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Mr. Percival does not pretend to deal with the devil; but appears to have used the fair and natural resources of observation and good sense, to put together an interesting description of Ceylon. There is nothing in the book very animated, or very profound, but it is without pretentions; and if it does not excite attention by any unusual powers of description, it never disgusts by credulity, wearies by prolixity, or offends by affectation. It is such an account as a plain military man of diligence and common sense might be expected to compose; and narratives like these we must not despise. To military men we have been, and must be, indebted for our first acquaintance with the interior of many countries. Conquest has explored more than ever curiosity has done and the path for science has been commonly opened by the sword.

We shall proceed to give a very summary abstract of the principal contents of Mr. Percival's book.

The immense accessions of territory which the English have acquired in the East Indies since the American war, rendered it absolutely necessary, that some effort should be made to obtain possession of a station where ships might remain in safety during the violent storms incidental to that climate. As the whole of that large track which we possess along the Coromandel coast presents nothing but open roads, all vessels are obliged, on the approach of the monsoons, to stand out in the open seas; and there are many parts of the coast that can be approached only during a few months of the year. As the harbour of Trincomalee, which is equally secure at all seasons, afforded the means of obviating these disadvantages, it is evident that, on the first rupture with the Dutch, our country. men would attempt to gain possession of it. A body of troops was, in consequence, detached in the year 1795, for the conquest of Ceylon, which (in conse quence of the indiscipline which political dissension had introduced among the Dutch troops) was effected almost without opposition,

has been many years customary for the Dutch to bring them to Ceylon, for the purpose of carrying on vari ous branches of trade and manufacture, and in order to employ them as soldiers and servants. The Ma lays are the most vindictive and ferocious of living beings. They set little or no value on their existence, in the prosecution of their odious passions; and having thus broken the great tie which renders man a being capable of being governed, and fit for society, they are a constant source of terror to all those who have any kind of connection or relation with them. A Malay servant, from the apprehension excited by his vindict ive disposition, often becomes the master of his master. It is as dangerous to dismiss him as to punish him; and the rightful despot, in order to avoid assas sination, is almost compelled to exchange characters with his slave. It is singular, however, that the Malay, incapable of submission on any other occasion, and ever ready to avenge insult with death, submits to the severest military discipline with the utmost resig nation and meekness. The truth is, obedience to his officers forms part of his religious creed; and the same man who would repay the most insignificant insult with death, will submit to be lacerated at the halbert with the patience of a martyr. This is truly a tremendous people! When assassins and blood-hounds will fall into rank and file, and the most furious savages submit (with no diminution of their ferocity) to the science and discipline of war, they only want a Malay Bonaparte to lead them to the conquest of the world. Our curiosity has always been very highly excited by the accounts of this singular people; and we cannot help thinking, that, one day or another, when they are more full of opium than usual, they will run a muck from Cape Comorin to the Caspian.

Mr. Percival does not consider the Ceylonese as descended from the continentals of the peninsula, but rather from the inhabitants of the Maldive Islands, whom they very much resemble in complexion, features, language, and manners.

Ceylon is now inhabited by the English; the remains of the Dutch and Portuguese, the Cinglese or natives, subject to the dominion of the Europeans; the Candians, subject to the king of their own name; and the Vaddahs, or wild men, subject to no power. A Ceylonese Dutchman is a coarse, grotesque species of animal, whose native apathy and phlegm is animated only by the insolence of a colonial tyrant: his principal amusement appears to consist in smoking; but his pipe, according to Mr. Percival's account, is so seldom out of his mouth, that his smoking appears to be almost as much a necessary function of animal life as his breathing. His day is eked out with gin, ceremo-show the extent to which this passion is carried. If a Ceynious visits, and prodigious quantities of gross food, dripping with oil and butter; his mind, just able to reach from one meal to another, is incapable of farther exertion; and, after the panting and deglutition of a long protracted dinner, reposes on the sweet expectation that, in a few hours, the carnivorous toil will be renewed. He lives only to digest, and, while the organs of gluttony perform their office, he has not a wish beyond; and is the happy man which Horace de

scribes :

in seipso totus, teres, atque rotundus. The descendants of the Portuguese differ materially from the Moors, Malabars, and other Mahometans. Their great object is to show the world they are Europeans and Christians. Unfortunately, their ideas of Christianity are so imperfect, that the only mode they can hit upon of displaying their faith, is by wearing hats and breeches, and by these habiliments they consider themselves as showing a proper degree of contempt, on various parts of the body, towards Mahomet and Buddha. They are lazy, treacherous, effeminate, and passionate to excess; and are, in fact, a locomotive and animated farrago of the bad qualities of all tongues, people, and nations, on the face of the

lite in their demeanour, even to a degree far exceeding their The Ceylonese (says Mr. Percival) are courteous and pocivilization. In several qualities they are superior to all other Indians who have fallen within the sphere of my observation. I have already exempted them from the censure of stealing and lying, which seem to be almost inherent in the nature of an Indian. They are mild, and by no means captious or passionate in their intercourse with each other; furious and lasting. Their hatred is indeed mortal, and though, when once their anger is roused, it is proportionably they will frequently destroy themselves to obtain the destruction of the detested object. One instance will serve to lonese cannot obtain money due to him by another, he goes to his debtor, and threatens to kill himself if he is not instantly paid. This threat, which is sometimes put in execucompliance with the demand: as, by their law, if any man tion, reduces the debtor, if it be in his power, to immediate causes the loss of another man's life, his own is the forfeit. "An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth," is a proverbial expression continually in their mouths. This is, on other occasions, a very common mode of revenge among them; and a Ceylonese has often been known to contrive to kill himself in the company of his enemy, that the latter might suffer for it.

This dreadful spirit of revenge, so inconsistent with the usually mild and humane sentiments of the Ceylonese, and much more congenial to the bloody temper of a Malay, still continues to be fostered by the sacred customs of the Candians. Among the Cinglese, however, it has been greatly mitigated by their intercourse with Europeans. The desperate mode of obtaining, revenge which I have just des cribed, has been given up, from having been disappointed of its object; as in all those parts under our dominion, the European modes of investigating and punishing crimes are enforced. A case of this nature occurred at Caltura, in 1799. A Cinglese peasant happening to have a suit or conbathe in company with him, and drowned himself, with the troversy with another, watched an opportunity of going to view of having his adversary put to death. The latter was upon this taken up, and sent to Columbo, to take his trial for making away with the deceased, upon the principle of havThe Maylays, whom we forgot before to enumerate, ing been the last seen in his company. There was, howform a very considerable portion of the inhabitants of ever, nothing more than presumptive proof against the culCeylon. Their original empire lies in the peninsula prit, and he was of course acquitted. This decision, howof Malacca, from whence they have extended them-Cinglese, who are as much inclined to continue their ancient ever, did not by any means tally with the sentiments of the selves over Java, Sumatra, the Moluccas, and a vast barbarous practice as their brethren the Candians, although number of other islands in the peninsula of India. It they are deprived of the power,'—(pp. 70—72.)

earth.

bargain possible is made for each boat separately. The Dutch generally followed this last system; the banks were fished on government account, and the pearls disposed of in different parts of India or sent to Europe. When this plan was pursued, the governor and council of Ceylon claimed a certain per centage on the value of the pearls; or, if the fishing of the banks was disposed of by public sale, they bargained for a stipulated sum to themselves over and above what was paid on account of government. The pretence on which they founded their claims for this perquisite, was their trouble in surveying and valuing the banks, -(pp. 59-61.)

The warlike habits of the Candians make them look | boat. There are, however, no stated prices, and the best with contempt on the Cinglese, who are almost entirely unacquainted with the management of arms. They have the habit and character of mountaineers-warlike, hardy, enterprising, and obstinate. They have, at various times, proved themselves very formidable enemies to the Dutch; and in that kind of desultory warfare, which is the only one their rugged country will admit of, have cut off large parties of the troops of both these nations. The King of Candia, as we have before mentioned, possesses only the middle of the island, which nature, and his Candian majesty, have rendered as inaccessible as possible. It is traversable only by narrow wood-paths, known to nobody but the natives, strictly watched in peace and war, and where the best troops in the world might be shot in any quantities by the Candian marksmen, without the smallest possibility of resisting their enemies; because there would not be the smallest possibility of finding them. The King of Candia is of course despotic and the history of his life and reign presents the same monotonous ostentation, and baby-like ca-ject under water with their toes. Their descent is price, which characterize oriental governments. In public audiences he appears like a great fool, squatting on his hams; far surpassing gingerbread in splendour; and, after asking some idiotical question, as whether Europe is in Asia or Africa, retires with a flourish of trumpets very much out of tune. For his private amusement, he rides on the nose of an elephant, plays with his jewels, sprinkles his courtiers with rose-water, and feeds his gold and silver fish. If his tea is not sweet enough, he impales his footman; and smites off the head of half a dozen of his noblemen, if he has a pain in his own.

ώσπερ γαρ (says Aristotle) τελεωθεν βελτιστον των ζωων άνθρωπος εστι, ούτω και χωρισθεν νόμου, και δικης χειριστον παντων. Polit.

The only exportable articles of any importance which Ceylon produces, are pearls, cinnamon, and elephants. Mr. Percival has presented us with an extremely interesting account of the pearl fishery, held in Condatchy Bite, near the island of Manaar, in the straits which separate Ceylon from the main land.

The banks are divided into six or seven portions, in order to give the oysters time to grow, which are sup posed to attain their maturity in about seven years. The period allowed the merchant to complete his fishery, is about six weeks, during which period all the boats go out and return together, and are subject to very rigorous laws. The dexterity of the divers is very striking; they are as adroit in the use of their feet as their hands; and can pick up the smallest ob aided by a great stone, which they slip from their feet when they arrive at the bottom, where they can remain about two minutes. There are instances, however, of divers, who have so much of the aquatic in their nature, as to remain under water for five or six minutes. Their great enemy is the ground-shark; for the rule of, eat and be eaten, which Dr. Darwin called the great law of nature, obtains in as much force fathoms deep beneath the waves as above them: this animal is as fond of the legs of Hindoos, as the Hindoos are of the pearls of oysters; and as one appetite appears to him much more natural, and less capricious than the other, he never fails to indulge in it. Where fortune has so much to do with peril and profit, of course there is no deficiency of conjurers, who, by divers enigmatical grimaces, endeavour to ostracise this submarine invader. If they are successful, they are well paid in pearls; and if a shark indulges himlives at Colang, on the Malabar coast, who always self with the leg of a Hindoo, there is a witch who

bears the blame.

A common mode of theft practised by the common people engaged in the pearl fishery, is by swallowing the pearls. There is perhaps no spectacle which the island of CeyWhenever any one is suspected of having lon affords more striking to an European, than the Bay of swallowed these precious pills of Cleopatra, the po Condatchy, during the season of the pearl fishery. This lice apothecaries are instantly sent for; a brisk ca desert and barren spot is at that time converted into a scene, thartic is immediately despatched after the truant which exceeds, in novelty and variety, almost any thing I pearl, with the strictest orders to apprehend it, in ever witnessed. Several thousands of people, of different whatever corner of the viscera it may be found lurk colours, countries, castes, and occupations, continually passing. Oyster lotteries are carried on here to a great ing and repassing in a busy crowd; the vast numbers of small tents and huts erected on the shore, with the bazaar extent. They consist in purchasing a quantity of the or market place before each; the multitude of boats return- oysters unopened, and running the chance of either ing in the afternoon from the pearl banks, some of them finding or not finding pearls in them. The European laden with riches; the anxious expecting countenances of gentlemen and officers who attend the pearl fishery the boat-owners, while the boats are approaching the shore, through duty or curiosity, are particularly fond of and the eagerness and avidity with which they run to them these lotteries, and frequently make purchases of this when arrived, in hopes of a rich cargo; the vast numbers of jewellers, brokers, merchants of all colours and all des- sort. The whole of this account is very well written, criptions, both natives and foreigners, who are occupied in and has afforded us a great degree of amusement. By some way or other with the pearls, some separating and as- what curious links and fantastical relations, are man. sorting them, others weighing and ascertaining their num-kind connected together! At the distance of half the ber and value, while others are hawking them about, or globe, a Hindoo gains his support by groping at the drilling and boring them for future use; all these circum- bottom of the sea, for the morbid concretion of a shell stances tend to impress the mind with the value and impor- fish, to decorate the throat of a London alderman's tance of that object, which can of itself create this scene. wife. It is said that the great Linnæus had discovered The bay of Condatchy is the most central rendezvous for the boats employed in the fishery. The banks where it is the secret of infecting oysters with this perligenous carried on, extend several miles along the coast from Ma- disease: what is become of the secret we do not naar southward off Arippo, Condatchy, and Pomparipo. knew, as the only interest we take in oysters is of The principal bank is opposite to Condatchy, and lies out at a much more vulgar, though, perhaps, a more humane sea about twenty miles. The first step, previous to the commencement of the fishery, is to have the different oyster banks surveyed, the state of the oysters ascertained, and a report made on the subject to government. If it has been found that the quantity is sufficient, and that they are arrived at a proper degree of maturity, the particular banks to be fished that year are put up for sale to the highest bidder, and are usually purchased by a black merchant. This, however, is not always the course pursued: government sometimes ju lees it more advantageous to fish the banks on its own account, and to dispose of the pearls to the merchants. When this plan is adopted, boats are hired for the season on account of government, from different quarters; the price varies considerably according to circumstances; but is usually from five to eight hundred pagodas for each

nature.

The principal woods of cinnamon lie in the neighbourhood of Columbo. They reach to within half s mile of the fort, and fill the whole surrounding pros. pect. The grand garden near the town is so extensive. as to occupy a track of country from ten to fifteen miles in length.

Nature has here concentrated both the beauty and the riches of the island. Nothing can be more delightful to the eye, than the prospect which stretches around Columbo. The low cinnamon trees which cover the plain, allow the view to reach the groves of evergreens, interspersed with tall clumps, and bounded everywhere with extensive ranges

of cocoa-nut and other large trees. The whole is diversified | with small lakes and green marshes, skirted all round with rice and pasture fields. In one part, the intertwining cinnamon trees appear completely to clothe the face of the plain; in another, the openings made by the intersecting footpaths just serve to show that the thick underwood has been penetrated. One large road, which goes out at the west gate of the fort, and returns by the gate on the south, makes a winding circuit of seven miles among the woods. It is here that the officers and gentlemen belonging to the garrison of Columbo take their morning ride, and enjoy one of the finest scenes in nature.'-(pp. 336, 337.)

As this spice constitutes the wealth of Ceylon, great pains are taken to ascertain its qualities, and to propagate its choicest kinds. The prime sort is obtained from the Laurus Cinnamonium. The leaf resembles the laurel in shape, but is not of so deep a green. When chewed it has the smell and taste of cloves. There are several different species of cinnamon trees on the island; but four sorts only are cultivated and barked. The picture which we have just quoted from Mr. Percival of a morning ride in a cinnamon wood is so enchanting, that we are extremely sorry the addition of aromatic odours cannot with veracity be made to it. The cinnamon has, unfortunately, no smell at all but to the nostrils of the poet. Mr. Percival gives us a very interesting account of the process of making up cinnamon for the market, in which we are sorry our limits will not permit us to follow him. The different qualities of the cinnamon bundles can only be estimated by the taste; an office which devolves upon the medical men of the settlement, who are employed for several days together in chewing cinnamon, the acrid juice of which excoriates the mouth, and puts them to the most dreadful tortures.

(and the fact has been confirmed to us by the most respectable authority), that if it even pass over a bottle of wine, however well corked and sealed up, the wine becomes so strongly tainted with musk, that it cannot be used: and a whole cask may be rendered useless in the same manner. Among the great vari ety of birds, we were struck with Mr. Percival's account of the honey-bird, in whose body the soul of a common informer appears to have migrated. It makes a loud and shrill noise, to attract the notice of any body whom it may perceive; and thus inducing to the tree where the bees have concealed their treahim to follow the course it points out, leads him sure; after the apiary has been robbed, this feathered scoundrel gleans his reward from the hive. The list conciled to the crude and cloudy land in which we of Ceylonese snakes is hideous; and we become relive, from reflecting, that the indiscriminate activity of the sun generates what is loathsome, as well as what is lovely; that the asp reposes under the rose; and the scorpion crawls under the fragrant flower, and the luscious fruit.

The usual stories are related here, of the immense

ter ten men.

It is a natural umbrella, and is of as eminent service in that country as a great-coat tree would be in this. A leaf of the talipot tree is a tent to the soldier, a parasol to the traveller, and a book to the scholar. The cocoa tree affords bread, milk, oil, wine, spirits, vinegar, yeast, sugar, cloth, paper, huts, and ships.

size and voracious appetite of a certain species of serpent. The best history of this kind we ever remem ber to have read, was of a serpent killed near one of our settlements, in the East Indies; in whose body they found the chaplain of the garrison, all in black, the Rev. Mr. -(somebody or other, whose name we have forgotten,) and who, after having been missing for above a week, was discovered in this very inconvenient situation. The dominions of the King of Candia are partly defended by leeches, which abound in the woods, and from which our soldiers suffered in The island of Ceylon is completely divided into two the most dreadful manner. The Ceylonese, in comparts by a very high range of mountains, on the two pensation for their animated plagues, are endowed sides of which the climate and the seasons are entire with two vegetable blessings, the cocoa-nut tree and ly different. These mountains also terminate comthe talpot tree. The latter affords a prodigious leaf, pletely the effect of the monsoons, which set in peri-impenetrable to sun or rain, and large enough to shelodically from opposite sides of them. On the west side, the rains prevail in the months of May, June, and July, the season when they are felt on the Malabar coast. This monsoon is usually extremely violent during its continuance. The northern parts of the island are very little affected. In the months of October and November, when the opposite monsoon sets in on the Coromandel coast, the north of the island is attacked; and scarcely any impression reaches the southern parts. The heat during the day is nearly the same throughout the year; the rainy season renders the nights much cooler. The climate, upon the whole, is much more temperate than on the continent of India. The temperate and healthy climate of Ceylon, is, however, confined to the sea-coast. In the interior of the country, the obstructions which the thick woods oppose to the free circulation of air, render the heat almost insupportable, and gencrate a low and malignant fever, known to Europeans by the name of the Jungle fever. The chief harbours of Ceylon are Trincomalee, Point de Gallee, and, at certain scasons of the year, Columbo. The former of these, from its nature and situation, is that which stamps Ceylon one of our most valuable acquisitions in the East Indies. As soon as the monsoons commence, every vessel caught by them in any other part of the Bay of Bengal is obliged to put to sea immediately, in order to avoid destruction. At these seasons, Trincomalec alone, of all the parts on this side of the peninsula, is capable of affording to vessels a safe retreat; which a vessel THIS dismal trash which has nearly dislocated the from Madras may reach in two days. These circum-jaws of every critic among us with gaping, has so stances render the value of Trincomalee much greater alarmed Bonaparte, that he has seized the whole imthan that of the whole island; the revenue of which pression, sent Madame de Stael out of Paris, and, for will certainly be hardly sufficient to defray the ex- ought we know, sleeps in a night-cap of steel, and pense of the establishments kept up there. The agri- dagger-proof blankets. To us it appears rather an atculture of Ceylon, is, in fact, in such an imperfect tack upon the Ten Commandments, than the govern state, and the natives have so little availed themselves ment of Bonaparte, and calculated not so much to enof its natural fertility, that great part of the provisions force the rights of the Bourbons, as the benefits of necessary for its support, are imported from Bengal. adultery, murder, and a great number of other vices, which have been somehow or other strangely neglect. ed in this country, aud too much so (according to the apparent opinion of Madame de Stael) even in France.

Ceylon produces the elephant, the buffalo, tiger, elk, wild-hog, rabbit, hare, flying-fox, and musk-rat. Many articles are rendered entirely useless by the smell of musk, which this latter animal communicates in merely running over them. Mr. Percival asserts

We could with great pleasure proceed to give a further abstract of this very agreeable and interesting publication, which we very strongly recommend to the public. It is written with great modesty, entirely without pretensions, and abounds with curious and important information. Mr. Percival will accept our When we can praise with such justice, we are always best thanks for the amusement he has afforded us. happy to do it; and regret that the rigid and indepen. dent honesty which we have made the very basis of our literary undertaking, should so frequently compel us to speak of the authors who come before us, in a style so different from that in which we have vindicated the merits of Mr. Percival.

DELPHINE. (EDINBURGH REVIEW, 1803.) Delphine. By Madame de Staël Holstein. London. Maw

man. 6 vols, 12 mo.

* All books are written upon it in Ceylon.

It happens, however, fortunately enough, that her | vers between them, besides hæmoptoe, hemorrhage, book is as dull as it could have been if her intentions deliquium animi, singultus, hysteria, and faminei ululahad been good; for wit, dexterity, and the pleasant tus, or screams innumerable. Now, that there should energies of the mind, seldom rank themselves on the be a reasonable allowance of sickness in every novel, side of virtue and social order; while vice is spiritual, we are willing to admit, and will cheerfully permit eloquent, and alert, ever choice in expression, happy the heroine to be once given over, and at the point of in allusion, and judicious in arrangement. death; but we cannot consent, that the interest which ought to be excited by the feelings of the mind should be transferred to the sufferings of the body, and a crisis of perspiration be substituted for a crisis of passion. Let as see difficulties overcome, if our approbation is required; we cannot grant it to such cheap and sterile artifices as these.

The story is simply this.-Delphine, a rich young widow, presents her cousin Matilda de Vernon with a considerable estate, in order to enable her to marry Leonce Mondeville. To this action she is excited by the arts and the intrigues of Madame de Vernon, an hackneyed Parisian lady, who hopes, by this marriage, to be able to discharge her numerous and pressing debts. Leonce, who, like all other heroes of novels, has fine limbs, and fine qualities, comes to Paris -dislikes Matilda-falls in love with Delphine-Delphine with him; and they are upon the eve of jilting poor Matilda, when, from some false reports respecting the character of Delphine (which are aggravated by her own imprudences, and by the artifices of Madame Vernon), Leonce, not in a fit of honesty, but of revenge, marries the lady he came to marry. Soon after, Madame de Vernon dies-discovers the artifices by which she had prevented the union of Leonce and Delphine-and then, after this catastrophe, which ought to have terminated the novel, comes too long volumes of complaint and despair. Delphine becomes a man-runs away from the nunnery with Leonce, who is taken by some French soldiers, upon the supposition that he has been serving in the French emigrant army against his country-is shot, and upon his dead body falls Delphine as dead as he.

The characters in this novel are all said to be drawn from real life; and the persons for whom they are intended are loudly whispered at Paris. Most of them we have forgotten; but Delphine is said to be intended for the authoress, and Madame de Vernon (by a slight sexual metamorphosis) for Talleyrand, minister of the French republic for foreign affairs. As this lady (once the friend of the authoress) may probably exercise a considerable influence over the destinies of this country, we shall endeavour to make our readers a little better acquainted with her; but we must first remind them that she was once a bishop, a higher dignity in the church than was ever attained by any of her sex since the days of Pope Joan; and that though she swindles Delphine out of her estate with a consid erable degree of address, her dexterity sometimes fails her, as in the memorable instance of the American commissioners. Madame de Stael gives the following description of this pastoral metropolitan female:

Though she is at least forty, she still appears charming even among the young and beautiful of her own sex. The paleness of her complexion, the slight relaxation of her festures, indicate the languor of indisposition, and not the decay of years; the easy negligence of her dress accords with this impression. Every one concludes, that when her health is recovered, and she dresses with more care, she must be completely beautiful: this change, however, never happens, imagination still add something more to the natural effect but it is always expected; and that is sufficient to make the or her charms.'-(Vol. I., p. 21.)

Nothing can be more execrable than the manner in which this book is translated. The bookseller has employed one of our countrymen for that purpose, who appears to have been very lately caught. The contrast between the passionate exclamatious of Madame de Stael, and the barbarous vulgarities of poor Sawney, produces a mighty ludicrous effect. One of the heroes, a man of high fastidious temper, exclaims in a letter to Delphine, I cannot endure this Paris; I have met with ever so many people whom my soul abhors.' And the accomplished and enraptured Leonce terminates one of his letters thus: Adieu! adieu! my dearest Delphine. I will give you a call to-morrow. We doubt if Grub street ever imported from Caledonia a more abominable translator.

Making every allowance for reading this book in a translation, and in a very bad translation, we cannot but deem it a heavy performance. The incidents are vulgar; the characters vulgar, too, except those of Delphine and Madame de Vernon. Madaine de Stack has not the artifice to hide what is coming. In travel ling through a flat country, or a flat book, we see our road before us for half the distance we are going. There are no agrecable sinuosities, and no speculations whether we are to ascend next or descend; what new sight we are to enjoy, or to which side we are to bend. Leonce is robbed and half murdered; the apothecary of the place is certain he will not live; we were absolutely certain that he would live, and could predict to an hour the time of his recovery. In the same manner we could have prophesied every event of the book a whole volume before its occurrence. This novel is a perfect Alexandrian. The two last volumes are redundant, and drag their wounded length: it should certainly have terminated where the interest ceases, at the death of Madame de Vernon; but, instead of this, the scene-shifters come and pick up the dead bodies, wash the stage, sweep it, and do every thing which the timely fall of the cur. tain should have excluded from the sight, and left to the imagination of the audience. We humbly appreWe admit the character of Madame de Vernon to be hend, that young gentlemen do not in general make drawn with considerable skill. There are occasional their tutors the confidants of their passion; at least we traits of eloquence and pathos in this novel, and very can find no rule of that kind laid down either by Miss many of those observations upon manners and characHamilton or Miss Edgeworth, in their treatises on edu.rer, which are totally out of the reach of all who have cation. The tutor of Leonce is Mr. Barton, a grave old lived not long in the world, and observed it well. gentleman, in a peruke and snuff-coloured clothes. Instead of writing to this solemn personage about second causes, the ten categories, and the eternal fitness of things, the young lover raves to him, for whole pages, about the white neck and auburn hair of his Del. phine; and, shame to tell! the liquorish old pedagogue seems to think these amorous ebullitions the pleasantest sort of writing in usum Delphini that he has yet met with.

By altering one word, and making only one false quantity, we shall change the rule of Horace to

"Nec febris intersit nisi dignus vindice nodus
Inciderit.'-

Delphine and Leonce have eight very bad typhus fe-
* Perhaps a fault of all others which the English are least
disposed to pardon. A young man, who, on a public occa-
sion, makes a false quantity at the outset of life, can sel-
dom or never get over it.

The immorality of any book (in our estimation) is to be determined by the general impression it leaves on those minds, whose principles, not yet ossified, are capable of affording a less powerful defence to its influence. The most dangerous effect that any fictitions character can produce, is when two or three of its popular vices are varnished over with every thing that is captivating and gracious in the exterior, and eunobled by association with splendid virtues: this apology will be more sure of its effect, if the faults are not against nature, but against society. The aversion to murder and cruelty could not perhaps be so overcome; but a regard to the sanctity of marriage vows, to the and to numberless restrictions important to the wellsacred and sensitive delicacy of the female character. being of our species, may easily be relaxed by this subtle and voluptuous confusion of good and evil. It is in vain to say the fable evinces, in the last act, that vice is productive of misery. We may decorate a vil

sure to add, that the badness of the principles is alone corrected by the badness of the style, and that this celebrated lady would have been very guilty, if she had not been very dull!

1819.)

Mission from Cape Coast Castle to Ashantee, with a Statistical Account of that Kingdom, and Geographical Notices of other Parts of the Interior of Africa. By T. Edward Bowdich, Conductor. London, Murray. 1819.

lain with graces and felicities for nine volumes, and hang him in the last page. This is not teaching vir. tue, but gilding the gallows, and raising up splendid associations in favour of being hanged. In such an union of the amiable and the vicious, (especially if the vices are such, to the commission of which there is no want of natural disposition,) the vice will not degrade the man, but the man will ennoble the vice. We shall MISSION TO ASHANTEE. (EDINBURGH REVIEW, wish to be him we admire, in spite of his vices, and, if the novel be well written, even in consequence of his vice. There exists, through the whole of this novel, a show of exquisite sensibility to the evils which individuals suffer by the inflexible rules of virtue prescribed by society, and an eager disposition to apologize for particular transgressions. Such doctrine is not conCAPE COAST CASTLE, or Cape Corso, is a factory of fined to Madame de Staël; an Arcadian cant is gaining Africa, on the Gold Coast. The Portuguese settled fast upon Spartan gravity; and the happiness diffused, here in 1610, and built the citadel; from which, in a and the beautiful order established in society, by this few years afterwards, they were dislodged by the unbending discipline, are wholly swallowed up in com- Dutch. In 1661, it was demolished by the English passion for the unfortunate and interesting individual. under Admiral Holmes; and by the treaty of Breda, Either the exceptions or the rule must be given up: it was made over to our government. The latitude of every highwayman who thrusts his pistol into a chaise Cape Coast Castle is 58 6 north; the longitude 1° 51' window has met with unforeseen misfortunes; and west. The capital of the kingdom of Ashantee is every loose matron who flies into the arms of her Coomassie, the latitude of which is about 6° 30' 20" Greville was compelled to marry an old man whom north, and the longitude 2o 6' 30" west. The mission she detested, by an avaricious and unfeeling father. quitted Cape Coast Castle on the 22d of April, and arThe passions want not accelerating, but retarding ma-rived at Coomassie about the 16th of May-halting chinery. This fatal and foolish sophistry has power two or three days on the route, and walking the whole enough over every heart, not to need aid of fine com- distance, or carried by hammock-bearers at a footposition, and well-contrived incident-auxiliaries pace. The distance between the fort and the capital which Madame de Staël intended to bring forward in is not more than 150 miles, or about as far as from the cause, though she has fortunately not succeeded. Durham to Edinburgh; and yet the kingdom of AshM. de Serbellone is received as a guest into the house antee was, before the mission of Mr. Bowdich, almost of M. d'Ervins, whose wife he debauches as a recom- as much unknown to us as if it had been situated in pense for his hospitality. Is it possible to be disgust- some other planet. The country which surrounds ed with ingratitude and injustice, when united to such Cape Coast Castle belongs to the Fantees; and, about an assemblage of talents and virtues as this man of the year 1807, an Ashantee army reached the coast paper possesses? Was there ever a more delightful, for the first time. They invaded Fantee again in fascinating adulteress than Madame d'Ervins is inten. 1311, and, for the third time, in 1816. To put a stop to ded to be? or a povero cornuto less capable of exciting the horrible cruelties committed by the stronger on compassion than her husband? The morality of all the weaker nation; to secure their own safety, enthis is the old morality of Farquhar, Vanburgh, and dangered by the Ashantees; and to enlarge our know. Congreve-that every witty man may transgress the ledge of Africa-the government of Cape Coast Castle seventh commandment, which was never meant for the persuaded the African committee to send a deputation protection of husbands who labour under the incapacity to the kingdom of Ashantee; and of this embassy the of making repartees. In Matilda, religion is always as publication now before us is the narrative. The emunamiable as dissimulation is graceful in Madame de bassy walked through a beautiful country, laid waste Vernon, and imprudence generous in Delphine. This by the recent wars, and arrived in the time we have said Delphine, with her fine auburn hair, and her beau- mentioned, and without meeting with any remarkable tiful blue or green eyes (we forget which), cheats her accident, at Coomassie the capital. The account of cousin Matilda out of her lover, alienates the affec- their first reception there we shall lay before our tions of her husband, and keeps a sort of assignation readers. house for Serbellone and his chère amie, justifying her. self by the most touching complaints against the rigour of the world, and using the customary phrases, union of souls, married in the eye of heaven, &c. &c. &c., and such like diction, the types of which Mr. Lane, of the Minerva Press, very prudently keeps ready composed, in order to facilitate the printing of the Adventures of Captain and Miss F, and other interesting stories, of which he, the said inimitable Mr. Lane, of the Minerva Press, well knows these sentiments must make a part. Another perilous ab. surdity which this useful production tends to cherish, is the common notion, that contempt of rule and order is a proof of greatness of mind. Delphine is everywhere a great spirit struggling with the shackles imposed upon her in common with the little world around her; and it is managed so that her contempt of restrictions shall always appear to flow from the extent, variety, and splendour of her talents. The vulgarity of this heroism ought in some degree to diminish its value. Mr. Colquhoun, in his Police of the Metropo lis, reckons up above 40,000 heroines of this species, most of whom, we dare say, have at one time or another reasoned like the sentimental Delphine about the judgments of the world.

To conclude-Our general opinion of this book is, that it is calculated to shed a mild lustre over adultery; by gentle and convenient gradation, to destroy the modesty and the caution of women: to facilitate the acquisition of easy vices, and encumber the difficulty of virtue. What a wretched qualification of this cen

'We entered Coomassie at two o'clock, passing under a fetish, or sacrifice of a dead sheep, wrapped up in red silk, and suspended between two lofty poles. Upwards of 5000 people, the greater part warriors, met us with awful bursts of martial music, discordant only in its mixture; for horns, drums, rattles, and gong-gongs, were all exerted with a zeal bordering on frenzy, to subdue us by the first impression. The smoke which encircled us from the incessant discharges of musquetry, confined our glimpses to the foreground; and we were halted whilst the captains performed their Pyrrhic dance, in the centre of a circle formed by their warriors; where a confusion of flags, English, Dutch, and Danish, were waved and flourished in all directions; the bearers springing from side to side, with a passion of enthusiasm only equalled by the captains, disthen were in a blaze; and emerging from the smoke with all charging their blunderbusses so close, that the flags now and the gesture and distortion of maniacs. Their followers kept up the firing around us in the rear. The dress of the captains was a war cap, with gilded rams' horns projecting in front, the sides extended beyond all proportion by immense plumes of eagles' feathers, and fastened under the chin with bands of cowries. Their vest was of red cloth, covered with fetishes every colour, which flapped against their bodies as they and saphies in gold and silver; and embroidered cases of almost moved, intermixed with small brass bells, the horns and tails of animals, shells and knives; long leopards' tails hung down their backs, over a small bow covered with fetishes. They wore loose cotton trowsers, with immense boots of a dull red leather, coming half way up the thigh, and fastened by small chains to their cartouch or waist belt; these were also ornamented with bells, horses' tails, strings of amulets, and innumerable shreds of leather; a small quiver of poisoned arrows hung from their right wrist, and they held a long iron chain between their teeth with a scrap of Moorish writing affixed to the end of it. A small spear was in their left hands, covered

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