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The “Curiosities of Literature,” commenced fifty years since, have been composed at various periods, and necessarily partake of those successive characters which mark the eras of the intellectual habits of the writer.

In my youth, the taste for modern literary history was only of recent date. The first elegant scholar who opened a richer vein in the mine of MODERN LITERATURE was JOSEPH WARTON;—he had a fragmentary mind, and he was a rambler in discursive criticism. Dr. JOHNSON was a famished man for anecdotical literature, and sorely complained of the penury of our literary history.

I cannot, myself, consign to the press, for the ninth time, these “Curiosities of Literature,” in their present popular form, without being reminded of the peculiarity of their fate. It is now approaching half a century since their first volume appeared; about a year or two after, the second succeeded. Twenty years elapsed before a third was produced; and six years subsequently, the last three volumes were at once given to the world. Of volumes produced at such distinct intervals, it may be worth notice that they reflect three eras of the writer’s life. In the first stage of investigation we are eager to acquire and arrange knowledge; in the second our curiosity becomes more critical, and more varied; and in the third, knowledge and curiosity opening the virgin veins of original research, and striking out new results, in the history of human nature, we combine philosophy with literature. For a long series of years these volumes have been domestic favourites. A great personage once called them his “little library,” and they stand classed in the catalogue, among the deliciæ literariæ. They have received a more distinguished approbation by the honour of being constantly referred to, by the most eminent writers, both for their information and their opinions.

The form of essay-writing, were it now moulded even by the hand of the Raphael of Essayists, would fail in the attraction of novelty; Morality would now in vain repeat its counsels in a fugitive page, and Manners now offer but little variety to supply one. The progress of the human mind has been marked by an enlargement of our knowledge; and essay-writing seems to have closed with the century which charmed and enlightened.

This miscellany, was first formed, many years ago, when two of my friends, were occupies in those anecdotical labours, which have proved so entertaining to themselves, and their readers.^* I conceived that a collection of a different complexion, though much less amusing, might prove, somewhat more instructive; and that, literary history, afforded an almost unexplored source, of interesting facts. The work itself, has been well enough received by the public, to justify its design.

SAY, can I sing my Marianna’s death?
   How sing, alas!—my breast, with anguish fraught,
While heart-felt sighs suppress the labouring breath,
   Words crowd on words, and thought contends with thought.
Pleasures now past embitter present woe,
Afresh my bosom bleeds, anew my sorrows flow.

My love too strong, too much thy worth I feel,
   Too deep thy form emprinted on my breast,
For silent grief my suff’rings to conceal;
   My love is sooth’d while its sad power’s express’d,
And the sweet image of our union chaste,
Bliss now for ever fled, by mem’ry’s hand is trac’d.

Shall I sing thy death, Marianne? What a theme! when my sighs interrupt my words, and one idea flies before the other! The pleasures thou didst bestow on me, now augment my sorrows; I open the wounds of a heart that yet bleeds; and thy death is renovated to me.

When the daughter of James the First married the Palatine, many English soldiers of fortune followed her; amongst these gentlemen was one Duncomb, who was an officer in the Earl of Oxford’s company. He left a beautiful mistress behind him in England, to whom he had offered vows of the most faithful passion; accompanied by a promise of marriage. Her fortune was however small, and his father threatened to disinherit him if he carried his design into execution. To alienate his affections from this lady, he sent him to the Palatinate, where he conceived time and absence would efface the impressions which love had made upon his heart. He charged him at his departure never to think of her more, if he wished to be remembered by him. Our lover had been now absent for some time, and his heart breathed with undiminished affection. He resolved to give way to the pressure of his feelings; and for this purpose wrote to his mistress, assuring her, that no threats or anger of his unfeeling parents should ever banish the tender recollection of their reciprocal passion. Our youth, who was a careful lover, but a careless writer, having occasion to write to his father at the same time, addressed his father’s letter, (in which he renounces his mistress for ever) to his mistress; and the letter of his mistress to his father, in which he promises a durable passion. The father, with harsh and cruel indignation, sent to his son a letter of the most unkind nature. Whether it was this letter, or a sense of shame for the mistake that had happened, that she should see he had renounced her; the lover, alive to the finest sensibilities, run himself on his sword, and his death was sincerely lamented by all the English in the Palatinate.

A description of the disorder of an Atrabilarian, in whose mind the melancholy humour produces extraordinary effects; in which there is this remarkable, that while the patient is attacked by these symptoms, he is sensible of them, and attempts to find a remedy.

Our ingenious etymologist likewise observes, that it is hardly a doubt, but that the name of ALBION, which was given to the most northern parts of England, is derived from the same circumstance, viz. the height of the mountains.

The reason of this he ingeniously conjectures to be, that the human body differs greatly from that of other animals, by its structure and its prefiguration, and what is remarkable by the situation of its centre of gravity. Compared with the other parts of his body, Man has the head very heavy; because it is full of brain, and has much bone and flesh, and no cavities which admit the air; so that the head plunged into water by its own weight, the nostrils and the ears overflow, and the strong parts overcoming the feeble ones, he is soon drowned. Animals, on the contrary, having the head lighter in proportion to the rest of the body, because they have rarely any brain, and that there are chasms in the head, they are enabled to hold the nostrils in the air, and breathing without difficulty, they do not drown as man does, by statical reasons which are undeniable.

The King of Siam has in one of his country palaces, a most singular pavilion. The tables, the chairs, the closets, &c. are all composed of crystal. The walls, the ceiling, and the floors, are formed of pieces of ice, of about an inch thick, and six feet square, so nicely united by a cement, which is as transparent as glass itself, that the most subtile water cannot penetrate. There is but one door, which shuts so closely, that it is as impenetrable to the water as the rest of this singular building. A Chinese engineer has constructed it thus as a certain remedy against the insupportable heat of the climate. This pavilion is twenty-eight feet in length, and seventeen in breadth; it is placed in the midst of a great basin, paved and ornamented with marble of various colours. They fill this basin with water in about a quarter of an hour, and it is emptied as quickly. When you enter the pavilion, the door is immediately closed, and cemented with mastick, to hinder the water from entering; it is then they open the sluices; and this great basin is soon filled with water, which is even suffered to overflow the land; so that the pavilion is entirely under water, except the top of the dome, which is left untouched for the benefit of respiration. Nothing is more charming than the agreeable coolness of this delicious place, while the extreme fervour of the sun boils on the surface of the freshest fountains.