fome particulars of their misfortune, and faw fome of the remains of their effects, he could gain little fatisfactory information concerning them. A few of them feem to have furvived But they were beyond his reach. The fhipwreck feems to have occurred nearly to the fouth of Madagascar, on the coast of Caffraria, or in the Mofambic Channel. If our author had been a botanist we might have derived fome particular information from his expedition to the country of the Caffres; but the birds and the animals of that country are not materially different from thofe of the neighbouring provinces, The chains of yellow mofs, a vegetable as foft as flax, tow, or cotton, deferves particular attention; and the vegetable cords, a creeping plant, are reprefented as both ftrong and extenâive, Oftriches were not, in this region, uncommon, and it is finguIar that the eggs of this bird, which have been fuppofed to be trufted to the cafual heat of the fun, in reality enjoy a peculiar privilege in this refpect. The incubation is performed by different females in fucceffion, and fome eggs are left in the neighbourhood, as the first food of the young. At leaft our travellers, when the young were almoft hatched, found, very near the fpot, fome eggs in a perfect ftate; and M. Vaillant tells us, that, if he could have conquered his prejudices, he should have thought even the more mature eggs not inferior to the recent ones. The mimofa Nilotica, the fenfitive plant, which produces the gum arabic, the vegetable most common through the African defarts, is here very plentiful. The young thorns were greedily eaten by Kees, our author's tafter, and often his purveyor; they were brittle like afparagus, but, after being fwallowed, left a rough difagreeable acrimony. The country of the Caffres is reprefented as highly pleafing and fertile: among this people polygamy is common. M. Vaillant is at last weary; and this independent child of nature feems to feel a fincere fatisfaction at returning to the more civilized regions. We may, for a time, become the creatures of enthufiafm; we may perfuade ourselves that we are happy, but one heartfelt expreffion is more convincing than pages of wild admiration and ftudied declamation. In his return he vifited the fnow mountains, the region of the Bofhies men, in his opinion, a mixed race, confifting of the most treacherous and abandoned refugees of Hottentots, of baftard Hottentots, the creoles of Africa, and even Europeans. One of this race was detected in the most treacherous attempt on the life of an Hottentot attendant of M. Vaillant: but, in general, the Sneuwbergen and the Bofhies men afford little fubject of remark. Our author faw the very numerous troops of gazels, in their annual emigration to the moifter regions, and gives a short ac count ceant of the Houfwana, the Chinese Hottentots, a new race, often confounded with the Bofhies men, and refembling the Chinefe, which he promises to defcribe more fully in his future work. This volume concludes with a particular defcription of the male and female Giraffe, which we cannot properly follow without the plate. Such is nearly the work of M. Vaillant, which we have read with great pleasure, and can recommend as travels highly entertaining, and peculiarly interefting. We muft obferve, however, that our author has carried the manners and the prejudices of his countrymen into the wilds of Africa. We fee, in every inftance, the eager, the fanguine, the enthufiaftic Frenchman. Even in the plates, he appears with feathers in his hat, among the Hottentots, the oxen, the elephants, the tigers of Africa, an affociation fo incongruous, that the greatest affectation of fenfibility and admiration is fcarcely more difgufting. His representations, as we have fhown, are not very different, and we cannot recommend this work as adding greatly to our information, respecting the remote regions which this traveller defcribes The translations are of very different kinds. That which is published for Meff. Robinfon is more exact and clofe; but, either from hafte or inattention, many minute errors are obferv able. The other, the work of Mrs. Helme, is more free and elegant, but lefs exact and minute. In reality, M. Vaillant has indulged himself in fome particular phyfiological obfervations, which a lady could not, with propriety, follow: the has therefore omitted them, without any very great injury to the work... Thofe who wish for a pleafing agreeable narrative will confe quently perufe the latter: the philofopher and physician, who with for more feientific information, will prefer the former. The ornaments of each are nearly of equal merit, and at least not inferior to the original: if Mrs. Helme has omitted one plate, it is not fuch as will add to the value of her tranflation, or the information of the general reader. Travels to difcover the Source of the Nile. By J. Bruce, Efg: (Continued from Vol. LXIX. p, 563.) THE eastern kingdoms of Afia and Africa were inhabited. by a powerful and comparatively polished race,while Europe was covered with woods, rendered anwholefome by marshes, and fcantily and partially inhabited by a few barbarians. It was in the eat that population commenced: it was from these regions that mankind, after the almoft univerfal deftruction of the flood, began again to expand, and from this point again to cover the earth. Early hiftory, which is almoft exclufively facred, relates to the eastern nations, and it must be chiefly illuftrated by a traveller in the fame track. Mr. Bruce in this refpect gives much fatisfactory information; but we can trace the outline only, for we must remember that two extensive articles have not yet enabled us to reach the end of the first volume. The immenfe riches of the Eaft, riches which have raised the wonder of the commentator, and the fneers of the infidel, were the refult of commerce; and this commerce in the early ages was confined to the eastern fide of Africa, Arabia, and the neighbouring continent of India. The first offered gold, filver, ivory, myrrh, and caffia; and these precious fubftances were exchanged for the fpices, the filk, and cotton of Indoftan; which obtained in return from Arabia, myrrh, dying materials, and balfam. The connection feems to have been by land, and the trade to have been carried on by caravans, which, for a time, met in Affyria, and contributed to the grandeur and riches of the famous Semiramis. While this communication was known and common by land, Sefoftris opened a more eafy one by fea, and Semiramis, unwilling to grow gradually rich by the daily egg, endeavoured to obtain the mother by force, and destroyed in a great degree the advantages hitherto derived from this trade. The carriers by land were the fhepherds, a race often heard of, but scarcely known. Cush and his defcendants ftill dreading, it is faid, another deluge, were unwilling to remain in the lower country of Egypt, to which they had migrated, and proceeded fouthward to the firft mountains, where the rains were not so frequent as in the higher grounds; and here they lived in caves hollowed with incredible induftry. They are said to have built the city of Axum about the time of Abraham, and afterwards to have pushed their colony down to Atbara, where they were called Meroëtes, from the island Meroë, which they inhabited. Mr. Bruce fuppofes that the tormenting Ay* which is found within the limits of the rain, induced them occafionally to migrate to different fpots without forfaking their old habitations, and on this account too, or from their increasing numbers, they feem to have proceeded to the Thebaid, but they were ftill Trogloditæ, inhabitants of the neighbouring mountains, or at leaft they preferved their retreats It is called the zimb, and when the rain comes in, is heard to ap proach with a buzzing noife: unless the camels are driven beyond the rainy fpot, it fixes on their skin, wounding and producing puftules, which foon mortify. A fimilar infect is found in Lapland, and is equally in the fame way a mortal enemy of the rein deer. The zimb is alluded to in Ifaiah vii. 18 and 19. · in in cafe of attack or their apprehended deluge. The connection of the rains with the phenomena of the heavens led them to aftronomical obfervations, and they found their commencement to coincide with the heliacal rifing of the dog-ftar. This luminary was, therefore, the object of their attention : the dog was preferved in their ftatues, was perhaps their idol, and its name, Seir, feems to have given the appellation (Sire) to their district, and to the river (Siris) which bounds it. The country unclouded gave them full fcope for their farther improvements in aftronomy, and thefe our author thinks they have perpetuated by records, which, instead of inftructing, have mifled us. The hieroglyphics, Mr. Bruce fuppofes to be aftronomical obfervations, and it could not be, he thinks, a general language, as the figns are few and these are often repeated. This race did not, however, extend only to the north; in the fouth they found mountains where they thought themselves fecure from the waters of the tropical rains; they difcovered also gold and filver: while in their confinement dur ing the rainy feafon, they are fuppofed to have reduced their own or their countrymen's obfervations, to have invented letters and arithmetical characters. It feems that the Cafhite was confined to his mountains, and trufted for the difpofal of his merchandize to the shepherds, a long haired, brown race, far diftant from the negro in colour and in form, whofe origin we are unacquainted with, bat whose proper fituation was between the northern tropic and the mountains of Abyffinia. Various are their appellations in their own language, perhaps from their different ranks; but among these we may trace Berber, the origin of barbarians, Suah, the root of Suez, and Ag-ag, the prifoner of Saul and the victim of the religious zeal of Samuel. These were the carriers in Africa; but on the oppofite coaft, in Syria and Palestine, the Ishmaelite merchants fupplied their place, and each party probably dealt in flaves. Africa was always deftined to furnish involuntary fervants to other more luxurious nations; and on its ealtera fide the flaves were carried to India. Mr. Bruce confiders the present attempts to abolish the flave-trade as affected refinements arising from effeminacy: it is our proper bufinefs, he obferves, to regulate it; and as we have often remarked, by fecuring good treatment to the flaves, to leave slavery only a name. He mentions two practices established in Africa, which highly difgrace the national character, and which are fufficiently authenticated, viz. eating men and facrificing human creatures to the devil. The shepherds were Sabeans, worshipping the heavenly bodies: the Cufhites foon "became idolaters, and were hated by the shep herds, herds, whofe worship was pure, though improperly directed and thefe were, in turn, odious to the former, because they killed and eat the facred animal, the cow. It must, however, be owned, that much of the hiftory of this warlike nation, for, though thepherds, they were warriors, and very commonly conquerors, is yet in obfcurity. Their origin is wholly un known. These are not the only inhabitants of this part of Africa. The Convena, a mixed race of distinct tribes, are also found in Abyfiinia. This region was deftroyed by a flood 1600 years before Christ, 200 years after it was first inhabited ; and in about an equal space after the flood, this mixed race appeared, who were received as friends by the shepherds; fo that thefe laft were not destroyed, or they preceded the Convenæ. It is fuppofed that the Convene were inltabitants of Paletine, driven out by Joshua; and the periods of the different events coincide fufficiently to fupport this fyftem: they have no kings, and according to the curfe of Canaan, they are till hewers of wood and drawers of water.' The fhepherds feem to have been Negros; from this race Mofes took. his wite Zipporah, which gave fuch great offence; and from that circumstance, Mr. Bruce thinks we may explain several obfcure paffages of fcripture. The dog-liar (O-Siris) was the great object of the Egyptian fuperftition, and from this fource their mythology was derived. The Tot is, in other words, an almanac; and the hieroglyphics, as we have already remarked, fyitems of afronomical observations. If the hieroglyphics were the first letters, the merchants of Ethiopia foon reduced them to a regu lar fyftem of characters, fignifying founds instead of things; and in characters of this kind the commandments were written in the table which Mofes received the fecond time from God. This alteration, our author thinks, is plainly pointed out in Exodus xxviii. 21. and he confequently concludes that the Hebrew facred character was the common Ethiopic, with a little change probably made by Mofes in the direction of the writing, in taking away the points and difcontinuing the dif tinct words of the language of Ethiopia. The author continues his obfervations on the ancient trade to India, by remarking that David extended his dominions to the isthmus of Suez, and established himself in Edom, in Eloth, and in Ezion-Gaber, on the northern extremity of the Red Sea. From thence he pursued the commerce either with India or Ophir, and this last place was, in Mr. Bruce's opinion, a spot on the fouth-eastern coaft of Africa, in the present country of the Caffres, oppofite to Madagascar. The voy 3. age |