M. E. Braddon - "Henry Dunbar"

Various - "R. Caldecott's First Collection of Pictures and Songs"

Various - "Georgian Poetry 1920 22"

Edgar F. Smith - "Priestley in America"

Annual Bibliography of Commonwealth Literature 2007
This paper argues that discourses of love in Ghanaian market literature for youth offer a view into complex negotiations of agency and empowerment. Drawing on Deborah Durham's notion of youth as "social `shifters'" and Francis Nyamnjoh's conception of the "interconnectedness" of agency, I take Ghanaian market literature as one specific case of how African literature for youth foregrounds questions of continuity and change as African societies enter into increasingly complex global relations. In this literature for youth, received notions of love, often constructed out of impressions from American pop and hip hop music, carry new notions of agency that compete with existing "domesticated" forms. Authors like Ike Tandoh and Evelyn Tay employ discourses of love to offer youth alternative avenues for empowerment in a context of socio-economic disenfranchizement. In a creative process of "straddling", this writing both reveals and reproduces the contradictions that obtain in youth configurations of agency.

The Botanic Garden

E >> Erasmus Darwin >> The Botanic Garden





[_Led by the Sage_. l. 195. Dr. Priestley's discovery of the production
of pure air from such variety of substances will probably soon be
applied to the improvement of the diving bell, as the substances which
contain vital air in immense quantities are of little value as manganese
and minium. See additional notes, No. XXXIII. In every hundred weight of
minium there is combined about twelve pounds of pure air, now as sixty
pounds of water are about a cubic foot, and as air is eight hundred
times lighter than water, five hundred weight of minium will produce
eight hundred cubic feet of air or about six thousand gallons. Now, as
this is at least thrice as pure as atmospheric air, a gallon of it may
be supposed to serve for three minutes respiration for one man. At
present the air can not be set at liberty from minium by vitriolic acid
without the application of some heat, this is however very likely soon
to be discovered, and will then enable adventurers to journey beneath
the ocean in large inverted ships or diving balloons.

Mr. Boyle relates, that Cornelius Drebelle contrived not only a vessel
to be rowed under water, but also a liquor to be caried in that vessel,
which would supply the want of fresh air. The vessel was made by order
of James I. and carried twelve rowers besides passengers. It was tried
in the river Thames, and one of the persons who was in that submarine
voyage told the particulars of the experiments to a person who related
them to Mr. Boyle. Annual Register for 1774, p. 248.]

[_Day and Spalding mourn_. l. 217. Mr. Day perished in a diving bell, or
diving boat, of his own construction at Plymouth in June 1774, in which
he was to have continued for a wager twelve hours one hundred feet deep
in water, and probably perished from his not possessing all the
hydrostatic knowledge that was necessary. See note on Ulva, Vol. II. of
this work. See Annual Register for 1774. p. 245.

Mr. Spalding was professionally ingenious in the art of constructing and
managing the diving bell, and had practised the business many years with
success. He went down accompanied by one of his young men twice to view
the wreck of the Imperial East-Indiaman at the Kish bank in Ireland. On
descending the third time in June, 1783, they remained about an hour
under water, and had two barrels of air sent down to them, but on the
signals from below not being again repeated, after a certain time, they
were drawn up by their assistants and both found dead in the bell.
Annual Register for 1783, p. 206. These two unhappy events may for a
time check the ardor of adventurers in traversing the bottom of the
ocean, but it is probable in another half century it may be safer to
travel under the ocean than over it, since Dr. Priestley's discovery of
procuring pure air in such great abundance from the calces of metals.]

[_Hapless Pierce!_ l, 219. The Haslewell East-Indiaman, outward bound,
was wrecked off Seacomb in the isle of Purbec on the 6th of January,
1786; when Capt. Pierce, the commander, with two young ladies, his
daughters, and the greatest part of the crew and passengers perished in
the sea. Some of the officers and about seventy seamen escaped with
great difficulty on the rocks, but Capt. Pierce finding it was
impossible to save the lives of the young ladies refused to quit the
ship, and perished with them.]


"VII. SYLPHS OF NICE EAR! with beating wings you guide
The fine vibrations of the aerial tide;
235 Join in sweet cadences the measured words,
Or stretch and modulate the trembling cords.
You strung to melody the Grecian lyre,
Breathed the rapt song, and fan'd the thought of fire,
Or brought in combinations, deep and clear,
240 Immortal harmony to HANDEL'S ear.--
YOU with soft breath attune the vernal gale,
When breezy evening broods the listening vale;
Or wake the loud tumultuous sounds, that dwell
In Echo's many-toned diurnal shell.
245 YOU melt in dulcet chords, when Zephyr rings
The Eolian Harp, and mingle all its strings;
Or trill in air the soft symphonious chime,
When rapt CECILIA lifts her eye sublime,
Swell, as she breathes, her bosoms rising snow,
250 O'er her white teeth in tuneful accents slow,
Through her fair lips on whispering pinions move,
And form the tender sighs, that kindle love!

"So playful LOVE on Ida's flowery sides
With ribbon-rein the indignant Lion guides;
255 Pleased on his brinded back the lyre he rings,
And shakes delirious rapture from the strings;
Slow as the pausing Monarch stalks along,
Sheaths his retractile claws, and drinks the song;
Soft Nymphs on timid step the triumph view,
260 And listening Fawns with beating hoofs pursue;
With pointed ears the alarmed forest starts,
And Love and Music soften savage hearts.


[_Indignant lion guides_. l. 254. Described from an antient gem,
expressive of the combined power of love and music, in the Museum
Florent.]


VIII. "SYLPHS! YOUR bold hosts, when Heaven with justice dread
Calls the red tempest round the guilty head,
265 Fierce at his nod assume vindictive forms,
And launch from airy cars the vollied storms.--
From Ashur's vales when proud SENACHERIB trod,
Pour'd his swoln heart, defied the living GOD,
Urged with incessant shouts his glittering powers;
270 And JUDAH shook through all her massy towers;
Round her sad altars press'd the prostrate crowd,
Hosts beat their breasts, and suppliant chieftains bow'd;
Loud shrieks of matrons thrill'd the troubled air,
And trembling virgins rent their scatter'd hair;
275 High in the midst the kneeling King adored,
Spread the blaspheming scroll before the Lord,
Raised his pale hands, and breathed his pausing sighs,
And fixed on Heaven his dim imploring eyes,--
"Oh! MIGHTY GOD! amidst thy Seraph-throng
280 "Who sit'st sublime, the Judge of Right and Wrong;
"Thine the wide earth, bright sun, and starry zone,
"That twinkling journey round thy golden throne;
"Thine is the crystal source of life and light,
"And thine the realms of Death's eternal night.
285 "Oh, bend thine ear, thy gracious eye incline,
"Lo! Ashur's King blasphemes thy holy shrine,
"Insults our offerings, and derides our vows,---
"Oh! strike the diadem from his impious brows,
"Tear from his murderous hand the bloody rod,
290 "And teach the trembling nations, "THOU ART GOD!"--
--SYLPHS! in what dread array with pennons broad
Onward ye floated o'er the ethereal road,
Call'd each dank steam the reeking marsh exhales,
Contagious vapours, and volcanic gales,
295 Gave the soft South with poisonous breath to blow,
And rolled the dreadful whirlwind on the foe!--
Hark! o'er the camp the venom'd tempest sings,
Man falls on Man, on buckler buckler rings;
Groan answers groan, to anguish anguish yields,
300 And DEATH'S loud accents shake the tented fields!
--High rears the Fiend his grinning jaws, and wide
Spans the pale nations with colossal stride,
Waves his broad falchion with uplifted hand,
And his vast shadow darkens all the land.


[_Volcanic gales_. l. 294. The pestilential winds of the east are
described by various authors under various denominations; as harmattan,
samiel, samium, syrocca, kamsin, seravansum. M. de Beauchamp describes a
remarkable south wind in the deserts about Bagdad, called seravansum, or
poison-wind; it burns the face, impedes respiration, strips the trees of
their leaves, and is said to pass on in a streight line, and often kills
people in six hours. P. Cotte sur la Meteorol. Analytical Review for
February, 1790. M. Volney says, the hot wind or ramsin seems to blow at
the season when the sands of the deserts are the hottest; the air is
then filled with an extreamly subtle dust. Vol. I. p. 61. These winds
blow in all directions from the deserts; in Egypt the most violent
proceed from the S.S.W. at Mecca from the E. at Surat from the N. at
Bassora from the N.W. at Bagdad from the W. and in Syria from the S.E.

On the south of Syria, he adds, where the Jordan flows is a country of
volcanos; and it is observed that the earthquakes in Syria happen after
their rainy season, which is also conformable to a similar observation
made by Dr. Shaw in Barbary. Travels in Egypt, Vol. I. p. 303.

These winds seem all to be of volcanic origin, as before mentioned, with
this difference, that the Simoom is attended with a stream of electric
matter; they seem to be in consequence of earthquakes caused by the
monsoon floods, which fall on volcanic fires in Syria, at the same time
that they inundate the Nile.]


305 IX. 1. "Ethereal cohorts! Essences of Air!
Make the green children of the Spring your care!
Oh, SYLPHS! disclose in this inquiring age
One GOLDEN SECRET to some favour'd sage;
Grant the charm'd talisman, the chain, that binds,
310 Or guides the changeful pinions of the winds!
--No more shall hoary Boreas, issuing forth
With Eurus, lead the tempests of the North;
Rime the pale Dawn, or veil'd in flaky showers
Chill the sweet bosoms of the smiling Hours.
315 By whispering Auster waked shall Zephyr rise,
Meet with soft kiss, and mingle in the skies,
Fan the gay floret, bend the yellow ear,
And rock the uncurtain'd cradle of the year;
Autumn and Spring in lively union blend,
320 And from the skies the Golden Age descend.


[_One golden secret_. l. 308. The suddenness of the change of the wind
from N.E. to S.W. seems to shew that it depends on some minute chemical
cause; which if it was discovered might probably, like other chemical
causes, be governed by human agency; such as blowing up rocks by
gunpowder, or extracting the lightening from the clouds. If this could
be accomplished, it would be the most happy discovery that ever has
happened to these northern latitudes, since in this country the N.E.
winds bring frost, and the S.W. ones are attended with warmth and
moisture; if the inferior currents of air could be kept perpetually from
the S.W. supplied by new productions of air at the line, or by superior
currents flowing in a contrary direction, the vegetation of this country
would be doubled; as in the moist vallies of Africa, which know no
frost; the number of its inhabitants would be increased, and their lives
prolonged; as great abundance of the aged and infirm of mankind, as well
as many birds and animals, are destroyed by severe continued frosts in
this climate.]


2. "Castled on ice, beneath the circling Bear,
A vast CAMELION spits and swallows air;
O'er twelve degrees his ribs gigantic bend,
And many a league his leathern jaws extend;
325 Half-fish, beneath, his scaly volutes spread,
And vegetable plumage crests his head;
Huge fields of air his wrinkled skin receives,
From panting gills, wide lungs, and waving leaves;
Then with dread throes subsides his bloated form,
330 His shriek the thunder, and his sigh the storm.
Oft high in heaven the hissing Demon wins
His towering course, upborne on winnowing fins;
Steers with expanded eye and gaping mouth,
His mass enormous to the affrighted South;
335 Spreads o'er the shuddering Line his shadowy limbs,
And Frost and Famine follow as he swims.--
SYLPHS! round his cloud-built couch your bands array,
And mould the Monster to your gentle sway;
Charm with soft tones, with tender touches check,
340 Bend to your golden yoke his willing neck,
With silver curb his yielding teeth restrain,
And give to KIRWAN'S hand the silken rein.
--Pleased shall the Sage, the dragon-wings between,
Bend o'er discordant climes his eye serene,
345 With Lapland breezes cool Arabian vales,
And call to Hindostan antarctic gales,
Adorn with wreathed ears Kampschatca's brows,
And scatter roses on Zealandic snows,
Earth's wondering Zones the genial seasons share,
350 And nations hail him "MONARCH OF THE AIR."


[_A vast Camelion_. l. 322. See additional notes, No. XXXIII. on the
destruction and reproduction of the atmosphere.]

[_To Kirwan's hand_. l. 342. Mr. Kirwan has published a valuable
treatise on the temperature of climates, as a step towards investigating
the theory of the winds; and has since written some ingenious papers on
this subject in the Transactions of the Royal Irish Society.]


X. 1. "SYLPHS! as you hover on ethereal wing,
Brood the green children of parturient Spring!--
Where in their bursting cells my Embryons rest,
I charge you guard the vegetable nest;
355 Count with nice eye the myriad SEEDS, that swell
Each vaulted womb of husk, or pod, or shell;
Feed with sweet juices, clothe with downy hair,
Or hang, inshrined, their little orbs in air.


[_The myriad seeds_. l. 355. Nature would seem to have been wonderfully
prodigal in the seeds of vegetables, and the spawn of fish; almost any
one plant, if all its seeds should grow to maturity, would in a few
years alone people the terrestrial globe. Mr. Ray asserts that 101
seeds of tobacco weighed only one grain, and that from one tobacco plant
the seeds thus calculated amounted to 360,000! The seeds of the ferns
are by him supposed to exceed a million on a leaf. As the works of
nature are governed by general laws this exuberant reproduction prevents
the accidental extinction of the species, at the same time that they
serve for food for the higher orders of animation.

Every seed possesses a reservoir of nutriment designed for the growth of
the future plant, this consists of starch, mucilage, or oil, within the
coat of the seed, or of sugar and subacid pulp in the fruits, which
belongs to it.

For the preservation of the immature seed nature has used many ingenious
methods; some are wrapped in down, as the seeds of the rose, bean, and
cotton-plant; others are suspended in a large air-vessel, as those of
the bladder-sena, staphylaea, and pea.]


"So, late descry'd by HERSCHEL'S piercing sight,
360 Hang the bright squadrons of the twinkling Night;
Ten thousand marshall'd stars, a silver zone,
Effuse their blended lustres round her throne;
Suns call to suns, in lucid clouds conspire,
And light exterior skies with golden fire;
365 Resistless rolls the illimitable sphere,
And one great circle forms the unmeasured year.
--Roll on, YE STARS! exult in youthful prime,
Mark with bright curves the printless steps of Time;
Near and more near your beamy cars approach,
370 And lessening orbs on lessening orbs encroach;--
Flowers of the sky! ye too to age must yield,
Frail as your silken sisters of the field!
Star after star from Heaven's high arch shall rush,
Suns sink on suns, and systems systems crush,
375 Headlong, extinct, to one dark centre fall,
And Death and Night and Chaos mingle all!
--Till o'er the wreck, emerging from the storm,
Immortal NATURE lifts her changeful form,
Mounts from her funeral pyre on wings of flame,
380 And soars and shines, another and the same.


[_And light exterior_. l. 364. I suspect this line is from Dwight's
Conquest of Canaan, a poem written by a very young man, and which
contains much fine versification.]

[_Near and more near_. l. 369. From the vacant spaces in some parts of
the heavens, and the correspondent clusters of stars in their vicinity,
Mr. Herschel concludes that the nebulae or constellations of fixed stars
are approaching each other, and must finally coalesce in one mass. Phil.
Trans. Vol. LXXV.]

[_Till o'er the wreck_. l. 377. The story of the phenix rising from its
own ashes with a twinkling star upon its head, seems to have been an
antient hieroglyphic emblem of the destruction and resuscitation of all
things.

There is a figure of the great Platonic year with a phenix on his hand
on the reverse of a medal of Adrian. Spence's Polym. p. 189.]


2. "Lo! on each SEED within its slender rind
Life's golden threads in endless circles wind;
Maze within maze the lucid webs are roll'd,
And, as they burst, the living flame unfold.
385 The pulpy acorn, ere it swells, contains
The Oak's vast branches in its milky veins;
Each ravel'd bud, fine film, and fibre-line
Traced with nice pencil on the small design.
The young Narcissus, in it's bulb compress'd,
390 Cradles a second nestling on its breast;
In whose fine arms a younger embryon lies,
Folds its thin leaves, and shuts its floret-eyes;
Grain within grain successive harvests dwell,
And boundless forests slumber in a shell.
395 --So yon grey precipice, and ivy'd towers,
Long winding meads, and intermingled bowers,
Green files of poplars, o'er the lake that bow,
And glimmering wheel, which rolls and foams below,
In one bright point with nice distinction lie
400 Plan'd on the moving tablet of the eye.
--So, fold on fold, Earth's wavy plains extend,
And, sphere in sphere, its hidden strata bend;--
Incumbent Spring her beamy plumes expands
O'er restless oceans, and impatient lands,
405 With genial lustres warms the mighty ball,
And the GREAT SEED evolves, disclosing ALL;
LIFE _buds_ or _breathes_ from Indus to the Poles,
And the vast surface kindles, as it rolls!


[_Maze within maze_. l. 383. The elegant appearance on dissection of the
young tulip in the bulb was first observed by Mariotte and is mentioned
in the note on tulipa in Vol.II, and was afterwards noticed by Du Hamel.
Acad. Scien. Lewenhook assures us that in the bud of a currant tree he
could not only discover the ligneous part but even the berries
themselves, appearing like small grapes. Chamb. Dict. art. Bud. Mr.
Baker says he dissected a seed of trembling grass in which a perfect
plant appeared with its root, sending forth two branches, from each of
which several leaves or blades of grass proceeded. Microsc. Vol. I. p.
252. Mr. Bonnet saw four generations of successive plants in the bulb of
a hyacinth. Bonnet Corps Organ. Vol. I. p. 103. Haller's Physiol. Vol.
I. p. 91. In the terminal bud of a horse-chesnut the new flower may be
seen by the naked eye covered with a mucilaginous down, and the same in
the bulb of a narcissus, as I this morning observed in several of them
sent me by Miss ---- for that purpose. Sept. 16.

Mr. Ferber speaks of the pleasure he received in observing in the buds
of Hepatica and pedicularis hirsuta yet lying hid in the earth, and in
the gems of the shrub daphne mezereon, and at the base of osmunda
lunaria a perfect plant of the future year, discernable in all its parts
a year before it comes forth, and in the seeds of nymphea nelumbo the
leaves of the plant were seen so distinctly that the author found out by
them what plant the seeds belonged to. The same of the seeds of the
tulip tree or liriodendum tulipiferum. Amaen. Aced. Vol. VI.]

[_And the great seed_. l. 406. Alluding to the [Greek: proton oon], or
first great egg of the antient philosophy, it had a serpent wrapped
round it emblematical of divine wisdom, an image of it was afterwards
preserved and worshipped in the temple of Dioscuri, and supposed to
represent the egg of Leda. See a print of it in Bryant's Mythology. It
was said to have been broken by the horns of the celestial bull, that
is, it was hatched by the warmth of the Spring. See note on Canto I. l.
413.]

[_And the vast surface_. l. 408. L'Organization, le sentiment, le
movement spontane, la vie, n'existent qu'a la surface de la terre, et
dans le lieux exposes a la lumiere. Traite de Chymie par M. Lavoisier,
Tom. I. p. 202.]


3. "Come, YE SOFT SYLPHS! who sport on Latian land,
410 Come, sweet-lip'd Zephyr, and Favonius bland!
Teach the fine SEED, instinct with life, to shoot
On Earth's cold bosom its descending root;
With Pith elastic stretch its rising stem,
Part the twin Lobes, expand the throbbing Gem;
415 Clasp in your airy arms the aspiring Plume,
Fan with your balmy breath its kindling bloom,
Each widening scale and bursting film unfold,
Swell the green cup, and tint the flower with gold;
While in bright veins the silvery Sap ascends,
420 And refluent blood in milky eddies bends;
While, spread in air, the leaves respiring play,
Or drink the golden quintessence of day.
--So from his shell on Delta's shower-less isle
Bursts into life the Monster of the Nile;
425 First in translucent lymph with cobweb-threads
The Brain's fine floating tissue swells, and spreads;
Nerve after nerve the glistening spine descends,
The red Heart dances, the Aorta bends;
Through each new gland the purple current glides,
430 New veins meandering drink the refluent tides;
Edge over edge expands the hardening scale,
And sheaths his slimy skin in silver mail.
--Erewhile, emerging from the brooding sand,
With Tyger-paw He prints the brineless strand,
435 High on the flood with speckled bosom swims,
Helm'd with broad tail, and oar'd with giant limbs;
Rolls his fierce eye-balls, clasps his iron claws,
And champs with gnashing teeth his massy jaws;
Old Nilus sighs along his cane-crown'd shores,
440 And swarthy Memphis trembles and adores.


[_Teach the fine seed_. l. 411. The seeds in their natural state fall on
the surface of the earth, and having absorbed some moisture the root
shoots itself downwards into the earth and the plume rises in air. Thus
each endeavouring to seek its proper pabulum directed by a vegetable
irritability similar to that of the lacteal system and to the lungs in
animals.

The pith seems to push up or elongate the bud by its elasticity, like
the pith in the callow quills of birds. This medulla Linneus believes to
consist of a bundle of fibres, which diverging breaks through the bark
yet gelatinous producing the buds.

The lobes are reservoirs of prepared nutriment for the young seed, which
is absorbed by its placental vessels, and converted into sugar, till it
has penetrated with its roots far enough into the earth to extract
sufficient moisture, and has acquired leaves to convert it into
nourishment. In some plants these lobes rise from the earth and supply
the place of leaves, as in kidney-beans, cucumbers, and hence seem to
serve both as a placenta to the foetus, and lungs to the young plant.
During the process of germination the starch of the seed is converted
into sugar, as is seen in the process of malting barley for the purpose
of brewing. And is on this account very similar to the digestion of food
in the stomachs of animals, which converts all their aliment into a
chyle, which consists of mucilage, oil, and sugar; the placentation of
buds will be spoken of hereafter.]

[_The silvery sap_. l. 419. See additional notes, No. XXXVI.]

[_Or drink the golden_. l. 422. Linneus having observed the great
influence of light on vegetation, imagined that the leaves of plants
inhaled electric matter from the light with their upper surface. (System
of Vegetables translated, p. 8.)

The effect of light on plants occasions the actions of the vegetable
muscles of their leaf-stalks, which turn the upper side of the leaf to
the light, and which open their calyxes and chorols, according to the
experiments of Abbe Tessier, who exposed variety of plants in a cavern
to different quantities of light. Hist. de L'Academie Royal. Ann. 1783.
The sleep or vigilance of plants seems owing to the presence or absence
of this stimulus. See note on Nimosa, Vol. II.]


XI. "Come, YE SOFT SYLPHS! who fan the Paphian groves,
And bear on sportive wings the callow Loves;
Call with sweet whisper, in each gale that blows,
The slumbering Snow-drop from her long repose;
445 Charm the pale Primrose from her clay-cold bed,
Unveil the bashful Violet's tremulous head;
While from her bud the playful Tulip breaks,
And young Carnations peep with blushing cheeks;
Bid the closed _Petals_ from nocturnal cold
450 The virgin _Style_ in silken curtains fold,
Shake into viewless air the morning dews,
And wave in light their iridescent hues;
While from on high the bursting _Anthers_ trust
To the mild breezes their prolific dust;
455 Or bend in rapture o'er the central Fair,
Love out their hour, and leave their lives in air.
So in his silken sepulchre the Worm,
Warm'd with new life, unfolds his larva-form;
Erewhile aloft in wanton circles moves,
460 And woos on Hymen-wings his velvet loves.


[_Love out their hour_. l. 456. The vegetable passion of love is
agreeably seen in the flower of the parnassia, in which the males
alternately approach and recede from the female, and in the flower of
nigella, or devil in the bush, in which the tall females bend down to
their dwarf husbands. But I was this morning surprised to observe,
amongst Sir Brooke Boothby's valuable collection of plants at Ashbourn,
the manifest adultery of several females of the plant Collinsonia, who
had bent themselves into contact with the males of other flowers of the
same plant in their vicinity, neglectful of their own. Sept. 16. See
additional notes, No. XXXVIII.]

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