gold and silver, ornaments of pearls, and the precious metals, valuable weapons, furniture, and such like.

With regard to the commodities imported into Russia, although they are nowhere expressly mentioned, one can have little difficulty in determining them, when he considers the nature of the productions of the north, and the wants of the Asiatics. Three articles then occur to us, that are all found prevalent in the north, furs, fish, and amber. That furs were very abundant, and of excellent quality, in Scandinavia, cannot be doubted. Norway and Sweden produce, at present, bears, wolves, squirrels, ermines, hares, foxes, beavers, and similar animals, in greater or less abundance, according as the districts are more or less inhabited and cultivated. Only a few such animals are now found in Denmark; which is occasioned by the increased number of the inhabitants, the universal cultivation of the ground, and the decrease of woods. There was throughout all Scandinavia, in former times, when the lands were only thinly peopled, a much greater number of all such animals. If we also remember what we have before remarked, what an unbounded desire the people in the east had, and still have, for beautiful furs, we shall form an idea of the extent to which our ancestors, who were born huntsmen, carried this trade.

The second considerable article of commerce, which can here be considered, was that of salt-water fish, of which the seas of Scandinavia, especially along the Norwegian coasts, produce a greater number of kinds, in greater abundance and of better quality than any other sea in the world. It is well known with what eagerness the Norwegian stockfish (fish of Bergen) are sought everywhere along the coast of the Mediterranean, so that there is no doubt, but that a considerable quantity was imported into Russia (although its large seas and rivers, especially in the Ukraine, possess great abundance of fresh-water fish of inferior quality), especially as they were not difficult to transport. The sale of amber was likewise an important object of trade. It is well known, that this is found upon the shores of the Baltic, especially in Prussia, and was well known and sought after from the earliest times. The Arabians were all acquainted with amber, but did not

know whence it was brought; for Cazwini says, "amber is a yellow stone, inclining to red. It is said, that it is the gum of certain nuts. It delivers the person that bears it from jaundice, palpitation of the heart, swelling, and hemorrhage, and prevents vomiting, and, when suspended upon a woman with child, it preserves the child."

It may be seen, from this short description of the articles of commerce, that, as the greatest number of commodities imported were articles of luxury, the Scandinavians, so long as they maintained the simple mode of living used by their ancestors, must necessarily have gained by their trade with Asia, through the medium of Russia ; and that the Russians, in order to preserve the balance, must have been obliged to expend money, in order to pay for the quantity of northern wares they received, which was greater than that of those they disposed of. Scandinavia, therefore, and the northern coast of Germany, were in those times an abyss, in which the money received for all those commodities was swallowed up; and as neither the Russians, nor the Bulgarians, nor any other people or horde upon the Volga had any coinage of their own, but made use of the Arabic (for along the banks of the Volga, at Cadova and Rival, Arabic coins are found in great quantities), which they gained by the overbalance of their trade; it follows, that these same Arabic coins must have likewise found their way to Scandinavia, and the northern coast of Germany, in payment for the wares exported from those countries. In fine, it is very evident that, as trade was carried on first with the different Arabian and Persian dynasties, settled near the Caspian sea, all payments must have, in the first instance, been made in their money, which afterwards would come into circulation in the northern countries.

This balance in their favour, however, ceased, in proportion as the Scandinavians acquired a taste for Asiatic and Byzantian luxury; and it became necessary to the higher and lower ranks to possess fine clothes, weapons, furniture, and other such things from those countries. After piracy was abolished, the consequences of it were more sensibly felt, inasmuch as people could acquire those

articles which they had themselves made necessary, only by money, or the value of money, i. e. for other articles; but these were no longer in sufficient supply. This was the case in Scandinavia, in the eleventh century, when the ancient simple manners were daily growing more into disuse. Luxury and the increased consumption of the above-mentioned Asiatic commodities, became more and more prevalent after the time of Magnus the Good; the consequence of which was, that the exportation of furs, which were the principle article that should have preserved the balance of trade, decreased considerably on account of the improved cultivation of the soil, and the increase of population, especially in Denmark and the north of Germany. Lastly, the irruption of Thorgills into the modern Russia took place at the same time.

We must not, then, expect to find after this period (the beginning of the eleventh century), Arabic coins in the North.

Experience fully confirms what has been here'said. An incredible number of Arabic silver coins, with Cufic inscriptions, none of which is posterior to the year 1010, have been dug up in Jutland, in Sweden (especially Gulland), Norway, Mecklenburg, Pomerania, and Prussia, although in other places there are found coins of a date as modern as the thirteenth century. Besides, silver coins (dirhems) only are found, and no gold (denarii) or copper coins; for these last were neither of very easy conveyance, nor of any value in the North, which abounds in copper. It was likewise the custom to measure their value by that of silver. Gold coins are altogether deficient, because the Bulgarians and Russians probably had themselves kept the gold, and given the Scandinavians silver, or, as is still more probable, because gold, in the northern countries, on account of its scarcity, bad no determinate value, as measured by that of silver, which, in general, was at that time difficult to determine. When coins were weighed, it would therefore be most convenient to adopt some one current metal, which could be weighed without requiring any eal

5

culation. In order, however, to obtain small money to make up the deficiency of weight, they usually broke in two pieces the oldest and most used coins, particularly those of the first califs; and on many of them are still to be seen incisions, which were made for the purpose of more easily breaking them when occasion required. That this method of settling moneymatters by breaking silver coins, was in use in the large trading town of Samarcand, is expressly testified by John Haucal.

All the coins hitherto found were struck by, or in the reign of the chalifs at Bagdad, down to the year 1810, in Irak, Chorasan, the countries on the other side of the Jihson; in the towns of Alshash, Bagdad, Bitch, Bassora, Bochara, Enderabe, Ferabar, Cufa, Samarcand, &c. Not one is from Palestine, Egypt, or North Africa, whence they might have been brought by the crusades; and none from Spain, although that country lies much farther north. Whereas most of the coins that have been found, were struck in the countries lying immediately around the Caspian Sea; a great number, particularly of the coins of the Samanidæ, have been discovered; for that powerful dynasty, which ruled over Persia, and the countries on the other side of the river, from the year 874 to 999, encouraged and protected trade, and caused money to be coined, both in large quantities and of excellent quality; and the coins have found their way to the north in so great numbers, that they can scarcely be found any where else. The cabinets of the north almost alone can show them; they are neither found in the south of Europe, nor even in the country, whence they originally came, as Niebuh informs us. On the contrary, these Cufic coins, from the countries mentioned, are found in the north in incredible numbers. When we consider only the immense number that has become known, and how many more the ignorant and avaricious discoverers have kept concealed or melted, it appears as if almost all the Cufic coins, from the regions of the Caspian, had been destined to be deposited in Russia and Scandinavia.

THREE ORIGINAL SONNETS OF WORDSWORTH; SUGGESTED BY WESTALL'S VIEWS OF THE CAVES IN YORK

SHIRE.

MR William Westall has lately published some most striking and impressive "Views of the Caves near Ingleton, Gordale Scar, and Malham Cove, in Yorkshire. These caves, at once the most singular and sublime of any scenes of the kind in England, were visited by the poet Gray, and have been described generally by him, with those powerful and characteristic touches which render his prose as truly poetical as his verse. They were afterwards subjected to a visit from a Mr Hutton, a Westmoreland Rector, we believe, or Church-dignitary of some sort or other, whose long and laboured account of them may be found in the appendix to "West's Guide to the Lakes." Mr Hutton having read Virgil at Cambridge, more especially the sixth book of the Eneis, seems to have been perpetually haunted by the image of the infernal regions; and the moment he found himself in a cave, he imagined himself metamorphosed into Æneas. This fancy pervades his journal of his descent into the caves of Yorkshire; and after having identified the great Trojan prince with the parish minister of Burton, he found no difficulty in transforming the old hostler of the inn at Ingleton into the Sybil. Accordingly, Virgil becomes a Yorkshireman-and he, the old hostler and Æneas Hutton, on their reascent from the "inania regna," seek out the "Eagle and Child," and get

rather more than social over a can of stingo.

Mr Westall, however, is a person of a very different character-an excellent artist and an intelligent man. He has described the various caves, very shortly and simply, in the letter-press that accompanies the " Views;" while we do not recollect ever to have seen the wild and fantastic wonders of Nature delineated by the pencil with more vivid and intense truth. An honour has been conferred upon these "Views," of which the greatest artist in England might well be proud. They have received the praise of Wordsworth, who has expressed the delight with which their poetical character inspired him, in three Sonnets, which we are now permitted, by their illustrious author, to make public. VOL. IV.

We have to add, that Yorkshire abounds also with ruins of the finest specimens of Gothic and Norman architecture in the kingdom; and that Mr William Westall and Mr M'Kenzie are at present employed in producing a series of views of these venerable remains, from which a work will be published in the course of the spring.

I.

PURE Element of Waters, wheresoe'er
Thou dost forsake thy subterranean haunts,
Green herbs, bright flowers, and berry-bear-
ing plants,
Start into life, and in thy train appear;
And, through the sunny portion of the year,
Swift Insects shine thy hovering pursuivants,
And, if thy bounty fail, the forest pants,
And Hart, and Hind, and Hunter with his
spear,

Languish and droop together! Nor unfelt
In Man's perturbed soul thy sway benign;
And haply far within the marble belt
Of central earth, where tortured spirits pine
For grace and goodness lost, thy murmurs
melt

Their anguish, and they blend sweet songs with thine!

ABSTRACT OF METEOROLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS FOR THE YEAR 1818.

MR EDITOR,

I BEG leave to present your readers with an abstract of another year's meteorological observations, and to offer a few remarks on some of the most interesting facts which it contains.

At the commencement of last year, I began, and continued regularly, to make the following observations, in addition to those that I had been in the habit of making for some years before. 1st, The daily range of the thermometer, or the number of degrees betwixt the highest point to which it rose, and the lowest point to which it sunk, during the 24 hours. 2d, The daily range of the barometer, or the spaces between the points at which the mercury was observed to stand at 10 o'clock morning and evening of the same day, and at 10 on the morning of the following day. The sum of these was entered in a column as the daily range, or the whole space through which the mercury moved every 24 hours. The amount of course can only be an approximation to the truth, as the mercurial column might have risen higher, or sunk lower, during the interval, than it was at the time of observation. 3d, The temperature of water issuing from a pipe, after passing through a distance of several hundred yards, at the depth of about 3 feet below the surface. In one of the inonthly reports, the depth was stated at 3 feet; but I have since ascertained, that the average is considerably less, hardly amounting perhaps to 3 feet. The temperature is taken three times every month, viz. about the 5th, 15th, and 25th. The first two of the above particulars, viz. the ranges of the thermometer and the barometer, can hardly be called additional observations, as they are merely the results arising from subtracting the lowest observation from the highest. They serve, however, to shew more readily, as well as more distinctly, the extent of the changes that take place in the state of the atmosphere, and are therefore, I apprehend, not the least valuable part of the abstract. With regard to the 3d, the temperature of spring

water, it is, I conceive, the simplest, as well as the most accurate, method of finding the temperature of the ground at that depth below the surface. Thermometers, of sufficient length to reach the required depth, have been recommended, and, in one instance at least, have been actually employed for this purpose; but besides the difficulty of constructing such instruments, the method appears to me to be liable to the objection of inaccuracy. If the thermometer be sunk into a sandy soil, heavy rains passing through the cold surface in winter, and the heated sand in summer, will reach the instrument more rapidly, and of course produce greater fluctuations, than would take place in a loamy soil; and, on the other hand, if it be fixed in clay, it will be less readily affected than it would be in soils of a different description. The method adopted in the following observations, is, I think, not liable to this objection. The water, before being collected in the first or highest cistern, is brought in different directions, and from a considerable distance, in covered ditches, cut for the purpose of draining a large field. ter issuing from that cistern, it is conveyed through the distance mentioned above, before it flows from the stopcock where the temperature is taken; and at every observation it is allowed to run five minutes. By this means, the water, besides embracing a great extent, passes through a considerable variety of soil, and gives the mean temperature, not of any particular spot, but of the general average of the ground in the neighbourhood. Of the advantages to be derived from a series of such observations, I shall make some remarks afterwards. The other columns of the subjoined table contain the same particulars as those of the abstract for 1817, inserted in your tenth Number-the observations being made with the same instruments, on the same spot, and precisely at the same hours. I need hardly remind your readers, that these hours are 10 o'clock morning and evening, and that the day is supposed to begin at that hour in the morning, and to terminate at the same hour next morning-thus embracing an entire day and night.

Af