men who have formed attachments without the means of consummating them prior to their going to India. These attachments were maintained, it seems, during many years of absence and business, and ended in disappointment to the parties on the very eve of marriage. We do not know if cases of this sort be common; but we should not be surprised if they are so. There is a tone of dissatisfaction running through these volumes, which makes us fear that the author himself has been disappointed. The narrative of Captain Maple's misfortunes, which, after all, are attributable (poor fellow!) rather to his wife than to India, and the still more sombre history of Captain Philipson, would lead us to suppose that the life of an officer in the Indian army is by no means enviable. Yet, if we turn to our author's "letter home," we shall find, if we take his opinion, that it has some features by which many a man would be captivated with it: "The life," says he, of an Indian officer is that of a gentleman, and is sufficiently aristocratic to gratify the most fastidious pride. He has servants, horses, a house, a plentiful table, fine wines, constant hope of an augmentation of income; and, above all, for I speak to the proud, he has consideration-a place and a right to mingle with the highest. He is at ease in the society of his superiors, because at no very distant day, if he is tolerably fortunate, he is to occupy the same position. He has a place at their tables, a seat in their carriages, and is on that easy footing of familiarity which implies essential equality.”—Vol. ii. pp. 10, 11, "Othello's occupation" is no longer productive, it is true, of those harvests of gold which were reaped from it so speedily in "days gone by;" but it still offers a provision and a chance of wealth to the young and the adventurous. They often meet, we admit, with disappointments; but disappointments, as most of us. know, are not peculiar to India. All, when life is new Commence with feelings warm and prospects high: Peels off it's bright skin yearly, like the snake." Although we have made so many extracts, that the reader may almost form for himself an opinion of the style and character of the volumes before us, we think it, nevertheless, our duty to express our sentiments on that head. The East India Sketch Book, then, may be said to contain some amusing native tales, of which we prefer the "Legend of Benar," "Hourmahed," and "The Three Moons," to the others; and some good sketches of Anglo-Indian life, of which we consider Management," "Le petit nez retroussé," and "The Sick Certificate," the best. It is inferior to Mrs. Trollope's delineation of -the Americans; and we wish that the "Introduction" and "Ram 66 bling Essay" had been omitted altogether. It has many inaccuracies, and some affectations of language; but it would be invidious to particularize them, the more so, as we hope that the author may have an opportunity of correcting them in a second edition; for we must confess that, upon the whole, we have derived much amusement and instruction from the perusal of his volumes. ART. IV.-The History of Rome. By B. G. NIEBUHR. Translated by JULIUS CHARLES HARE, M.A. and CONNOP THIRLWALL, M.A. Fellows of Trinity College, Cambridge. Second Volume. Cambridge: Printed by the Printer to the University. 1832. FEW persons who have received the benefits of a classical education can read the works of Niebuhr as they are presented in an English. dress by the reverend translators of this volume, without being astonished at the immensity of the sum of historical statements concerning ancient Rome which they have yet to unlearn. By a process of investigation, which for its ingenuity, its extent, and the labour and perseverance it required, commands the admiration of mankind, Professor Niebuhr was enabled to describe the actions, the political and civil condition, and in some measure the peculiar manners of the people composing the Roman empire, in a manner which far outstrips all that the most credible annalists have hitherto collected. He was able, by his extraordinary diligence, to obtain the sight of a vast number of documents which were never before suspected to contain information connected with the history of Rome, and from these, by means of unwearied application, and by the exercise of the most acute penetration and a cautious judgment, he deduced so many undeniable conclusions, so many indisputable facts, as to make up an entirely new and original history of a people, the most renowned, with the exception of the Greeks, which time has yet witnessed. The first volume of the present work has now been before the British public for some years, and the avidity with which it has been read by scholars of every grade, is at once a proof of the great merit of the author, and of the just and discriminating taste of the erudite portion of our community. The great purpose which the author seems to have had in view in the first volume was to prove that the commonly received History of Rome, whilst she was governed by kings, had no authority in truth. He states, that the accounts of that empire, which were universally circulated throughout Europe, and which were embodied into almost every system of liberal education, consisted to a great extent of imaginary stories, derived from tradition, or fabricated for the purpose of exciting popular interest. The duty, therefore, which the advanced cha racter of the present age imposed upon competent persons was, that they should search out the productions of those who had at any time contributed to the illustration of Roman history; that they should carefully and deliberately examine those documents, should distinguish fable from reality, and should trace out that portion of the narrative of each which was due to his mistakes, his prejudices, or his want of probity. This was a task pregnant with difficulties, which were of a nature scarcely to be surmounted, save by such a rare union of qualifications as were found in Niebuhr alone. The substantive part of the present volume may be properly described as consisting of a view of the changes and the influence of the constitution of Rome during one of the most interesting epochs of its existence. In his elaborate exposure of the true state of things as connected with the political situation of Rome, the author keeps perpetually in view, as he had done in the first volume, the great object of explaining the institutions, together with the political and civil proceedings of the Romans. In numerous instances he shows how erroneous are the impressions which are handed down amongst us, even at this hour, with respect to those institutions and proceedings, and never fails, by a course of the most luminous and convincing arguments, to define the exact meaning of all those terms and expressions used in the ancient legislative and judicial records, to which we have been so long taught to assign an arbitrary and incorrect import. One of the most important of the subjects discussed in the present volume is that of the Agrarian Law, the nature of which is expounded with extraordinary learning and accuracy by Niebuhr. We find that the term " Agrarian Law" was applied to every law by which the Commonwealth disposed of its public land, but it has been accepted almost universally in the sense of an enactment which relates to the landed property of the aggregate body of citizens, setting a limit to that property, and handing over all beyond the defined portion to the destitute members of the state. This is a different meaning from that attributed to the words "Agrarian Law," by the ablest of the Jurisconsults in Europe. The explanation into which the author is led is in every respect worth quoting: "The ager publicus was only a part of the publicum, or the estate of the populus. This consisted, like that of a private person, of divers objects, both productive and unproductive ones, and of revenues accruing from rights. The last head included tolls, excise duties, land taxes paid by subject towns. The unproductive property comprehended public buildings of every kind, whether sacred or profane, roads, and public places. The productive objects may be divided into two classes, according to the different modes of enjoying them: for either the soverain sought to keep as much of the produce as possible for the public, though a part was at all events to be allowed to the farmer :-such was the case with houses (and the Roman republic was the proprietor of whole cities,) with mines, quarries, salt works or else the state reserved only a small share of the produce, and gave up the larger to its citizens for the benefit of individuals. There was a by-class of the Roman system, when the republic restored a conquered territory to its old inhabitants, subject to the payment of a tithe or some other similar tax: this, so long as the precarious possessions lasted, was like any other impost; but the republic had the right of claiming the land and turning out the possessors. "The rule by which it was determined what part of the public property ought to be productive for the state alone, and what part, while it yielded some profit to the state, should be mainly turned to the account of private persons, is plain. The former course was taken when the nature of the object was such that a very small number could enjoy it, thereby reaping a large profit, in which it was fair that a much greater number should participate, through the increase of the public revenue, and a proportionable diminution of the burthens of the tax-payers. It would have been granting an unfair privilege, if a single person or a few had been permitted to work a mine, on condition of merely paying a small part of the produce; whereas the affair would have been a scramble, if every citizen who chose had been at liberty to sink a shaft: therefore such property was leased to a company. On the other hand, a tunny-fishery might be carried on by thousands, if the poorer sort clubbed together to procure boats and nets; and it would have been unfair to farm it to a company, though the state might have drawn a larger revenue from it by doing so. Wherever there was no obstacle in the way of an occupation for the benefit of individuals, it was preferred: indeed individuals enjoyed many kinds of public property, which yielded nothing to the state. "The state shewed itself no less moderate in its claims, where it might have demanded the whole, than the gods. They content themselves with the refuse of the victim: and the piece of ground at Scillus which Xenophon dedicated to Diana, was just as much her property, though he; reserved the cultivation and enjoyment of it, subject to the payment of a tenth. I hope my meaning will not be mistaken, if I observe that the Levites received only the tithe of the produce of the land of Canaan, though it had been consecrated to Jehovah, whom they represented, as his property. So a tenth of a portion of the state seems in general to have levied on corn; as the Roman republic did, whenever it exercised its right of ownership. Plantations and vineyards might fairly be subjected to a higher rate, as they require no seed and less labour: hence the Roman people received two tenths from them: and so perhaps on the same ground did they of the young, the cheese, and the wool, of cattle kept on the common pastures, before an agistment was introduced. Now if the persons: who occupied the public domain had the supreme power in their hands, they could free themselves from this charge, and shift the burthens necessary for the service of the state entirely upon the commonalty in such case the ownership became a bare right, as unproductive as a right of way. This however is an accidental circumstance; just as much so as it was that the Delphic god let the territory of Cirrha lie waste, when his temple might have drawn a tenth from it. Properly the notion of the ager implied that the state itself reapt a profit from it. This profit was termed fructus, the occupation for which an individual rendered this stated due, VOL. II. (1833) No. I. P usus. For we must not be led by the fragments of the jurists, in their present state, to believe that usus fractus was equivalent to fructus : such a superfluous combination of two words would be contrary to the genius of the language: it is usus et fructus combined in the old style without any connecting particles. On the contrary, a person who had merely the fructus cannot anciently have had the usus along with it: though in private property the one might merge in the other; and when this was the case he enjoined the usus fructus. "The state seems never to have collected its tenths directly by its officers; the universal practice, to which I doubt whether a single exception occurs, was to farm all the branches of the revenue, except the landtax, fines, and some other things of the same nature. That which arose from the domain opened two sides to speculation; first, in the amount of the tithe, as the harvest was more or less productive; next in the variations of price, if the rent was to be paid in money. This indeed was by no means necessary; and especially in war times, when corn must else have been bought for the public granaries, the simple course was to require a fixed quantity in lieu of the tenth: a certain proportion of grain might even be contracted for instead of the two tenths of oil and wine: and this was actually done. The farming for a money-rent, however, was incomparably the more usual practice; but the old technical term for it in the Roman system of finance expressed not the farming, but the sale of the fructus→ as in the case of those Sicilian lands, which had not become the property of the Roman republic, but paid a tithe as a land-tax. It was not a sale for the term of a lustre at a sum to be laid down once for all, but at one payable yearly. This was done in the strictest legal form, by mancipa.. tion-the regular mode of conveying all rights to land, among which that of levying a tax from the produce was one.' -pp. 135—139. - Those who held such of the estates of the republic as were the subject of the agrarian laws were called possessors; that is, they held possession, and could alienate it, although the fee of the land remained vested in the state. This is the interpretation which the author puts on all the evidence that has been accessible to him. The origin of those possessions was brought about early in the Roman times. When a territory was conquered, it was considered as transferred to the Roman state, and was parcelled out by virtue of the agrarian law; but the property might be resumed at any time by the republic, which reserved to herself the power of terminating the possession by a particular occupant, and alienating the lands. The institution of the Decemvirate forms one of the most interesting events in the history of ancient Rome. For twenty years before its establishment Rome is described by Niebuhr as having been the seat of the most direful visitations, such as calamitous defeats, earthquakes, but above all, mortal pestilence. The first time that the city was invaded by a pestilence was in 282 of the building of Rome; the character of the disease is not specified by any author, but this is certain, that it attacked every one without exception; it rolled like a torrent of lava over the inhabitants, and ultimately swept over the whole of Italy. In 291, nine years after this, a second plague visited Rome; it carried off the two consuls, |