fifty-five fhillings; are kept with all imaginable care and cleanliness, in one uniform progreffive ftate of increase, for the space of eighteen to twenty-fix weeks, when the major part of them are fufficiently fattened for fale. As they are of different breeds, and the produce of different counties, fo their progreffive qualities are always ftrikingly characteriflic. It may then be afked, if they differ fo much in quality and fize, why not fatten thofe forts only that are found to be the beft?' The answer is, becaufe a fufficient number cannot be obtained of that From whence brought. Shroph.Here age; and therefore recourse must be had to hogs of a younger age, as well as thofe of an inferior quality. When fattened, they are fold, and realize the prices marked against each in the table, upon an average. It must be obferved, that no pains are fpared to keep them clean and fweet, which the fuperior conftruction of their very ex tenfive premises enables them to do. One half of their time they are brought forward, with a certain quantity of wash and grains, and the latter part with a portion of meal duft. fordh. Glo 15 months Shillings. £. 5. cefterfh. and old. 18 to 26 55 to 5 Berkshire.. Norf. Suffolk. Younger. 42 Ditto. 21 to 24 2 15 to 3 37 Effex, but not of the breed of 15 months 60 Ditto. 34 to 36, 4 15 to 5 10 old. that county. Yorkshire. It is neceffary to be here remarked, that the Norfolk and Suffolk are the fooneft fattened, but they do not come to fo valuable a fhape to make bacon; the Yorkshire are upon the whole the handsomeft make, and the real Effex breed of the least value: At mefirs. Benwell's diftillery at Batterfea, are annually fattened from three to four thoufand hogs. The fame progreffive treatment, and the fame confequent fuccefs mark the practice of this house; and upon enquiring whether any improvement could be made by a mixture of the breed, it was with fatisfaction that we learned, that Mr. Benwell's predeceffor, Mr. Bell, had fome years ago fent a great many boars and fows from Berkshire into Yorkshire, which had fucceeded fo well, as greatly to have improved the breed, and for which that gentleman deservedly received the thanks of many of the principal farmers of that county. At Meffrs. Bush's diftillery at Wandfworth, there are about two thoufand annually fattened. They give the preference to the Berkshire breed; and they get fome excellent ftores of this breed from the neighbourhood of Beverley, in Yorkshire, which corresponds with the accounts given by Mr. Benwell, as well as by meffrs. Johnfon's, of the fuperiority of their fhape. It is the opinion of thefe gentlemen, that if the Shropshire ftores came to hand in better condition and more age, they would be certain of coming to a fale; confequently there must be a certain degree of good quality attach ed to them: they are near fix months in getting them from twenty-five to thirty ftone; and from the prefent high price of corn, this trade is by no means confidered profitable to them. 3 At Mr. Stonard's ftarch manufac tory, upon an average of four years, they have fed, from the refufe of the manufacture, two thousand and seven © hundred per annum; but as their food is of a poor and cold nature, and in no way equal to the distillers wath and grains, they are obliged to give them a very confiderable quantity of beans and peafe, amounting to between nine hundred to one thoufand quarters communibus annis. They have generally from feven to eight hundred at à time fattening. At meffrs. Randall and Suter's ftarch manufactory, are fattened, after the fame manner, between fix and feven hundred annually; they buy them in at one year and a half old, and in fix months they are fit for fale, when they fetch from four to five pounds each. The forts which are made choice of by thefe gentlemen, are in every respect the fame as thofe which the diftillers farten. The greateft part of these ftores are brought to Finchley, in Middlefex, where they are forted and put into fizes by the falefmen, before they are fent to the respective feeders: thefe, as we faid before, are principally Yorkshire, Shropshire, Berkshire, Lincolnfhire, and Leicestershire. Those which come from Norfolk, Suffolk, and Effex, are brought from juft after the harveft, to the month of October, to Rumford market. The cuftom about London differs from that in the country, as to the weight of the hogs: in the former it is the net weight of the carcafe, not including the head, feet, or flea, as is done in the latter. When malt is at a moderate price, they are fuppofed to pay to the distillers about two thilings per week, per head. It is fomewhat fingular, that with fo much knowledge as thefe gentlemen must have acquired respecting thefe animals, no method has yet been discovered for afcertain ing their ages, and therefore they are obliged to buy them in at a venture. From what has been faid upon this fabject, it will appear, that the number of hogs fed in the manner deferib ed, in this courty, upon an average of four years, is upward of 11,700, valued at 46,2151. ON THE DISADVANTAGES OF FINE WEATHER*. Sir, It will be rain to night- To the Editor of the Univerfal Magazine. WAS very much pleafed with your correfpondent, Old Lilly's account of the pains and misfortunes of a rainy day, and with the noble author he quotes, I can fympathize with unlearned gentlemen in a rainy day. rainy day.' Doubtless alfo the rules your correfpondent has laid down for alleviating the calamities of a rainy day would be very effectual, where regularly followed. I hope his letter will have an extenfive circulation, because the prefent feafon feems to be of a defcription that will probably bear very hard upon ⚫ unlearned gentlemen,' if they cannot find fome employment to footh, or enable them to forget their dilappointments, I do not, fir, pretend to clafs my SHAKSPEARE. felf with learned gentlemen, yet I can make a tolerable fhift with a rainy day, and I am fo little addicted to gadding, and fo much diflike formal parties of pleasure, that a fmart fhower, or even a complete foaking rain feldom interrupts my purfuits. But I am not lefs an object of compaffion than thofe unlearned gentlemen,' your correfpondent preferibes for, although my complaint arifes from a very dif ferent caufe, and after I have explained it, if your correfpondent can afford me any relief, I fhall be ever grateful for the obligation. I am, fir, a married man. My wife (I hope I may speak candidly, for I am not writing an epitaph) is a very good kind of woman, but has * In anfwer to a Letter in our laft Magazine, page 11. taken it into her head that health is may not be too wet for fowing, nor whether the farmers have houfed their crops. I think only of myself, which you will fay is very felfish, and I allow it, but confider what a misfortune it is to have ones happiness connected with the weather, and to reflect that though I preach economy to my family, they cannot practice it, unless it drop from the clouds. That you may have fome idea of this affair, be pleafed to take the following abftracts from our family Weather-glafs, which is graduated extremely accurately as to the weather, but not quite fo correctly as to the fums of money which certain weather is fure to confume. Monday-Clear-a poftchaife to Greenwich. Tuesday Somewhat cloudy Hackney coach to Clapham. Wednesday-Very cloudy-Ditto and detained to dinner at ditto, for fear of rain. Thursday-Showery and windyat home-pot-luck. Friday Clear and fine-Richmond turbot, &c. and two poftchaifes. Saturday-Partially cloudy--Hackney coach to the park, Kenfington Gardens, &c. Sunday-Very fine-Hamptontwo chaifes, dinner at the Toy, &c. In all, fir, about twenty pounds, odd fhillings; lofs of time not to be Unfortunately too, I happen to calculated, but gain exactly Lo-0-0 have a fet of relations and acquaint- Yet all this, though bad enough, ances, who are remakably tenacious it not the worst. This relates chiefly of good health, and are always form to the fpring and fall. Thefe, fir, ing fome agreeable party for the first are the misfortunes of a fine day, fine day,' and to mach am I peftered coming fingly and unaccompanied, with thefe engagements, which no- but they are nothing to a fucceffion of thing but rain can prevent, that I am fine weather. Then it is, fir, that afraid it has worked a firange and my wife, whofe skill in medicine is milanthropic change on my temper, great, difcovers that we are all very and that I am become fo great an ene- bad, that the metropolis is a most unmy to my country, and my climate, healthy place, and the environs little as to wish for repeated fhowers, with- better, that we fhall pofitively conout any regard to the price of hay, or tract afthmas, fore throats, colds, the fcarcity of wheat. When a hearty agues, and confumptions, if we stay rain has faved me the mortification of any longer, that we fhall lofe our apidling away a whole day in the coun- petites and flesh, and become pale and. try, I never think whether the ground wan, weak and feeble, and that-the whofe fortunes are adequate to the enjoying of them with a full relish. most important of all difcoveries-the quite fo warm in their praifes, as thofe temple of Hygeia is fituated in the ifland of Thanet! Thither we must all go, in fpite of all my remonstrances, in spite of my offering to obtain from the phyficians a certificate of the good health of my family. No-they are all very ill, or they fancy they are, and phyficians tell us that difeafes of the imagination are as afflictive to the patient as real gouts and fevers. I need fcarcely add that it is the fashion: in all fuch diforders to take the most expenfive method of cure. Perhaps, fir, your correfpondent's reading frem might anfwer in cafes ke mine, if I could venture to prefcribet, or having done fo, if I could enforce my prefcription, but all the libraries in London are nothing to the circulating library of a watering place, nor is there any exercife we have accefs to here, equal to fhaking the dice-box at a raffle, nor any fights the metropolis affords, equal to the genteel lounge of the family of Delutle's · at the pump-roem, or on the fea-fide. My eloquence, therefore, and even that of your correfpondent, which I take to be greater, would all be thrown away, and fink to nothing before the perfuafive arguments of tears, fits, pouting, and ill-humour, which never fail to accompany- a compulfiveconfinement at home in fine weather. And, now, fir, I hope I have convinced your correfpondent, that however deferving of pity unlearned gentlemen may be in a rainy day, yet there are objects much more deferving of pity in fine weather, a kind of weather, fir, which modern manners have rendered friendly only to expence and idlenefs. It may ripen the corn and mature the fruits of the earth, but it obliges us at the fame time to meddle with them in a very, fparing way, and I am certain, had it not been for the profpect we have of a wet feafon, my affairs would have been rather embarraffed. There is no evil fo great, but what we may derive fome benefit from it, and unlefs the months of Auguft and September deceive me, I am certain I fhall wind up at the year's end, a bettor man by twenty per cent. than I can poffibly do under a continuance of warm weather and a ferene ky. Indeed, fir, as I faid before, it is very hard to have one's temper turned differently from that of other people, but neceffity has no law. I can de rive no pleasure from your azure des your gentle zephyrs-the fanning of the trees cool grottos-limpid ftreams-and other graces and beauties which poets celebrate on purpofe, I believe, to feduce induftrious people from their shops and counting-houfes. Thefe may be very fine things to behold,. but when they are leagued against a mans and attack his property in all die rections, hope you will make fome allowance for him, if he should not be Your correfpondent talks of a man, having refources within himself. Alas, fir, who has refources within himfelf? Man is a gregarious animal. His happiness is the aggregate of a number of contributions in which the smallest donations will be thankfully received.' We borrow a bit of hap-. pinefs from one, and a bit from another, and make a patch-work fort of felicity, which falls to pieces the moment we begin to ftretch it, and then we must look out for frefl remnants. And all this, fir, ftrange as it may feem, proceeds from longevity. We live fo very long, that we think we have ten times more years on our hands than we have any ufe for, and hence our great proficiency in the art of killing time. But may we not, with all due deference to the most expert of our time-killers, fufpect that they - Have fcotch'd the fnake, not kill'd it; She'll clofe, and be herself; while their poor malice Remains in danger of her former tooth !* London, A CITIZEN. BIOGRAPHICAL REGISTER of eminent PERSONS deceafed in 1795*. science, and contributed to procure JOSIAH WEDGEWOOD, Efq. him the esteem of fcientific men at home and throughout Europe. His R. Wedgewood was the young Mer Ton of a potter, whole pro-invention of a thermometer for meas perty confifting chiefly of a fmall entailed eltate, that defcended to the eldest fon, Jofiah was left, at an early period of life, to lay the foundation of his own fortune. This he did most fubftantially by applying his attention to the pottery bufinefs, which, it is not too much to fay, he brought to the highest perfection, and established a manufacture that has opened a new fcene of extenfive commerce, before unknown to this or any other country. His many discoveries of new fpecies of earthen wares and porcelains, his studied forms and chafte ftyle of decorations, and the correctnefs and judgment with which all his works were executed under his own eye, and by artifts, for the most part of his own forming, have turned the current in this branch of commerce; for, before his time, England imported the finer earthen wares; but for more than twenty years past, fhe has exported them to a very great annual amount, the whole of which is drawn from the earth, and from the industry of the inhabitants; while the national tafte has been improved, and its reputation raised in foreign coun furing the higher degrees of heat employed in the various arts, is of the highest importance to their promotion, and will add celebrity to his name. At an early period of his life, feeing the impoffibility of extending confiderably the manufactory he was engaged in on the fpot which gave him birth, without the advantages of inland navigation, he was the propofer of the Grand Trunk Canal, and the chief agent in obtaining the act of par liament for making it, against the prejudices of the landed intereft, which at that time ftood very high, and but juft before had been with great difficulty overcome in another quarter by the all powerful influence of the duke of Bridgewater, whofe canal was at that time but lately finished. The Grand Trunk Canal is ninety miles in length, uniting the rivers Trent and Merfey; and branches have fince been made from it to the Severn to Oxford, and to many other parts; and it will alfo have a communication with the grand junction canal from Braunfton to Brentford. In the execution of this vast scheme, he was affifted by the late ingenious Mr. Brindley, whom he never mentioned but with refpect. His inventions have prodigioufly By it he enabled the manufacturers of increased the number of perfons em- the inland part of Staffordshire and its ployed in the potteries, and in the neighbourhood, to obtain from the traffic and tranfport of their materials diftant fhores of Devonshire, Dorfetfrom diftant parts of the kingdom: fhire and Kent, thofe materials of and this clafs of manufacturers is alfo which the Staffordshire ware is comindebted to him for much mechanical pofed; affording, at the fame time, contrivance and arrangement in their a ready conveyance of the manufac operations; his private manufactory ture to diftant countries, and thus not having had, for thirty years and up- only to rival, but underfell, at foreign ward, all the efficacy of a public work markets, a commodity which has of experiment. Neither was he un- proved, and must continue to prove known in the walks of philofophy. of infinite advantage to thefe kingHis communications to the Royal doms; as the ware, when formed, Society fhew a mind enlightened by owes it value almoft wholly to the las • See Biographical Register for 1794, in our Magazine for August and Sept. 1795, tries. |