CEYLON. said, for some leetle time he had; "for, oh, Misses," con- filled with fears for the lives of some beloved beingstinued he, "me sure dat dey going to do someting very where they may enjoy, what we could not then, peaceful bad, when dey kill a cock." "Kill a cock!" we ex-" dreams and slumbers light." claimed. "Yes, Misses," said he, "dey kill one cock, May the young, the fair, and the gentle, experience at and put de blood on de drum head, and den dey beat de this happy season, all the exhilaration and gladness of drum, and shout very bad; and when me see dat, me spirit which in future years may enable them to look back know for sure dat dey do someting bad too much." on it as a verdant spot in the waste of life; and may none Probably, this was some African custom, betokening war of them ever feel the like fears and dreads we endured the or rebellion, the meaning of which he was acquainted with. Christmas of 1823. At last, we had the satisfaction of seeing our people return to their gay, joyous dances, under the trees, in the bright moonlight. The white inhabitants became reas- The following is an extract of a letter from Ceylon, dated sured, and for the time, danger was past. Social meet- May 4, 1835:-"Since I last wrote to you we paid our ings of a few families re-commenced in the country; and, long-promised visit to Alipoot, and were delighted with in town, the evening conversaziones of so truly delightful our trip. We remained four clear days there, and had a kind in Port-of-Spain were renewed. There were as- splendid sport. Our party consisted of Sir R. W. Horton, sembled some literary men; ladies, whose graces, and ac- Captains Rogers and Kelson, and Messrs. Mann, Elliott, complishments would have done credit to our British me- and myself. The first day 11 elephants were bagged, the tropolis, although a few of them had never even been out second 9, the third 8, and the fourth 4, and one young one of the island; while in this society was found that easy taken alive, besides one shot the first day by a nigger. Of reunion of talent and ability which reflected honour on the above, Rogers shot 16, Elliott 6, Kelson 5, Mann 4, those then at the head of society, and from whom, conse- and his Excellency 3. I was the only one who could not claim a tail. quently, the tone of manners was taken. I never saw such a splendid country-dif With this last remark, we may well allude to His Ex-ferent from any thing I had ever seen in Ceylon, and quite cellency Sir Ralph Woodford, and the late Chief Judge, like an English park on an immense scale. If we saw the Honourable Ashton Warner; both of whom were one elephant, we saw, on a low calculation, 200, but Roendowed with singularly culivated and refined minds. Agers says 500. We had four different breakfast bungavery few years after these events, the island had the mis- lows, each four or five miles from the sleeping places. We fortune to be deprived of the services of these truly were out each day at daylight, and hunted and shot our estimable men; first, by the death of Sir Ralph Woodford, way to one of the breakfast places, attended by an army which took place on board of ship, in his voyage home of bowmen. The numbers of spotted deer were quite infor the recoveoy of his health in 1828; and, lastly, in that credible-I could have no conception of it. We had faof the Chief Judge, who expired in 1830, leaving behind mous galloping after them with greyhounds. Rogers and him a character distinguished for unvarying benevolence, myself rode down six, including two bucks, in one hour and a half. uprightness, and mildness. His Excellency had a narrow escape with his So passed this fearful period of dread and exhausting life, being furiously charged by a rogue elephant, near a anxiety; but not with it passed away the remembrance of place called Dahagony. There had been a Moor man all we, in common with others, endured both before and killed, a day or two before our arrival, by an elephant, at after that season of alarm-when we felt, by the expe- the village of Kattaboowa, and the people requested Rogers rience of every hour, how immeasurably wide is the dif- to go out and shoot him, as the beast was quite close to ference between mere rumours of danger and the absolute the bungalow. Accordingly out sailed Sir Robert and presence of it. This, in all the racking varieties of ago- Rogers in one direction, Mann and Kelson in another, and nized terror, we had now fully participated in; and to such a height as rendered it impossible for us ever to erase it from our memories. Even at this distance of time, the 2nd of November never comes round without all the awful sensations, and dreary remembrances of that terrible time, rising up vividly in our minds. Elliott by himself. I did not go out. Sir Robert and Rogers took the right path, and saw the brute in a thick thorny jungle at about nine yards' distance. Sir Robert turned round to Rogers, and asked, in a whisper, if he should fire. At that moment the brute rushed out in the most furious way you can imagine, bearing everything be Such circumstances are of a nature not easily to be for- fore him, right down on his Excellency; and when within gotten; from the way in which these horrors surrounded four yards of him, received the contents of Sir Robert's us, entering into our homes and hearts-creating in us an rifle (seven to the pound) in his forehead. Rogers fired incessant gloomy anticipation of the future. The Christ- both barrels almost at the same instant, but only succeeded mas that followed the intended insurrection was of a less in turning him; and leaving him with a slight headach. happy nature, both to master and negro, than any we We had the Nedahs there, armed with their bows and arever witnessed either before or since; and well do we re- rows. They are more like monkeys than men, and are member, when we sat all together, on the Christmas night dressed au naturel. They were horribly frightened when of 1823, and listened to the occasional sound of the I approached them on my gray horse, as they had never drum, as it echoed from the negro houses through the seen one before. Their dance was very curious-perpasture and distant hill, that we felt not a little anxiety as fectly savage. They tossed and rolled themselves about to whether it was the signal of mirth or murder. like so many fiends, and became exceedingly excited; and, Perhaps there are few, who can readily conceive the all of a sudden, every one of them were on their backs, as train of feelings and associations that have been called if by magic, with their limbs quivering, as if in the last up, even by the detail of these scenes; the perusal of agony. We had archery for prizes, and remarkably good which, if containing little of interest, may at least bring practice the Chingalese made of it; much better than the to the hearts of our fair countrywomen during this season Nadahs, but the latter excel at a running shot, and, I am of social family intercourse, the conviction of how emi- told, bring down their deer very often. The colony is exnently blessed they are in dwelling in a land of peace and tremely healthy, and we are as gay as possible. The pearl security; in a land where they may gather round their fishery has enriched the treasury to the amount of 40,0007. happy Christmas firesides; without one ache in a heart-Times Newspaper. From the Quarterly Review. ing country of the Chinese, rich in singularities of all DR. MEYEN'S VOYAGE ROUND THE WORLD.-Reise um die kinds; all these are thoughts which so vividly engage Erde, ausgeführt auf dem koniglich Preussischen See-the heated fancy of a young man who has devoted himhandlungs-Schiffe Prinzess Louise, commandirt von Capi. self to the study of nature, that it is not until the moment tain W. Wendt, in den Jahren 1830, 1831, und 1832. of departure, not until the hour of leave-taking, that he Von Dr. F. J. F. Meyen. 2 vols. 4to. Berlin. 1834. from the circle of ordinary resort, of tearing himself becomes sensible of the difficulty of separating himself WE quite agree with Boswell, that 'one is carried away away from all with which he is connected by the ties with the general, grand, and indistinct notion of a voyage of blood, of friendship, and of tenderness. In such round the world. Let Johnson talk as he will, there is moments, forebodings arise in the soul of man, from a misty vastness about such enterprises, a sense of the which he cannot guard himself. We quitted home, marvellous and dangerous inextricably mixed up with and, by an unlucky accident, received no letters during them, that delights and expands the mind, even though, what national calamities, had been in the interval en the whole period of the voyage; and what revolutions, particularly since the recent multiplication of circumnavidangering the peace of Europe!' gators, we may not be well able to justify our impressions to ourselves by any rational hope of fresh and really valu- Notwithwithstanding our traveller's vivid expectations able discovery. But a voyage round the world by a Ger- from the New World, he devotes several pages to objects, man differs materially from a voyage round the world by now familiar to most of us, in the Old; as the badness of an Englishman: they see with different eyes, and refer to the road between Berlin and Hamburgh-the beauty different standards of comparison, so that the same objects (which he greatly exaggerates) of the suburban villas on which have begun to grow wearisome in the descriptions the banks of the Elbe-and the attachment (which he of our own countrymen, may strike again with all the in- unduly depreciates) of the citizens of Hamburgh to the terest of novelty when placed in the point of view taken official costume, wigs, lace-collars, and so forth, of their by a foreigner. The truth of this observation will appear forefathers. He has also inserted a tabular view of the from the passages we are about to quote from the book coffee trade of Hamburgh and Altona, from 1815 to 1829; before us; which is the work of a scientific gentleman, of from which it clearly and satisfactorily appears that the competent intelligence, commissioned to accompany a yearly imports are 32 4-5 millions of pounds; and the exPrussian expedition in the double capacity of surgeon and ports and home consumption-32 millions!! naturalist. At the mouth of the Elbe, off Cuxhaven, they stop to Twice already' (says he in his Preface) had the take in water; a highly important ceremony, upon which royal Prussian flag circumnavigated the globe, before Dr. Meyen avails himself of the opportunity to expatiate:I had the happiness to be attached to a trading expedi-Although every one who has been long at a time on tion, undertaken, chiefly with a view to South Amerishipboard knows the value of good water, it must notca and China, by orders of the Royal Merchant-Marine. The splendid ship which was destined for this adven- in taking in water, set to work with singularly little withstanding be observed, that messieurs the captains, ture has the honour to bear the august name of Princess Louisa, having been christened after her Royal High- of this extent, is dependent on the quality of the procare. The health of the whole crew, on an expedition ness the youngest daughter of his Majesty our King, visions and water; if these be good, the people can reby marriage the Princess Frederick of the Netherlands. sist even the worst climate for a much longer period Once already had this ship successfully circumnavi- than otherwise. In the ports of North Germany, howgated the earth, and wherever we touched she was received as a familiar guest.' The politeness with which this gentleman speaks of the ship which had the honour to bear the august name of 1 Prussian princess, &c., bears no very distant analogy to bat of the Frenchman (mentioned by Miss Edgeworth) who talks of the earthquake that had the honour to be noticed by the Royal Society:' but it is only on very rare ccasions that Dr. Meyen indulges in this style. : ever, there prevails a prejudice, that pure spring water keeps good, on sea voyages, a much shorter time than river water; the captains constantly adduce their own experience in proof of this doctrine,and the practice continues as of old. Still we would fain contradict this apparent experience of mariners, and recommend pure spring water as preferable: the truth is, that only for convenience' sake, have mariners adopted the rule of taking the water which lies nearest at hand in other words, they are reluctant to sacrifice a single hour to 'Although' (he continues) the object of our expedi- such objects, although a great and salutary enjoyment Lon was quite different from that of voyages of scienti- might be thereby preserved for the whole crew, fe discovery, still, through the gracious favour of his the melancholy time they are to pass in open sea. At during Masty the King, many opportunities have been afford- some places, particularly in tropical countries, we were ed me of visiting places which had remained more or compelled during our voyage to take in spring water, unknown to the scientific public; 1 therefore con- and it was precisely this which kept the best and longest. ader it a duty to communicate a detailed report. But it is hard to cure seamen of their prejudices; notave divided my materials into a personal narrative where do ingrained habits hold out longer than amongst and a scientific department; the former occupies the two them. On the many plans which have been recomlames which I now publish: the other will appear mended to them for preserving and purifying the water, hereafter.' in case of necessity, they bestow no attention whatHe begins with his departure from Berlin: the follow-ever; nay, these remain absolutely unknown to the g are his reflections on that occasiongreater part of the very class for whose benefit they have been suggested. The keeping of water in iron On July the 28th, 1830, at nine o'clock in the even-casks has long been practised in the English navy, and ng, we left Berlin, attended by the good wishes of re- is proved to be highly advantageous; to all appearance, ations, friends, and acquaintances. It is not easy to however, there is not, at the present moment, a single sketch the leave-taking on beginning a journey of such ship in the whole German marine that makes use of *tent as we contemplated. The hope of seeing the iron water-casks.' paradisiacal regions of the world-of mounting the beren-aspiring Cordilleras, with their mighty sum- At length we find ourselves at sea, but on a voyage ats and volcanoes-of seeing the natives of the South most inauspiciously begun; it was nine days before the Ses in their state of nature-of visiting the farstretch- Princess Louisa came off Dover, which with a fair wind FOL. XXVIII. FEBRUARY, 1836.-13 E |