A YOUNG MAN, once known among village-readers ¹, as the humble historian of the hour, the conductor of a Farmer's Museum, and a Lay Preacher's Gazette, again offers himself to the public as a volunteer-editor. Having, as he con­ceives, a right to vary, at pleasure, his fictitious name, he now, for higher reasons than any fickle humour might dictate, assumes the appellation of OLDSCHOOL. ² Fond of this title, indicative of his moral, political, and literary creed, he propo­ses publishing, every Saturday, on a super-royal quarto sheet,

A NEW WEEKLY PAPER, TO BE CALLED, THE PORT FOLIO, ³ BY OLIVER OLDSCHOOL, ESQ.

Warned by "the waywardness of the time ⁴," and the admonitions of every honest printer, the Editor begins his work on a Lilliputian page, and, like a saving grocer, gives of his goods only a small sample; but Subscribers, if per­adventure ⁵ the Editor should have any, must not "despise the day of small things." It is proposed always to give plenty of letter-press, in proportion to the public demand, and, as the exigency of the season, or copiousness of materials may require, to double, treble, and even quadruple the number of pages in the PORT FOLIO. Hereafter, more may be done, if more be wanted, and if more be fostered. At present, with the prudent policy of wary beginners, it is judged expedient to risk but little. No sonorous promises are made, and no magnificence of style attempted. The paper is to be neither wire-woven, nor hot-pressed, and it certainly, in more senses than one, shall not be cream-coloured; but, in a plain dress of Quaker simplicity, may, perhaps, offer something tolera­ble on political, literary, and transient topics, and something, auxiliary to sound principles, which, after church, "retired leisure ⁶" may read on Sunday ⁷.

Empirical vaunting is always nauseous and arrogant; and the plausibility of mighty promise has generally a pitiful conclusion. The Editor, with honest diffidence, declines making specious engagements; timid, lest time or chance, lest la­ziness, sickness, or stupidity, should step between stipulation and fulfilment, he applies to himself one of the didactics of Solomon, and ‘boasts not himself of to-morrow, for he knows not what a day may bring forth.’

But though the making of such promises is no less trite than fallacious, and it is the part of Effrontery to exclaim, ‘I possess adequate pow­ers, and I will perform mighty things,’ yet, on the other hand, it will be both novel and safe for an Editor to declare, what he will avoid. More certain and confident respecting that which he can shun, than that which he can accomplish, he stipulates, with perfect sincerity, not to do certain things, and makes his public contract as Theolo­gians, at the beginning of the century, used to divide their sermons, with a First, negatively.

He will not publish an impartial ⁸ paper, in that style of cold, callous, supine, and criminal in­difference, [Page] which views, with equal eye, a chief­tain, and a follower—a man of sense, and a fool— the philosophy of the Greeks, and the philosophy of the French—a stable government, and the uproar of anarchy. He will not make his paper "a carte-blanche on which every fool and knave may scribble what he pleases." To gratify the malignancy of fanatics, he will not asperse the government or the church, the laws or the literature of England. Remembering that WE ARE AT PEACE with that power—that the most wholesome portions of our polity are modelled from hers—that we kneel at Shrines, and speak a language common to both, he will not flagitiously and foolishly advert to ancient animosities, nor, with rash hand, attempt to hurl the brand of discord between the nations.

He will not strive to please the populace, ⁹ at the expence of their quiet, by infusing into every ill-balanced and weak mind, a jealousy of rulers, a love of innovation, an impatience of sa­lutary restraint, or the reveries of liberty, equa­lity, and the rights of man.

He will not labour to confound the moral, social, and political system, nor, desperately essay "to break up the fountains of the great deep" of government. He will not calumniate Talents and Authority, and the "higher powers," whether of Genius or Wealth, or ‘Might and Domini­on.’ He will not repeat to ‘hewers of wood and drawers of water,’ the Fairy-Tales of France, that all men ¹⁰ are kings and emperors, and nobles, and judges, and statesmen. To plunder property, and to suffocate genius, he will not in­vite either a Wat Tyler, or a Jack Cade.

He will not, with political adversaries, main­tain any other than well-manner'd controversy, and will not, in the rage ¹¹ of a zealot, forget the principles of a gentleman.

And, lastly, He will not print any other than a uniform, correct, and independent paper; nor gratify the caprice of parties, sects, or individu­als, by departing, no, not for a moment, from that scheme of political and literary composition, which has hitherto been pursued by the Editor, with sufficient approbation from the good ¹², the loyal, and the studious. He will not be an in­constant and luke-warm supporter to principles and law; nor, like the parasite of the poet,

On the promissory part of this contract, the Editor engages that attempts will be made,

To publish, in a condensed manner, momen­tous intelligence. ¹³ To reject the minuteness of foreign and domestic detail, and, by a sort of sy­nopsis of news, retain the valuable, and reject the refuse;

To communicate, with accuracy, the most interesting and important State papers;

To correct vulgar errors, and detect Jacobi­nical misrepresentations, respecting the acts of government;

To obtain political essays, not merely from lookers-on, but from experienced statesmen and from principals,

To relieve the dryness of news, and the se­verity of political argument, with wholesome mo­rals and gay miscellany—to insert interesting ar­ticles of biography, criticism, poetry, and merri­ment, and ‘bind the rod of the moralist with the roses of the Muse ¹⁴.’

Having succinctly stated what he will avoid, and what he will attempt, the Editor now feels the propriety, the necessity, the utility of sum­moning to his aid the Master-Spirits of the na­tion. It must be apparent to the most heedless observer, that it is the object of this undertaking, to combine literature with politics, and attempt something of a more honorable destiny, than a meagre journal. To accomplish this purpose, the co-operation of many minds is requisite; and, without the cheerful and constant contributions of erudition, taste, and genius, an Editor, the most inventive and industrious, would have fre­quent occasion to sigh over his pages, either "mournfully jejune," or ignominiously vacant and incorrect. The causes of the inaccuracy, inequalities, dulness, and, at length, the total fai­lure of many of our American Gazettes may be easily traced; and it may be useful to read a ‘brief chronicle’ of the rise, progress, and downfal of a newspaper, lamely conducted, and penuri­ously supported.

An obscure and illiterate individual, of mere mechanical skill in the art of printing, contracts debt for his press and paper, and issues proposals for a Gazette. As education or habit, as chance or interest, may determine, he professes himself a republican, or a federalist; or, what is more common, a man of no party; willing to publish trash for all, and pretending to be unbiassed by any. Fervet opus. The press groans, the work begins, and with the paltry aid of two or three hun­dred subscribers, and without assistants, either literary or political, he, of necessity, prints from week to week a thing—"without a name," with­out correctness, without consistency; in narra­tion turbid, or false, in comment clumsy, in its original departments crude and juvenile, in its selections uncouth, vicious in the humblest com­binations of grammar, and a trespasser on all the limits of language. ¹⁵ A puny bantling from the press "so faint, so spiritless, so dull, so dead in look," quickly "goeth to its long home," its inky "mourners go about the streets," and its numerous sponsors and friends strangely wonder at its dissolution.

Thus conducted, and thus unsupported, can it be expected that a paper should flourish in vigor, or possess interest; that it should furnish docu­ments to the Historian, or even amusement to [Page] the Lounger? The journals of Europe are res­pectable, are read eagerly, and preserved long, because they are under the direction of active skill, assisted by the researches of statesmen, and the liberal labours of literature and genius.— Abroad, it is generally understood that the di­rector of a press is a scholar and a gentleman ¹⁶. In Germany and Holland, university professors, men erudite and dignified, are frequently engaged in this honourable service. A Gazette of Leyden, and a Spectator of the North have been conducted by men who associated the statesman's research and the scholar's lore; men who visited the tombs of the learned, and the camps of the vali­ant. In France, under the old government, abbés, lawyers, and men of letters by profession, super­intended the flying-sheets of the time; and now, UNDER THE ANARCHY, it is notorious that all the public prints, controuled by whatever faction, are composed, or compiled, by men of invention and learning, many of whom were once among the clergy. In Scotland, more than one paper has been illuminated by many a ray from the constel­lations of genius and wisdom, shining in her three universities; and in England, not to mention that political articles and arguments are frequently furnished by the ministry themselves, the best and most popular papers exhibit the abilities of numerous writers, ACTING IN CONFEDERACY. The memory of WOODFALL has supplied with parliamentary debates the columns of a Chronicle, and DUNNING has given it sparkling wit, and lo­gical precision. By the side of SMART's poetry, Dr. JOHNSON published his Idlers in a Saturday's paper, by Newberry. The Whitehall Evening Post, and the St. James' Chronicle numbered Soame JENYNS, Lord CHESTERFIELD, and Ho­race WALPOLE, on an ample catalogue of accom­plished auxiliaries; and both the literary virtu­oso, and the laborious annalist, still preserve and read the files of "The Public Advertiser," which displayed, at one period, the political arguments of the Marquis of ROCKINGHAM, the playful hu­mour of Dr. GOLDSMITH, the polite literature of ARTHUR MURPHY, and the gorgeous imagery of EDMUND BURKE ¹⁷.

From the experience of some years, while he was conducting the FARMER's MUSEUM, a paper pronounced, by the partiality of the public, not altogether vacant of original composition, the Editor concludes, that of learning and wit, an al­liance defensive can be formed even here. Pri­vate assurances have been already made of libe­ral contributions from learned minds; and the Editor will omit nothing, which can add to the literary forces of this enterprize. To this end, a correspondence with men of political information, and miscellaneous writers will be commenced; and arrangements are already made, to obtain from Europe every new and interesting publication, which, either for use or ornament, may sup­ply proper materials to be deposited in the PORT-FOLIO.

To men of letters, ¹⁸ and to all, who are in the habit of writing correctly, usefully, or pleasantly, we would give a very general invitation. Me­ritorious essays shall always be cordially wel­comed, and bad ones dismissed with urbanity. From the very nature, and demands of the un­dertaking, the Editor will sometimes be compelled to the ungrateful task of rejection; but he will al­ways "glance an eye of pity" on juvenile imper­fections, and though the crude and incorrect must be denied a place in the PORT-FOLIO, yet the de­nial shall not be conveyed in terms contemptuous, or austere.

In this invocation to correspondents, it is pro­per and pleasant to name the CLERGY. From their love of letters, from their literary leisure, and from their order and regularity of life, so propitious to mental exertion, they are peculiarly interested in the advancement of every vehicle of knowledge. The members of that dignified and pious profession, who, in the words of PROSPERO, are

are entreated to become auxiliaries. To such Mentors, as candid, consistent, and enlightened Clergymen, we shall always lend a listening ear, and give the confiding heart ¹⁹.

The gentlemen of the bar, to whose liberality and genius the Editor is largely indebted for much of the diffusion, and many of the materials, of the papers, he formerly conducted, are solicited to supply pages for the Port-Folio, when the Court Docket is cleared, and when the client has paid "the uttermost" of his fee. Though duty and interest urge every Barrister to employ "his courage, and his care," in climbing the rugged steep of jurisprudence, yet, lawyers are splendid­ly distinguished for polite, as well as professional studies. The critics of Rome desc [...]d no less upon the elegant literature, than upon the legal science of Trebatius, Sulpitius, and Cicero; and London will not soon cease to extol the versatile genius of a Talbot, a Yorke, and a Jones ²⁰.

The liberal merchant, the inquisitive manu­facturer, and the country gentleman, if they find leisure, in the intervals of business, to inspect the contents of the Port Folio, will discover that essays on topics of commerce, and the useful arts, and rural economy, will not be omitted.

The tranquil sect of Quakers, a description of men, imbued with that "charity, which suffereth long, and is kind;" men honourably distinguished for their aversion to pernicious novelties, and to the state charlatans, and audacious deists of France, and to all the trumpery of her bungling innovation, and to all the tampering of her po­litical restlesness, are invited to countenance this work.

In aid of a paper, principally devoted to moral instruction, and polite literature, it would be equally indecorous and undeserved, to neglect so­liciting the good opinion, and assistance of the ladies. The influence of female elegance on the manners, and female principles on the character of men, is wide and powerful. They not only fix the standard of fashion, but regulate most of the duties, and decencies of life. On every question of delicacy, and sentiment, and taste, and decorum, they have the clearest right to be respectfully heard. To the honour of the country, especi­ally of its CAPITAL, where their education is the most sedulously regarded, there are many, who, possessing learning, which would be thought extensive in the other sex, set an example of deep humility to their own;—women who distinguish­ed for wit and genius, are eminent for domestic qualities; who, excelling in the fine arts, have carefully enriched their understandings; and who have not refined elegance into insipidity, nor frit­tered down delicacy into frivolousness ²¹. Such fe­males can give grace, strength, and lustre to Liter­rature, can weave the brightest textures in the loom of Fancy, and teach the noblest morals of the heart. To this respectable and polished class of female characters, the Editor looks confidently for the exertion of their influence, and for the display of their talents in support of his Miscella­ny. It has been his privilege to know more than one highly instructed and accomplished woman, indulging herself in a chaste display of literary as well as fashionable excellence, benignant to the votaries of science, which she loved, and patroniz­ing the learning which she herself adorned. Flat­tery and fondness have extolled the Aspasias and the Glyceras of Athens, and the Talliens of [Page] Paris. But we can pay homage to beauties of purer lustre. We have "of honorable women not a few;" who associate study and invention, who unite the virtues to the graces, and who are "capa­ble of making the bad good, the inconstant stable, and the giddy wise."

Nor is the Editor of that hermit humour, to be regardless of the innocent wishes of the modish tribe. Though it cannot correctly be expected that he should be a critic of Coquelicot, or learned in laces; yet, he will not omit to notice sometimes the shop of the milliner, and "watch the wild vicissitudes of taste." Fashionable dress, as well as manners, shall be occasionally described; and to please the flaunting belle, he will, with no lan­guid voice, and in the words of Anstey, invoke her tutelary power.

It remains for the Editor to indicate to his friends and correspondents, various topics of composition, and to subjoin the conditions to which the purchase of his paper is subjected. He enters copiously into the detail of the first; and, he presumes, that to the terms of the second, no just and generous man will hint an objection.

Brief reports of the most interesting debates in Congress, from the notes of members, friendly to this undertaking.

Political information, and political disquisition from the pens of Princi­pals.

Elegant, or interesting speeches, in either house of Congress.

An early and prompt communication of momentous state papers.

Monthly, quarterly, or semi-annual retrospects of foreign affairs.

Faithful translations from valuable French, Spanish, or German books, pamphlets or papers. But, it must be understood, that the Editor totally pro­hibits every thing Jacobinical.

Economical essays, on the model of count Rumford.

Statistical tables.

Abstracts of the specification of eve­ry new patent.

Summary of domestic politics.

Detections of Jacobinical forgery, falshood, and misrepresentation.

Accurate reports of legal decisions, involving important national, commer­cial, or private interests.

Essays on rural economy.

Scientific papers.

Notices of the useful and fine arts.

Notices of new books, pamphlets, and literary projects of every descrip­tion.

Information, respecting every species of "lettered worth," in obscurity.

Sketches of tours and journies, either through our own, or foreign territory.

Journals of voyages.

Descriptions of local peculiarities, and characteristical manners.

Review of new, or fashionable musi­cal publications.

Remarks on the manners of the times, and on public amusements.

Descriptions of the fashionable dres­ses of the season.

Hymeneal register.

Articles for an obituary of remarka­ble, or distinguished persons, accom­panied by anecdotes, after the model in " The Gentlemans' Magazine."

Meteorological diaries.

The various tribes of gay and useful miscellany; and in this pleasant and flowery walk, the Editor will assume the freedom to particularize the [...]iects, he wishes should be attended to.

Burlesque translations.

Parodies of the poets, particularly of Shakespeare.

Cross readings.

Ship news extraordinary

Advertisements extra.

Humorous and satiric ballads, in the style of John Gilpin.

Tender and pathetic ballads, in the manner of Dr. Percy's "O Nancy wilt thou go with me," and Hamilton's "Braes of Yarrow."

Mock odes, imitations &c. in the manner of "The Rolliad."

Hudibrastic poetry.

Characteristical and humorous dia­ries.

Dialogues, sentimental, or sportive.

Correct songs, adapted to the taste of the Anacreontic group, or the ama­teur.

Translations from the classic poets of Spain and Italy.

Epigrams.

Anecdotes.

Articles of levity, wit, and humour.

Articles of American biography, and of memoir writing in general.

Historical documents, or narrative.

Elegant translations of brilliant or useful passages from THE ANCIENTS.

Concise moral lessons.

Criticisms on new books and pam­phlets.

Periodical essays, in the manner of Addison, Johnson, or Goldsmith.

Moral Allegories, Tales, and Ro­mances.

Dramatic Sketches of Character.

Extracts from scarce and curious publications.

Extracts from the most novel works of celebrity, published abroad.

Extracts from the most recent and valuable American publications.

Original poetry.

Scenes of original plays.

Original letters.

Notes, concerning Americans of ge­nius, enterprize, or mechanic skill, re­sident abroad, and

Literary selections from the London, or Cambridge, Bristol, Bath, Liverpool, Edinburgh, Glasgow, and Dublin news­papers.