding the recapture of the redoubt, had it not been for the fall of the lamented Commander of the Forces, we were very far from being, even at this advanced period of the contest, abandoned by fortune. Soon after this sad event, the troops on the opposite bank, commanded by Colonel