Page images
PDF
EPUB

possibility that prejudice might revolt from the taste of musk beef.

Projects so patriotic and extensive, deserved a better fate, and I grieve to record their evaporation in complete disappointment. The trees, it is true, were planted with an unsparing hand, and the sheep, purchased from an overflowing purse, combining the choicest breeds, selected from all parts of Great Britain, and the greatest pains were exerted to insure their safe arrival. So far all was hope and exultation; the natives assembled in crowds to view these precious treasures—to admire the plaids of the Highland shepherds, who came from the Cheviot Hills to guard their fleecy care; and they believed the owner of such wealth and such wonders must be almost as great a man as their far-famed Prince Mananan, with his fogs and his fairies.

Whilst the summer smiled, the sheep grazed on the fragrant heath, and the young plants took root unmolested; but, alas! no sooner did winter assert his reign, than all was want and dismay; for, till the snow actually bespread the ground, the necessity of providing for such an astonishing event had never entered the thoughts of this admirable projector. For a while, the animals preserved their existence by brousing on the buds of the infant plantations, and the tops of

the young firs; but these were soon destroyed, and with them all hope of future shade or shelter. Next, the sheep fell victims to disease, and, lastly, the promises of philanthropy, with the visions of speculative profit, all sunk together in irretrievable ruin. Happily, however, this failure, instead of annihilating the hopes of our mountainlaird, has only turned them into another channel; he is now eagerly bent on the cultivation of flax, to which his whole domain is to be subjected; and he waits only till he has tried the effect of a new invention for dressing this article, before he will erect a factory, build a town, cover the mountain with artificers, and supply all Europe with linen cloths. There is so much vivacity of genius, such a grasp of benevolence, and such genuine public spirit, in all these designs, combined as they are by the gentleman in question, with repeated acts of solid use to this community, of which he is an acknowledged benefactor, that those who witness their failure, must still respect the source whence they originate, and that charity indeed be cold, that does not wish him success, though the faith must be strong that can hope it.

Much expectation of beneficial example was excited in the friends of Man, when Colonel Mark Wilkes, a native of the island, and a gen

tleman well known in the higher walks of literature, returned from the East Indies with a fortune, earned by uncommon talents judiciously applied, and promised his countrymen to devote the residue of his days to the peaceful pursuits of agriculture. Unfortunately for the Manx, his talents were too well known and appreciated to admit of this seclusion, his services were again demanded in the government of St. Helena, whither he returned in the year 1812. However he might at first regret this disturbance of his domestic arrangements, he will doubtless be reconciled by the great events in which he has now become a party. To his care for a short time is consigned the disturber of the peace of Europe, and it will be impossible to accept with indifference the honor of guarding even for a few months so distinguished a captive.

Colonel Wilkes is erecting a mansion in the Isle of Man, on an extensive scale, though I cannot help thinking, if it had been conducted under his own inspection, a better taste would have been displayed, especially as the farmhouses, offices, and cottages, built by himself upon his estate, are raised on plans so chaste, as to add much to the rural beauty of the scenery, and form a decided contrast to the cumbrous mass appointed for his own future habitation. In

the short space of three years, that part of the country belonging to Colonel Wilkes has been converted from a barren waste, not worth halfa-crown an acre, to luxuriant arable and pasture land, great part of it letting at £2.

There are doubtless many other individuals in the island, who may justly claim distinction as improvers in this valuable science, but it would. be tedious to general readers to dwell longer on the subject; to sum up the whole, I believe it is universally admitted, that a great, and for the time, an astonishing progress has been made; that the approaches of insular distress are nearly fenced out, and that the few obstacles which remain, must shortly give way to the awakened spirit of inquiry, industry, and emulation now prevailing in the country.

CHAP. XII.

Herring Fishery, and Trade in general.

THE herring trade being the staple commodity,

must be first noticed. It has hitherto been considered as an established fact in natural history, that the appearance of the herring on the different coasts of Europe in the summer season, was in consequence of migration. Their progress from the cold regions of the north has been detailed with singular precision; they have been marshalled in large bodies, or sent out in detachments, as the fancy or information of Zoologists dictated; but late inquirers strongly question this progress from distant parts, and rather incline to the belief that the herring, like the mackarel, is in reality at no great distance dur

« PreviousContinue »