Of the private life of Mr Barlow there is but little to say. He was of a very taciturn disposition ; and though he had lived so long abroad, was in manners and appearance a true New England man. His life was sober and uniform. His court dress, though plain, he called his harness. He left no issue ; but his wife survived him, and returned to America, to the enjoyment of considerable property bequeathed by her husband.
bus, which he afterwards gave to the world in a more expanded and imposing form.
After quitting the service of the church, he ap pears for some time to have practised law ; but, in 1788, he likewise abandoned that profession to be come the agent of a mercantile company, who had purchased some millions of acres of lands situate on, or near the river Ohio, which they proposed to sell to foreigners at an enhanced price. For this purpose, Mr Barlow was sent to Europe ; and it is said that he was fortunate in the execution of this commission.
Having during this period become deeply interest ed by the events of the French Revolution, he published, in the years 1791 and 1792, the following political pieces : 1. Advice to the Privileged Orders. 2. The Conspiracy of Kings.-8. Letter to the Na tional Convention qf France.-4. The Royal Recol lections. Towards the end of the year 1792, he was, being then in London, appointed by the Constitu tional Society of London one of a deputation to pre sent an address to the National Convention of France,—a circumstance which attracted the notice of the British Parliament, it having been stated by a member that the Convention had received an ad dress by means of two fellows calling themselves the representatives of Great Britain, viz. Frost and Bar low.
In 1798, Barlow, from motives of curiosity, ac companied the four commissioners of the National Convention who were sent to Montblanc, to organize that department ; and this excursion gave rise to another production, entitled, A Letter to the People of Piedmont. He also translated about this time Volney's well known work, entitled, Ruins of Em pares.
Objects of a commercial nature at length drew him to Hamburgh, and afterwards to the coast of Africa, where he received the commission of con sul-general of the United States, with instructions to enter into and conclude treaties with the Bar bary powers, for the purpose of procuring the ran som of the American citizens who were detained as slaves in those countries. The execution of this commission was prompt and fortunate ; and, after residing for some time in Paris, to which he re turned from Barbary, be, in 1805, proceeded to America, and purchased a neat habitation in the territory of Columbia, the seat of the general go.
vernment, to which he gave the name of Kahrama. Here he formed an acquaintance with certain consi derable members of Congress, to whom he greatly recommended himself by the publication of a short sketch of a plan of national education, and an ad dress to the citizens of Washington upon occasion of one of the anniversaries of American indepen dence. He now also published the superb quarto edition of his national poem,. to which he finally gave the name of The Cohnnbiad.
Soon after his return from Europe, he was admit ted to the confidence of the first magistrate of the United States ; and, in 1811, he received the valued appointment of minister-plenipotentiary to the court of France. This nomination met with powerful op.
To this account of Mr Barlow, for which we are indebted to a correspondent abroad, to whom he was known, we shall subjoin the estimate which has been formed of his great work the Columbiad, by a very competent critic. " In this poem, the whole histor7, past, present, and future, of America, is delivered in the clumsy and revolting form of a miraculous vision ; and thus truth is not only blended with falsehood and fancy, but is presented to the mind under the mask of the grossest and moat palpable fiction.—From the prose which he has introduced into the volume, and even from much of what is given as poetry, it is easy to see that he was a man of a plain, strong, and resolute understanding ; but without any play or vivacity of fancy, any gift of simplicity or pathos, any loftiness of genius, or delicacy of taste. Though not deficient in literature, nor unread in poetry, he had evidently none of the higher elements of a poet in his composition ; and has accordingly made a most injudicious choice and unfortunate application of the models which lay before him. Instead of aspiring to emulate the sub Barlow lime composure of Milton, or the natural eloquence fl and flowing nervousness of Dryden, he has bethought Barometer. him of transferring to epic poetry the light, spark ling, and tawdry diction of Darwin; and of narrating great events, and delivering lofty precepts, in an unhappy imitation of that picturesque, puerile, and Barlow pedantic style, which alternately charms and -„_ I us in the pages of our poetical physiologist." burg* Review, Vol. XV.)