Moses striking the rock, by Nicolo Poussin, born 1594, and died 1665. W.

33. With scenes too sad Salvator strives to please,] A very capital picture of the prodigal son on his knees at prayers amidst the herd of swine, by Salvator Rosa, born 1614, and died 1673. W.

ibid. Pure beams of light around the Virgin play,] The famous picture, by Guido, of the doctors of the church disputing on the immaculate conception. Guido Reni, born 1575, and died 1642. W.

34. Thee too, Lorrain, the well-pleas'd Muse should name,] Claud. Gille of Lorrain, born 1600,

and died 1682. W.

ibid. Nor e'er forget Domenichini's fame,] Dome. nico Zampieri, commonly called Domenichini, born 1561, and died 1641. W.

ibid. May we like Walpole, meet the fatal day!] Ca. tharine Shorter, first wife to Sir Robert Walpole, whose merits are inscribed by her youngest son, the honorable Horace Walpole, on the tomb he erected in Westminster-Abbey, at once a monument of piety and taste.

EPISTLE IV.

Page 35. For a more particular account of these venerable ruins, the Reader is refered to Mr. Gilpin's "Observations on the river Wye," p. 31, &c. ̧

35. See the ridg'd tide with sober grandeur heave,

And float in triumph o'er the river-wave.] This manner of the coming-in of the tide to the river Severn is called the Eager, or the Hyger, of the Severn. There is a beautiful allusion to it in bishop Sprat's History of the Royal Society. D.

36. Here, noble Stafford, thy unfinish'd dome,] The remains of a noble seat bugun by Stafford Duke of Buckingham. DAVIES.

ibid. And thence the long-stretch'd race of Berkeley come.] Berkeley-castle, the seat of the

Earl of Berkeley.

37. Where Vaga mingles with Sabrina's tide.] The rivers Wye, and Severn. D.

ibid. Ascending Chepstow shews its castled seat.] Chepstow-castle in Monmouthshire, the seat of the Duke of Beaufort. D.

EPISTLE V.

Page 39. Dr. Yalden, or, as Wood styles him, Youlding, was a younger son of John Youlding who had been page to Charles I. when Prince, and after the Restoration, an exciseman at Oxford. Our Auther, born in that city, from being originally a chorister of Magdalen, became a demy and probationer fellow. He took the degree of Doctor in Divinity in the year 1708.

EPISTLE VI.

Page 47. The two Ladies here addressed, were the honorable Miss Lowthers, daughters to the late Lord Lonsdale.

ibid. From sulph'rous damps, &c.] The coal mines near Whitehaven are greatly infested with fulminating damps; large quantities of them being frequently collected in those deserted works, which are not ventilated with perpetual currents of fresh air: and, in such works, they often remain for a long time, without doing any mischief. But when, by some accident, they are set on fire, they then produce dreadful explosions, very destructive to the miners; and bursting out of the pits with great impetuosity, like the fiery eruptions from burning mountains, force along with them ponderous bodies to a great height in the

air.

ibid. From bursting streams, &c.] The coal in these mines hath, several times, been set on fire by the fulminating damp, and hath continued burning for many months; until large streams of water were conducted into the mines, and suffered to fill those parts where the coal was on fire. By such fires, several collieries have been intirely destroyed; of which there are instances near Newcastle, and in other parts of England, and in the shire of Fife in Scotland; in some of which places, the fire has continued burning for ages. But more mines have been ruined by inundations.

48. The Daemons of the mine restrains, &c.] In order to prevent, as much as possible, the collieries from being filled with those pernicious damps, it has been found necessary carefully to search for those crevises in the coal, from whence they issue out; and at those places, to confine them within a narrow space; and from those narrow spaces in which they are confined, to conduct them through long pipes into the open air; where being set on fire, they consume in perpetual flames, as they continually arise out of the earth.

49. And summons, &c.] Those who have the direction of these deep and extensive works, are obliged to use great care and art in keeping them continually ventilated with perpetual currents of fresh air; which afford the miners a constant supply of that vital fluid, and expel out of the mines damps and other noxious exhalations, together with such other burnt and foul air, as is become poisonous and unfit for respiration.

ib. Nor strikes the flint, &c.] It having been observed by Mr. Spedding, who superintends these collieries, and to whom the author here gives the name of Prospero, that the fulminating damp could only be kindled by flame, and that it was not liable to be set on fire by red-hot iron, nor by the sparks produced by the collision of flint and steel; he invented a machine, in which, while a steel wheel is turned round with a very rapid motion, and flints are applied thereto, great plenty of fiery sparks are emitted, that af

ford the miners such a light as enables them to carry on their work in close places, where the flame of a candle, or lamp, would occasion dreadful explosions. Without some invention of this sort, the working of these mines, so greatly annoyed with these inflammable damps, would long ago have been impracti cable.

50. But on You move, &c.] The reader may sup pose that he hath entered these mines by the opening at the bottom of a hill, and hath already passed through a long adit, hewn in the rock, and arched over with brick, which is the principal road into them for men, and for horses; and which, by a steep descent, leads down to the lowest vein of coal. Being arrived at the coal, he may suppose himself still to descend, by ways less steep, till, after a journey of a mile and a half, he arrives at the profoundest parts of the mine. The greatest part of this descent is through spacious galleries, which continually intersect other galleries; all the coal being cut away except large pillars, which, in deep parts of the mine, are three yards high, and about twelves yards square at the base; such great strength being there required to support the ponderous roof.

ibid. A triple story, &c.] There are here three strata of coal, which lie at a considerable distance one above another. The mines wrought in these parallel strata have a communication by pits, and are compared by the author to the different stories of a building.