You may well conceive that we were not long without walking up as far as the castle, where the states general of France have been frequently held, and where the celebrated duke of Guise was put to death by order of Henry III. We found the court of the castle overgrown with weeds, and the staircase hardly practicable, and heard no noise but our own footsteps and the whistling of the wind; but there was something in this frightful solitude, in this scene of ruined walls and towers, tottering to their fall, which is not unfriendly to wholesome meditation, when connected with the memory of past times, and the recollection of what had been said, or done, or perpetrated within these enclosures. Perhaps no assassination, not even that of Cæsar, approached so near to being justifiable as that of the duke of Guise, and particularly if we consider how extremely unfavourable the manners of the age were to every degree of order and good government; to that adoration of beauty, that enthusiasm of courage which had impelled the gallant knight of ancient days, and to all the amiable extravagancies of chivalry, the greatest depravity had succeeded, and the grossest debauchery. The slightest provocation was revenged with blood; and the apparent fairness of open defiance was now blended with the profligate policy of private murder.

The principal growth of the country we could command a view of seemed to be vines, and there are some manufactories in the town, which are said not to flourish. That of cutlery, at least, does not, if I may judge from the importunity of those who brought us some specimens to look at, and who seemed as anxious that we should purchace a trifling article or two, as if they had been asking charity.

We saw Chambord at a distance, on the other side of the river. Young will have given you a very good idea of the castle, and of the splendid establishment which Louis XV. created there for his favourite general, who is said never to have been great but at the head of an army. The place is now in ruins; but it does not appear that any part of the forest has been converted to the purposes of agriculture, though Young, whose book is highly esteemed in France, has given very good advice on that subject. Game of all sorts were shut up here in prodigious quantities, and roamed at large over a space of twenty thousand A great waste of land, surely, in a country which was rather overstocked with inhabitants. The decree of the national assembly which put an end to all feudal rights having let in a crowd of hungry peasants upon these lords of the forest, thousands of them were destroyed in a short time, and among them were found not less than eight hundred wild boars.

acres.

THE USEFUL ARTS FOR THE PORT FOLIO.

Description of the Roller cast at General Ridgely's furnace, on the suggestion of Thomas W. Griffith Esq. and used on the new turnpike road from Baltimore towards York-Town.

THE roller weighs two tons, thirteen hundred and eight pounds, exclusive of the axletree, wedging, clevices, and hounds; the weight of all which, added together makes the real pressure on the road equal to about three tons. It measures three feet six inches and a half in length, by two feet five inches and a half in diameter. As the weight required could not be procured at one blast, it is cast in five pieces, the outside one, or cylinder, is two inches and three quarters thick, and weighs about 22cwt. Each of the other pieces fill one quarter or angle of the inner circle of the cylinder and weighs about 8cwt, leaving a hollow square, each side of which is eleven inches, through the centre of which is passed a wrought iron axletree, two inches and three quarters square, wedged fast with gudgeons projecting four inches at either end and turning with the roller.

The carriage is a pair of wheels somewhat smaller than the fore wheels of a wagon, shod with three inch tire, with a tongue and double gear. Through the axletree of the carriage a strong body bolt let through the end of the coupling pole, passes, and, as it is almost impossible to turn the roller in the ordinary way, this bolt is taken out, and the end of the coupling pole is passed over by hand, whilst the horses and carriage are taken round, and the coupling pole is again attached in the opposite direction alternately.

The roller and carriage complete cost 398 dollars and 13 cents. It requires six or eight horses, shod expressly quite across the hoofs, and two men, at an expense of six or eight dollars per day, during which a mile of road, twenty feet wide, may be rolled three or four times.

It is put on the road immediately after the stone is broken, and passed over each part of the surface ten or twelve times, on three or four days successively, and the oftener the better, especially if the material is flint stone.

The effect of rolling is to make the surface even, and fit to be travelled without a covering of gravel or sand, which would cost per mile as much as the whole cost of the roller and rolling, and these materials can very seldom be obtained at any price, fit for covering; for if clay, or earth of any kind, be mixed with with them, they are manifestly of more injury than benefit to the turnpike. Indeed the great advantage of rolling is that it presses and binds the stone together, so that sub

stances which loosen the stones cannot penetrate down between them, whilst the surface, being even from the first using of the road, the horses have no temptation or guide to follow each other and form paths, and the compactness and hardness of the surface rolled, will longer resist the effect of the carriage wheels and be clear of ruts, the great enemies of good roads.

CORRESPONDENCE-FOR THE PORT FOLIO.

MR. OLDSCHOOL,

As a subscriber to The Port Folio and consequently one of its well wishers, I take the liberty of proposing what I am sure will not fail of raising it in the opinion of its learned supporters. What I allude to is the proposing of one or two mathematical questions in each number of The Port Folio, to be solved by such of your numerous contributors whose taste and genius may lead them to interesting inquiries on this subject.

The very extensive circulation of your useful and entertaining magazine causes one to hope that your consent to what I have proposed will tend to promote, in a great measure a general taste for researches into important branches of the mathematics.

PHILO MATHEMATICUS.

The publication of a Poetical Miscellany commended to the Editor.

MR. OLDSCHOOL,

I find, in a work entitled "Literary Hours," by Mr. Drake, No xxv, vol. 2, a critique on, and comparison between the Greek and Roman lyric bards and the British lyric poets, with a list of such original English odes as, in the opinion of this writer, bid defiance to competition. These he has particularized by the first lines, and the authors' names, and classed under the following heads. 1st. The sublime. 2d. The pathetic. 3d. The descriptive. 4th. The amatory.

It has occurred to me that the publication of these pieces, in one volume, without any additional ones, arranged in the order, and agreeably to the divisions adopted by Mr. Drake, would be well received by the readers of poetry, and have a direct tendency to improve the style and to fix the taste of such of our youth as are inclined to court the lyric muse.

With a view to the latter object particularly, I should think it advisable to give Mr. Drake's twenty-fifth number entire, by way of introduction, and to provide an appendix, containing such judicious criticism as have appeared on the most distinguished of these odes.

The work would then comprise the finest models of their kind in the English language, and a selection of appropriate criticism.

Should your opinion, in these respects, correspond with mine, it will give me pleasure to see the publication conducted under your auspices, provided you can derive from it a compensation for your trouble. I am, sir, with great esteem,

Your obedient servant.

J. M' H.

MEMOIRS OF HAYTI-FOR THE PORT FOLIO.

LETTER. XI.

The Cape, island of Hayti, November 1805.

I SHALL now proceed to relate some additional circumstances which occurred during the general massacre described in my last.

Boisrond Tonnere, a mulatto officer of rank, who had been liberally educated, was one of those adepts in dissimulation, who could, by his duplicity, present the mask of friendship to a person at the same moment that he was meditating his destruction. This man went one day to the house of a Frenchman whom he knew to be possessed of several valuable articles. He entered and informed the gentleman, with a smile of complacency, that he had understood he had an elegant watch which he said he was desirous of purchasing. The Frenchman knowing too well the object of his visit, replied that he had a very excellent watch, and that if Mons. Tonnere would accept of it he would present it to him. The offer was not rejected, and the officer then said that he also wished to bargain with him for his sabre, which he had heard was superbly mounted. This was also handed to him; but the demands of the villain were not yet satisfied, and he asked the gentleman if he had not a pair of valuable pistols. The Frenchman's patience being almost exhausted, and foreseeing the result of these apparent friendly inquiries, he answered, that he had such a pair of pistols, and that if Mons. Tonnere would accept of one, he would give it to him with pleasure. The mulatto not being remarkable for an overcharge of courage, ve,

ry civilly declined the proposition, and immediately retreated with his watch and sabre, leaving the Frenchman to take his chance with the first party of assassins who should enter his house for plunder.

After the carnage had been continued until victims were scarcely any longer to be found, an aid-de-camp was sent to Mr. Dodge to direct him to appear before the governor-general, and to bring with him all the Frenchmen who were at his house. Mr. Dodge obeyed, and an examination into the claims of the different individuals to American citizenship was made by Dessalines, Christophe, and others. The proofs of most of them, though their number was small, were satisfactory, and they had liberty to return to Mr. Dodge's house. Among them, however, were two gentlemen, Messrs O. and G. who had long resided at the Cape, as copartners in trade, and who very narrowly escaped with their lives upon this occasion. Dessalines said he knew them to be Frenchmen; as for O. he had known him many years, and he concluded by stating his opinion to be decidedly in favour of putting them both to death. Christophe, whose passion for money constitutes a very prominent feature of his character, addressed himself to the governor in the following language: "With due submission to your excellency, I must beg leave to differ with you upon this point. I think if they will pay us a reasonable sum for their ransom, we might liberate them. As they are pauvre diables, and perhaps have not much money, we should let them off for two thousand dollars each." The governour assented to the proposition, and the money was immediately paid for them by Mr. Dodge. But it appears that this humane scheme of commutation was an infamous device to turn their deaths to some account; for, instead of being permitted to return with Mr. Dodge, they were ordered to prison, whence they never would have been permitted to depart; but it fortunately happened that on their route to their destined confinement, the officer under whose sole superintendance they were conducted, met with a party of soldiers who had in their possession some wretched whites, whom they were leading to their houses, in order to obtain from them a disclosure of the place in which their property was concealed, under promises to spare their lives. The officer, supposing that nothing could be obtained from the two persons in his charge, as they had already been fleeced by a higher authority, but calculating that there was a probability in the other case, of sharing in some valuable plunder, left them, and joined his comrades. The two gentlemen, being thus released, fled, and found means to conceal themselves among some rubbish in a burned house. After remaining there for several days, until nearly exhausted by hunger, they contrived, by an old black woman, who was passing, to inform Mr. Dodge of their situation. That gentleman, who, as well as Dessalines and the others, had supposed them to be dead,