but instantly elevating his head with firmness, he said: "It will be but a momentary pang;" and taking from his pocket two white handkerchiefs, the provost-marshal with one loosely pinioned his arms, and with the other, the victim, after taking off his hat and stock, bandaged his own eyes with perfect firmness, which melted the hearts and moistened the cheeks not only of his servant but of the throng of spectators. The rope being appended to the gallows, he slipped the noose over his head, and adjusted it to his neck without the assistance of the executioner. Colonel Scammell now informed him that he had an opportunity to speak, if he desired it. He raised the handkerchief from his eyes, and said: "I pray you to bear me witness that I meet my fate like a brave man!" The wagon being now removed from under him, he was suspended, and instantly expired.' 'When life had departed,' adds our American authority, 'the body was taken down and interred within a few yards of the place of execution. The coat and other regimentals were given to his servant, who faithfully attended him to the last, and saw the grave close over his mortal remains.' After a lapse of upwards of ninety years, the fate of André has not ceased to be deplored, nor will it be while aught honourable and piteous is held in remembrance and respect. Nor will this sentiment suffer from the more enlightened view which is now taken of the nature of judicial punishments. It would be a waste of words to attempt an exculpation of André. He was doubtless a spy, but there were extenuating circumstances in the case. He was seduced by a general-officer of the enemy into a position of danger; and, should this be insufficient, let it be recollected that his condemnation came from the guileless and excessive candour of his own confessions. That he might have been tried and condemned under his feigned name, and in ignorance of his rank, is unquestionable; still, the explicit course he adopted was so noble and confiding, that, if anything could avail, it merited a merciful consideration. All things considered, therefore, we are sorry we cannot unite in honouring Washington for suffering André to be led to the gallows, as if he had been a base and mercenary villain who habitually traded in treachery. Considering the extenuating circumstances of the case, the culprit might at least have been so far indulged as to be left a choice in the mode of his execution. Such, we believe, will now be the verdict of all who are uninfluenced by feelings of nationality or partisanship. If there be the slightest tarnish on the character of the great Washington, it is that of having, under a too peremptory sense of duty, put the gallant and unfortunate André to an ignominious death. The intelligence of the melancholy event sent a chill through the British nation, and by none was the fate of André more acutely felt than by George III. By order of his majesty, a handsome marble monument was erected to his memory in Westminster Abbey, bearing the following inscription: SACRED TO THE MEMORY OF MAJOR JOHN ANDRÉ, WHO, RAISED BY HIS MERIT, AT AN EARLY PERIOD OF HIS LIFE, TO THE RANK OF AND EMPLOYED IN AN IMPORTANT BUT HAZARDOUS ENTErprise, UNIVERSALLY BELOVED AND ESTEEMED BY THE ARMY IN WHICH HE SERVED, HIS GRACIOUS SOVEREIGN, KING GEORGE III., HAS CAUSED THIS At the same time, a pension was bestowed on the mother of André; and, in order to wipe away all stain from the family, the honour of knighthood was conferred on his brother. It may be further stated, that the remains of André, which had been buried at the place of execution, were taken up in 1821, and being removed to England, were deposited near the monument in Westminster Abbey. It is not without a feeling of pain that we close our account of the fate of André, and turn to that of the wretch who had inveigled him to his doom. Arnold was received with favour by the British authorities, as an officer of rank who had seen fit to quit the service of the 'rebels,' and resume his allegiance. He was confirmed in his station of major-general, and was employed shortly afterwards in some military operations in Virginia. The last exploit in which he was concerned was that of attacking and destroying his native town; and it is said he enjoyed the satisfaction of seeing it burned to the ground. At the end of the war, Arnold felt that the States were no longer safe as a home, and he removed with his family to England, where he lived unnoticed for a number of years. Subsequently, he took up his residence in St John's, New Brunswick, and carried on a trade with the West Indies. Finally, he returned to England, and died in London in 1801, aged sixty-one years. Despised by the world, and no doubt conscious of his guilt as a traitor, it is worth mentioning, as an instructive revelation of human inconsistency, that Arnold, till the last, spoke and wrote as an ill-used man. Congress had never settled his accounts, from which he certainly suffered an inexcusable injury; the error of not promoting him according to his standing as an officer, was a second ground of complaint; and to extend his catalogue of wrongs, he declared that he could not but feel offended by the alliance of the Americans with the French-a thing not reckoned upon at the beginning of the war! Such are the kind of excuses by which intense Selfishness ordinarily seeks to justify a departure from rectitude. AFRICAN DISCOVERY. HE vast continent of Africa, measuring 5000 miles in length, and about 4700 in its greatest breadth, and the area of which is calculated at 12,000,000 square miles, or nearly one-fourth of the entire land area of the globe, has presented greater obstacles to human enterprise than any other equal portion of the earth's surface. The peculiar physical condition of Africa has operated as one cause of her isolation from the rest of the world. The other portions of our earth situated under the tropics consist generally either of sea, or of narrow peninsular tracts of land, and clusters of islands blown upon by the sea-breeze. Africa, on the other hand, presents scarcely one gulf or sea-break in its vast outline. A consequence of this compact geographical shape of a continent, the greater part of which is within the torrid zone, is its subjection, throughout its entire extent, to the unmitigated influence of the sun's heat. All that is noxious in climate we are accustomed to associate with Africa. Notwithstanding the difficulties which lie in the way, Africa has at all times been an object of curiosity and interest to the inhabitants of the civilised parts of the earth; and scientific zeal, the desire of extending traffic, and even the mere thirst for adventure, have prompted many expeditions for the purpose of exploring its coasts and making discoveries in its interior. The ancients appear to have acquired much knowledge of Africa, which was afterwards lost, and had to be re-acquired by the moderns for themselves. The African coasts of the Mediterranean and the Red Sea were not only familiar to the ancient geographers, but were inhabited by populations which performed a conspicuous part in the general affairs of the world, and ranked high in the scale of civilisation-the No. 157. I Egyptians, Carthaginians, &c. Nor, if we may believe the evidence which exists in favour of the accounts of the circumnavigation of Africa by ancient navigators, were the other coasts of the continent -those, namely, which are washed by the Atlantic and the Indian Ocean-unvisited by northern ships. Regarding the interior of Africa, too, the knowledge possessed by the ancients, although very meagre in itself, was nearly as definite as that possessed by their modern descendants, until within a comparatively recent period. As far as the northern borders of the Great Desert, their own personal observation might be said to extend; and respecting the wandering tribes of black and savage people living farther to the south, they had received many vague notices. The Nile being one of the best-known rivers of the ancient world, its origin and course were matters of great interest, and the African geography of the ancients, in general, may be said to consist of speculations respecting this extraordinary river. The first mention made of the other great African river, the Niger, is by Ptolemy, who lived seventy years after Christ. Ptolemy believed that this river discharged itself ultimately into the Nile; others, however, did not admit this conclusion, and acknowledged that the real course of the Niger was a mystery. Such are some of the more prominent points in the ancient geography of Africa. How wild and inaccurate must have been the notions entertained respecting the shape and total extent of the African continent, may be judged from the fact, that one geographer describes it as an irregular figure of four sides, the south side running nearly parallel to the equator, but considerably to the north of it! Others, again, held forth the fearful picture of Central Africa as a vast burning plain, in which no green thing grew, and into which no living being could penetrate; and this hypothesis of an uninhabitable torrid zone became at length the generally received one. The invasion of Africa by the Arab races in the seventh century wrought a great change in the condition of the northern half of the continent. Founding powerful states along the Mediterranean coasts, these enterprising Mohammedans, or Moors, as they were called, were able, by means of the camel, to effect a passage across the Desert which had baffled the ancients, and to hold intercourse with the negroes who lived on its southern border along the banks of the Niger and the shores of Lake Tchad. In some of these negro states the Arabs obtained a preponderance, and with others they carried on an influential and lucrative commerce. The consequence was a mixture of Moorish and negro blood among the inhabitants of the countries of Central Africa bordering on the Great Desert, as well as a general diffusion of certain scraps of the Mohammedan religion among the negro tribes. Hence it is that, in the innermost recesses of interior Africa at the present day, we |