Mr. Martin

death, and that his brother was gone to America. calls the nurse Baucis, because she put a ragged cloth upon the table, and served up to our Jupiter or Mercury a piece of black bread, an omelette, some cheese, and a pitcher of cider. The old woman was unwilling to sit down with her young master; but he, good soul, obliged her to waive all ceremony; and we have here the interesting chat between these two cronies, in the midst of which, he no longer regretted the delights of Russia and Poland. At last St. Pierre embraced his hospitable nurse, and took heaven to witness that he would never forsake her.

However, on the same evening, he embarked for Honfleur, to pay a visit to his sister, who had taken the veil. He did not remain long with her, but went to Paris; or rather to a village near St. Cloud, to indite leisurely his observations on the North of Europe. Mr. de Laroche, the chief clerk of the foreign department, whom he had known in Poland, made him many flattering speeches; but soon cut him, according to the modern phrase. Yet our hungry engineer dug and sapped, until he stormed the man in office, whom he found lying on a sopha, with his memoirs in his hands. He received compliments and promises; but at last discovered, (says Mr. Martin,) that Mr. de Laroche despatched candidates for employment, as Don Giovanni did his creditors.

Count de Mercy, whose views, observes the biographer, he had served in Poland, the famous Rhulière, and Baron de Breteuil, received him coldly. The latter, however, caught him in his own net, by accepting his proposal to go to the colonies, and appointed him engineer at the Isle of France; but he secretly intimated to him, that he should go to Madagascar, to direct the repairs of Fort Dauphin, and to organize that colony. The crafty statesman touched him there on his weak side. He was immediately introduced to the chief of the expedition, a planter of the Isle of France, and Knight of St. Louis, and "who talked of civilizing Madagascar, as if it were a change of decorations at the opera." St. Pierre was resolute to take with him to his Barrataria, "not one ambitious man." The company which was given to him, consisted of players, dancers, cooks, and servants. But after all, he consoled himself with the idea, that the leader was a philosopher, who had an encyclopedia among his books.

In his philanthropic projects, St. Pierre, like his future brethren of revolutionary renown, was not content with settling everything according to his principles, in Madagascar, but would extend their influence "through the canal of Mozambique, to the whole African continent." Like the worthy Knight of La Mancha, he sold all his little property, to buy the books which could aid him in his glorious apostleship. Mr. Martin sagely

observes, that he wanted, however-shirts. "Il en fallait cependant, et même une certaine provision pour 5 ou 6 mois de trajet," (p. 109.) Upon the recommendation of Mr. de Breteuil, a seamstress rigged him with coarse linen, on credit.

But our travellers were scarcely upon the solitary sea, when the philosopher disclosed to St. Pierre his real business-which was the slave-trade.

To the Isle of France they first directed their course, and after having suffered a storm in the canal of Mozambique, (that supposed "conductor" of philanthropy,) they landed; the company had not lived in great harmony, and several duels were brewed.

St. Pierre was recognised in his appointment by the engineer in chief of the colony, but declared he would not go to Madagascar. He found the colonists divided into two political factions, in consequence of the opposite principles of the governor and Mr. Poivre the intendant. We would not speak of this latter with levity, and much less with disrespect, for he was something better than a "philosopher,"-an honest and zealous functionary, to whom the colony and France are to this day greatly indebted.* Mr. Poivre treated St. Pierre with kindness, directed his mind to the study of nature, and cured him for a time of his extravagant speculations; but he grew afterwards cold to him, and in spite of all the latter's endeavours to come to an explanation, he found himself finally compelled to desist from courting any longer the intimacy of that respectable gentleman. He of course ascribed this sudden change to calumny; "but revenged himself," says his ingenuous biographer, "by not mentioning M. Poivre in the narrative of his voyage. The votary of nature bought a negro slave, and lived in a miserable solitude, beguiling his leisure with the cultivation of a little garden, out of which, however, he was soon ejected by the governor, from a pique against Mr. Poivre, who had granted St. Pierre that piece of ground.

He made excursions to the Cape of Good-Hope, and to St. Mauritius, (Isle de Bourbon,) and then returned to France, after an absence of three years, in June 1771, with many plants, birds, insects, and cockleshells, all of which he presented to Baron de Breteuil; but he soon learned, to his great mortification, that this minister, in displaying the rareeshow, pretended to have received it from the governor of the Cape. Breteuil, however, recommended him to d'Alembert, by whom he was introduced to the literary worthies who assembled at Madlle. de Lespinasse's. With the quarrels that divided that famous "Status in Statu" of ill-fated France, our readers are, we presume, acquainted: and Mr. Martin's picture of their character is only interesting, as a

* See Prince Talleyrand's memoir on the establishment of new colonies. Mr. Poivre introduced the culture of the capebush in the south of France.

confirmation of facts generally known. In the midst of these artisans of the revolution, St. Pierre, with his usual inconsistency, or through a perverse spirit of contradiction, became, at once, the advocate of the existing state of things. He preached religion to professed atheists, and respect for property and love of peace to levellers and speculative demagogues. They of course laughed at him, derided him, and became his enemies: and when they heard that he was in penury, they treated him with contempt.

About that time, St. Pierre published his first work, "the Voyage to the Isle of France," in which he commented with boldness upon the colonial system, and consigned the slave-trade to universal odium. This work procured him the aequaintance of a Demoiselle D., who was destined for the stage by her parents, but who made such a virtuous resistance against an opulent Fermier-général," that he at last married her. "Rien de plus joli, de plus coquet ne pouvait s'offrir aux regards," (p. 121.) St. Pierre would have acquiesced in a Platonic liaison;" the wife of Potiphar had, however, other views. She compelled her husband to employ his credit with the ministry in favour of St. Pierre. But when he decidedly repelled her advances, the lady, instead of calumniating him with her husband and her servants, declared her own dishonour to the world, to make the new Joseph ridiculous and contemptible in the eyes of his contemptible friends.

D'Alembert had sold the MS. of St. Pierre's first work to a publisher, for a thousand francs. But when the author came for his money, the bookseller insulted him, and retired into his study. St. Pierre was about to chastise him, but he bethought himself better, and went away with the determination of prosecuting him. Mr. Martin details how that event and St. Pierre's selfpossession were judged of by his literary and philosophical brethren. D'Alembert said he ought to have killed the publisher. A bishop, renowned as a Jansenist, called him, ironically, a good Christian, a joke which was much applauded by Condorcet; and Mademoiselle Lespinasse said: "That is what I call Roman virtue" and opening a box of bon-bons, presented him one, exclaiming, "take: you are so sweet and good." At last the Abbé Raynal, probably scandalized as much as any of the other worthies, at his Platonism and his "want of courage;" told him that the age of Themistocles was past.

We already thought our hero in the way of convalescence of his follies, when we discovered, that instead of contemning the contumely of such a crew, he determined to fight with the first who should crack a joke with him about his moderation towards his bankrupt publisher; and in two personal encounters in which he was accordingly engaged, he grievously wounded both his antagonists!

Self-reproach brought upon St. Pierre sickness and a real alienation of mind; and it is no wonder, that, with such a feeble ballast of good sense and principle, he sunk into misanthropy when he surveyed the society in which he had lately moved, and looked back upon his own past life.

Yet, fortunately for him, while he distrusted and fled from his fellow-creatures, he began seriously to love inanimate nature. In both respects, and in regard to situation and moral analogy, Rousseau was a fit companion for him; and of their intercourse, many details are recorded in the volumes that lie before us.

The deceptive quiet of the new mode of life he had adopted, was interrupted by the misfortunes which befel his brother Dominique, and of which his elder brother was the author. This latter served, during the war of American Independence, in Georgia, as engineer; and having distinguished himself, and obtained advancement, he wished to increase his prosperity, by marrying a rich Creole lady of St. Domingo. To escape the British cruisers, he wrote to the governor of Jamaica a traitorous letter against Congress, and offered to the Court of St. James, means to make, with success, an attack upon Georgia; and communicating his plan to a Tory, he obtained from him a letter of recommendation for some gentlemen of St. Augustine. Under these auspices he set sail from Charleston, in April, 1778, but was soon captured by a British privateer, whereupon he produced his letters of recommendation, and the Englishman, trusting to these credentials, put him on shore at Porto Rico, whence he reached Cape-Français in safety. But the lady's family either rejected. him, or really desired that he might acquire more laurels before he should marry. Upon this he prepared himself to return to the United States; and having bespoken his passage on board a vessel bound for Charleston, he informed Count d'Argout, the governor of St. Domingo, of his intended departure; and for his safety, he invented a new stratagem. There was then at CapeFrançais an English prisoner of war, by name of Stolt. To him Dutailly disclosed his supposed secret, and obtained from him letters for Jamaica; but Stolt, nevertheless, denounced all his overtures to Count d'Argout, in consequence of which, he was arrested; and after having remained four months prisoner in St. Domingo, he was conveyed to France, or rather to the Bastile. He claimed his brother's intercession; and St. Pierre prepared a memoir for the ministry, to which Franklin added the weight of his recommendation. Dutailly was restored to liberty; but his mind was bewildered to such a degree by his deserved or undeserved misfortunes, that he determined to go to St. Domingo, upon some wild scheme, hoping to repair his fortune, or to die. To accomplish this design, he wanted the assistance of his brother Dominique; and here opens a tale of woe. Dominique's wife

being afraid of the visit of so exasperated a man, begged her husband to avert it by all means. But as Dutailly was already on his way, Dominique determined to meet him at Havre, to give him the money he should want, and to prevent thus his interrupting the peace of his humble, but happy home. He departed: and when his wife expected him back, she beheld, at a distance, a man, whose disordered dress and gait foreboded some ill. It was her brother-in-law; and such was her terror of him, that she instantly died of a miscarriage. Dutailly's mental aberration was increased by this mournful accident: he retired into a forest, and wandered three days without taking any food. At last he was met, at twenty miles from Havre, and lived afterwards twenty years, in a complete state of insanity. Poor Dominique, upon entering his house, found the cold corpse of his beloved wife. Even he, the most sensible of his family, could not bear his misfortune with resignation. He solicited an appointment in the navy, with a hope of being relieved by death from the sting of his sorrows. The minister was then preparing an expedition to bring back to France a colony settled on the coast of Florida, which was fast dwindling away, in consequence of the yellow fever. Accepting a commission which had been refused by many, he departed, and found eleven persons affected with the disease, which had already destroyed the greatest part of the settlement. He carried them off-but did not reach the place where he had hoped to procure for them a safe asylum. A few weeks afterwards, a vessel stranded on the coast of America. Some fishermen went to visit the wreck-and they found only dead bodies, and, among them, that of the unfortunate Dominique.

St. Pierre lost, about the same time, an annual pension of a thousand francs, for a reason unexplained by his biographer. He engaged now, seriously, in literary labours, and prepared his "Studies of Nature." We cannot touch, even with a pruning knife in hand, upon the biographer's exposition of the plan, tendency, and merits of this work, nor of any that he afterwards published, nor upon the difficulties which he experienced in their publication, as well from the government, as from booksellers; and we are still less willing to add new strictures upon Mr. Martin's redundance and inopportune and tasteless declamation.

It is a prominent fact, that St. Pierre's character improved, from the time that he gave himself entirely up to literary labours. He was now turned of forty-the age at which Rousseau also began to be an author. The choice-spirits of France, did not pardon him for the religious tendency of his writings. They accused him of receiving a pension from the clergy, who had, indeed, offered him such encouragement; but he refused it. Mr. Martin says, that St. Pierre was, nevertheless, the favourite of the better and larger portion of his countrymen. Many mo