the only
consolation in looking on weak princes, wicked statesmen, unfeeling
lawyers, and military butchers, is that, in the course of nature,
Death will soon relieve the world from the pest of their influence!
And there are few men who would, not prefer death as their own fate,
and who would not hail death as a common blessing, rather than live an
eternity under the dominion of the weak, the crafty, or the cruel
Proud!

The road from York House towards Wandsworth, lay across a Plain of
unenclosed fields, which, before the Thames had carved out the
boundaries of its course, was, I have no doubt, generally covered with
its waters. After the ocean left the land, and the hills became the
depositaries of the clouds, how many ages must have elapsed before the
beds of rivers were circumscribed as we now see them in England. The
water always followed the lowest level, but, being of different
quantities at different seasons, vegetation would flourish on the
sides occasionally covered, and in time would generate banks; while
the stream itself, by carrying off the argillaceous bottom, would add
to the depth--the two combined causes producing all the phenomena of
bounded rivers.[2] The Thames, after heavy rains, or thaws of snow,
still overflows its banks, thereby adding to the vegetable productions
of its meadows, which, if not consumed, or carried away by man, would,
long ere this, have fixed unalterably the limits of its course. The
effect of these inundations in our days, or in past ages, has been to
render its banks the fertile scite of all those fine garden-grounds
which supply the metropolis so abundantly with fruits and vegetables.

[2] It is difficult to assign limits to the gradual effects
of the circuit of the waters by evaporation and rain on the
creation of land, from the decay of vegetable organizations.
All the rain which falls on such a country as England, from
two to three feet deep per annum, tends to raise the surface
of the soil with the substances generated by it, which we
call solids. How small a portion reaches the rivulets, and
how little returns to the sea! The consideration seems at
least to justify the notion, that the waters desiccate in
spite of the encroachments of currents, and that all things
have proceeded from the silent agency of water.

Some large Distilleries, on the banks of the river, reminded me of the
ba