THE European Magazine, For MAY 1803. [Embellished with, 1. A PORTRAIT of MRS. OPIE. And, 2. A REPRESENTATION of MR. HENRY GREATHEAD'S LIFE-BOAT.] Batavia; or, A Picture of the United 325 329 335 Simmons's Five Common Sense Ar- Page 368 ibid. 369 Remarks on Pind. Nem. d' 365 Foreign Intelligence Ellays on the Population of Ireland, Domestic Intelligence 368 Marriages Monthly Obituary ibid. Price of Stocks. 370 377 390 398 400 406 497 London: Printed by I, Gold, Shae-line, Fleet-freet, FOR THE PROPRIETORS, AND PUBLISHED BY JAMES ASPERNE, (Succeffor to Mr. SEWELL,) At the BIBLE, CONSTITUTION, and CROWN, No. 32, CORNHILL. Perfons who refide abroad, and who wish to be supplied with this Work every Month as publifted, may have it fent to them, FREE OF POSTAGE, to New York, Halifax, Quebec, and Every Part of the Weft Indies, at Two Guineas per Annum, by Mr. THORNHILL, of the General Poft Office, at No 21, Sherborne Lane; to Hamburg, Lisbon, Gibraltar, or any Part of the Mediterranean, at Trvo Guineas per Annum, by Mr. BISHOP, of the General Poft Office, at No. 22, Sherborne Lane; to any Part of Ireland, at One Guinea and a Half per Annum, by Mr. SMITH, of the General Poft Office, at No. 3, Sherborne Lane; and to the Cape of Good Hope, r any Part of the Eaft Indies, at Thirty Shillings per Annum, by Mr. Guy, at the Eafi India Houje. VOL. XLIII. MAY 1803. Tt ACKNOWLEDGMENTS TO CORRESPONDENTS: We are forry to be under the neceffity of apologizing to our readers for poftponing the account of Mr. ROMNEY until next month.. The indelicacy of Walter Wagtail's Ballad renders it unfit for the European Magazine. We therefore decline the infertion of it. If the Lift of Oxford Prizes can be made complete, we have no objection to its infertion. In its prefent ftate it is too imperfect. AVERAGE PRICES of CORN from May 7, to May 14. VARIATIONS OF BAROMETER, THERMOMETER, &c. BY THOMAS BLUNT, No. 22, CORNHILL, Mathematical Inftrument Maker to bis Majefty, At Nine o'Clock A. M. THE EUROPEAN MAGAZINE, AND LONDON REVIEW, FOR MAY 1803. H MRS. OPIE. [WITH A PORTRAIT.] IGH in the lift of thofe who have exalted the female character, whofe works have reflected luftre on the age in which they lived, and put to open fhame the ill-founded affertion of thofe who, with more of malevolence and rancour than of juftice and truth, have contended for the inferiority of female intellectual endowments, must be placed the fubject of the following Memoir, whose Portrait decorates our prefent Number. MRS. OPIE was born at Norwich (if we are rightly informed) about the year 1772, and is the only child of Dr. Alderfon, a physician of that city, in great practice, and of acknowledged talents and ellimation. At an early period, Mifs Alderfon was diftinguished by great fertility of invention, and evident marks of a fuperior mind; and the is even faid to have compofed dramatic pieces and novels, as well as poems, at an age when others have fcarcely completed their education. Many of thefe poems, and we believe one novel, have been published without a fignature; and among her dramatic works, Adelaide, a Tragedy of confiderable excellence (of which an account was given in Vol. IX. of this Magazine), was performed, under the fanction of her father, at Mr. Plumbtree's private Theatre at Norwich, the 4th, and again the 6th, of January 1791. In this play, the principal parts were fupported by Mifs Alderfon, and her friends the Mifs Plumbtrees. It is an obfervation no less common than true, that literary life feldom abounds with incidents; and when to the purfuit of literature is added the regular and unobtrusive performance of every domestic and focial duty, much cannot be expected to be left for the notice of the Biographer. On the 8th of May 1798, Mifs Alderfon became the wife of the celebrated Mr. Opie, an artist certainly in the first rank of his profeflion, and of increasing reputation. Mrs. Opie poffeffes great fweetness of countenance, and eyes beaming with intelligence and good humour; her manners are unaffected, affable, and engaging; no one has enjoyed the fafcinating charms of her converfation, without regretting the time of its termination; and the melody of her voice, especially in ballad-finging, is fomewhat more than fkilful; it is mufic which reaches the heart, and must be beard to be adequately conceived. To fpeak of living merit is often a difficult, and always a delicate, talk: whether we cenfure or commend, there are readers who will be ready to impute to us illiberal or unworthy motives: happy, however, is it for our prefent purpofe, that we poffefs, in the writings of Mrs. Opie, ample and undoubted teftimonies of the itrength of her judg ment, and of the goodness of her heart. "The Father and the Daughter," in Tt2 oppofition |