II. Entre fes mains, et en fon plein pouvoir, Je mets mon fils, mon honneur, et ma vie, "Mon païs, mes fubjets; mon ame affub"jettie Eft toute a luy, et n'ay autre vouloir "Pour mon objet, que fans le decevoir Suivre je veux, malgré toute l'envie "Qu'iffir en peut. Car je n'ay autre envie, **Que de ma foy luy faire appercevoir. "Que pour tempefte, où bonaffe, qu'il face, Jamais ne veut changer demeure ou place. "Bref, je feray de ma foy telle preuve, "Qu'il cognoiftra, fans faute, ma conftance; "Non par mes pleurs, ou feinte obeïffance, "Comme autres font, mais par diverfe "efpreuve, &c. &c. &c." "Schortly, I fall give of my treuth fic "prufe, "That he fall knaw my conftancie without fictioun, "Not be my weiping, or fenzeit obedience, "As uther have done, bot be uther éxpe"rience, &c. &c. &c." The contracts are next examined with the fame care, and in the fame manner as the letters and fonnets have been defcribed to be; and the author's obfervation refulting from the whole is," that as we "have feen the letters contradicting each other, and the fonnets " contradicting the letters, we now "fee the letters contradicted alfo "by the contracts. The three "utheris twa quhilks had cloakes "about yair faces."—In the latter, quhan the deponar and Pat Will"fon come to the Frier zet (gate) "with the laft convoy, and laid "the fame down, Robert Ormel toun came forth and faid, &c.— "And at the fame time that the deponar and Pat Wilfon laid "down the laft cariage at the faid "Frier gait, the E. Bothwell 66 came unto yame utwith (without) "the Frier zet, accumpanyit with "three more quhilks had yare "cloaks and mulis upon yair feet. "And to notice only one more "contradiction, the first part of "the first depofition afferted him " and Wilfon to have taken twa mail's and ane tronk, and ye "uthir an ledderin mail, quilks "wer lyand in the faid nethir hall," (the lower room of Bothwell's lodgings at Holyrood houfe)" quilks "the deponar and the faid Pat put on and chargit upon twa horjes of my lordis, the ane being his foun "(own) horfe"-and yet on the 3d of July re-fwears yat the carage of the tronk and mail, " contenit in his former depofitioun, were carried by him and Pat Wilfone," not upon two horfes of my lord's, and one of them his own, but " upon one gray horfs yat pertained to Herman, page to " my lord, at twa fundry times.". "But Powrie confirmed his account of the 23d June by this "remembered incident, that on "their return back out of the yard "at Black Friars to the gate, the twa borfes (which they had left gotten, the faids twa charges bethere, while they carried in the being fhrunk into the faid maill powder) war away, and they "and tronk; and yet though the "were obliged to go back to Holy-"fecond depofition continues at <rood houfe without them. And he corroborated his account of July 3d by another incident of a contrary nature, and yet equally "remembered; which was, "yat at "the LAST borse cariage he bare up "ane toome (empty) pulder barrel to the fame place yai carriet the pulder, and yat he wift not how "nor be quhome, the fame came in the erle Bothwel's ludging in the "Abby." Such grofs contradic mails and ane tronk in one load, " and an leidderin mail" in "another; but in the fucceeding "parts the tea mails are for "first to fpeak of the tronk-and "maill, it foon changes its tone, "and makes up for what it has "taken away, by adding ane toome pulder barrel to the whole. With "fuch a negligent induftry have "these confeffions been put_to"gether, that one man, fpeaking at the diftance of only ten days; "fpeaking of a general and a very memorable fact, which happened "only four or five months before; "and fpeaking of circumftances, "which he must have remembered "as well as he remembered his own prefence at the whole, violently "and repeatedly gives himself the "lye." We could not avoid mentioning at full length thefe particulars, be caufe, caufe, with fome others nearly as strong, they entirely overthrow the falfe accounts hitherto given us of the murder. The next thing done is to proceed to the true account, and from the circumftances of this affair, as ftated to us by the bishop of Rofs, and from the agreement between his teftimony and that of Camden, a cotemporary author, employed under the patronage and intrufted with the papers of Cecil himself, we can have very little room to doubt of the murder's having been originally planned by Murray and Morton, whofe fecret views in this matter are thus difclofed to us by Camden :-" These two above all things thought it "beft utterly to alienate the queen's "mind from the king, their love being not yet well renewed; and "to draw Bothwell into their fociety, who was lately reconciled "to Murray, and was in great "favour with the Queen, putting "him in hope of divorce from his wife and marriage with the Queen " as foon as the was a widow. To the performance hereof, and to "defend him against all men, they "bound themselves under their "hands and feals; fuppofing that "if the matter fucceeded, they "could with one and the fame "labour, make away the king, "weaken the Queen's reputation a86 mong the nobility and commons, "tread down Bothwell, and draw 66 66 66 bafis, and rendered any farther attempts to vindicate her unneceffary. -"But the Bishop's defence," fays our author, was carefully fuppreffed by the tyranny of the mafculine queen. The writing fubtcribed by the peers of Scotland, was locked up in the regif"ter of Mary, and among the papers in the Cotton library. "And as Camden's hiftory of "Elizabeth came not out till near "half a century had paffed over the "tranfactions, and till the flanders "against Mary had made a deep "impreffion upon the yielding "faith of the nation, fo it lay long "fequeftered from the generality of "readers, by being confined to its original Latin." In this manner it is to be accounted for, in fome degree, why the memory of this unfortunate queen has been fo long ftigmatifed with the enormous crimes of which he has hitherto been fuppofed guilty, and from which her prefent zealous advocate feems indeed most fully to have exculpated her. The fonnets, contracts, and letters he has proved in a very fatisfactory manner to have been the works of her enemies; and from the writings of her enemies themfelves he has detected their views in the forgery. The murder of Darnley, of which the has been fo long fuppofed an accomplice, is here plainly discovered to have been both planned and executed by her moft inveterate foes, fome of whom afterwards, in the most awful moments of their lives, acquitted her in the most folemn manner of having had any fhare in it. And, to conclude this account in the author's own words-" These confeflions, made (most of them) fo openly to the attending multi0 2 tudes, «tudes, reported (all of them) fo openly to us at and near the "moment, authenticated by fuch "formal and dignified atteftations, "and afcending upwards through "fuch a scale of witneffes, to fuch "a couple of leaders, carry a "wonderful weight with them. "They were made by men who "were all but one, actors in the "deed of murder. They were "made by men, who were attached "to Bothwell particularly. They were made by men, who were all "but one, affociates in the villainy "with Murray, Morton, and Both"well. They were made even by "Bothwell himself. And they "were even made by Morton him"felf. They were made by all, "when they were awfully standing ་་ on the very shore and beach of "time, when they were awfully throwing their eyes across the $6 narrow ocean of death before "them, and when they were peni"tentially preparing for their re"ception in the regions of eternity beyond. They thus form an energy of evidence, even fupe❝riour, I think, if poffible to all the conftructive teftimonies of history before. They certainly fpeak to the underftanding, in "conjunction with thefe, in a "voice of power, and with a tone 86 of thunder. And the innocence "of Mary, and the guilt of "Murray, Morton, and Bothwell, now ftand upon a bafis as firm as "the pillars of the earth, and now "appear to the eye as confpicuous as the arch of heaven." Travels through Egypt and Syria, in the years 1783, 1784, and 1785; by M. C. F. Volney. E minute, concerning Egypt and VERY circumftance, however Syria, is unquestionably, from the memory of their ancient fplendour and independence, an object of rational curiofity. We need not therefore hesitate to recommend a work which, like the prefent, abounds with fuch a variety of new and interefling matter relating to those countries, in the strongest manner to the attention of the reader. Befides many ingenious and philofophical obfervations on the climate and natural productions, and an interefting account of the cuftoms, manners, laws, genius, and character of the people; it contains a fund of valuable information about the ftate of their revenues, the nature of their military establishment, and the general fyftem of Turkish policy in the government of the provinces dependant on the Ottoman empire. It appears to be the principal object of the author to lay before his readers an accurate and faithful account of the prefent natural and political state of these countries. With that view he has confined his refearches chiefly to thofe points; and refers his readers on the fubject of antiquity, which he confiders in a great measure as exhausted, to Norden, Pocock, Niebuhr, Savary, and other travellers. There is indeed a full and minute account of the ruins of Palmyra and the temple of the fun at Balbec, in that part of the work relating to Syria. But he has allotted no more than one fhort chapter to the copious fubject of the pyramids, and to the general description of all the other winds which conftantly occafion "head aches, nor thofe fwarms of "fcorpions, gnats, and especially "flies, which are fo numerous, that it is impoffible to eat with"out running the risk of fwallow" ing them. Befides, no country prefents fuch a fameness of afpect. A boundless naked plain, other remains of antiquity which felf a flat plain, interfected by "canals, under water during three "months, marthy and rank with "vegetation for three others, and dufty and parched the remainder "of the year; if he imagines a "number of wretched mud-walled "and brick villages, naked and "funburnt pealants, buffaloes, camels, fycamore and date trees thinly fcattered, lakes, cultivated fields, and vacant grounds of "confiderable extent; and adds "befides a fun darting his rays "from an azure fky, almoft inva"riably free from clouds, and "winds conftantly blowing, though "not always with the fame force, he "will form a tolerably juft idea of the natural appearance of this country. I cannot be reconciled," he continues," to the peftiferous fouthern blaft, the north-eaft 66 "uniform, date trees with flender thing but fat herds, fertile fields, are terrified at finding nothing "but favage defarts. The con"traft of this melancholy fcene fo "near, has given to the cultivated "fields of Egypt all their charms." The fecond and third chapters contain a long difcuffion of Monf. Savary's opinion refpecting the enlargement and the rife of the Delta. Our author contends that the progrefs in the enlargement of the Delta could not have been fo rapid as Monf. Savary had imagined. In the courfe of his argument, in which he difplays very acute reafoning and confiderable learning, he detects a falle quotation from Strabo, with which Monf. Savary had fupported his fyftem; and likewife gives the true explanation of a paffage in Homer, which the other had mistaken. He then concludes by obferving, "that it would ftill "remain to be explained, why the 03 "fhore, : |