the stroke of his paw. Man, however, takes him home and roasts himand the boa constrictor swallows him whole, shell and all, and consumes him slowly in the interior, as the Court of Chancery does a great estate.

The danger seems to be much less with snakes and wild beasts, if you conduct yourself like a gentleman, and are not abruptly intrusive. If you will pass on gently, you may walk unhurt within a yard of the Labairi snake, who would put you to death if you rushed upon him. The taguan knocks you down with a blow of his paw, if suddenly interrupted, but will run away, if you will give him time to do so. In short, most animals look upon man as a very ugly customer; and, unless sorely pressed for food, or from fear of their own safety, are not fond of attacking him. Mr. Waterton, though much given to sentiment, made a Labairi snake bite itself, but no bad consequences ensued— nor would any bad consequences ensue if a court-martial were to order a sinful soldier to give himself a thousand lashes. It is barely possible that the snake had some faint idea whom and what he was biting.

Insects are the curse of tropical climates. The bête rouge lays the foundation of a tremendous ulcer. In a moment you are covered with ticks. Chigoes bury themselves in your flesh, and hatch a large colony of young Chigoes in a few hours. They will not live together, but every Chigoe sets up a separate ulcer, and has his own private portion of pus. Flies get entry into your mouth, into your eyes, into your nose; you eat flies, drink flies, and breathe flies. Lizards, Cockroaches, and Snakes get into the bed; Ants eat up the books; Scorpions sting you on the foot. Everything bites, stings, or bruises; every second of your existence you are wounded by some piece of animal life that nobody has ever seen before, except Swammerdam and Meriam. An insect with eleven legs is swimming in your teacup, a nondescript with nine wings is struggling in the small beer, or a caterpillar with several dozen eyes in his belly is hastening over the bread and butter! All nature is alive, and seems to be gathering all her entomological hosts to eat you up, as you are standing, out of your coat, waistcoat, and breeches. Such are the tropics. All this reconciles us to our dews, fogs, vapours, and drizzle-to our apothecaries rushing about with gargles and tinctures-to our old, British, constitutional coughs, sore throats, and swelled faces.

We come now to the counterpart of St. George and the Dragon. Every one knows that the large snake of tropical climates throws himself upon his prey, twists the folds of his body round the victim, presses him to death, and then eats him. Mr. Waterton wanted a large snake for the sake of its skin; and it occurred to him that the success of this sort of combat depended upon who began first, and that if he could contrive to fling himself upon the snake, he was just as likely to send the snake to the British Museum, as the snake, if allowed the advantage of prior occupation, was to eat him up. The opportunities which Yorkshire squires have of combating with the boa constrictor are so few, that Mr. Waterton must be allowed to tell his own story in his own

manner.

"We went slowly on in silence, without moving our arms or heads, in order to prevent all alarm as much as possible, lest the snake should glide off, or attack us in self-defence. I carried the lance perpendicularly before me, with the point about a foot from the ground. The snake had not moved; and on getting up to him, I struck him with the lance on the near side, just behind the neck, and pinned him to the ground. That moment the negro next to me seized the lance and held it firm in its place, while I dashed head foremost into the den to grapple with the snake, and to get hold of his tail before he could do any mischief.

"On pinning him to the ground with the lance, he gave a tremendous loud hiss, and the little dog ran away, howling as he went. We had a sharp fray in the den, the rotten sticks flying on all sides, and each party struggling for superiority. I called out to the second negro to throw himself upon me, as I found I was not heavy enough. He did so, and the additional weight was of great service. I had now got firm hold of his tail; and after a

violent struggle or two, he gave in, finding himself overpowered. This was the moment to secure him. So, while the first negro continued to hold the lance firm to the ground, and the other was helping me, I contrived to unloose my braces, and with them tied up the snake's mouth.

"The snake, now finding himself in an unpleasant situation, tried to better himself, and set resolutely to work, but we overpowered him. We contrived to make him twist himself round the shaft of the lance, and then prepared to convey him out of the forest. I stood at his head, and held it firm under my arm, one negro supported the belly, and the other the tail. In this order we began to move slowly towards home, and reached it after resting ten times; for the snake was too heavy for us to support him without stopping to recruit our strength. As we proceeded onwards with him, he fought hard for freedom, but it was all in vain."-(Pp. 202-204.)

One of these combats we should have thought sufficient for glory, and for the interests of the British Museum. But Hercules killed two snakes, and Mr. Waterton would not be content with less.

"There was a path where timber had formerly been dragged along. Here I observed a young coulacanara, ten feet long, slowly moving onwards; I saw he was not thick enough to break my arm, in case he got twisted around it. There was not a moment to be lost. I laid hold of his tail with the left hand, one knee being on the ground; with the right I took off my hat, and held it as you would hold a shield for defence.

"The snake instantly turned, and came on at me, with his head about a yard from the ground, as if to ask me what business I had to take liberties with his tail. I let him come, hissing and open-mouthed, within two feet of my face, and then, with all the force I was master of, I drove my fist, shielded by my hat, full in his jaws. He was stunned and confounded by the blow, and ere he could reccver himself, I had seized his throat with both hands, in such a position that he could not bite me; I then allowed him to coil himself round my body, and marched off with him as my lawful prize. He pressed me hard, but not alarmingly so."-(Pp. 206, 207).

When the body of the large snake began to smell, the Vultures immediately arrived. The King of the Vultures first gorged himself, and then retired to a large tree while his subjects consumed the remainder. It does not appear that there was any favouritism. When the King was full, all the mob Vultures ate alike; neither could Mr. Waterton perceive that there was any division into Catholic and Protestant Vultures, or that the majority of the flock thought it essentially Vulturish to exclude one third of their numbers from the blood and entrails. The Vulture, it is remarkable, never eats live animals. He seems to abhor everything which has not the relish of putrescence and flavour of death. The following is a characteristic specimen of the little inconveniences to which travellers are liable who sleep on the feather beds of the forest. To see a rat in a room in Europe insures a night of horror. Everything is by comparison.

"About midnight, as I was lying awake, and in great pain, I heard the Indians say, 'Massa, massa, you no hear tiger? I listened attentively, and heard the softly sounding tread of his feet as he approached us. The moon had gone down; but every now and then we could get a glance of him by the light of our fire: he was the Jaguar, for I could see the spots on his body. Had I wished to have fired at him, I was not able to take a sure aim, for I was in such pain that I could not turn myself in my hammock. The Indian would have fired, but I would not allow him to do so, as I wanted to see a little more of our new visitor for it is not every day or night that the traveller is favoured with an undisturbed sight of the Jaguar in his own forest.

Whenever the fire got low the Jaguar came a little nearer, and when the Indian renewed it, he retired abruptly; sometimes he would come within twenty yards, and then we had a view of him, sitting on his hind legs like a dog; sometimes he moved slowly to and fro, and at other times we could hear him mend his pace, as if impatient. At last the Indian, not relishing the idea of having such company in the neighbourhood, could contain himself no longer, and set up a most tremendous yell. The Jaguar bounded off like a race-horse, and returned no more: it appeared, by the print of his feet the next morning, that he was a full-grown Jaguar." (Pp. 212, 213.)

We have seen Mr. Waterton fling himself upon a snake; we shall now mount him upon a crocodile, undertaking that this shall be the last of his feats exhibited to the reader. He had baited for a cayman or crocodile, the

hook was swallowed, and the object was to pull the animal up and to secure him. "If you pull him up," say the Indians, "as soon as he sees you on the brink of the river, he will run at you and destroy you." "Never mind," says our traveller, "pull away, and leave the rest to me. And accordingly he places himself upon the shore, with the mast of the canoe in his hand, ready to force it down the throat of the crocodile as soon as he makes his appearance. "By the time the Cayman was within two yards of me, I saw he was in a state of fear and perturbation; I instantly dropped the mast, sprung up, and jumped on his back, turning half round as I vaulted, so that I gained my seat with my face in a right position. I immediately seized his fore legs, and by main force twisted them on his back; thus they served me for a bridle.

"He now seemed to have recovered from his surprise, and probably fancying himself in hostile company, he began to plunge furiously, and lashed the sand with his long and powerful tail. I was out of reach of the strokes of it, by being near his head. He continued to plunge and strike, and made my seat very uncomfortable. It must have been a fine sight for an unoccupied spectator.

"The people roared out in triumph, and were so vociferous that it was some time before they heard me tell them to pull me and my beast of burden farther in land. I was approhensive the rope might break, and then there would have been every chance of going down to the regions under water with the Cayman. That would have been more perilous than Arion's marine morning ride:

'Delphini insidens, vada cærula sulcat Arion.'

"The people now dragged us above forty yards on the sand: it was the first and last time I was ever on a Cayman's back. Should it be asked, how I managed to keep my seat, I would answer-I hunted some years with Lord Darlington's foxhounds."-(Pp. 231, 232.)

The Yorkshire gentlemen have long been famous for their equestrian skill; but Mr. Waterton is the first among them of whom it could be said that he has a fine hand upon a crocodile. This accursed animal, so ridden by Mr. Waterton, is the scourge and terror of all the large rivers in South America near the Line. Their boldness is such, that a Cayman has sometimes come out of the Oroonoque, at Augustura, near the public walks where the people were assembled, seized a full-grown man, as big as Sir William Curtis after dinner, and hurried him into the bed of the river for his food. The governor of Angustura witnessed this circumstance himself.

Our Eboracic traveller had now been nearly eleven months in the desert, and not in vain. Shall we express our doubts, or shall we confidently state at once the immense wealth he had acquired?-a prodigious variety of insects, two hundred and thirty birds, ten land_Tortoises, five Armadillas, two large Serpents, a Sloth, an Ant-bear, and a Cayman. At Liverpool, the Custom-house officers, men ignorant of Linnæus, got hold of his collection, detained it six weeks, and, in spite of remonstrances to the Treasury, he was forced to pay very high duties. This is really perfectly absurd; that a man of science cannot bring a pickled armadilla, for a collection of natural history, without paying a tax for it. This surely must have happened in the dark days of Nicolas. We cannot doubt but that such paltry exactions have been swept away by the manly and liberal policy of Robinson and Huskisson. That a great people should compel an individual to make them a payment before he can be permitted to land a stuffed snake upon their shores, is, of all the paltry Custom-house robberies we ever heard of, the most mean and contemptiblebut Major rerum ordo nacitur.

The fourth journey of Mr. Waterton is to the United States. It is pleasantly written; but our author does not appear as much at home among men as among beasts. Shooting, stuffing, and pursuing are his occupations. He is lost in places where there are no bushes, snakes, nor Indians. But he is full of good and amiable feeling wherever he goes. We cannot avoid introducing the following passage :

"The steam-boat from Quebec to Montreal had above five hundred Irish emigrants on board. They were going they hardly knew whither,' far away from dear Ireland. It made one's heart ache to see them all huddled together, without any expectation of ever revisiting their native soil. We feared that the sorrow of leaving home for ever, the miserable accommodations on board the ship which had brought them away, and the tossing of the angry ocean, in a long and dreary voyage, would have rendered them callous to good behaviour. But it was quite otherwise. They conducted themselves with great propriety. Every American on board seemed to feel for them. And then they were so full of wretchedness. Need and oppression stared within their eyes. Upon their backs hung ragged misery. The world was not their friend.' 'Poor dear Ireland,' exclaimed an aged female, as I was talking to her, 'I shall never see it any more!'"-(Pp. 259, 260.)

And thus it is in every region of the earth! There is no country where an Englishman can set his foot, that he does not meet these miserable victims of English cruelty and oppression-banished from their country by the stupidity, bigotry, and meanness of the English people, who trample on their liberty and conscience, because each man is afraid, in anotheir reign, of being out of favour, and losing his share in the spoil.

We are always glad to see America praised (slavery excepted). And yet there is still, we fear, a party in this country who are glad to pay their court to the timid and the feeble, by sneering at this great spectacle of human happiness. We never think of it without considering it as a great lesson to the people of England, to look into their own affairs, to watch and suspect their rulers, and not to be defrauded of happiness and money by pompous names and false pretences.

"Our western brother is in possession of a country replete with everything that can con tribute to the happiness and comfort of mankind. His code of laws, purified by experience and common sense, has fully answered the expectations of the public. By acting up to the true spirit of this code, he has reaped immense advantages from it. His advancement, as a nation, has been rapid beyond all calculation; and, young as he is, it may be remarked, without any impropriety, that he is now actually reading a salutary lesson to the rest of the civilised world.”—(P. 273.)

Now, what shall we say, after all, of Mr. Waterton? That he has spent a great part of his life in wandering in the wild scenes he describes, and that he describes them with entertaining zeal and real feeling. His stories draw largely sometimes on our faith; but a man who lives in the woods of Cayenne must do many odd things, and see many odd things-things utterly unknown to the dwellers in Hackney and Highgate. We do not want to rein up Mr. Waterton too tightly-because we are convinced he goes best with his head free. But a little less of apostrophe, and some faint suspicion of his own powers of humour, would improve this gentleman's style. As it is, he has a considerable talent at describing. He abounds with good feeling; and has written a very entertaining book, which hurries the reader out of his European parlour, into the heart of tropical forests, and gives, over the rules and the cultivation of the civilized parts of the earth, a momentary superiority to the freedom of the savage, and the wild beauties of Nature. We honestly recommend the book to our readers: it is well worth the perusal.

GRANBY. (E. REVIEW, February, 1826.)

Granby. A Novel in Three Volumes. London: Colburn. 1826. THERE is nothing more amusing in the spectacles of the present day, than to see the Sir John's and Sir Thomas's of the House of Commons struck aghast by the useful science and wise novelties of Mr. Huskisson and the Chancellor of the Exchequer. Treason, Disaffection, Atheism, Republicanism, and Socinianism-the great guns in the Noodle's park of artillery,

-they cannot bring to bear upon these gentlemen. Even to charge with a regiment of ancestors is not quite so efficacious as it used to be; and all that remains, therefore, is to rail against Peter M'Culloch and Political Economy! In the meantime, day after day, down goes one piece of nonsense or another. The most approved trash, and the most trusty clamours, are found to be utterly powerless. Twopenny taunts and trumpery truisms have lost their destructive omnipotence; and the exhausted common-placemen, and the afflicted fool, moan over the ashes of Imbecility, and strew flowers on the urn of Ignorance! General Elliot found the London tailors in a state of mutiny, and he raised from them a regiment of light cavalry, which distinguished itself in a very striking manner at the battle of Minden. In humble imitation of this example, we shall avail ourselves of the present political disaffection and unsatisfactory idleness of many men of rank and consequence, to request their attention to the Novel of Granby-written, as we have heard, by a young gentleman of the name of Lister, and from which we have derived a considerable deal of pleasure and entertainment.

The main question as to a novel is-did it amuse? were you surprised at dinner coming so soon? did you mistake eleven for ten, and twelve for eleven? were you too late to dress? and did you sit up beyond the usual hour? If a novel produces these effects, it is good; if it does not-story, language, love, scandal itself cannot save it. It is only meant to please; and it must do that, or it does nothing. Now Granby seems to us to answer this test extremely well; it produces unpunctuality, makes the reader too late for dinner, impatient of contradiction, and inattentive,—even if a bishop is making an observation, or a gentleman, lately from the Pyramids, or the Upper Cataracts, is let loose upon the drawing-room. The objection, indeed, to these compositions, when they are well done is, that it is impossible to do anything, or perform any human duty, while we are engaged in them. Who can read Mr. Hallam's Middle Ages, or extract the root of an impossible quantity, or draw up a bond, when he is in the middle of Mr. Trebeck and Lady Charlotte Duncan? How can the boy's lessons he heard, about the Jove-nourished Achilles, or his six miserable verses upon Dido be corrected, when Henry Granby and Mr. Courtenay are both making love to Miss Jermyn? Common life palls in the middle of these artificial scenes. All is emotion when the book is open-all dull, flat, and feeble when it is shut.

Granby, a young man of no profession, living with an old uncle in the country, falls in love with Miss Jermyn, and Miss Jermyn with him; but Sir Thomas and Lady Jermyn, as the young gentleman is not rich, having discovered, by long living in the world, and patient observation of its ways, that young people are commonly Malthus-proof and have children, and that young and old must eat, very naturally do what they can to discourage the union. The young people, however, both go to town-meet at balls-flutter, blush, look and cannot speak-speak and cannot look, suspect, misinterpret, are sad and mad, peevish and jealous, fond and foolish; but the passion, after all, seems less near to its accomplishment at the end of the season than the beginning. The uncle of Granby, however, dies, and leaves to his nephew a statement accompanied with the requisite proofs-that Mr. Tyrrel, the supposed son of Lord Malton, is illegitimate, and that he, Granby, is the heir to Lord Malton's fortune. The second volume is now far advanced, and it is time for Lord Malton to die. Accordingly Mr. Lister very judiciously despatches him; Granby inherits the estate-his virtues (for what shows off virtue like land?) are discovered by the Jermyns—and they marry in the last act.

Upon this slender story, the author has succeeded in making a very agreeable and interesting novel; and he has succeeded, we think, chiefly