without its being known to the merchants, who are in the habits of entering every house, not excepting that of the Sultan himself; a complete refutation of the notion so currently entertained, that he was, or is still confined in Tombuctoo by the Sultan, on account of his medical skill.

The Nil, Goulbi, Joliba, or Kattagum, runs from Tombuctoo through Melli in the Fellata; thence to Fendah S. W. of Kashna; it again makes its appearance at Kattagum, four days W.S. W. of Bornou, where it runs into a lake called the Tsaad. Thus far the Nil may be traced; the accounts of its further course are merely conjectural; yet, it is universally agreed, that by one of these routes, it joins the great Nile of Egypt to the southward of Dongola.

Although our Travellers did not find themselves quite at ease within the power of Mukni, whose treachery they had repeatedly occasion to suspect, yet, they had ample opportunities of observing and studying the inhabitants. Their visits to the dategroves for the purpose of shooting pigeons, gave them an insight into their modes of cultivating grain and other esculent products. Their wells are like large ponds, twenty or thirty feet deep; the bottom is a stratum of clay; the water salt, and offensive. They raise it by means of sheers, made of date-trees lashed together, and placed slopingly over the centre of the pit. To this, one or two asses are attached by a light harness, and run down a steep bank; while the men employed assist them in drawing, quickening their pace by pricking their flanks with their small reaping hooks. The water runs into small channels round the garden, while the women and children distribute it with scoops. The dates, when quite dry, are buried in square holes, and then covered with sand.

The condition of the party became every day more destitute. They hired a woman to cook for them, but she was required to come only once a day to bake their bread, or to make their cusscussou, for they were obliged to observe a spare diet; and it often happened that when she had stolen half their allowance, they were obliged to fast till the morrow. Belford having constructed a kind of rude carriage for Mukni, which gave him great satisfaction, was rewarded by this munificent potentate with seven dollars, which he brought home in triumph; and these really saved us,' says our Author, when on the very brink of 'starvation.'

• We economized our small allowance of money,' (they had sold a horse for seventy dollars) which, however, soon became much reduced. Belford and I fell ill about this time. I remained a week in bed, and rose from it a skeleton. One night, as we were all sitting pensively on our mat, our friend Yusuf came in, and, addressing Mr. Ritchie, said, "Yusuf, you and Said are my friends. Mukni has VOL. XVI. N.S.

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hopes you may die, that he may secure to himself all your goods. You seem very melancholy; do you want money?" Mr. Ritchie having acknowledged that he did, Yusuf rejoined, "I have none myself, but 'I will borrow some for you." Twenty dollars being the sum named, our kind friend went out, and soon returned with thirty! an act of generosity so unlooked for, that we were incapable of thanking him as he deserved. This seasonable supply enabled us to buy good food, and to make some amends for our late privations. Our health soon improved, and Mr. Ritchie's spirits began to brighten.'

pp. 187-188.

But this interval of hope was soon darkened. On the 8th of November, poor Ritchie was again attacked by illness, and on the 20th, expired. During this time, he was for the most part delirious, but when he had in some degree recovered his intellect, he expressed an anxiety to know whether letters bad arrived announcing a further allowance of money from Government. When Captain Lyon replied in the negative, he made no comment. The two survivors of this ill-fated party were themselves reduced to the lowest state of debility.

We looked at each other,' says our Author, expecting that in a few days it might be our own lot to follow our lamented companion. And now, for the first time, my hopes did indeed fail me. Belford formed a rough coffin out of our chests. The washers of the dead came to perform their melancholy office, and the body was washed, perfumed, and rubbed with camphor. During our preparations for the burial, the women, who are always hired to cry at the death of persons whose friends can pay them, proposed to perform that disgusting office, but I shut the door unceremoniously against them. When I was out of sight, some persons stole several of our effects, and I now clearly saw that we were considered as lawful plunder. We hired men to carry the coffin, but one of them left us, and poor Bel. ford was obliged to supply his place. The clay below the sand was white, which was considered as a good omen. We had, during the night, unknown to the people, read our Protestant burial service over the body. At the grave, we recited the first chapter of the Koran, which the most serious Christian would consider as a beautiful and applicable prayer on such an occasion. We returned home to pass a day of misery. It was necessary to distribute food to the poor, who surrounded our door in great numbers, and we had no money to purchase a morsel for ourselves. Yusuf's kindness having again supplied our wants, I succeeded in getting the house a little more quiet. Within an hour after the funeral, a courier arrived from Tripoli, announcing that a further allowance of £1000 had been made by our Government for the expenses of the mission. Had this letter reached us a little sooner, many of our distresses would have been prevented.'

pp. 191-193. Various reasons induced Captain Lyon to return to England. The sum of £1000 was by no means adequate to carry him through Africa; as it would have been requisite to purchase

goods wholly different from those provided for the mission. As a precaution to future travellers, he states, that their adoption of the Moorish costume, was by no means a sufficient security in traversing the Interior. Whenever they had occasion to remain at any station, it was requisite to conform also to the duties of the Mohammedan religion, without which precaution, their lives would have been in perpetual jeopardy. But, by attending the established prayers, and repeating, There is no god but God, 'Mohammed is his prophet,' they obviated all suspicions. Into the morality of this compliance, it is not our present business to institute an inquiry.

Previously to his return to Tripoli, Captain Lyon determined to ascertain the situation of other parts of Fezzan South and East of Mourzouk. We cannot follow him through these researches, but must content ourselves with saying that he has, at great personal risk and with untried perseverance, succeeded in making a more accurate survey of this part of the Desert, than our most sanguine expectations had led us to anticipate. His notices of the rude tribes that inhabit those regions, and of the animal and vegetable products of the country, have been collected with the most indefatigable industry. Upon the whole, we have read the volume with considerable interest, an interest tinged with melancholy. Captain Lyon has given a plain, unadorned narrative, which, in our opinion, owes no inconsiderable portion of its charm to the absence of all rhetorical affectation.

Art. III. Narrative of the Chinese Embassy to the Khan of the Tourgoutk Tartars in the Years 1712, 13, 14, and 15. By the Chinese Ambassador, and published by the Emperor's authority at Pekin. Translated from the Chinese, and accompanied by an Appendix of Miscellanous Translations. By Sir George Thomas Staunton, Bart. LL.D. and F.R.S. 8vo. pp. 330. Price 18s. London. 1821. TO Sir George Staunton belongs the praise of having been

the first translator of a Chinese book into the English language. The Ta Tsing Leu Lee, or the penal code of China, which he translated in 1810, is a monnment of the astonishing proficiency which unwearied diligence enabled him to make in that mysterious and difficult tongue. It cannot, however, be denied, that he had peculiar and exclusive advantages for its attainment. He was scarcely eleven years of age, when he accompanied Lord Macartney's embassy to Pekin. During his residence in China, he received regular instructions in the language, and, on his return to England, brought with him one or two natives. With this elementary knowledge, he went out again to China as a supercargo, where he resided several years; during which time, he assiduously kept alive and augmented his aequaintance with the written character.

Our readers may not probably have formed a due estimate of the difficulties of such an acquisition. Reasoning from ordinary analogies, they may be disposed to consider it merely as a triumph over the common perplexities of a foreign tongue, which a certain degree of attention and familiarity with those by whom it is spoken, will gradually achieve. But it is impossible to entertain any accurate notions upon the subject, without adverting to the written language of China as a distinct and anomalous contrivance for the communication of ideas. Rules and systems of construction constituting what, in speaking of languages in general, is called Grammar, have nothing to do with Chinese writings. The elementary characters are representations of sensible objects, and signs or symbols of abstract ideas. Their number is two hundred and fourteen; and the combinations of which these marks are rendered susceptible, constitute the whole of a written language which paints discourse, and speaks to the eyes. In all other languages, from the Sanskrit to the Celtic, from East to West, however diversified, this feature uniformly prevails,-that ideas are expressed by a combination of letters, representing, not the ideas themselves, but certain particular sounds, which signify conventionally those ideas. But the Chinese language almost realizes the visionary scheme of Bishop Wilkins, and is in the strictest sense, a philosophical language. It immediately conveys, according to an established classification, the ideas as they present themselves to the understanding, and is wholly independent of the sounds employed to give them utterance.

Enough has probably been said to prove, that, beautiful and ingenious as the theory of this singular language may be,-the practice of it must be highly inconvenient and perplexing. A more familiar idea may perhaps be conveyed of the extent to which the combination of two hundred and fourteen characters may be carried, by simply remarking, that the dictionary of China, so called xar x, consists of more than two hundred volumes, and contains, it is said, sixty thousand characters. Add to this, that these characters, besides being pictures and representations of perceptible, or arbitrary symbols of intellectual objects, are perpetually used in a sense which has no immediate relation to the pictures or signs which they represent separately, but, by inference or analogy, convey in their combination a totally distinct image. Thus, the compound of primitive characters representing mouth and maternal bosom, implies affectionate admonition. A man, in combination with a field, signifies a village. It is the frequent use of this allegorical or metaphorical figure, that, while it constitutes the wealth and copiousness of the language, renders it so inaccessible and difficult. Nor are the significations of the character to be at

tained by mere reading, however systematic or laborious. A competent knowledge of Chinese history, customs, and modes of thinking, is absolutely necessary to their development. A single instance will elucidate our meaning. The character signifying marriage, is a combination of the signs representing wine and seal; because the wine presented in that solemnity by the bridegroom to the bride, is the seal of the union. Here, then, lies the principal impediment to the attainment of this singular dialect. The Jesuits were generally unsuccessful in their attempts to decypher the metaphorical parts of it; and although the zeal and industry of later students have achieved miracles in the cultivation of Chinese literature, a diction guarded as it were by so impenetrable a frontier, will, we apprehend, long continue to be among the rarest accomplishments of human diligence. Let us not, however, despair. Much has already been effected towards this important object, by those who are engaged in the pious labours of converting the heathen from his idolatry; before the victorious progress of whose benevolence, every difficulty seems successively to disappear, that has heretofore retarded the comprehension of the divided families of the earth in the golden bonds of Christian union.

Having said so much of the language, we have but little space to speak of the literature of this extraordinary people. It may be sufficient to convey some notion of its extent and variety, to remark, that the Chinese press is nearly as prolific as our own. The Chinese are a nation of readers; and their books are inconceivably cheap. Novels, apologues, jest-books, imperial exhortations, songs, romances, dramas, books of cookery, almanacks, and court-calendars, are in constant circulation from the capital to the provinces. To those who cherish a liberal curiosity concerning that remote nation, their literature, in which they draw their own portrait, and sketch their own habits and institutions, is an invaluable source of information. For we are completely shut out from personal communication with them, being merely permitted to peep at them from Canton or Macao, as through a grate, where our factory converse with them through the medium of a mercantile jargon, intelligible only to themselves and the individuals with whom they traffic. It is obvious, therefore, that we are under no trifling obligations to those who, having mastered their language, bring us into a literary and intellectual contact with a country almost hermetically sealed to all external intercourse.

The work translated by Sir George Staunton, to which we have already referred, presented us with a view of the internal policy of that vast empire. The volume now before us, to

* Particularly by Dr. Morrison, and Dr. Milne.