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discovered a stream, which, to their great delight, was stocked with trout, on which they made a hearty meal, besides bringing several home for the gratification of the colonists." The cattle brought by speculators from Sydney not meeting a ready market on account of the want of the survey, some of them were killed for provisions; and we find beef variously stated as being at Sd. and 1s. a-pound. Pigs being an abundant stock among the native population, pork was sixpence a-pound. It is spoken of as a delicious article, the animals being allowed to go about wild, feeding on fernroot, which makes even the fat by itself a rich treat. There was also abundance of native potatoes, of the finest quality, which we observe quoted at 12s. per hundred-weight. It must be remembered that there are two crops per annum in New Zealand. February is there analogous to our August. Nevertheless, the vegetables sown there by the settlers are described only a fortnight after as getting on amazingly fast, and likely to afford an abundant crop before winter, which would commence in May. Cabbages of all sorts, cauliflowers, brocoli, peas, mustard, cress, and pumpkins, are enumerated as amongst the vegetables sown. The soil at Port Nicholson gives high satisfaction to all: scientific agriculturists declare it to be superior to West Hoo, one of the most fertile spots in Kent. The climate is also described as mild and equable, even when winter was approaching.

Our government, it is well known, was at first doubtful of its right of sovereignty over New Zealand, and would give no sanction to any measures for preserving order amongst the company's settlers. The company acted under this inconvenience with remarkable patience and submission. The settlers themselves hit upon an expedient of an ingenious nature for supplying the want. Assuming that the sovereignty lay in the native chiefs (though in fact these men had no practical sovereignty), they determined to accept a constitution from them, and to act under it. A deed was accordingly drawn out, and signed by Warreporec and Eponee, chiefs of the Port Nicholson district, and a council was appointed to exercise the legislative and executive powers thus conferred. This provisional constitution was proclaimed with due formalities, and an address upon the subject was published, April 18, in the New Zealand Gazette, a sheet printed in a small tent hastily erected on the beach, and destined to be the Moniteur of the colony. It was now clear that the colonists were in the fair way of setting up an independent republic, and Captain Hobson took the resolution of proclaiming the sovereignty of Great Britain over the whole of the islands. This at once altered the face of affairs, and replaced the colony under British protection. The proclamation has been sanctioned at home by its being inserted in the London Gazette, and at the end of October it was announced that the Colonial Office had come to a good understanding with the company. We are now, then, to regard all difficulties on this score at an end. New Zealand, including the settlement at Port Nicholson, will be henceforth ranked as a separate colony, and will probably ere long have a governor appointed to it, who will be wholly independent of New South Wales. Amongst the population at Port Nicholson, up to April last, were about 500 natives. Most accounts speak favourably of these individuals, and prognosticate that they will be useful as labourers. They had already been active in clearing land and building houses for the settlers. "We give them," says a colonist (Mr Partridge), "blankets, muskets, powder, tobacco, and shirts, in exchange for pigs, potatoes, house-building, and thatching, and things of that

sort."

Speaking of the chiefs, the same gentleman says (March 18), "Warreporee drank tea with me to-night, and drank wine like a good Christian; but his appetite is of the largest. He is a great warrior, six feet high, and a restless fighting devil. Eponee is an orator, and a sensible fellow." Though irritable when thwarted in their prejudices and customs, they are, if civilly treated, obliging, attentive, and wellbehaved. To an active European they appear indolent; but it must be readily seen that a barbarian cannot all at once be broken into habits of diligent application. This must be a matter of time, and perhaps the existing generation will never be very serviceable. It is by taking the young into training, that the services of the aboriginal race will be most speedily and efficiently secured. A lady (Miss Hunter) says, April 7—“We are very much pleased with the natives, who seem to be intelligent and obliging, but very indolent. They take a great deal of interest in the children, and bring them presents of Indian corn and pumpkins, of which they have abundance. We are learning the language by degrees, and, with the assistance of signs, we understand each other pretty well." Another writer (Mr Marjoribanks) speaks of the natives as extremely filthy, and more disposed to thrust themselves upon the hospitality of the settlers, than to work for an independent subsistence. He adverts to two princesses who live in a pig-sty, cover themselves by day with a mat of native Hax, and eat vermin. But even he allows that he, by and bye, saw one of these ladies appear on a Sunday in a nice new gown that would not have disgraced a London or Parisian milliner. If once the people in general get a taste for smart dresses and superior accommodations, their barbarism and inactivity will disappear together. It is a noble and humane arrangement, which this company has been the first to make with respect to any aborigines, that a tenth part of

the land is reserved for their use as free property. The reserves made for them at Port Nicholson were estimated, a few weeks after the first settlement, as worth L.35,000. This appears like acting upon high principle, and forms a striking contrast with the conduct of the missionaries of the Church Missionary Society, who have possessed themselves of a great deal of land in the most unscrupulous way, and, now that their arts are exposed and stopped, do all they can to incense the natives against the company's settlers. It may here be observed, that the company has also acted with great liberality with respect to the religious interests of the colony. To a body entitled the Church Society of New Zealand, they offered a free grant of 2000 acres, and to devote L.1500 to the carrying out of labourers to cultivate it, provided the society would become purchasers in the ordinary way for other 2000 acres. This offer has been accepted, and arrangements are consequently in progress for erecting a bishopric in New Zealand. The company also give a free passage to any clergyman of whatever denomination, who can make it appear that there is a congregation desiring his services.

A few miscellaneous excerpts from the letters of settlers, may here be appropriate.* Dr Dorset, in a journal-shaped letter to his brother, after mentioning his arrival at Port Nicholson, on the 21st February, says, "I cannot describe my sensations when I saw lying there five large ships, and another, the Bengal Merchant, coming into the harbour astern of us, and several small vessels from Sydney and the coast of New Zealand at anchor also; and the beach covered with tents and houses, and packages of goods strewed every where. * I was particularly struck with the cheerfulness pourtrayed in all the emigrants' countenances, and the universal content and satisfaction that reigned among them with regard to the soil, climate, and appearance of the country; also the usefulness of the natives, with whom the emigrants are on the best terms.

Several merchants from

Sydney have opened large storehouses here, and things are very moderate." He describes himself as having laboured in England under permanent weakness of the chest, but as being quite restored by the New Zealand climate. "I am," he adds, "in full swing as surgeon of the colony, with lots to do-not in the way of sickness, but in bringing young ones into the world." E. J. Wakefield, a nephew of the Company's agent, says, "In hilly situations, the vine might be grown to great advantage: at Hokianga, in the north island, I have seen 360 odd species of vines, which had produced a crop last year." Mr Revans, the publisher of the Gazette, says (April 6), "We have a most magnificent harbour; most fertile land; such foliage and verdure as I have never before witnessed; and the climate agreeable, and, I think, admirably suited to the English constitution. * * The bank is in operation, and I believe a local bank will soon be started. It is a very promising place, and I have no doubt that a large business will soon be done at immense profits, with the people, and the whaling parties on these islands. * * I am in rude health. I rise at five, and go to bed at eight, and work, and talk, and walk incessantly. We have no time to open books-that will be for the future. I like Colonel Wakefield much; I think him admirably qualified for the post he occupies, and I do not believe he has an enemy in the place." Miss Hunter writes to a female friend (April 7), "The scenery is very romantic, and mamma says that in some places it reminds her of Scotland. We have six visiters for every one we had at home. *Baby is quite well, and likes every thing except the cooking, which we are obliged to do in the open air, over wood fires, laid upon the ground. * Papa is post-master for the colony, and has between two and three hundred letters for Sydney and England; this will give you some idea of the population." Mr Partridge writes (March 18), "Labour is high; mechanics 45s. to 50s. per week; labourers 30s. per week. I am now living in a tent which I have bought, for the house is not yet landed; and I am very well contented that I have not yet been obliged to sleep with an umbrella over my head, as most others have done. The climate is so fine that every body laughs at such things. * Molesworth, Sinclair, and Petre, and the aristocracy, are setting a good example by working away. Fustian coats and thick shoes are very fashionable, and you would laugh to see officers, doctors, and dandies-digging, thatching, and chopping with great frenzy. My living here, I think, will cost me I carpenterise, carry logs, and cook, and go to council, a mere trifle. Economy is the order of the day; and without detriment to my gentility."

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Mr Charles McGurk represents himself (March 16) as a contractor for clearing lines for streets in the place originally designed for the settlement. "It is very hard work, and I am generally wet all day, as we have to cross over swamps; yet I have not felt the least ill effects from it, and I like this sort of life amazingly. feet in circumference; it is, I think, of the pine We came to a tree yesterday forty genus, of a red colour, and as hard as iron. There is no doubt that the wood will pay well when oxen are at work, and some kind of roads made." Mr E. B. Hopper (April 12) says-" At present, persons who brought out from L.100 to L.300 with them, are all doing well; mechanics and labourers are also doing

New Zealand Journal, *We derive them from a London fortnightly newspaper, the

well.

Common labourers are getting 30s. a-week ; carpenters from 6s. to 7s. per day; and, from the great demand for labour, wages will be much higher. Considerable premiums have already been given for town and country sections. One quarter of the town acre of No. 27 choice, was sold the other day for L.100; two or three whole sections of higher numbers have been sold for L.250 the section of 101 acres. Numbers of capitalists are flocking here from Sydney and Van Diemen's Land. Companies of several descriptions are forming at Sydney to establish themselves here; so that I am fully in hopes that, by this time two years, the colony will begin to take the lead of the southern colonies, on account of its resources in three fixed commodities, viz. flax, timber, and oil. With the first we have tied together all the materials, including the roofs and walls, of our first houses, and very strong they are; and the fine broad leaves, from six to ten feet long, make excellent side walls. Some of the trees are large enough to scoop out. bed-rooms, although this is by no means considered a fine timber district. For the present we are located on the banks of the river Hutt, and a most delightful place it is; the soil is of the richest quality. We are already enjoying fine radishes, the seed of which was sown five weeks since; wild pigeons and ducks are very plentiful; the rivers supply quantities of fine salmon, snappers, eels, and other fish, which we catch in front of our doors. The natives are very much attached to us, and pride themselves in evincing their readiness to preserve and protect us from being molested by their enemies. We allow them to come in and out of our dwellings as they please; and you will probably be surprised when I tell you we have neither locks, bolts, nor bars, in use for the security of any of our property-it is lying about exposed in every direction. My boxes and chests have been for weeks out in the open air, night and day, and not a single article has been stolen."

* *

Since this article was written, intelligence from New Zealand to the 9th July reached this country. It was of the same satisfactory kind as all that had preceded it. British law had been established in full efficiency by Governor Hobson. Two additional vessels from London had arrived with emigrants, and the immigration from Australia was continuing on a large scale. The surveys were proceeding vigorously, and, meanwhile, a considerable traffic was carried on with Sydney, the emigrants purchasing flax and potatoes from the natives for exportation to that port, whence they received miscellaneous supplies in exchange. The New Zealand Company have now declared a dividend; they have raised the price of land; and are henceforth to cease allowing a drawback to purchasers to assist in paying their passage, the wholeemigration funds being now to be reserved for passengers of the labouring class.

So far, then, all appears to be going on well in this new settlement. We would hope that the settlers will soon be able, and be found willing, to set about agricultural and pastoral business on a proper scale, and not devote more than enough of attention to those speculations in land which, leading to no actual production, only enrich one at the expense of another, and tend to repress every thing like real progress. In concluding, we would beg our readers to observe, that our purpose here strictly is, to communicate intelligence respecting a very remarkable movement at present in progress, not to recommend individuals to become emigrants, or to emigrate to this part of the world in particular. Individual adventures of so important a kind should be made upon grounds more solid than any we can hope to present; but we may at the same time, with perfect sincerity, express our gratification at the agreeable intelligence which has been as yet returned from New Zealand, and our confident expectation that, if no unexpected circumstances of an unfavourable nature shall arise, this must speedily become one of the most prosperous of our colonies.

ORIGINALS OF "THE BRIDE OF
LAMMERMOOR."

"Truth is strange---stranger than fiction."---BYRON.

OUR readers, we feel assured (says the editor of the Inverness Courier), will peruse with deep interest the following excellent account of the originals of the touchingly beautiful fiction which proceeded from the principal characters who figure in, perhaps, the most the best means of ascertaining the real circumstances genius of the author of Waverley. The letter is written by a gentleman who, as will appear, has had true characters of the persons introduced in this on which the romance was founded, as well as the tragical tale. The light thrown upon the point as to the author of the homicide, is curious and striking :"L

E-, September 5, 1823. My dear Sir J,Various circumstances have turning an earlier answer to your queries regarding occurred which have unavoidably prevented my reour unfortunate relative, The Bride of Lammermoor.' I shall now have much pleasure in complying with your wishes, in as far as an indifferent memory will enable me to do so.

her designation in our family) was the Honourable The Bride of Baldoon' (for such has always been Janet Dalrymple, eldest daughter of our great-greatgrandfather, James Viscount Stair, Lord President of the Court of Session in the reign of William and

in all his abstraction had found no preparative for so hideous a death as this-the mother, whose hope had withered as her babe died upon her bosom, and who clung to life rather from instinct than from volitionthe fond, the beautiful, the delicately nurtured-all were huddled together during that fearful day upon the narrow spaces scattered over the town and suburbs which the waters had not yet reached. And as it wore by, every half hour added to the devastation around them; houses and buildings which had survived the first shock, seemed to have been preserved only to add to the horrors of that day; many of them fell and perished from roof to base; others became rent by the heavy dashing of the waters, and through the yawning apertures the wasting tide poured in, and ruined all it touched; while to add to the confusion, in some quarters of the city the heavy barges which had been procured to remove the sufferers from their threatened houses, broke loose, and went driving onward through the streets on the crest of the foaming waters.

Many individuals declared that they felt the shock of an earthquake on the night of the 13th, an assertion which added to the terror of the people; but this fact has never been verified, and it is probable that the impression was originated by explosions of the fixed air which was pent up in the subterraneans, and which, as the impetuosity of the water broke in, rushed out at the other extremity of the drains with a sound like thunder. It may be imagined what an immense hydraulic pressure must have been exerted on these underground channels, when it is stated that in a thousand places in the middle of the streets, courts, and gardens, the water forced its way in small jets from the earth; and to that pressure may be attributed in a great degree the ruin of the city.

To attempt a description of the horrors of the 15th, would be a vain as well as an ungraceful task; but nothing tended so utterly to bring them to a climax as the fall of the extensive Derra Palace in the New Market-place. In vain did men murmur to each other that the building had been defective in its construction, and unsound in its foundations; their misery was deeper than the cheat which they sought to put upon themselves; and from that moment those who yet enjoyed the shelter of a roof looked on their temporary asylum with suspicion, and a general fear grew among the multitude that the whole city was crumbling about them.

throughout the city-while thousands of wretched beings were still without food or shelter-the Archduke Palatine sent his eldest son, the young Prince Stephen, to speak peace and comfort to the miserable citizens; and despite the danger of the mission, the high-hearted youth accepted it without hesitation. Nor was it a light duty which this noble scion of the House of Hapsburg received as a boon at the hands of his imperial father; for the river was pouring down angrily, laden with masses of ice driven onward by the current, and threatening ruin to the unwary bark with which they might chance to come in contact. There were no attentive menials awaiting his disembarkation on the opposite shore, with ready services and obsequious words. He went to meet misery, famine, and madness; but as he stood erect in the boat, he cast not one look behind to the safe asylum which he had left-he waved his arm encouragingly towards the sinking city he urged on his panting and trembling boatmen and after a weary and perilous passage, his little bark began to thread the streets of Pesth. No sooner had his appearance brought comfort to the sufferers-for there must have been comfort in the conviction that abandonment was not superadded to misery-than he vigorously applied himself to the task of mitigating the wretchedness by which he was surrounded. With his own hands, he distributed the bread with which his boat was laden; he had a kind and a hopeful word for all; and it is certain that the exertions and sympathy of the Palatinate family on the occasion of this dreadful calamity, will be as durably impressed upon the hearts of the inhabitants of Pesth, as though they had been graven upon marble." Pesth has since been partly rebuilt in a style of great beauty, and on a plan more secure than formerly, and is now one of the most attractive places of residence in Europe.

COLONISATION OF NEW ZEALAND— FURTHER PROCEEDINGS.

In our number for September 12th of last year, we gave an account of the proceedings in and respecting New Zealand, down to the 7th of March last. We now propose to continue the narrative, as far as subsequent intelligence will allow.

Horror accumulated upon horror: the young and the fragile, unaccustomed to exposure, in drenched and clinging garments, to the bleak wind of that chilly season, began to droop and sicken. Even amid the terrors which surrounded them, fathers of families, who sat silently among their quailing children, remembered that they had suddenly become beggars; and they glanced from their wretched offspring to the leaping and foaming waters about them, and listened to the crash of the falling houses which burst at intervals upon their ears, till they began to smile vaguely and fearfully, and to muse the wild musings of mad-vessels which contained emigrants. The lateness of

ness.

One miserable man-a merchant in prosperous circumstances was seen early in the morning of that memorable day, standing with folded arms and gloomy brow, gazing upon the wreck of what had so lately been his happy and comfortable home. The roof had fallen in, for the foundation had failed, and one of the side walls having given way beneath the pressure, a section of the house was laid bare, and the waters were rioting and brawling over his ruined property. The hour of noon arrived, and still there stood the sufferer, stern, and silent, and motionless: twilight fell, but he stirred not from his watch; nor was it until the increasing darkness hid from his view the spectacle of his worldly overthrow, that he started from his seeming reverie, and laughed, and shouted, and clapped his hands in wild and savage glee! Nero jested upon the flames which were consuming Rome, because they worked out his revenge-the maniac merchant gambolled, and mowed, and mocked the lashing waters that had beggared him-nor knew amid his frenzy that he was making merry over the ruins of his own

reason!

The 15th of March was, however, sufficiently terrible to the most sane and collected; and it is questionable whether the poor victims of temporary hallucination, shocking as it was to contemplate their wretchedness, did not escape much real suffering. All was misery, desolation, and despair, and the firmest nerves must have quailed beneath the sights and sounds which every where assailed them.

It having been found necessary to extricate all who had lingered in the suburbs from their frail and failing houses, a number of boats were busily plying in every direction, and as there was no time to waste on forms or convenience, the terrified people were rapidly put on board and carried off to places of comparative safety. By eleven o'clock at night, throughout the whole city there was not a foot of dry ground, save in the New-Market-Platz, the Joseph-Platz, the Franciscan-Platz, and the courts of the Lutheran Church, the County-Hall, and the Invalid Hospital, and these were crowded both by men and horses, while many families of the highest rank were huddled together in the rude wooden booths erected in the Market-place, or sat in their carriages for days and nights, exposed like the rest of the population to the sufferings of cold and damp.

While yet the fury of the element was at its greatest height, and all was want, and anguish, and desolation

By the 7th of March, eight vessels dispatched by the New Zealand Company had reached the harbour called Port Nicholson, in Cook's Straits. The first, the Tory, had arrived in August, with Colonel Wakefield, the company's chief agent, who employed himself during the four last months of 1839 in purchasing land from the natives. He acquired the southern portion of the northern island, and the northern portion of the southern island, or all the New Zealand territory between the 38th and 43d parallels of latitude. The second vessel, the Cuba, contained the surveying party; it had a long voyage, and only arrived in January, a few weeks before the other six the arrival of the Cuba has been a misfortune to the colony. This vessel should have preceded all emigrant ships by several months, in order to have had the land ready for occupation. For want of this preparation, the first year's procedure of many of the colonists must be provisional, or a life of squatting.

It was also stated in our first report that the British government, while refusing to countenance the proceedings of the New Zealand Company, had dispatched an officer, Captain Hobson, to represent it in that part of the world; and that Hobson, arriving on the 30th January at the Bay of Islands, immediately proclaimed that a commission would be appointed to inquire into the validity of all previous purchases of land, and that all future purchases would be null and void. It was stated that the captain thereafter made some inquiries with reference to the best site for the government capital of New Zealand, but had been interrupted in these and all other proceedings by a paralytic attack.

The later intelligence represents the colonisation of this fine country as proceeding briskly. Those who have not happened to pay attention to the newspaper notices of it, and have been out of the way of hearing the colony spoken of, will be surprised to learn, that already, though but eighteen months have elapsed since the commencement of proceedings, the number of persons sent out to it amounted, on the 20th October, to 2274. Eight vessels, it has been said, arrived before 7th March last. Several others arrived soon after. Six have been dispatched during this summer and autumn. Eighteen vessels in all were sent out by the New Zealand Land Company in the first eighteen months. Port Nicholson, which, on last New Year's day, was the solitude it had been in the days of Cook, in May contained a population of 2115 (including natives), and exhibited all the bustle which our mer cantile nation practises at home, and must needs carry every where with it. Besides the emigration from the mother country, there is an extensive re-emigration from the Australian colonies. With this in addition to other means, the population must swell very fast. There are in all, perhaps, at this moment, fully five thousand Europeans in New Zealand, being probably not much short of the numbers of the natives in the same districts.

Port Nicholson is a bay of seven miles or upwards in extent every way, opening from Cook's Strait into the southern extremity of the north island. Into the head of this bay runs the Hutt river, through a valley

several miles in breadth, and where the vegetation is of such luxuriance that it has not as yet been penetrated more than a few miles. On each side of the bay, there is a considerable piece of level land, either of which would suit for the site of a town. The ground at the mouth, or rather mouths, of the river (for it forms a delta), was at first considered by the surveyor-general as the proper place for the principal city. The landing of emigrants appears to have taken place near the mouth of the river, and most of the colonists first took up their abode on the low ground adjoining. This part, however, was found to be exposed to inundations; the mouth of the river required deepening; and the anchorage was exposed to the south winds. Colonel Wakefield, therefore, with the approval of the majority of the colonists, determined to shift the site of the first town to the level ground on the west side of the harbour. This spot is called Thorndon; it adjoins to Lambton Harbour, an inner basin of Port Nicholson, and has the advantage of deep water close up to the shore. The place is sheltered from all winds, and has a safe anchorage for ships of every size. There is at this place a level space of 500 or 600 acres, with gentle eminences on which residences may be erected; and a road along the beach may be made with little difficulty to the mouth of the river, which is five miles distant. No large stream of water flows through the ground, but the wells are supplied at a small depth from the surface. The change to this site was made early in April, in consequence of the almost universal wish of the emigrants, and it gave general satisfaction. In May last, the directors in London determined to name the first town Wellington, but recent letters mention that Captain Hobson had previously named it Durham, in compliment to the lamented nobleman who was the first governor of the Company. The probability seems, therefore, that Durham will be the name.

Owing to the indecision as to the site of the first town, and the want of a survey for the assignment of particular settlements, the first proceedings of the emigrants were of a desultory nature, but conducted with the greatest possible cheerfulness. So early as February 12, Colonel Wakefield describes the banks of the Hutt as already quite changed by the efforts of the individuals who had landed in the Oriental only a fortnight before. "Rows of native houses, single settlements, tents, and rick-covers, already afford shelter to the whole of the passengers. The Roxburgh emigrants [meaning the passengers by the Duke of Roxburgh, who had arrived only six days before] have also united themselves in forming an adjoining settlement on the river. Farthest north are the Scotch party, rather separated from their friends, and eyeing with satisfied looks the rich land, into which they are eager to thrust their spades." In a dispatch of the 22d March, he says, "A town has actually sprung up in temporary locations along the beach, where stores and residences will soon afford great accommodation to shipping and immigrants." Amongst the capitalists who went by the Oriental, were a son of Lord Petre, a son of Sir George Sinclair of Thurso Castle, a brother of Sir William Molesworth, and several other young men of family. It is a pleasant trait of the new colony to hear of the activity of these young men, whose compeers at home in too many instances misspend their time and misuse their best faculties. Mr E. J. Wakefield, in a diary-like communication to his father, says, under date February 23, "I went up the river as far as the surveyor's lines extend, and saw Molesworth, Petre, Hopper, Sinclair, and an old school-fellow at Bruce-Castle, Mantell. They are all working away in excellent spirits, at houses made of flax, bark, and rushes, chiefly by native architects, and at small clearings for potato gardens, &c. All this is being done on what will be the public quay or boulevard, extending 150 feet back from the west bank of the Hutt." Another trait of the cheerful spirit of the settlers-" Feb. 28. Heavy rain all day. The canny Scots in the Bengal Merchant are a capital set, landing every day and working away at clearings and houses during the rain, while no other complaint escapes them except the remark, in a good-humoured tone of voice, that the weather's rayther saft!""

The settlement had only been a few weeks at Port Nicholson, when vessels began to arrive from Sydney, with sheep, cattle, provisions, and miscellaneous goods, which were offered to the settlers, not always at the most reasonable prices, and therefore were not very readily bought. With regard to provisions, the settlers do not seem likely to be much at a loss, for, though the delay of the survey prevents a hearty or general application to husbandry operations, the land is so easily tilled and so productive, that considerable stores will certainly be raised in the course of even the first few months. We find it mentioned in a letter by the physician, Dr Dorset, that when Colonel Wakefield bought the land at Port Nicholson, in the latter part of 1839, the man whom he left in possession planted some English seed, the consequence of which was, that when the place began to be settled in the ensuing February, there was a large and well-stocked garden, from which all the principal families were supplied with excellent vegetables. "We are,” says this gentleman (March 29), " extremely well off for provisions, and fish in abundance; among which are craw-fish, oysters, and fresh-water eels. We have also some mountain trout, of the existence of which, till within these few days, we had not the least knowledge; but the surveyors, in clearing the valley a few days ago,

discovered a stream, which, to their great delight, was stocked with trout, on which they made a hearty meal, besides bringing several home for the gratification of the colonists." The cattle brought by speculators from Sydney not meeting a ready market on account of the want of the survey, some of them were killed for provisions; and we find beef variously stated as being at 8d. and 1s. a-pound. Pigs being an abundant stock among the native population, pork was sixpence a-pound. It is spoken of as a delicious article, the animals being allowed to go about wild, feeding on fernroot, which makes even the fat by itself a rich treat. There was also abundance of native potatoes, of the finest quality, which we observe quoted at 12s. per hundred-weight. It must be remembered that there are two crops per annum in New Zealand. February is there analogous to our August. Nevertheless, the vegetables sown there by the settlers are described only a fortnight after as getting on amazingly fast, and likely to afford an abundant crop before winter, which would commence in May. Cabbages of all sorts, cauliflowers, brocoli, peas, mustard, cress, and pumpkins, are enumerated as amongst the vegetables sown. The soil at Port Nicholson gives high satisfaction to all : scientific agriculturists declare it to be superior to West Hoo, one of the most fertile spots in Kent. The climate is also described as mild and equable, even when winter was approaching.

Our government, it is well known, was at first doubtful of its right of sovereignty over New Zealand, and would give no sanction to any measures for preserving order amongst the company's settlers. The company acted under this inconvenience with remarkable patience and submission. The settlers themselves hit upon an expedient of an ingenious nature for supplying the want. Assuming that the sovereignty lay in the native chiefs (though in fact these men had no practical sovereignty), they determined to accept a constitution from them, and to act under it. A deed was accordingly drawn out, and signed by Warreporee and Eponee, chiefs of the Port Nicholson district, and a council was appointed to exercise the legislative and executive powers thus conferred. This provisional constitution was proclaimed with due formalities, and an address upon the subject was published, April 18, in the New Zealand Gazette, a sheet printed in a small tent hastily erected on the beach, and destined to be the Moniteur of the colony. It was now clear that the colonists were in the fair way of setting up an independent republic, and Captain Hobson took the resolution of proclaiming the sovereignty of Great Britain over the whole of the islands. This at once altered the face of affairs, and replaced the colony under British protection. The proclamation has been sanctioned at home by its being inserted in the London Gazette, and at the end of October it was announced that the Colonial Office had come to a good understanding with the company. We are now, then, to regard all difficulties on this score at an end. New Zealand, including the settlement at Port Nicholson, will be henceforth ranked as a separate colony, and will probably ere long have a governor appointed to it, who will be wholly independent of New South Wales.

Amongst the population at Port Nicholson, up to April last, were about 500 natives. Most accounts speak favourably of these individuals, and prognosticate that they will be useful as labourers. They had already been active in clearing land and building houses for the settlers. "We give them," says a colonist (Mr Partridge), "blankets, muskets, powder, tobacco, and shirts, in exchange for pigs, potatoes, house-building, and thatching, and things of that sort." Speaking of the chiefs, the same gentleman says (March 18), "Warreporee drank tea with me to-night, and drank wine like a good Christian; but his appetite is of the largest. He is a great warrior, six feet high, and a restless fighting devil. Eponee is an orator, and a sensible fellow." Though irritable when thwarted in their prejudices and customs, they are, if civilly treated, obliging, attentive, and wellbehaved. To an active European they appear indolent; but it must be readily seen that a barbarian cannot all at once be broken into habits of diligent application. This must be a matter of time, and perhaps the existing generation will never be very serviceable. It is by taking the young into training, that the services of the aboriginal race will be most ter) says, April 7—“We are very much pleased with speedily and efficiently secured. A lady (Miss Hunthe natives, who seem to be intelligent and obliging, but very indolent. They take a great deal of interest in the children, and bring them presents of Indian corn and pumpkins, of which they have abundance. We are learning the language by degrees, and, with the assistance of signs, we understand each other pretty well." Another writer (Mr Marjoribanks) speaks of the natives as extremely filthy, and more disposed to thrust themselves upon the hospitality of the settlers, than to work for an independent subsistence. He adverts to two princesses who live in a pig-sty, cover themselves by day with a mat of native flax, and eat vermin. But even he allows that he, by and bye, saw one of these ladies appear on a Sunday in a nice new gown that would not have disgraced a London or Parisian milliner. If once the people in general get a taste for smart dresses and superior accommodations, their barbarism and inactivity will disappear together. It is a noble and humane arrangement, which this company has been the first to make with respect to any aborigines, that a tenth part of

the land is reserved for their use as free property. The reserves made for them at Port Nicholson were estimated, a few weeks after the first settlement, as worth L.35,000. This appears like acting upon high principle, and forms a striking contrast with the conduct of the missionaries of the Church Missionary Society, who have possessed themselves of a great deal of land in the most unscrupulous way, and, now that their arts are exposed and stopped, do all they can to incense the natives against the company's settlers. It may here be observed, that the company has also acted with great liberality with respect to the religious interests of the colony. To a body entitled the Church Society of New Zealand, they offered a free grant of 2000 acres, and to devote L.1500 to the carrying out of labourers to cultivate it, provided the society would become purchasers in the ordinary way for other 2000 acres. This offer has been accepted, and arrangements are consequently in progress for erecting a bishopric in New Zealand. The company also give a free passage to any clergyman of whatever denomination, who can make it appear that there is a congregation desiring his services.

A few miscellaneous excerpts from the letters of settlers, may here be appropriate. Dr Dorset, in a journal-shaped letter to his brother, after mentioning his arrival at Port Nicholson, on the 21st February, says, "I cannot describe my sensations when I saw lying there five large ships, and another, the Bengal Merchant, coming into the harbour astern of us, and several small vessels from Sydney and the coast of New Zealand at anchor also; and the beach covered with tents and houses, and packages of goods strewed every where. I was particularly struck with the cheerfulness pourtrayed in all the emigrants' countenances, and the universal content and satisfaction that reigned among them with regard to the soil, climate, and appearance of the country; also the usefulness of the natives, with whom the emigrants are on the best terms.

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Several merchants from

Sydney have opened large storehouses here, and things are very moderate." He describes himself as having laboured in England under permanent weakness of the chest, but as being quite restored by the New Zealand climate. "I am," he adds, "in full swing as surgeon of the colony, with lots to do-not in the way of sickness, but in bringing young ones into the world." E. J. Wakefield, a nephew of the Company's agent, says, "In hilly situations, the vine might be grown to great advantage at Hokianga, in the north island, I have seen 360 odd species of vines, which had produced a crop last year." Mr Revans, the publisher of the Gazette, says (April 6), " We have a most magnificent harbour; most fertile land; such foliage and verdure as I have never before witnessed; and the climate agreeable, and, I think, admirably suited to the English constitution. The bank is in operation, and I believe a local bank will soon be started. It is a very promising place, and I have no doubt that a large business will soon be done at immense profits, with the people, and the whaling parties on these islands. I am in rude health. I rise at five, and go to bed at eight, and work, and talk, and walk incessantly. We have no time to open books that will be for the future. I like Colonel Wakefield much; I think him admirably qualified for the post he occupies, and I do not believe he has an enemy in the place." Miss Hunter writes to a female friend (April 7), "The scenery is very romantic, and mamma says that in some places it reminds her of Scotland. We have six visiters for every one we had at home. Baby is quite well, and likes every thing except the cooking, which we are obliged to do in the open air, over wood fires, laid upon the ground. * Papa is post-master for the colony, and has between two and three hundred letters for Sydney and England; this will give you some idea of the population." Mr Partridge writes (March 18), "Labour is high; mechanics 45s. to 50s. per week; labourers 30s. per week. I am now living in a tent which I have bought, for the house is not yet landed; and I am very well contented that I have not yet been obliged to sleep with an umbrella over my head, as most others have done. The climate is so fine that every body laughs at such things. * Molesworth, Sinclair, and Petre, and the aristocracy, are setting a good example by working away. Fustian coats and thick shoes are very fashiondandies-digging, thatching, and chopping with great able, and you would laugh to see officers, doctors, and frenzy. My living here, I think, will cost me I carpenterise, carry logs, and cook, and go to council, a mere trifle. Economy is the order of the day; and without detriment to my gentility."

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Mr Charles M'Gurk represents himself (March 16) as a contractor for clearing lines for streets in the place originally designed for the settlement. "It is very hard work, and I am generally wet all day, as we have to cross over swamps; yet I have not felt the least ill effects from it, and I like this sort of life amazingly. feet in circumference; it is, I think, of the pine We came to a tree yesterday forty genus, of a red colour, and as hard as iron. There is no doubt that the wood will pay well when oxen are at work, and some kind of roads made." Mr E. B. Hopper (April 12) says " At present, persons who brought out from L.100 to L.300 with them, are all doing well; mechanics and labourers are also doing

New Zealand Journal, * We derive them from a London fortnightly newspaper, the

well. Common labourers are getting 30s. a-week; carpenters from 6s. to 7s. per day; and, from the great demand for labour, wages will be much higher. Considerable premiums have already been given for town and country sections. One quarter of the town acre of No. 27 choice, was sold the other day for L.100; two or three whole sections of higher numbers have been sold for L.250 the section of 101 acres. Numbers of capitalists are flocking here from Sydney and Van Diemen's Land. Companies of several descriptions are forming at Sydney to establish themselves here; so that I am fully in hopes that, by this time two years, the colony will begin to take the lead of the southern colonies, on account of its resources in three fixed commodities, viz. flax, timber, and oil. With the first we have tied together all the materials, including the roofs and walls, of our first houses, and very strong they are; and the fine broad leaves, from six to ten feet long, make excellent side walls. Some of the trees are large enough to scoop out. bed-rooms, although this is by no means considered a fine timber district. * For the present we are located on the banks of the river Hutt, and a most delightful place it is; the soil is of the richest quality. We are already enjoying fine radishes, the seed of which was sown five weeks since; wild pigeons and ducks are very plentiful; the rivers supply quantities of fine salmon, snappers, eels, and other fish, which we catch in front of our doors. The natives are very much attached to us, and pride themselves in evincing their readiness to preserve and protect us from being molested by their enemies. We allow them to come in and out of our dwellings as they please; and you will probably be surprised when I tell you we have neither locks, bolts, nor bars, in use for the security of any of our property-it is lying about exposed in every direction. My boxes and chests have been for weeks out in the open air, night and day, and not a single article has been stolen."

Since this article was written, intelligence from New Zealand to the 9th July reached this country. It was of the same satisfactory kind as all that had preceded it. British law had been established in full efficiency by Governor Hobson. Two additional vessels from London had arrived with emigrants, and the immigration from Australia was continuing on a large scale. The surveys were proceeding vigorously, and, meanwhile, a considerable traffic was carried on with Sydney, the emigrants purchasing flax and potatoes from the natives for exportation to that port, whence they received miscellaneous supplies in exchange. The New Zealand Company have now declared a dividend; they have raised the price of land; and are henceforth to cease allowing a drawback to purchasers to assist in paying their passage, the whole emigration funds being now to be reserved for passengers of the labouring class.

So far, then, all appears to be going on well in this new settlement. We would hope that the settlers will soon be able, and be found willing, to set about agricultural and pastoral business on a proper scale, and not devote more than enough of attention to those speculations in land which, leading to no actual production, only enrich one at the expense of another, and tend to repress every thing like real progress. In concluding, we would beg our readers to observe, that our purpose here strictly is, to communicate intelligence respecting a very remarkable movement at present in progress, not to recommend individuals to become emigrants, or to emigrate to this part of the world in particular. Individual adventures of so important a kind should be made upon grounds more solid than any we can hope to present; but we may at the same time, with perfect sincerity, express our gratification at the agreeable intelligence which has been as yet returned from New Zealand, and our confident expectation that, if no unexpected circumstances of an unfavourable nature shall arise, this must speedily become one of the most prosperous of our colonies.

ORIGINALS OF "THE BRIDE OF
LAMMERMOOR."

"Truth is strange---stranger than fiction."---BYRON.

OUR readers, we feel assured (says the editor of the Inverness Courier), will peruse with deep interest the touchingly beautiful fiction which proceeded from the following excellent account of the originals of the principal characters who figure in, perhaps, the most the best means of ascertaining the real circumstances genius of the author of Waverley. The letter is written by a gentleman who, as will appear, has had on which the romance was founded, as well as the true characters of the persons introduced in this tragical tale. The light thrown upon the point as to the author of the homicide, is curious and striking :

"LE, September 5, 1823. My dear Sir J-Various circumstances have turning an earlier answer to your queries regarding occurred which have unavoidably prevented my reour unfortunate relative, The Bride of Lammermoor.' I shall now have much pleasure in complying with your wishes, in as far as an indifferent memory will enable me to do so.

her designation in our family) was the Honourable "The Bride of Baldoon' (for such has always been Janet Dalrymple, eldest daughter of our great-greatgrandfather, James Viscount Stair, Lord President of the Court of Session in the reign of William and

Mary; sister to the first Earl of that name, and to our great-grandfather the Lord President, Sir Hugh Dalrymple of North Berwick, and consequently our greatgrandaunt. She was secretly attached, and had plighted her faith to the Lord Rutherford, when, under the auspices of her mother, a less amiable, but much more opulent, suitor appeared in the person of David Dunbar, eldest son of Sir David Dunbar of Baldoon (an ancestor of the Selkirk family), whose addresses were, as may be supposed, submitted to with the greatest aversion, from their being ungenerously persisted in after his being informed of her early attachment and solemn engagement. To this man, however, she was ultimately forced to give her hand.

The result of this cruel and unnatural sacrifice was nearly, if not exactly, as related by Sir Walter Scott. On the marriage night, soon after the young couple were left alone, violent and continued screams were heard to proceed from the bridal chamber, and on the door (which was found locked) being forced open, the bridegroom was found extended on the floor, stabbed, and weltering in his blood, while the bride sat in the corner of the large fire-place in a state of the most deplorable frenzy, which continued without any lucid interval until the period of her death. She survived but a short time, during which (with the exception of the few words mentioned by Sir Walter Scott Ye ha'e ta'en up your bonny bridegroom') she never spoke, and refused all sustenance.

The conclusion drawn from these extraordinary circumstances, and which seems to have been assumed by Sir Walter as the fact, was, that the forlorn and distracted victim, seeing no other means of escaping from a fate which she beheld with disgust and abhorrence, had, in a fit of desperation, inflicted the fatal wound upon her selfish and unfeeling husband. But, in justice to the memory of our unhappy relative, we may be permitted to regret Sir Walter's not having been made acquainted with the tradition long current in the part of the country where the tragical event took place-namely, that from the window having been found open, it was conjectured that the lover had, during the bustle and confusion occasioned by the preparations for the marriage feast, and perhaps by the connivance of some servant of the family, contrived to gain admission and secrete himself in the bridal chamber, from whence he had made his escape into the garden after having fought with and severely wounded his successful rival-a conclusion strengthened by other concurring circumstances, and rendered more probable by the fact of young Baldoon having, to his latest breath, obstinately refused to give any explanation on the subject, and which might well justify a belief that he was actuated by a desire of concealing the particulars of a rencontre, the cause and consequence of which he might justly consider as equally discreditable to himself. The unfortunate lover was said to have disappeared immediately after the catastrophe, in a manner somewhat mysterious; but this part of the story has escaped my recollection. While on the subject of this calamitous event, I cannot help offering some observations on the principal personages introduced in Sir Walter Scott's narrative, all of whom are more or less interesting both to you and me.

The character of Sir William Ashton certainly cannot be considered as a fair representation of our eminent and respectable ancestor, Lord Stair, to whom le bears little resemblance either as a politician or a gentleman; and Sir Walter would seem wishful to avoid the application, when he says that, on acquiring the ancient seat of the Lords of Ravenswood, Sir William had removed certain old family portraits, and replaced them by "those of King William and Queen Mary, and of Sir Thomas Hope and Lord Stair, two distinguished Scotch lawyers; but on this point some less ambiguous intimation would have been very desirable; and having, in the character of Lucy Ashton, stuck so closely to the character of the daughter, the author should, in fairness, have been at more pains to prevent that of the Lord Keeper from being considered as an equally fair representation of the father; an omission of which the descendants of Lord Stair have, I think, reason to complain.

In Lady Ashton, the character of our great-greatgrandmother seems in many respects more faithfully delineated, or at least less misrepresented. She was an ambitious and interested woman, of a masculine character and understanding; and the transaction regarding her daughter's marriage was believed to have been hers, and not her husband's, who, from his numerous important avocations as Lord President, Privy Councillor, and active assistant in the management of Scottish affairs, had probably neither time nor inclination to take much personal concern in family arrangements.

The situation of young Ravenswood bears a sufficiently strong resemblance to that of the Lord Rutherford, who was an amiable and high-spirited young man, nobly born, but destitute of fortune, and who, ner and place in which he thought proper to chastise his successful rival, seems to have been not ill cut out for a hero of romance. And as to young Baldoon, of whom little is known beyond what has been related above, he seems to have a more respectable representation than he deserved in the person of Bucklaw.

if the above account is to be credited as to the man

The story was, I have understood, communicated to Sir Walter Scott by our worthy friend the late

Mrs A- MK, who seems to have been
well acquainted with all the particulars, excepting
those to which I have more especially alluded, which,
as a friend and connexion of the family, had she
known, she would not have failed to mention; and,
in as far as his information went (with the exception
of his having changed the scene of action from the
west coast to the east), Sir Walter seems to have adhered
to facts as closely as he could well be expected to do
in a work bearing the general stamp of fiction. But if
the memory of so disastrous and distressing a family
anecdote was to be preserved and handed down to
posterity in a story so singularly affecting, and by an
author the most popular of our own or any other age,
while it was surely of importance to avoid any such
offensive misrepresentation of character as that to
which I have alluded, it was at the same time much
to be lamented that the author of the Bride of Lam-
mermoor should have been ignorant of a tradition so
truly worthy of credit, throwing so much satisfactory
light on an event equally tragical and mysterious, and
which, while a judicious management of the circum-
stances might have increased rather than diminished
the interest of the narrative, would have left a less
painful impression regarding our unhappy
tunate relative, 'the Bride of Baldoon."
With best regards from all here, to you and Lady
S, I remain, my dear Sir J, ever most truly
yours, (Signed) R. D——— H- E-"

and unfor

FAREWELL, OLD YEAR!
Farewell, Old Year !-when other friends départ,
Fond hope still lingers in the sad adieu,
And e'en in absence tells the sorrowing heart

That after Fare-thee-well comes How-d'ye-do!
But thou, Old Year, art passing from my sight;
Thy cheerful days, thy happy hours, are o'er;
To memory's dim domain they take their flight,
And from her shades they shall return no more!
The summer birds that, with their truant wings,
Cleave the far ether of a southern sky,
Anon return, by bowers and gushing springs,
To glad the wild woods with their melody.
But they return not-hours of bliss swift stealing
Away, away, on pinions bright and pure,
E'en in their flight the matchless joys revealing-
Too fair to last, too lovely to endure!

In vain, with beating hearts and arms extended,
We court their stay, and pray that they may last;
They glide away, too soon with memories blended,
That crowd the precincts of the insatiate past.
Thus years roll by, and each and every one
Snatches some treasured happiness away.
Ah, graceless heart! reflect-and are there none
That bear griefs with them on their backward way?
Neither shall these return to mar thy rest.

If joys depart, so care's dark hours go by;
And time hath power to heal the bleeding breast,
To dry the falling tear, and hush the sigh.

Or if a sting remain, the honey dew

Of sweet remembrance shall allay the smart, And soothe regrets, and kindle hope anewBlest antidote to care!-oh! thankless heart! Yes! years roll on. Yet wherefore send them forth With records dark and sad to bear on high? Oh! give them noble thoughts and deeds of worth, To swell the annals of eternity! -Knickerbocker, or New York Monthly Magazine.

KINDNESS OF THE POOR TO THE POOR. the manners of the working classes, cannot fail to have Whoever has studied, with a mind free from prejudice, observed that these classes very generally present numerous examples of virtue. The working man is, for the most part, free-hearted, kind, and anxious to assist his comrades, and capable of the truest devotion towards his employer. In those quarters the population of which is chiefly engaged in the industrious arts, it is notorious that artisans, whose circumstances are tolerably easy, succour, with a ready and active charity, not only those of their comrades who are prevented from labouring by sickness, but all who occupy the same house with themselves, or with whom they maintain habits of neighbourhood. Out of their wages they keep back a portion for these purposes; and even perform the sick man's task in addition to their own, to preserve his salary to him during the continuance of his illness. If he is compelled to seek the hospital, on the day of his removal his bedside is visited by a deputation of his companions, with offers of money and words of consolation. When his strength returns, they make it their business to seek work for him, and subscribe towards his maintenance for the first fortnight. Should some unforeseen accident have reduced him to distress, they relieve him by an advance of money, a meal, a bed; and these succours, freely of fered, constitute a debt which the recipient could not, without dishonour, fail to discharge. Nay, their solicitude follows him even amid his follies, and does not abandon him in his crimes. In the former case they try to counsel him back to respectability, with friendly and indulgent words; in the latter, they still visit him in prison, and hold out to him a helping hand.-On the Dangerous Classes in Large Towns.

IMPORTANCE OF TRIFLES.

twenty or thirty shillings to the king's service argued, says Clarendon, "before all the judges of England?" Because, in those twenty shillings one party saw the germ of a tyranny, and the other of a rebellion. Why to claim the gathering of even a leaf upon your estate, will a lawyer warn you against permitting a neighbour without contesting his right? Because the gathering of the leaf may invalidate your title to the whole estate. Why will a wise politician contest so earnestly for the form of a word, or the wearing of a hat, or the title of a

Why was the refusal of a "private gentleman to pay

writ? Because each of these will become a precedent; and in precedent is involved principle. Why will an engineer be alarmed at the first drop of water oozing through a dam? Because the rest, he knows, will follow it. Why is the discovery of one little bone in a stratum of a rock enough to overturn a whole theory of geology? Because the little bone, like a pack-thread, will draw after it the whole skeleton, like a coil of rope, and the skeleton will imply the power which brought it to its site; and that power will be vast and pregnant with other influences: and thus the whole system of the science will be dragged into peril, as many other systems have been perilled, and have been upset by the merest trifle, by one little fact. Why will a spot of blood betray murder? Why will the print of a nail discover a thief? Why will a whole neighbourhood take flight at the sight of a little boy, with only a little spark of fire, going into a magazine of powder? or a crowd disperse upon the ice at the sound of the slightest crack? Because nature, as well as theology, has her Athanasian creed, and her damnatory clauses for those who neglect because nature, as well as theology, does not know what a trifle is.-Sewell's Christian Morals.

iotas;

THE UPRIGHT MAN OF BUSINESS.

There is no being in the world (says Dr Dewey) for whom I feel a higher moral respect and admiration, than for the upright man of business; no, not for the philanthropist, the missionary, or the martyr. I feel that I could more easily be a martyr than a man of that lofty moral uprightness. And let me say, yet more distinctly, that it is not for the generous man that I feel this kind of respect-generosity seems to me a lower quality, a mere impulse, compared with the lofty virtue I speak of. It is not for the man who distributes extensive charities, who bestows magnificent donations. That may be all very well-I speak not to disparage it-I wish there was more of it; and yet it may all consist with a want of the true lofty unbending uprightness. That is not the man, then, of whom I speak; but it is he who stands, amidst all the swaying interests and perilous exigencies of trade, firm, calm, disinterested, and upright. It is the man who can see another man's interests just as well as his own; it is the man whose mind his own advantage does not blind nor cloud for an instant; who could sit a judge upon a question between himself and his neighbour, just as safely as the purest magistrate upon the bench of justice. Ah! how much richer than erminehow far nobler than the train of magisterial authorityhow more awful than the guarded bench of majestyis that simple, magnanimous, and majestic truth! Yes, it is the man who is true-true to himself, his neighbour, and his God-true to the right-true to his conscienceand who feels that the slightest suggestion of that conscience is more to him than the chance of acquiring a hundred estates.

CURIOUS PRINTING ESTABLISHMENT.

A curious account is given, from Tubingen, in Wurtemburg, of a new printing establishment, lately opened by, M. Theodore Helgerad. All the compositors and pressmen, one hundred and ninety-six in number, eleven of the former being women, are deaf and dumb, and have been educated at his cost for the employment in which they are now engaged. The king has conferred on M. Helgerad the large gold medal, of the order of civil merit, for this great reclamation from the social and moral waste: but M. Helgerad has a higher recompense for this remarkable labour of love than medals can mark, or monarchs bestow.-Newspaper paragraph.

"INTERESTING ANECDOTE OF EMANCIPATED NEGROES." An Occasional Note, which appeared under the above title in No. 441 of the Journal, contains a statement to a certain extent erroncous, in consequence of a confusing of two sets of circumstances on the part of our informant. The truth, as communicated to us by Mr Finlay, the gentleman referred to in the anecdote, is as follows:A penn (that is to say, a pastoral) estate in Jamaica, was formerly managed by Mr Finlay, under the immediate care of a white overseer, at an expense of several hundred pounds. Since the emancipation, the principal business on this estate, the hiring out of negroes, has ceased, and the overseer, being no longer required, was discharged, and the estate was then put under the charge of an intelligent negro and an assistant, whose united salary is only L.50 per annum; "the people keeping the pastures in order, in consideration of their having their houses and provision-farms rent free." The wonder in the case is simply limited to the fact of an estate of 1200 acres, with 250 cattle, and 100 small tenants, being kept in order by one negro, and that even while Mr Finlay was absent in England. The whole management reflects credit, says Mr Finlay, both on the industry and the dispositions of the negroes, and is an earnest of the rapid progress they are making in the duties of citizenship.

This gentleman adds what will at the present time be read with interest, as the testimony of a most intelligent and respectable individual:-"I can solemnly assure all those who are interested in the welfare of the blacks, that, after a panoramic survey I have made during the last eighteen months, of the state of the wretched slaves of Cuba and America, and the cheated, nominally free blacks of the northern states-the stout independent English-the light-hearted Irish-the sagacious Scotch -the plodding Fleming the gay Frenchman, and the brutalised indolent Haitien-1 have returned here perfectly convinced that none of them have the physical comforts of the freedman of the British West Indies. His moral condition also is advancing with giant strides : churches, chapels, and schools, are rising on every side, and in ten years more, even in this respect, we will challenge comparison with most of the above.-Kingston, October 19, 1840."

LONDON: Published, with permission of the proprietors, by W. S. ORR, Paternoster Row.

Printed by Bradbury and Evans, Whitefriars.

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CONDUCTED BY WILLIAM AND ROBERT CHAMBERS, EDITORS OF "CHAMBERS'S INFORMATION FOR THE PEOPLE," "CHAMBERS'S EDUCATIONAL COURSE," &c.

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NUMBER 467.

DRAWBACKS.

BOTH individuals and communities will generally find, when they make advances in some presumed good, that the good is not altogether unmixed: there is always some drawback from the benefits contemplated, as if it were not possible in nature that human aims should be entirely accomplished, or human desires perfectly gratified. Proverbial wisdom recognises, and has at all times recognised, many of these drawbacks from attained good. For example, wealth brings with it cares, and though most people, like Charles Lamb, contrive to put up with it, yet it is from this cause not an unmixed good. Merit, again, may be proved, and the honours due to high public service may be conceded; but envy is the shade of merit, and the triumph is embittered to a generous nature by finding that from many it only provokes sneers and detraction.

"The moir I stand on opin nicht,

My faults moir subiect ar to sicht," says very truly the Regent Marr, on the front of his house at Stirling. The lowly and the unfortunate little think of the distress of mind which the prosperous man experiences when he finds that the sympathy and friendly kindness which he enjoyed in his humbler days, and the general satisfaction which he gave by the simple performance of the duties assigned to him, are exchanged for a disposition to take offence at the smallest oversight, a suspicion that he is proud and altered, and such a general jealousy of all he does and does not do, and all he says and does not say, that he feels as if he could not, though he were to give his whole time and fortune to it, please even that one half of the world to which sop counsels him to limit exertions of that nature. So also, when some of the virtues have been to all appearance attained, how often do we find some opposite vice appearing ! Here no degree of vigilance of which man is capable will avail to keep all right. Dam up error in one place, and presently you will see it oozing out at another. Let the right wing be victorious, and chase all opposed to it from the field, and straight you will find, as the royalists did at Marston Moor, that the left has been disgracefully beaten, and fled twenty miles to the rear. One of the most common drawbacks from the merit of a correct life, is a pride therein which renders it wholly unamiable. Indulgences of almost all kinds may be dispensed with, but, lo! in their place has come a spirit of puritanism so unnatural, that medium characters, in contemplating it, are not so much inclined to go in the self-denying as in the contrary direction. We have been told by rural observers, and we hope we may state the fact without injury to the cause of the virtues brought into question, that the votaries of temperance amongst the rustic classes are occasionally found somewhat morose, and to have lost a little of their hearty good will as workmen; and that sometimes a young servant who puts money in the savings' bank, seems less willing than before to go to the succour of an infirm parent, as fearing to have to dissipate her little store. These circumstances, as far as they can be presumed to exist, must be held as simply drawbacks, unavoidable in certain instances, from what is upon the whole meritorious conduct. Again, great pains may have been taken to avoid every sort of reproach; but the state attained is only negatively good; ungraced by a single active virtue, or the slightest effort to communicate happiness, it has only reached the distance-post of the race of goodness, and the better half of the task remains undone, unattempted. Gray, the poet, is said

SATURDAY, JANUARY 9, 1841.

irreproachable, but he never exerted himself to do any positive good. He allowed his life to pass away in the delusion that he was all that he could be expected to be; while, in reality, many of the world's equivocal characters were better in an active sense than he with all his high reputation. Even the religious sentiment, in its most exalted moods, is often found attended by dismal drawbacks, as fanaticism, bigotry, intolerance, superstition-showing in a peculiarly striking light that very frailty and imperfection which, as an inherent feature of human nature, forms one of the fundamental doctrines of religion. That justice and wisdom carried to an extreme become cruel and absurd, we have high authority for saying; and it is found to be the case in every-day life. Who do such foolish things as the wise, or who ever act so detestably as those who lay down to themselves certain rules from which they are too conscientious ever to swerve? The truth is, the general condition of things does not admit of any one principle being invariably followed; and perhaps there is even a law rendering folly and nonsense to a certain extent necessary elements in our condition, so that their utter extinction, were it possible, might be attended with effects not less disastrous than if light, heat, electricity, or some other important physical principle, were abstracted.

The progress of a community towards civilisation, is very much analogous to that of an individual in his efforts to perfect his condition and his moral nature. We must not expect to find any one supposable condition which a nation may attain, to be altogether without its drawbacks. European nations have for ages made civilisation one of their chief aims, and great advances have certainly been made in that respect. But civilisation, whatever blessings it may bring upon the whole, is also attended by evils which do not very clearly appear separable from it. This is only too certain a truth, and the sole consolation which attends it is, that no other state is attended by evils of less number or magnitude.

The romantic ideas entertained in the last century respecting the savage condition, are now pretty nearly abandoned. It is now seen that that state of society is no more without its pains and sorrows than any other which has been as yet experienced by the human family. The once alleged absence of indigence and disease amongst primitive tribes, is thus summarily treated in a late work :+-"It is generally agreed that indigence consists in the want of some things absolutely necessary to existence. Such a state cannot exist in barbarous life; the savage either lives or dies; he is never precisely rich or poor: whilst the means of subsistence are afforded, he exists from hand to mouth; when they fail, there is no one from whom he can beg or borrow, and few whom he can plunder. With him destitution is death. It is true that he can support hunger, thirst, pain, to a degree which we cannot approach; that he will feed on substances from which we shrink with horror. But there are limits to his powers of endurance when these are passed, he sinks unnoticed and unknown; there is no one to record that a unit has been subtracted from the amount of human existence. The uniformity which travellers and voyagers have discovered in savage life, is a condition but one degree higher than absolute starvation. Those who sink below it disappear instantaneously, and are as if they had never been. For a similar reason, severe diseases are rarely seen by the casual visiters of savage tribes. Death is their doctor, and the grave their hospital. Those who

* Ecclesiastes, chap. vii. ver. 16.

to have been a good man of this kind: he was nearly The Natural History of Society. By Dr W. C. Taylor. 2 vols.

PRICE THREE HALFPENCE.

have resided amongst them, testify that discases aro produced by the privations endured at one period, and the repletion in which they indulge when a time of plenty arrives. But unless the cure is rapid, the termination of the disease must be fatal. When patients are left entirely to nature, it is found that nature presses very hard for an immediate payment of her debt."

A still more conclusive fact against savage life is, that it admits of so few to its supposed benefits. In countries possessed by such tribes, the population is not believed to be in general above one to a square mile at an average; while, in many industrious countries, it is upwards of two hundred.

It may be concluded, then, that it is not to the state in which civilisation is nil, that we are to look for the blessings which we deem at present wanting. We may now pass forward to the state of things in which there is some civilisation, but only some, the great mass being slaves, and in a condition of brutish ignorance. Of the condition of an European feudal slave, we have a very striking picture in a late work of Dr Bowring:-"I went once into the hut of a Russian serf. It was made of logs of wood, and though the winter was bitterly cold, the only windows were small square holes, through which the snow was driven by the sharp winds, and when the door was opened, there rushed in showers of sleet and hoarfrost. Within was a smoky suffocating heat, produced by the burning of damp wood in a stove. The inhabitants were a boor, his wife, and three children, covered with dirt and vermin; and the whole family were the vassals of a neighbouring nobleman. They were attached to the soil according to the feudal usages-had no will of their own, they could possess no property, and were almost without any legal right. All they could gain was claimed by and paid to their master; and of the produce of the fields they cultivated, no part came to their share but such a portion as enabled them to support existence. I was curious to hear what notions a Russian boor had of freedom, and of his own condition. Peter Petrovich was sitting in his ragged sheep-skin garment on a block of wood, carving ornaments out of the thigh-bone of an ox. I sat down by him, and asked how far he had ever travelled. Never ten versts from where I was born,' said he. Should you not like to see a great city?' I have heard of one, I don't know what was its name, from Ivan Carlovich, and that's enough for me.' Can you read or write? Not I! What would be the use of reading or writing? The priest reads to me, and saves me the trouble; and I have nobody to write to, and nobody to write about.' 'Should you not like a better house?' 'I do not know what I should do with it; it would only add to my trouble.' The love of independence is often said to be an instinct of man, a natural irrepressible feeling; but when I asked Peter Petrovich if he ever thought of buying his freedom, of endeavouring to become his own master, he looked surprised, and said- Am I a fool? Do not I know when I am well off? Must not my lord provide for me? How could I provide for myself. It was in vain I sought to touch a chord which is said to vibrato in all minds-the love of liberty. Liberty to him was to take no care of himself. 'But surely

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if you were to labour for yourself, and keep all tho money you gain, you might have better food and garments, and a more comfortable house.' It was in vain to talk to Peter Petrovich. My master must provide for me,' was the burden of his story."* There is here, it is true, contentment, but a con

*Minor Morals. Part Third. 1 vol. 1839.

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