Kitabı oku: «The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Volume 14, No. 398, November 14, 1829», sayfa 4

The Bavarian is straight-forward, frank but dry, blunt, and he has hitherto been ruder, more ignorant, more fond of quarrel and drinking, more given up to superstition and old things than others; for his land was the home of priestcraft and monkery. You may ever distinguish the national Bavarian by his nervous squat body, small round head, and beer-belly, immediately beneath which the trousers begin; hence the braces or belt is indispensible. The showy belt, is, as in the Tyrol, matter of national pomp, so with the girls the boddice; and both are as little known in the north as the platted hair of the maidens—perhaps relics of the knight's girdle, bandalier, and breastplate; for noble knighthood flourished chiefly in the south.

SPIRIT OF DISCOVERY

GEOGRAPHICAL

The Niger

Sir Rufane Donkin's new hypothesis respecting the Nile, briefly stands thus: The Niger (Ni-Geir) passes through Wangara, and emptying itself into the Wad-El Ghazeh, or Nile of Bornou, which is formed by the continuation of the Misselad (Geir) through Lake Fittre, flows under the sands of Bilmah into the Mediterranean Sea. Sir Rufane is likewise of opinion—that "reasoning from analogy, and still more from what we know of the nature of the country, I have no doubt but that in very remote ages, the united Niger and Geir did roll into the sea in all the magnificence of a mighty stream, forming a grand estuary or harbour where now the quicksand is."—"The question to be solved under such a supposition is, what revolution in nature can have produced so great a change in the face of the country, as to cause a great river which once flowed into the sea, to stop short in a desart of sand." "We know from all recent, as well as from some of the older modern travellers, that the sands of the desarts west of Egypt, are encroaching on, and narrowing the valley of the Nile of Egypt. We see the pyramids gradually diminishing in height, particularly on their western sides, and we read of towns and villages which have been buried in the desart, but which once stood in fertile soils, some of whose minarets were still visible a few years ago, attesting the powers of the invading sand. The sphynx, buried almost up to the head, till the French cleared her down to the back, attested equally the desolating progress of this mighty sand-flood."—"And if we turn to the valley of the Nile of Egypt, we shall see at this moment the very process going on by which the lower part of the Niger, or Nile of Bornou has been choked up and obliterated by the invasion of the Great Sahara, under the names of the desarts of Bilmah and Lybia. Thus has been rubbed out from the face of the earth a river which had once its cities, its sages, its warriors, its works of art, and its inundations like the classic Nile; but which so existed in days of which we have scarcely a record."

La Perouse

Before quitting Vanikoro, off which island La Perouse was wrecked, M. de Urville, captain of the Astrolabe, constructed a monument there, bearing the inscription, "To the memory of La Perouse and his companions. The Astrolabe, 14 March, 1828." Among the relics which have been withdrawn with great difficulty from beneath the waves, are a very strong anchor, and two stout troughs.

Siberia

Professor Hansteen and his companions were at Tobolsk, on the 12th of September, whence they travelled on sledges, the cold being at 40 degrees Reamur, so that frozen quicksilver could be cut with a knife.

The Desart

The opinion generally formed of Desarts is completely erroneous, according to Mrs. Charles Lushington, who, in her recent Travels, says, "Though much variety of country or occurrence cannot be expected in the Desart, I may with truth assert, that the passage through it was, to me, very interesting and agreeable. For the three first stages, the road was diversified by some irregularities of ground, and remarkable passes through the rocky mountains; but the course of our journey in general, lay through an arid plain of sand and stones, about two miles in breadth, bounded by rocks of sandstone of an almost uniform appearance. On the second day's march, I saw one or two trees, and the road was so varied, that I could then scarcely believe myself in a desart, which I had always pictured to my imagination as a dreary and interminable plain, with heavy loose sand, curled into clouds by every breath of wind."

Stilts

In south-western France, the shepherds make stilts of long poles with the thigh-bone of an ox fastened at a moderate height from the ground, as a support for the foot, and to enable them to distinguish the approach of wolves at a greater distance.

Embalming

There are three modes of embalming among the Egyptians: one of these consists in the injection of some antiseptic drugs previous to drying the body; but the most perfect and sumptuous is thus effected: The viscera are removed, and the body sprinkled with aromatics and natron. After drying, it is enveloped in folds of gummed linen, and placed in coffins. The great principle of embalming is the exclusion of the external air, but much is attributable to antiseptics. One of the principal ingredients in the mummy balsam is colocynth, or bitter apple, powdered. The same drug is employed in Upper Egypt for destroying vermin in clothes' presses, and store-rooms; and ostrich feathers sent to Lower Egypt are sprinkled with it. A recent traveller found in the head of a mummy, of a superior kind, a balsam, in colour and transparency like a pink topaz. It burned with a beautiful clear flame, and emitted a very fragrant odour, in which cinnamon predominated. In the heart of one of the mummies he found about three drams of pure nitre; the heart being entire, this must have been injected through the blood-vessels. Mummy powder was formerly in use all over Europe as a medicine, and is still employed as such among the Arabs, who mix it with butter, and esteem it a sovereign remedy for internal and external ulcers.

Sulphur

It is well known that sulphur which has been recently fused, does not immediately recover its former properties; but no one suspected that it required whole months, and even a longer period, fully to restore them.—From the French.

Sympathetic Ink

Write on paper with a weak solution of nitrate of mercury, and the characters will become black, when held to the fire.

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS

A SINGULAR LETTER FROM SOUTHERN AFRICA

Communicated by Mr. Hogg, the Ettrick Shepherd

MY DEAR FRIEND,

In my last I related to you all the circumstances of our settlement here, and the prospect that we had of a peaceful and pleasant habitation. In truth, it is a fine country, and inhabited by a fine race of people, for the Kousies, as far as I have seen of them, are a simple and ingenuous race.

You knew my Agnes from her childhood—you were at our wedding at Beattock, and cannot but remember what an amiable and lovely girl she then was; and when she was going about our new settlement with our little boy in her arms, I have often fancied that I never saw so lovely a human being.

The chief Karoo came to me one day with his interpreter, whom he caused to make a long palaver about his power, and dominion, and virtues, and his great desire to do much good. The language of this fellow being a mixture of Kaffre, High Dutch, and English, was peculiarly ludicrous, and most of all so when he concluded with expressing his lord's desire to have my wife to be his own, and to give me in exchange for her four oxen, the best that I could choose from his herd!

As he made the proposal in presence of my wife, she was so much tickled with the absurdity of the proposed barter, and the manner in which it was expressed, that she laughed immoderately. Karoo, thinking she was delighted with it, eyed her with a look that surpasses all description, and then caused his interpreter to make another palaver to her concerning all the good things she was to enjoy; one of which was, that she was to ride upon an ox whose horns were tipped with gold. I thanked the great Karoo for his kind intentions, but declared my incapability to part with my wife, for that we were one flesh and blood, and that nothing could separate us but death. He could comprehend no such tie as this. All men sold their wives and daughters as they listed, I was told, for that the women were the sole property of the men. When I told him finally that nothing on earth could induce me to part with her, he seemed offended, bit his thumb, knitted his brows, and studied long in silence, always casting glances at Agnes of great pathos and languishment, which were perfectly irresistible, and ultimately he struck his spear's head in the ground, and offered me ten cows and a bull for my wife, and a choice virgin to boot. When this proffer was likewise declined, he smiled in derision, telling me I was the son of foolishness, and that he foretold I should repent it.

My William was at this time about eleven months old, but was still at the breast, as I could never prevail on his lovely mother to wean him, and at the very time of which I am speaking, our little settlement was invaded one night by a tribe of those large baboons called ourang-outangs, pongos, or wild men of the woods, who did great mischief to our fruits, yams, and carrots. From that time we kept a great number of guns loaded, and set a watch; and at length the depredators were again discovered. We pursued them as far as the Keys river, which they swam, and we lost them.

Among all the depredators, there was none fell but one youngling, which I lifted in my arms, when it looked so pitifully, and cried so like a child, that my heart bled for it. A large monster, more than six feet high, perceiving that he had lost his cub, returned brandishing a huge club, and grinning at me. I wanted to restore the abominable brat, for I could not bear the thought of killing it, it was so like a human creature; but before I could do this, several shots had been fired by my companions at the hideous monster, which caused him once more to take to his heels, but turning oft as he fled, he made threatening gestures at me. A Kousi servant that we had, finished the cub, and I caused it to be buried.

The very morning after that but one, Agnes and her black maid were milking our few cows upon the green: I was in the garden, and William was toddling about pulling flowers, when, all at once, the women were alarmed by the sight of a tremendous ourang-outang issuing from our house, which they had just left. They seemed to have been struck dumb and senseless with amazement, for not one of them uttered a sound, until the monster, springing forward, in one moment, snatched up the child and made off with him. Before I reached the green where the cows stood, the ourang-outang was fully half a mile gone, and only the poor, feeble exhausted women running screaming after him. Before I overtook the women, I heard the agonized cries of my dear boy, my darling William, in the paws of that horrible monster. I pursued, breathless and altogether unnerved with agony; but, alas! I rather lost than gained ground.

These animals have this peculiarity, that when they are walking leisurely or running down-hill, they walk upright like a human being; but when hard pressed on level ground, or up hill, they use their long arms as fore-legs, and then run with inconceivable swiftness. When flying with their own young, the greater part of them will run nearly twice as fast as an ordinary man, for the cubs cling to them with both feet and hands, but as my poor William shrunk from the monster's touch, he was obliged to embrace him closely with one paw, and run on three, and still in that manner he outran me. Keeping still his distance before me, he reached the Keys river, and there the last gleam of hope closed on me, for I could not swim while the ourang-outang, with much acuteness, threw the child across his shoulders, held him by the feet with one paw, and with the other three stemmed the river, though then in flood, with amazing rapidity. It was at this dreadful moment that my beloved babe got his eyes on me as I ran across the plain towards him, and I saw him holding up his little hands in the midst of the foaming flood, and crying out, "Pa! pa! pa!" which he seemed to utter with a sort of desperate joy at seeing me approach.

Alas, that sight was the last, for in two minutes thereafter the monster vanished, with my dear child, in the jungles and woods beyond the river, and then my course was stayed, for to have thrown myself in, would only have been committing suicide, and leaving a destitute widow in a foreign land. I was quickly aroused by the sight of twelve of my countrymen coming full speed across the plain on my track. They were all armed and stripped for the pursuit, and four of them, some of whom you know, Adam Johnstone, Adam Haliday, Peter Carruthers, and Joseph Nicholson, being excellent swimmers, plunged at once into the river and swam across, though not without both difficulty and danger, and without loss of time continued the pursuit.