In the mean time, Richard Mallet, a sailor, who had just been discharged from the civil hospital, after ten months' detention there for the cure of a loathsome disease, was sent to take charge of the "Minerva." Most of the Portuguese crew were remaining on board when Mallet arrived. The British captors, it appears, had not taken the precaution to dismantle the slaver. The spars and sails were still on board, there was plenty of provisions and water, and the vessel was in a fit condition in every respect for continuing the voyage to the Brazils. Thither, it seems, the Portuguese had determined to take her. There were none on board who could have opposed their undertaking, but a weak and sickly being, whom it would have been an easy affair to overmaster. The chain cable detached or cut, and the sails bent, during the darkness of night, before dawning light they might have been many a mile away out of sight of the island. Some of the negroes, who understood Portuguese, had overheard, however, the plot which was brewing, and on the night it was to have been put in execution informed Mallet of it. Still, had the Portuguese been resolved to carry through their plans, there was nothing to have prevented them. Mallet could not have left the ship to announce their escape, for the only boat belonging to the station was on shore, and the vessel was too far off for him to have swam to land, or to have been heard had he endeavoured by shouts to give alarm-besides the liability of his cries, if heard, being mistaken for the uproarious songs of the negroes, as they often danced and sang during a large portion of the night. So intimidated were the Portuguese, however, at this unexpected discovery of their intentions, that they had not the heart to make the attempt at escape, easy as it might have been; and as a boat was despatched for them the next morning, they left the " 'Minerva," much to our satisfaction, if not their own.

About a week after the arrival of the "Minerva," when sufficient time had elapsed to enable the Africans to recover from the surprise created by their late capture and the novelty of their present situation, it was highly diverting to witness the gaiety that seemed to animate them. Drawn up in rows, they would sing for hours together without moving, beating the cadences of the music with clapping of hands, or the shaking of calabashes half filled with sand. At other times, they would follow each other in long files, and promenade and march round the deck, dancing and capering like young goats. Towards evening they would indulge in their favourite figures; the fandango and the war-dance would then be the principal source of amusement, and these gay, thoughtless creatures were the same who but a month ago were exposed to the tortures of suffocation in the hold, and lost so many of their companions in that catastrophe, perhaps amongst them the fondest relations and the most esteemed friends. Well may the race be accused of insensibility. These occupations, however, were not the only means at the disposal of the Congos for the purpose of enabling them to pass the time pleasantly. In the billets sent for firewood, as they consisted of timber from broken-up slavers, they discovered a number of copper nails, and from these they made fish-hooks to catch

mackerel with, and very passable rings for the decoration of their females.

The deck of the "Minerva " was converted into a smithy, and round the galley fire, might be continually seen bands of sable Cyclops, heating bars in the fire or beating them out to the required shapes; the copper bolts serving for anvil, hammer, and likewise material from which the articles were manufactured. The rings constituted not merely ornaments, for being worn on the wrist and ankles in pairs, and sometimes larger numbers, they served likewise all the purposes of castanets, and made really not inharmonious music with their jingling in the different steps of the dance. Their hooks being made of different sizes, they were able to catch with them fish of all sorts and dimensions, from the small fry to the full-grown sandspear. Many a wholesome dish their industry thus procured them. At that season the fish were schooling in myriads in the bay; after the fry the bonitas would come skipping and bounding, the albacores would rush with the speed of lightning after the mackerel, and the porpoises dart on the flying fish. Numbers of sea-birds, attracted to the place, would catch the flying fish started from the waters by their finny pursuers, or wheeling round and round to watch their prey, would dart with unerring precision, and secure their share of the spoils. The sea and sky seemed alive with animation; the whirring of the flying fish, the scream of the cormorants, the splash of the albacores, and the puffing and blowing of the porpoises, all betokened the desperation of the actors in the terrific game of life and death.

One of the most pleasant and successful piscatorial excursions I ever made was alongside of the "Minerva," fishing for bonitas. A rod and line are used for the purpose, the former made out of a stout bamboo, and the latter of a hard twisted cord, not above six feet in length. Some fry are dipped for with a hand-net, and one of the fattest and liveliest being selected for bait, is hooked through the dorsal fin, and drawn over the surface of the water, in the same manner as you play the fly in angling for trout. Presently, the bonitas, attracted by the motion, will come dashing and leaping at the fish. When hooked, the bonita is thrown into the boat by a jerk of the rod. In this manner I caught two dozen in less than an hour one day; and as several of them weighed more than 20lbs., some idea may be formed of the boatload that is occasionally procured by a few hours' toil. The sport is excellent, and was always highly relished by the negroes, who were provided by it frequently with the means of feasting and revelling for days together afterwards.

I have already alluded to the resignation of their situations by several of the overseers. Lieutenant Matthew O'Connor, who was clerk and chief overseer, and his wife, who was matron, were the first to give up their berths. As they always lived in Lemon Valley, they did not require to suffer the penance of a three days' pilgrimage to Old Woman's Valley. On the present occasion, Fuller, Ross, and Welsh were the persons who emigrated to that delightful "El Dorado." They were followed shortly afterwards by five out of the nine Portuguese who had

been put upon the establishment. The others preferred remaining to accompanying their comrades; Joseph, Marco, and Manvel stopped at Lemon Valley, while Theodore was removed to the station at Rupert's. The third party who visited Old Woman's Valley on the same errand as the others consisted of Young, Blake, and Mason. Such were the changes that took place among the officials of the establishment in the interval that elapsed between the arrival of the "Minerva" and the expiration of the quarantine.

That day so ardently wished for at length arrived. By the beginning of April I was enabled to announce to the authorities the disappearance, for the fourth time, of the smallpox. That disease had been extremely mild on board the "Minerva," as, indeed, it had been among the people of the "Louisa" and "Marcianna;" very few deaths were occasioned by it, and the last case having been cured, it was with much pleasure I indited the epistle that intimated the welcome intelligence. It was received with as much delight as communicated. The inhabitants were relieved of a great oppression; the terror which had seized them was now fled; they felt as if awoke from a slumber that had been long troubled by a hideous nightmare; in fact, they now felt secure, and therefore happy. A probationary period of six weeks was ordained as the term during which every chance of infection might be supposed to be extinguished, and the cessation of quarantine was appointed to take place on the 23d May. Without any further incident worthy of narrative, that day at last came, and quarantine ceased, to the inexpressible joy of us all-Colonial Authorities, natives of the island, and inmates of the establishment, whether officials or Africans.

EXPORTS OF VAN DIEMEN'S LAND.

A comparative statement of the principal articles exported from Hobart Town and Launceston:

COMPARATIVE PRODUCTION AND CONSUMPTION OF

COFFEE.

We are indebted to a commercial house in New Orleans for the following:

COMPARATIVE PRODUCTION AND CONSUMPTION OF COFFEE IN THE YEARS 1832, 1841, AND 1845.

Increase of produce from 1832 to 1841 (nine years) 103'1, or 3 per cent.

per annum.

Suppose the increase to be the same to 1845, the produce would be 492.7.

In 1832, 1841, 1845,

123.2 111.8 165.8

310-2436 8 495.0

Increase from 1832 to 1841 (nine years) 126'6, or 4 per cent. per annum.

Increase for four years 58.2, or 3 per cent. per annum.

Stock in Europe, January 1st, 1845
Ditto in United States

165.8

Probable stock, January, 1846, for world 118.8

Or about three months' consumption.

In addition to the above we might add, that the import into New Orleans this season is 3,800 bags Cuba, and 167,000 bags Rio, against 52,800 bags Cuba, and 161,000 bags Rio, last season.

The whole export of coffee from Rio to the United States is 150,000 bags less this season than the last, and the import from Cuba almost entirely cut off.

VOL. VI. NO. 24. DECEMBER, 1845.

2 K

ON THE VEGETABLE ORIGIN OF BASALTIC COLUMNS.

BY CAPT. CHARLES MORTON, R.N.

(Resumed from vol. v. p. 269.)

ASTRONOMY displays to our wondering minds, the myriads of stars, suns, worlds, a million times bigger than our earth, which, at the Almighty command, revolve in endless space; we are irresistibly impressed with a conviction of the unlimited extent of His creative powers. Globes seem to have issued from His hands with all the facility and rapidity with which the happy child commits to the winds his brilliant but evanescent soap-bubbles. Were it not as vain for the human mind to speculate upon the origin and nature of the nucleus around which our visible globe is formed, as to imagine a beginning or an end to matter, time, or space -we might, from the nebulous appearance of some of the heavenly bodies, be disposed to fancy that our own earth in its embryo state was merely an inflated bubble; that, receiving the divine command or stimulus to consolidate and expand to perfect maturity, imbued with the property of maintaining and appropriating to its own growth the accumulations which the luxuriant animal and vegetable kingdoms of remote ages had absorbed from the vapour of the atmosphere and ocean, and fixed in their own structures, it had, like the mighty cotton tree, the giant of tropical forests, expanded many hundred million times beyond the bulk of the original seed, or atom, from which it sprung. For, where the lowest coal formation now is, there, most assuredly, the surface of the earth once was; and in all the works of creation yet unfolded to human research, we invariably find the most stupendous results produced by the most simple means. Minute seeds

expand to mighty trees-the gigantic iguanodon, a lizard sixty or seventy feet long, was once a fluid confined within an egg-shell. How then shall vain man, seeing where the surface of the earth once was, presume to deny its obedience to the general laws of expansion which we find so universally in operation?

However this may be, it is evident that in endowing human nature with powers adequate to trace causes from effects, the Almighty intended those faculties should be exercised, as well in the contemplation of the wonders of creation as of other matters. It is, in fact, by the contemplation of His works that we arrive at the best knowledge of our Heavenly Father. With this conviction, and the belief that we are all, according to our abilities, bound to assist in unravelling those mysteries which still shroud subjects susceptible of rational solution, I attempted, in a former article, to procure for regularly-jointed and articulated Basaltic Columns, now pronounced by geologists to be of volcanic formation, the admission of a vegetable origin. I have, as yet, confined my