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fishing for coral; so that being securely rid of this terrible bar to our voyage, we put to sea again, and lay that night at Monoca. The next morning set sail again, and we had not sailed above four hours but off of St. Remo it began to blow very hard; so that we were forced to put in there till the weather was fair again, and its inconstancy had now tired my patience enough with that small boat; whereupon, I immediately, understanding there was a bark bound for Civita Vechia, agreed with the patron to put me a-shore at Leghorn, where I arrived the 20th; but not so fortunate as to find the ship I expected, Captain Sovaire, bound for Alexandretta, he being departed four days before, to my great dis comfort. Nor was this the only occasion of exercising my patience; but, to add to my discontent, the next day after my arrival, I received the unwelcome news of the death of my honoured Father, when I immediately wrote a condoling letter to my honoured Mother, and another likewise to Sir Thomas Cook, to satisfy him, and the honourable Committee, about my proceedings; and, in pursuance of my promise at parting, to assure them, that nothing but death, sick ness, or imprisonment, should hinder the prosecution of my design for India, though my presence at home then would have been no small advantage to my own particular affairs. However, qualifying my sorrow for my loss and misfortune as well as I could, I embarked myself on board a French ship bound for Alexandria, and accordingly departed on the 2nd of June; and after an indifferent good passage of eighteen days (thanks be to God) we safely arrived at Alexandria, where I immediately hired a bark for Scandaroon, and at the same time dispatched an express to Grand Cairo to Consul Fleetwood, for his advice, he having been formerly at India; the answer of which brought me all the encouragement imaginable, and made me hope the difficulty of my enterprise would not be so considerable, as afterwards, not only to my sorrow, but likewise to my great disappointment of your affairs, I found it; so that the next day after the return of my express, I hired a boat for Roset, and arrived there about noop, after a very dangerous

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passage over a Bogasse, or Barr, at the entrance of the Nile, occasioned by the strong Westerly winds, against the evacuation of the Nile, which began to increase considerably, to the unexpressible joy of the natives. Here, Fortune favouring me with a smile, I had the good luck to meet with a French merchant bound for Cairo, and after we had diued together, we hired a boat to ourselves, and put off that evening for the afore said city, where, after some impositions, we arrived safe; and made our first entrance into the suburbs of Cairo, called Bollack, from whence I sent to the English consul at Old Cairo, for is janizaries to conduct me to his house, which accordingly he did; and during my stay there, which was but four days, treated me with all manner of civility, which I am perpetually obliged to own; as also Messrs. Vernon aud Goodman, Mr. Merchant and Mr. Bower, factors there. Nor were the French, who abound here as in most scales of the Levant, backward in shewing me their courtesies; there being at Alexandria and Cairo above a hundred merchants; the chiefest of which did me the honour to accompany me with the English merchants, and divert me, shewing me the curiosities of the place; as the famous Piramides, the castle, and several other famous antiquities. Amongst which, five miles South-East from thence, where once flourished the regal city of Memphis, the strength and glory of old Egypt, stand the sumptuous temples of Apis and Vulcan, the antient mummies, Joseph's Well, and his Granaries; obliging to the curiosities of most strangers, as also the pillar of Marcus Aurelius; and at my return to Old Cairo, most kindly entertained me at the convent of Capuchines, where our blessed Saviour Christ and his holy mother were hid when the soldiers of Herod pursued them. This city is very large and populous, to such a vast degree, that it is credibly averred, that in the year 1618, there died above 600,000 people of the plague, and scarcely to be missed. This city is divided into four parts, as Old Cairo, New Cairo, Bolack, and Carafat; and in the midst of which is a large fair plain (but by the Arabians only known by the name of Mizar) which is very pleasant in all

its seasons, especially in March, being full of corn: and in the month of June I had the diversion of seeing the Bashaw drawing up his soldiers, consisting of several thousand beautiful horse and foot, adorned with very rich equipage and furniture: yet though this plain in the season of June be proper and convenient to exercise their military affairs, yet it is otherwise in the month of August, being emerged by the overflowing of the Nile, and during that time as full of boats as the river Thames on a Lord Mayor's-day; and in the night illustrating their splendour by frequent and admirable fire-works, and rejoicing, after their barbarous manner, as much as possible they can, for the expected plenty of the year ensuing the water leaving a strange kind of nitre behind at its ebbing away, which improves the land for the growth of grain to a very wonderful degree.

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"This city, by several authors, is accounted to be the largest in the world, whose extent, number of houses, streets, mosques, canes, bazars, &c. you will find in most modern authors, and too tedious for me to insert; but, to add to its felicity, it is generally blest with a very good trade. Here I had the luck to find an Englishman, who had turned Turk; he was a West-Country native; his name was formerly Gardiner, but at present Haggy Biram, who had been so much beholden to Fortune, to become very rich there, and to whom I was obliged for many civilities; and found him indeed the only person there that thought it worth his while to be civil to strangers, the natives being generally morose, slothful, and lazy: the men daily lie basking in the sun, and wholly depending upon the Nile's fertility for their subsistence; and the women so sauntering, slut tish, and negligent, not caring for employment, though it is even to keep themselves clean, having, by reason of the heat, very few clothes on, and the virgins commonly wearing none at all.

"Though I found little or no good nature or hospitality from these barbarians in general, yet my kind renegade, Haggy Biram, daily made it his business to oblige me with fresh courtesies; who, though an apostate from the state of Grace, shewed him

self very Christian-like in the state of my concerns; and whose humanity obliges me to shew my extremest gratitude in his commendation. He not only procured me a Firmand from the Bashaw to embark on the Red Sea, but also recommended me to a guide to conduct me safe to Sues, who was the Prince of the rogues of that couutry; obliging him to take his uttermost care in furnishing me with good camels, which accordingly he did, and mounted me on his own mare.

"So after having taken leave of my friends, who accompanied me out of the city, on the 7th of July we departed, our caravan consisting of about 12,000 camels loaden with merchandise for Sues; and although it is not above seventy miles from Cairo to Sues, we were four days on our journey, passing the tedious and terrible sands with great difficulty and uneasiness by reason of the violent heat; nor was there any water in all that road, but what we carried with us, which made this fatigue more extraordinary than I could have imagined it; but patience, the only remedy in such cases, I was fain to resort to, by force, and was obliged to exercise it upon seve. ral occasions. Therefore, undergoing the trouble as well as I could, without repining, which would have been to little purpose, upon the 11th, at night, we arrived at Sues,

"Sues is a sea-port town at the foot of the Red-sea, and hath its name from that neck of land which is between the Red Sea and the Mediterranean, called the Isthmus of Sues, which separates Egypt from Arabia; to which port belongs about forty sail of ships, who trade every year between that place and Judda, their outward merchandise being little or nothing but provisions, and pieces of eight; and their return all sorts of spices, muslins, silks, precious stones, pearls, and ambergrease, musk, coffee, and many other druggs, which are brought by the trading vessels which come yearly from India to Mocha and Judda, and transported by land on camels to Cairo and Alexandria."

"Here I had a letter of recommendation from my aforesaid friendly renegade to his correspondent, to provide me with a lodging; but, arriving late, was obliged to take my quarters upon the tarras of a poor Greek

church,

church, where I was welcomed by all manner of vermin the scorching season could afford; who, by their perpetual visitation of me every minute, gave no small addition to the unpleasantness of my night's entertainment after the disagreeable adventure of my troublesome journey; but madam Fortune, some little time after, perhaps to keep me from despairing, was pleased to consider my miserable condition, and gave me opportunity to find a ship, contrary to my expectation, immediately upon departure, and bound for Judda, where were on board an hundred of the chiefest Janizaries of Grand Cairo,

guard the

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May 20. HOUGH have little acquain

appointed for that year to he advice Tune with the works at quaise

of which, the next day I waited on the captain, who at first appearance answered my demands for conveyance forward, with a surly morose air, proper enough for one in his place, but at that time extremely disagree able to me, he seeming very unwil ling to comply with my desire and request; but, producing the Grand Seignior's Firmand from the Bashaw of Cairo, and something more mollifying to his temper, viz, a purse of gold, the only and secure qualifier of barbarity over all the kingdoms of the earth, where its power is known, we soon after came to an agreement; he obliging himself to take me and my goods aboard, and convey me to the aforementioned Judda. Accordingly, on the 12th of July, we embarked and set sail; and after having been at sea about five hours, we came to an anchor, which at first extremely surprised me; but, to my great sorrow, being informed it was their daily practice, who never consider the passengers occasions, but their own pleasure and satisfaction, I was forced to have patience, as with the rest of my inconveniences, and discontentedly passed the tedious hours with lying still, when we had the fairest, briskest gales that man could wish for. Coming to an anchor every evening, as orderly as a traveller to his inn, in so fair a season, looked as if they did it in contempt of Providence, and all oppositions that could happen on that dangerous sea, in so uncertain a climate. Nor was it long before they sensibly paid for their laziness; for the third day alter we set sail, we met with so vio

who have treated upon the use and abuse of the Parenthesis, little skill in Antiquarian researches, and less in Divination; yet I have enough of curiosity, and regard for the interests of posterity, to court the opinion of some person who is skilled in most, if not in all, of these branches of know

ledge; upon a subject whose obscurity may hereafter require all their aid. So circumstanced I naturally have. recourse to you, Mr. Urban, for assistance.

Permit me, therefore, to learn, through the medium of your valuable publication, the sense in which the subjoined modern inscription will be read, some two or three centuries hence, by your successors, by those who may, perhaps, be ignorant that the building which exhibits it was originally somewhat amphibious (excuse the phrase for the sake of the parenthesis, of which I mean to avail myself very freely), for there were doubts coeval with its origin, whether it was actually situated in the suburbs (or town, comprehensively speaking), or in the fields, being contiguous to the former, and literally in the latter.

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Now, Sir, the question is, whether the ingenious author of the inscrip

tion intended its subordinate member to perpetuate the fact of this Chapel, and the circumjacent wall of its burying ground, being" Erected IN THE FIELDS (in) 1804," or, simply, of its being an appendage of St. Giles's IN THE FIELDS?-either? and which? or both? for both are consistent with fact, and so is either: so also either may hereafter be disputed, and the dispute may neutralize and prove fatal to both senses to the interest of the antiquary, and to that of the parishioner. The present solution of this riddle, if recorded in the Gentleman's Magazine, may save the future Antiquary a world of trouble, and the future worthy inhabitants of St. Giles's-inthe-Fields a mint of money, as well as a place to rest their bones.

In order to prove, or at least to elucidate this, I shall follow the example of the lawyers, and, by way of hypothesis, state a case, thus:

Suppose that the present combination against the reformed or established national religion should prove successful, and our churches, with their appurtenances, should be rudely wrested from the 'State, and impropriated, or be transferred to a more tolerant institution [for perhaps in the womb of futurity there may be such, although we look for it in vain, at this day, when every hackneyed expression of feeling and sentiment only betrays their non-existence; at this day, I repeat, when every vehement stickler for toleration has the address to prove its value by exercising the opposite quality over all within his reach, and against all who are fortunately beyond his reach. With the most consummate effrontery he raises an indiscriminating outcry, and universal clamour, against the intolerant principle, and then levels them, like charged air-guns, against such objects as check and coerce his own arbitrary views. If the reformed established church were destitute of every other recommendation, still its comparative tole ration and moderate use of power, constantly and recently demonstrated, to a degree wholly incompatible with the principles, and, still more, with the spirit and practice, of most, if not all, of the other forms and modifications of the day, would render it an object of esteem and veneration in the eye of every correct and

benevolent mind, whatever his per suasion in other respects.]

Suppose further, that at some happier era, the returning virtue and good sense of the nation should restore these (the churches, &c.) to their rightful uses, after the parochial archives had been destroyed. In this case St. Giles's-in-the-fields would naturally claim her legitimate child. As naturally would the lawyers (unless they change their nature and characteristics) resist the claim. Now let us conjecture what the consequences would be, should the learn ed gentlemen sagaciously discover that the designation is indicative of the locality, only, and not of the property, and thence infer, that either parish, patronised by that Saint (Giles), has an equal claim with the other, in the absence of all legal records (which, if they escape other ravages, may perhaps be consigned to the care of some Knight of the Needle, Church-warden for the time being, and by him to particular, though not to original, uses, and, finally, to oblivion.)

Furthermore, these learned gentlemen may fairly contend that, as the patronage of this tutelary Saint is not exclusive, it might have been assumed, in common with other designations, by some independent con gregation (a practice very general among the sectarists and governesses of young ladies' seminaries in the 19th century), and, therefore, for these and the foregoing reasons, move for a rule to shew cause why the property ought not to be held in abeyance, until the executors, administrators, or assigns, of the original proprietors, or the executors, &c. &c. of them the said executors, administrators, &c. first above-mentioned, shall be discovered, and prevailed upon to prosecute their claims to the property aforesaid, so that justice may be done in the premises, according to the statute in such case made and provided, or at some time hereafter to be made and provided, &c. &c.

Indeed the present crippled state of St. Giles's within, and the rapid approximation of a zealous rival, in the shape of a Chapel*, render it

* The transumption of the Chapel above alluded to may be numbered among the phænomena of the day : and will probably be useful to future lawyers.

I shall

probable that this structure will be extinct at the period which we are looking forward to; for its natural dilapidation seems almost to keep pace with the moral dilapidation of the establishment.

Should the identity of modern St. Giles's be preserved, and that of St. Giles's within fail, maugre tradition and other presumptive evidence, still the bereditary zeal of the lawyers of the day (except as before excepted) would doubtless leave no stone unturned (excepting such as would overturn their projects). They would naturally and instinctively appropriate all the funds they could lay their hands upon, by hook or by crook, and the said tenement of the defunct, in-the-Fields, among the rest, to the pious purpose of restoring this venerable pile, after deducting their own proper fees for innumerable attendances, consultations, &c. &c. &c. They would argue secundum artem, and wisely too, that the designation of St. Giles's-in-the-Fields necessarily implies the contemporaneous existence of St. Giles's not in the Fields, which would furnish an additional and powerful reason for placing the property upon the shelf, i. e. in abeyance, as aforesaid, till its presumed most unjust and illegal sequestration shall have been fully and sa

I shall therefore beg of you to record the fact, of a chapel changing its situation, by consent of parts, presume, manifested, but not to me, by its loco-motion; e. g. The Old Jewry Chapel, which was snug enough in a corner in the street so called, and by some regarded as their corner-stone, previously to a country excursion of mine, appeared on my return to have taken up its abode in Jewin-Street, Aldgate, where it now lifts its head and belies its locality, perhaps for the pious purpose of converting the Jews; however this may be, the parish of St. Giles's within seem to have taken the alarm, for they are propping up the church with all convenient speed. The secret of this loco-motion, known perhaps only to the chosen few, was a desideratum of great importance to the vicinity of St. Clement-Danes, before the late improvements. But, as the Illuminati consider the church a nuisance, and its transformation more congenial with their views than its transposition, there is no wonder that the Danes were not initiated.

GENT, MAG, July, 1812,

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tisfactorily proved. In the mean time, their provident care would of course provide proper conservators, in the form of, trustees, treasurers, solicitors, surveyors, &c. &c. to prevent the deterioration of the property hereinbefore mentioned, and to demand, collect, receive, and retain, the rents, profits, &c. to the end that, &c. By the time our author (if he be gentlemanly reader) has proceeded thus far, he will perceive the necessity of revising his inscription, unless he feel superior to correction, and prove (as I shrewdly suspect he may) one of those civil engineers who are habitually employed in fitting-up fronts of shops, warehouses, taverns, &c. in the superbest style imaginable, and whose architectural devices are about as durable as the firms which are so ingeniously arranged and blended with the notification of their respective trades and callings. I wish, Mr. Urban, you would drop a hint in the way of these gentlemen, signifying, that although they may blend indiscriminately the Grecian, the Gothic, the Egyptian, and the Chinese, styles and orders with the happiest effect in the construction and embellishments of haberdashers and milliners shops, with a brief history of their Modes and Persians, and extend the same medley to masquerading and promenading rooms for revels, routs, and other obscene assemblies, which have as little to do with chastity of style as with chastity of manners; yet, when they transfer the exercise of their talents (raised in public estimation by their success in this school) to structures of a very different cast, such as churches and their appendages, charitable institutions, and other public edifices, it will become them to consult those rudiments of just taste and style which their exuberant fancies and the prevalence of modern fine taste had before rendered unnecessary, and which, perhaps, the accidents of education had never thrown in their way.

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To conclude, seriously, with a brief recapitulation of these scattered hints I hope, Mr. Urban, your seasonable animadversions will teach pretenders to estimate their own qualifications, or limit them to their proper sphere,-check the insolent officiousness of mischievous pettifoggers, preserve the sacred in

stitutions

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