kings of Europe, piously devoted the synagogue to bolster up the Holy Alliance, and been made Knights Grand Crosses of the Legion of Hanover-was upon a tour collecting money, with a view to making one of their earliest speculations in the funds. It may be remarked here, that these Hebrew monarchs are not so much wealthy in themselves, as the depositaries and wielders of the collective riches of the children of Israel. Moses was by this time regarded by his tribe as a person of He was, of course, honoured by a visit from substance. the great man. Moses's little hoard was destined to become one of the tiny brooks that swelled the ocean of the other. He gained by this not only a safe deposit for his wealth, but what was more—an idea of the possibility of accelerating his rise in the world. He put himself to school with an old rabbi, in order to improve his writing and arithmetic, and bribed a banker's clerk of his own nation to initiate him into the mysteries of book-keeping by single and double entry. He now commenced banker on a small scale, still, however, keeping a keen eye to his shop. By degrees, his usurious transactions increased in magnitude, and he ventured to speculate in the carrying trade. He now thought himself rich enough to pay the six creutzers which his father had advanced him to begin business with, and to give him one glass of Tokay in return for that which had been administered to such excellent purpose. Nay, some even assert, that he was liberal enough to present the old gentleman with a pair of breeches, which he had bought speck and span new, and only worn for six months. Now, also, he thought he might venture to enjoy life a little, so he changed his shirt once a month, treated himself every fortnight to a glass of some sweet liqueur, smoked tobacco which did not create an absolutely pestilential smell in the room, and once in every summer took a pleasure-drive with other six in a calash built to hold four. Moses was universally admitted by the elders of the tribe to be an eligible match; and as he was now advancing towards his thirtieth year, the Jewish world was hushed in awful suspense, watching upon whom his choice would fall. Rachel Fiedel was the sixth daughter of wealthy parents. Her father had made a fortune by contracting to furnish the Duke of Brunswick's army with provisions when it marched into Champagne. Fiedel had managed to obtain security for his advances, but these advances he forgot to make. The duke returned in too great a hurry to have leisure to enquire into the matter, and by the time the importunate rascals of French generals left him a moment to breathe, Fiedel had disposed of the pledges for double their value. By the time the courts gave a decision against him, his capital was sufficiently increased to enable him to pay his forfeits without any sensible diminution of his fortune. flowery as those of the heroes with whom Miss Rachel's reading was conversant; but he offered a good establishment, and that was fully as much to the purpose. They were married in a few months, and their union was blessed in due time with two fair daughters, who were educated exactly as their mother had been before them. His new relation called into life feelings that had hitherto slumbered in Moses's bosom. Like all his tribe, he was passionately fond of his family. But he was more; he was proud of their accomplishments, and he even acquired a taste for their favourite pursuits. He paid more attention to his person, kept a splendid house and equipage, was regular in his attendance on the opera, drank sweet wines, and sucked comfits, and even laboured with infinite difficulty through three of Kotzebue's plays, and two of the thousand-and-one imitations of Werther. Both he and his wife, however, were keen in money matters as they were luxurious, and his wealth continued to increase. Frankfort was a gay place when the elder Miss Martin attained her seventeenth, and the younger her sixteenth year. The Prince Primate, the head of the Confederation of the Rhine, held his court there, and the town was filled with officers and young diplomatists of all countries. Martin's entertainments were rich and splendid, and of course frequented by all the idle young noblemen, who praised Madame's taste and execution, and flirted with the young ladies. The happiness of the family was not, however, without alloy. They were incessantly reminded, by some cross-grained accident or another, that they belonged to a despised caste. The ladies did not accept their invitations, nor were they invited to the innumerable fêtes of the nobility and chief merchants. The very beaux who were so frank and agreeable in their own house, recognised them with a distant stateliness at public places. Our fair friends began to grow fretful and waspish, and to project a thousand chimerical schemes for establishing themselves in society. A secret council was held, to take into consideration the expediency of becoming Christians, in hopes that they might afterwards be received into good company. Moses, whose reason and taste had not been so highly cultivated as those of his wife, and who was consequently rather a narrowOld minded man on some points, felt startled. It is true, that he had attended the synagogue at first for the music, afterwards because it was his custom, and in the latter days of his prosperity not at all. Still there was something dreadful in the thought of abandoning his religion, although to him it was but a name. The lady, however, was of a more bold and free spirit. She had Nathan the Wise, Kotzebue's Knight Templar, and Voltaire's Princess of Babylon, at her fingers' ends, and she pelted great lumps of them at her husband's head most perseveringly and unmercifully. The two young angels, who thought they had been long enough martyrs to their religion, and who, in confidence be it said, believed their sufferings on its behalf to exceed by many degrees those of any martyr who ever lived, chimed in with mamma. There was something extremely pretty in the volubility with which they passed from enunciating the profound philosophical axiom-that "religion was a feeling of the heart, and alike under all forms," to a pathetic reminiscence of the late refusal they had encountered, when applying for tickets of admission to the grand rout given by the Princess of And Mira said, that there was a great deal in Stolberg's and La Motte Fouqué's view of the Roman Catholic Church; and Zara said, when we are Christians, Lieutenant will not look so distant when we meet him coming from parade, and Miss Von Albert will not turn up her stumpy little Christian nose at us. We cannot say that Moses was convinced, but the women stuck to their point with true feminine pertinacity, and Jewish volubility; and, by degrees, the idea of the change lost its novelty, and he grew reconciled to it. Fiedel was a man superior to the prejudices of his nation, and he resolved that his daughters should be taught all the most fashionable accomplishments. They learned to draw, to sing, to play on all sorts of instruments; and they read all the most fashionable novels and plays. They were plump lively girls, with clear brown complexions, black eyes and hair. They were extremely sentimental, and spoke Jewish-German in all its purity. Miss Rachel, if she had ever noticed Moses at all before he emerged from his poverty, must have done it with as much hauteur as the best Christian baroness of eighteen quarters; but matters had now assumed a different aspect, and when her father announced his wish that she should marry him, she dutifully acceded to his desire, with something less than reluctance. An old female relation, who had some money lodged with Moses, was employed to hint to him the conquest he had made. Under her tuition, he acquired boldness; and one day, having carefully washed, combed, shifted, and scented himself, he made his bow at Madame Fiedel's soirée. His addresses were neither so tender nor so Oh! but the Mrs and Misses Martin were proud people when at last they found themselves-the interesting converts an object of interest to all the fine people in Frankfort! The little hearts of Mira and Zara fluttered in one continued palpitation of delight. Not a ball was given to which they were not invited, and their own parties were crammed to the door. And then nothing was spoken of but the beauty and the accomplishments, and above all, the fortunes of the Misses Martin. But with their father it was otherwise. He was no object for the flattery of the young and old fools of the city he was scarcely presentable, and whenever the family was spoken of, his name was sunk by common consent. His old friends addressed him with coldness, or passed him unnoticed. The venerable rabbi who presided over the synagogue, although he dared not utter such an excommunication as would have been pronounced against the renegadoes two centuries earlier and perhaps felt no wish to utter it-knew that the defalcation of so eminent a family could not be passed over in silence. The sentence was, therefore, pronounced, in virtue of which they became aliens. The announcement of this event was received by the females with indifference, by Moses with a shudder. He had of late, rejected by his old associates, and unable to conciliate new, sat much in his own apartment alone. There was a horrible vacancy in his mind. The pursuits of his life had not been of that kind which afford materials for after reflection. He had no intellectual amusements. He could not be said to be a believer either according to the Jewish or the Christian faith. But that innate indestructible idea of the existence of a God, which exists in all men, which had been kept dark and feeble in his soul by his reckless course of life, and which his habit of talking as other men talked, had kept barely alive, began to reawaken within him. Its presence was terrible, for he felt as if he had deserted one god without attaching himself to another-he dreaded both, but could give the preference to neither. He sunk gradually into a lethargic stupor, tormented by awful fears, which, in his condition, were rather like the dim and fearful phantasma of a fevered dream than waking thoughts. In this mood, the laughter, the music, and the sounds of high feasting from the state rooms of the house, would swell upon his ear. He felt as if he had sold his soul to some delusive demon for idle gauds which brought him no enjoyment. He shuddered and stopped his ears. Alone in a solitary, unfurnished, and remote apartment, he practised the fiercest austerities which he had heard in his youth were prescribed for sinners; but he only enfeebled his mind and body, without restoring his confidence. In the dead of night he was heard by all the house howling with agony. His wife and daughters upbraided him sharply for disturbing their repose. On Christmas eve there was a splendid ball given by his lady. Their spacious hall was hung with festoons of scarlet, white, and gold. At either end stood the rarest plants the greenhouses for twenty miles round could afford. The best musicians of the city were in the gallery-the music consisted of selections from Rossini and Mozart. The air was heavy with perfumes, the richest wines and most luscious dainties were handed round among the guests. Here you might see the noblest and loveliest of the city wheeling round in the waltz with a gliding motion, as if upborn by the full swell of the music. There sat a dark-haired girl in delicious abandonment, drinking in the low tremulous whisper of her partner. The voluptuous pulse-beat of the assembly paused for a moment as a loud shrill despairing scream burst upon the ear. The guests listened with pale and anxious faces, but it was not repeated, and by degrees the impression died away. It was far in the morning before the assembly broke up. When the lady of the mansion awoke next day at a late hour from her slumbers, she was informed that her husband was a-missing. A low window which opened upon the garden was unlatched. There was a track of footsteps among the snow thence to the foot of the garden, and on the other side of the wall down to the river side. Not far from the shore was a hole which had been broken in the ice to enable the citizens' wives to draw water. The footsteps led up to this. Drags, boat-poles, what not, were put in requisition, and before nightfall the livid and swollen body of Moses Martin was dragged from beneath the ice. The Ark of Israel carried death to him who dared to touch it wantonly, or with unclean hands. The Ark of the New Covenant is fraught with the same deadly power. W. LITERARY CRITICISM. Journal of a Residence in Germany, written during a Professional Attendance on their Royal Highnesses the Duke and Duchess of Clarence, during their Visits to the Courts of that Country, in 1822, 1825, and 1826. By William Beattie, M. D. 2 vols. Longman, Rees, Orme, &c. London. 1831. Ir would be very wrong to suppose that an egotist was an animal not as commonly to be encountered in society before as after the existence of John Gutenberg of Mentz. Certain it is, however, that since that epoch a material change has taken place in the strength of its intrenchment among us, and in the opportunities afforded for the display of its natural office of self-worship. In the history of the animal anterior to the invention of printing, the days of its own life, and the space of its immediate habitation, were generally sufficient for "the evil thereof." We might, of course, while in its presence, be subjected to repeated inflictions of the same lash, but were not apt, on returning home, or on visiting a neighbour, to be startled, "in scalis metuens pendentis habenæ," by a facsimile of it occupying a place in our apartments as a becoming appendage to their furniture. This sort of posthumous egotism could never, indeed, be wholly unknown, where books, even transcribed by the hand, had been published; but its attainment by this channel was, we know, attended with infinite delay and expense, and at the risk of much incorrectness. The vanity of the beast, therefore, was often deterred from exposure, by the fear of the probable mutilation of its most imposing appearances. But the printing-press has dispelled all these apprehensions. Precision of detail may be safely reckoned down to the minutest word; nor is it possible to assign any limit to circulation, while the facility of execution provokes and sustains repetition. We imagine, accordingly, though Pat may seem to have assisted us in the remark, that, amid all the expressions of grateful respect to the memory of Gutenberg, no voice ought to sound a louder eulogy than that of the egotist; or at least that, like the secret acknowledgment of worth at Salamis, the class should individually concur in placing the German only second in the roll of merit to themselves. Dr Beattie is one of those by whom, in gratitude, the name of this benefactor ought to be engraven in the front of his volumes in illuminated characters. "To contribute," says our author, in his dedication to the king, "to the historical literature of my country, and to record some of those exalted traits of character which are now the strong bond of union between the king and his people, have been the sole aim and impulse under which I have written." Now, after a fair and attentive perusal of the work which succeeds this preliminary assurance, and in the face of its testimony, we can only come to one conclusion regarding the "aim and impulse" with which it was composed. 66 Nothing, of course, is easier, than to contribute to the literature of a country in a certain way, just as every little" The proverb is something musty. But to make a really worthy addition to the page of its annals, by which we properly understand the historical department of its literature, by the introduction of some novelty of event or character, by incorporating any omission, or amplifying any obscurity, or by retracing the whole, in a spirit that may do justice to the importance of the theme, is a matter at once of difficult selection and trying performance; where the capacity, indeed, of the writer for the latter of these duties may, with a few exceptions, be readily ascertained from the judgment manifested in the former. If Dr Beattie, then, merely proposes to enlarge the history of England with a particular account of some occasional visits to the courts of Germany, in the summers of 1822, 1825, and 1826, made, with as little ostentation as possible, and for the benefit of his health, by his present majesty, when Duke of Clarence, we are afraid that the titlepage, which records the simple fact, is alone destined to meet the eye of posterity, to which we can have no possible objections, as, beyond a doubt, the titlepage is very genteel and gentlemanlike, with a pretty vignette at the bottom. If, again, it is our author's intention to effect the same object, and also to improve our relations with foreign states, by giving a clearer insight into the domestic policy of their princes, and the status of their citizens, we cannot but admire the natural deductions by which the mind arrives at this information, via picture galleries, senti- | mental soliloquies on monastic ruins, idle legends of antiquity, still idler effusions of our author's own muse, teaparty conversations, pic-nic expeditions, and descants on the virtues, omitting nothing, Ου δέμας, ουδε φυήν, ουτ' ας φρένας, ουτε τι έργα, of little princes and princesses, landgraves and electors. For this part, too, of Dr Beattie's contribution to the historical literature of his country, we think we hear "old truepenny" Time already whetting his scythe with a strange and ominous sound. In considering the fulfilment, besides, of his second resolution, we cannot help believing that he must somewhere have witnessed "Hamlet" performed, with the part of the young prince omitted, "for that night only," and taken his cue at present from the representation; unless we are to accept the certificate of his royal highness's physician in ordinary, that his majesty, while in Germany, could take daily exercise for two or three hours without fatigue, that he has an excellent memory, rises early, and is an affectionate husband and father, can submit to swallow medicine with a better grace than most mortals, and uses at least two gallons of "cold fresh water" as a simple gargle every morning, as a record of 66 some of those exalted traits of character which are now the strong bond of union between the king and his people." 66 a conversa We have here reduced the contents of the "Journal" to the general branches which, at the outset, we think it meant to discuss, and each of these, we find, hangs very lightly in the balance. But it is still our duty to determine with more positive accuracy what sterling coin may actually exist under the mantle of this rubbish. "I had, some time since," says the doctor, tion with a leibartz (physician to the person) at court. He is a man who has seen much, heard much, and read much; and what he has seen, heard, and read, he remembers." Here our author unconsciously describes himself, without drawing a very striking picture of excellence. For memory without judgment is but an overRowing hogshead without a stop-cock. Our own portrait of Dr Beattie may be struck off at a dash,—he is a courtier," Know ye this water-fly, Horatio?" This single truth stands out in all his expressions, and feelings, and conduct. He has often, we daresay, been at "a great feast of languages," and, in spite of himself, has retired, with the infection of many big words, but without the understanding that should accompany them. His language is always good enough, fluent, and ready, but with no choice-never pointed with that happy fitness, that brings the object home to the eye in its own colours, or that terse, meaning concentration which saves so many noisy paragraphs. Far less is it ever touching from its simplicity, and our readers may not wonder, therefore, if a rich harvest stands ripe for the sickle of Martinus Scriblerus, where he might meet with "marble that seems to weep where princes die," or "Herrenalb! a name once pronounced hat in hand, at whose sanctuary the incense burned for centuries;" or drink of Leibenzelt, and learn that "from the days of Hubert, the hirsch hunter, down to the degenerate days in which I record my humble testimony in their favour, these waters have been the regeneration of many a sinking house, making the wilderness of domestic love to 'blossom like the rose ;' the vine to put forth in its season; and mothers, who sorrowed once, to sing for joy!" |—(miraculous waters and marvellous doctor! even Warren's advertisements are sickly stuff after this!)—or might wander by "the shallow stream where a young lady found means to release herself from the cares of life, or from the more crazing effects of love." Our author's scenic description recurs in almost every page, but carries with it no permanency of impression. It is broad and discursive as the wide landscape he views, unrecommended by any of those startling individual points which arrest the eye in the broadest survey of nature, rising and jutting forth in prominent beauty, to chequer an otherwise too monotonous level, and to relieve the vague and unsatisfactory spirit, that at the sight of boundless expanse, settles on the soul, by recalling it to a few definite figures of attraction. There is, moreover, a disagreeably prevalent intrusion of self throughout-of" the strong and painful curiosity" with which Dr Beattie pays every visit, and meditates on every spectacle. The accounts of his journeys often lead us to imagine that he must have sat in the carriage, looking into a large mirror, which would certainly reflect the passing scenery of the way, but retain all the time in the centre the unvaried smirk of his own countenance. His courtly feelings are especially developed when he reaches any royal residence. Hereditary succession, if not the purest method in theory of perpetuating governments, has at least been pronounced by experience the practical substitute fraught with results of the least inconvenience, and the greatest measure of public benefit. Still it has its good and evil, and the wise man will be followed by the fool, the warrior by the dolt. In Germany it is quite another thing. Never since the days of fairyland has there existed, if we are to judge from what is now before us, such a spotless race of princes, such personal beauty, moral perfection, liberal acquirements, such benevolence, such grace. O ye subjects of such rulers! "O nimium fortunati !" &c. We should not perhaps press Dr Beattie too hard on this point, as it might be difficult in his situation, to be sans peur et sans reproche," frank and plain-spoken. If so, silence had surely become him better, and it is unlucky for his calculations of character, that several whom he saluted "Patres Patriæ," have not been lately in the best odour with those voices where such titles most properly reside. Of Dr Beattie's political sagacity, we cannot recollect any passage of his work from which we might judge, except a short rhapsody on the probable deportment of his royal highness, in the event of succeeding to the British throne, which has been sufficiently realized by existing circumstances; but it is so easy to add a page to a diary, that we refrain from giving a decided opinion. In the course of the work, we are treated to as many tales, anecdotes, and "stanzas for music," as might gallantly furnish forth a couple of annuals. Of the former, the legends of "Nonnenwerder" is the chief, and we ask Dr Beattie with what face he here pretends to serve up a novel treat to any well-informed reader, or if he did not blush at his own impertinence, in pitifully disfiguring what had already been immortalized by the pen of Schiller? Did he never hear of the ballad of "Ritten Toggenburg?" In that case let him blush deeper than ever. The poetry—we mean the verses-are the compositions of Dr Beattie; and, by his own free and unextorted confession, avowedly bad-unworthy of himself. Under which sentence we gladly restore our readers, who are evidently quaking, with good cause, in terrible suspicion of our intentions, to their wonted equanimity, with the - simple assurance that most of the "Stanzas for Music" have "a dying fall," which only reminds us of our trusty friend, who may be seen at his post every day by the garden-side, between Queen Street and Heriot Row, vehemently plying an instrument, which once, we doubt not, discoursed very eloquent music, but at present gives birth, at intervals of half an hour, to a few stifled squeaks, which, without the benefit of old acquaintance, sound very like a puny attempt at ventriloquism. We have hitherto, with whatever force we may have spoken, certainly treated Dr Beattie as a manly writer, and meriting manly consideration. A single extract may show with what justice we might have forsworn even this courtesy. Let us see. "The party was now at tea; her majesty seated in an arm-chair upon a nicely sanded floor; his royal highness at her right hand; a table in the centre with the tea equipage; a boiling kettle in the middle, and three of the ladies of honour seated round it; the gentlemen and myself standing near the window, and enjoying the rich forest, grey ruins, and pine-clad hills, by which this beautiful retreat is on all sides hemmed in. Sir Edward Seaward's Narrative of his Shipwreck, and SIR EDWARD SEAWARD is a Robinson Crusoe of the The book is very agreeable in the perusal, but when we come to look back upon what we have read, we find the memory. few or no prominent passages that have seized hold of This indicates a want of power and originality. The uniform, gentle, and benignant disposition of the hero, too, begins at last to get cloying. Such a milk-and-water piece of mildness could never have got on in the world as Sir Edward is made to do. It is cre ditable to the purity of a female's mind that she could not paint him otherwise, but it impinges sadly upon the probability and even the interest of the story. Sir Edward is Thaddeus of Warsaw, without his fire, but with all his excess of amiability. It is just such a character as was to be expected from the mind of the author of the latter after the glow of youth had passed away. There is something extremely Arcadian and delightful in the passage we subjoin, and it gives a fair idea of the style of the narrative. "For the benefit of those who make pic-nic parties, where the necessary expenditure of china in breakage is often a subject of serious reflection for next day, I would suggest the plan adopted by her majesty; namely, a metal apparatus. On this, as on former occasions, the cups and saucers were all of silver, gilt inside, so that they may be transported without risk, and survive a whole century of inadvertent tumbles. One inconvenience attends this description of metallic tea-ware, which has rather puzzled me at times. The tea is poured out hot, and immediately carried round the circle by the attendants. It usually happens, moreover, that the saucer is no accompaniment to the cup, and he who makes the experiment, as I have done, with the contents only a few degrees below the boiling point, will have an opportunity of giving most feeling testimony to the conducting power of silver. The "In the afternoon, we proposed a long walk to the best way in such a dilemma is to drop the cup, blow cold on your fingers, and every time you look at them for the plish it: so, slinging the captain's canteen over my shoulsouthern extremity of the isthmus, if we could accomnext week, pronounce a hearty panegyric on the super-der, and placing my pistols in my belt, with my pike in lative merits and properties of china, with an equally hearty malediction upon boiling water served in a silver tea-cup. This, as far as my own experience goes, is at once the best courage, and the surest consolation which a philosopher can adopt under such trying circumstances. He will also enjoy the pleasing conviction, of having contributed most liberally to the evening's amusement.' "God help thee, silly one!" such trash would not satisfy a child. God help the company who were tickled with such straws! God help the reader who has swallowed the present bolus! and God pardon us if we have cajoled any one into such a step! At length let some one demand, "the only conclusion" to which we could come regarding the "aim and impulse" under which these volumes were written. It is contained in four words: " Musca in temone sedit." my hand, and my wife with hers, followed by Fidele, we 'I completing my work, as it was already in far progress. Thus we talked, and in full enjoyment of peace, youth, and health, we proceeded homewards, only stopping now and then to pick up a beautiful shell, which lay in our way; till we arrived at the vessel, a little after sunset. Too tired to make tea, we regaled ourselves with a little wine and water and some biscuit; and then kneeling down in the presence of God, rendered to him that which is justly due, the sacrifice of praise and prayer and thanksgiving; and retired to rest.” The Gardens and Menagerie of the Zoological Society Delineated. Published with the Sanction of the Council, and under the Superintendence of the Secretary and Vice-Secretary of the Society. Vols. I. and II. 8vo. Pp. 308, 328. London. Charles Tilt. and indigestible.' Looking round me, I observed that, by the process of time on the wild vegetation, the soil had become pretty good about the cocoa-nut grove; so we decided on putting in some of our seeds there, in a day or two. We again descended to the beach, and bent our course observingly along to the northward, skirting the sandy isthmus on the west. Not far from its termination we arrived at a low sandy point, to the right of which, as we stood on it, with our faces to the lake, was a small bay; at the bottom of which rose a steep rock, projecting into the water, with a bold front directly opposite to us. The west side of this bay curved out also into a rocky point at the extremity; while its gradual slope, beautifully wooded down to the water's edge, rose somewhat abruptly, at a little distance from the shore; exhibiting from thence a thick forest, covering the lofty hills that formed the remote background. We stood awhile admiring this new scenery, rendered more interesting by the evolutions of a flock of sea gulls (those inThe Editor modestly announces that his work is inhabitants of every sea!) in pursuit of the small fish, leap. tended to co-operate with the excellent institution of the ing and sparkling in the bay even close to the beach. Zoological Gardens, in promoting a love of natural hisIt was but a short walk to the bold rock in the bosom tory, and diffusing more correct notions concerning it. of the bay; and we proceeded to it, much amused with In our opinion, it is entitled to higher praise than merely Fidele trying to catch the sprats or anchovies, or what- saying, this object has been accomplished. Many species ever they were, that swarmed upon the coast. We soon of birds and beasts are here described accurately from rereached the rock, which appeared to be forty or fifty feet peated observations for the first time. The plan of pubhigh; but, as it projected perpendicularly into deep water, lication, which is, we believe, to issue a volume as often there was no passing it; so we sat down upon a large as the increasing wealth of the Zoological Society affords stone near its base, glad to rest ourselves. When a little a sufficient stock of imperfectly known animals, forbids cooled from our exercise, we took a draught of water a scientific arrangement, but to each volume there is apfrom our canteen, which we found grateful and refresh-pended a systematic Index. Of the illustrations-drawn ing. Our eyes were now instantly arrested by our own noble promontory, which stood right over against us, distant about three miles to the south. We both exclaimed at once, What a magnificent object it is! The loftiest summit, immediately over our vessel, ap.. peared to be at least 300 or 400 feet high; while the lower part to the westward, where the cave is situated, looked like a rugged chasm. Beyond that, further again to the west, the cliff rose, in a conical form, to at least 250 feet. The highest summit seemed entirely naked But this hill was wooded to the top, and, by its figure and verdure, associated with the image of the cool spring at its foot, and the commanding aspect of its more barren neighbour, altogether presented a picture of great grandeur and beauty. of trees. We recog "After resting a reasonable time, we determined to cross the isthmus, (and return by the eastern beach,) which extended about half a mile to a projecting low rocky point, the very point on which the brig nearly struck, soon after her release from the reef! nised it by its relative situation to the reef beyond it; and then called to mind that we had seen a rivulet on what was then its further side. When recommencing our walk, we observed that the sand in our immediate direction produced some vegetation; and that further back to the northward, there were bushes, and then trees. We kept on the edge of the fertile ground, having found our steps impeded by the shrubs and other plants; and in about a quarter of an hour, we were on the eastern side of the isthmus, having had a beautiful silvan bank all the way on our left. On surveying the spot, I could not but reflect how fit a place it was for such seeds as required a full tropical sun, free from all shade; and made the remark to my wife. That may be, dear Edward!' replied she, anxiously; but you have only one pair of hands, and have already chalked out so much work for yourself, that I really am afraid you will fall sick from fatigue. I wish,' added she, tenderly pressing my arm, I had never thought of the tent on the ridge! making it is so very laborious, and takes up so much time which might be employed in the seeds, that I think you had better desist from finishing it for the present.' I thanked her affectionately for her solicitude; but told her I did not like vacillating, and that I would not delay by Harvey, and engraved by Branston and Wright-we cannot speak too highly. For accurate resemblance, life, character, and beautiful execution, they are every thing that could be wished. The culs-de-lampe are all elegant ; many of them evince a high feeling of art, and many a fine perception of the charm of mingled playfulness and beauty. In what manner the literary department of the work is executed, the reader may be able to judge after perusing the description of the Chinchillas-that delicate little creature to which our fair friends are indebted for some of their most costly ornaments. "The earliest account of the chinchilla with which we have met is contained in Father Joseph Acosta's Natural and Moral History of the East and West Indies, published at Barcelona, in Spanish, in the year 1591. From an English translation of this work, printed at London in 1604, we extract the following sentence, which is all that relates to the animal in question :— The chinchilles is another kind of small beasts, like squirrels; they have a wonderfull smoothe and soft skinne, which they weare as a healthfull thing to comfort the stomacke, and those parts that have neede of a moderate heate; [as most beasts' do; but the concluding part of the extract shows that this is spoken of the human natives, and not of the poor chinchillas themselves;] they make coverings and rugges of the haire of these chinchilles, which are found on the Sierre of Peru.' "We find these animals again mentioned, and nearly to the same purpose, in The Observations of Sir Richard Hawkins, knight, in his Voyage into the South Sea, an. dom. 1593,' published at London in a small folio, in the year 1622, and reprinted, three years afterwards, in the fourth part of Purchas his Pilgrims.' This hardy and adventurous seaman appears, notwithstanding the somewhat contemptuous manner in which he speaks of the princes and nobles' that 'laie waite' for these skins, to have been much of the same opinion with regard to their superior quality and comfort. It is worthy of remark, that he treats them not as wool, in which light Acosta seems to have regarded them, but as fur. 'Amongst others,' he says-showing, by the by, as little respect for the niceties of grammar as the translator above quoted-' they have little beastes, like unto a squir |