qualities, and propagate its choicest kinds. The prime sort is obtained from the Laurus Cinnamonum. The leaf resembles the laurel in shape, but is not of so deep a green. When chewed it has the smell and taste of cloves. There are several different species of cinnamon trees on the island; but four sorts only are cultivated and barked. The picture which we have just quoted from Mr. Percival, of a morning ride in a cinnamon wood, is so enchanting, that we are extremely sorry the addition of aromatic odours cannot with veracity be made to it. The cinnamon has, unfortunately, no smell at all but to the nostrils of the poet. Mr. Percival gives us a very interesting account of the process of making up cinnamon for the market, in which we are sorry our limits will not permit us to follow him. The different qualities of the cinnamon bundles can only be estimated by the taste; an office which devolves upon the medical men of the settlement, who are employed for several days together in chewing cinnamon, the acrid juice of which excoriates the mouth, and puts them to the most dreadful tortures. The island of Ceylon is completely divided into two parts by a very high range of mountains, on the two sides of which the climate and the seasons are entirely different. These mountains also terminate completely the effect of the monsoons, which set in periodically from opposite sides of them. On the west side, the rains prevail in the months of May, June, and July, the season when they are felt on the Malabar coast. This monsoon is usually extremely violent during its continuance. The northern parts of the island are very little affected. In the months of October and November, when the opposite monsoon sets in on the Coromandel coast, the north of the island is attacked; and scarcely any impression reaches the southern parts. The heat during the day is nearly the same throughout the year: the rainy season renders the nights much cooler. The climate, upon the whole, is much more temperate than on the continent of India. The temperate and healthy climate of Ceylon is, however, confined to the seacoast. In the interior of the country, the obstructions which the thick woods oppose to the free circulation of air, render the heat almost insupportable, and generate a low and malignant fever, known to Europeans by the name of the Jungle fever. The chief harbours of Ceylon are Trincomalee, Point de Galle, and, at certain seasons of the year, Columbo. The former of these, from its nature and situation, is that which stamps Ceylon one of our most valuable acquisitions in the East Indies. As soon as the monsoons commence, every vessel caught by them in any other part of the Bay of Bengal is obliged to put to sea immediately, in order to avoid destruction. At these seasons, Trincomalee alone, of all the parts on this side of the peninsula, is capable of affording to vessels a safe retreat; which a vessel from Madras may reach in two days. These circumstances render the value of Trincomalee much greater than that of the whole island; the revenue of which will certainly be hardly sufficient to defray the expense 45 of the establishments kept up there. The agriculture of Ceylon is, in fact, in such an imperfect state, and the natives have so little availed themselves of its natural fertility, that great part of the provisions necessary for its support are imported from Bengal. Ceylon produces the elephant, the buffalo, tiger, elk, wild-hog, rabbit, hare, flying-fox, and musk-rat. Many articles are rendered entirely useless by the smell of musk, which this latter animal communicates in merely running over them. Mr. Percival asserts (and the fact has been confirmed to us by the most respectable authority), that if it even pass over a bottle of wine, however well corked and sealed up, the wine becomes so strongly tainted with musk, that it cannot be used; and a whole cask may be rendered useless in the same manner. Among the great variety of birds, we were struck with Mr. Percival's account of the honey-bird, into whose body the soul of a common informer appears to have migrated. It makes a loud and shrill noise, to attract the notice of anybody whom it may perceive; and thus inducing him to follow the course it points out, leads him to the tree where the bees have concealed their treasure; after the apiary has been robbed, this feathered scoundrel gleans his reward from the hive. The list of Ceylonese snakes is hideous; and we become reconciled to the crude and cloudy land in which we live, from reflecting, that the indiscriminate activity of the sun generates what is loathsome, as well as what is lovely; that the asp reposes under the rose; and the scorpion crawls under the fragrant flower and the luscious fruit. The usual stories are repeated here, of the immense size and voracious appetite of a certain species of serpent. The best history of this kind we ever remember to have read, was of a serpent killed near one of our settlements, in the East Indies; in whose body they found the chaplain of the garrison, all in black, the Rev. Mr. -(somebody or other, whose name we have forgotten), and who, after having been missing for above a week, was discovered in this very inconvenient situation. The dominions of the King of Candia are partly defended by leeches, which abound in the woods, and from which our soldiers suffered in the most dreadful manner. The Ceylonese, in compensation for their animated plagues, are endowed with two vegetable blessings, the cocoa-nut tree and the talipot tree. The latter affords a prodigious leaf, impenetrable to sun or rain, and large enough to shelter ten men. It is a natural umbrella, and is of as eminent service in that country as a great-coat tree would be in this. A leaf of the talipot tree is a tent to the soldier, a parasol to the traveller, and a book to the scholar. The cocoa tree affords bread, milk, oil, wine, spirits, vinegar, yeast, sugar, cloth, paper, huts, and ships. We could with great pleasure proceed to give a farther abstract of this very agreeable and interesting publication, which we very strongly recommend to the public. It is written with great modesty, entirely without pre * All books are written upon it in Ceylon 2 G 2 tensions, and abounds with curious and import- | have made the very basis of our literary unant information. Mr. Percival will accept our dertaking, should so frequently compel us to best thanks for the amusement he has afforded speak of the authors who come before us, in a us. When we can praise with such justice, style so different from that in which we have we are always happy to do it; and regret that vindicated the merits of Mr. Percival. the rigid and independent honesty which we DELPHINE.* [EDINBURGH REVIEW, 1803.] away from the nunnery with Leonce, who is taken by some French soldiers, upon the supposition that he has been serving in the French emigrant army against his country-is shot, and upon his dead body falls Delphine as dead as he. THIS dismal trash, which has nearly dislocated the jaws of every critic among us with gaping, has so alarmed Bonaparte, that he has seized the whole impression, sent Madame de Staël out of Paris, and, for aught we know, sleeps in a night-cap of steel, and daggerproof blankets. To us it appears rather an Making every allowance for reading this attack upon the Ten Commandments than the book in a translation, and in a very bad transgovernment of Bonaparte, and calculated not lation, we cannot but deem it a heavy perso much to enforce the rights of the Bourbons, formance. The incidents are vulgar; the chaas the benefits of adultery, murder, and a great racters vulgar, too, except those of Delphine number of other vices, which have been some- and Madame de Vernon. Madame de Staël how or other strangely neglected in this coun- has not the artifice to hide what is coming. try, and too much so (according to the ap-In travelling through a flat country, or a flat parent opinion of Madame de Staël) even in France. book, we see our road before us for half the distance we are going. There are to agreeable sinuosities, and no speculations whether we are to ascend next, or descend; what new sight we are to enjoy, or to which side we are to bend. Leonce is robbed and half murdered, the apothecary of the place is certain he will not live; we were absolutely certain that he would live, and could predict to an hour the It happens, however, fortunately enough, that her book is as dull as it could have been if her intentions had been good; for wit, dexterity, and the pleasant energies of the mind, seldom rank themselves on the side of virtue and social order; while vice is spiritual, eloquent, and alert, ever choice in expression, happy in allusion, and judicious in arrange-time of his recovery. In the same manner ment. The story is simply this.-Delphine, a rich young widow, presents her cousin Matilda de Vernon with a considerable estate, in order to enable her to marry Leonce Mondeville. To this action she is excited by the arts and the intrigues of Madame de Vernon, an hackneyed Parisian lady, who hopes, by this marriage, to be able to discharge her numerous and pressing debts. Leonce, who, like all other heroes of novels, has fine limbs, and fine qualities, comes to Paris-dislikes Matilda-falls in love with Delphine, Delphine with him; and they are upon the eve of jilting poor Matilda, when, from some false reports spread abroad respect ing the character of Delphine (which are aggravated by her own imprudences, and by the artifices of Madame Vernon), Leonce, not in a fit of honesty, but of revenge, marries the lady whom he came to marry. Soon after, Madame de Vernon dies-discovers the artifices by which she had prevented the union of Leonce and Delphine-and then, after this catastrophe, which ought to have terminated the novel, come two long volumes of complaint and despair. Delphine becomes a nun-runs we could have prophesied every event of the book a whole volume before its occurrence. This novel is a perfect Alexandrian. The two last volumes are redundant, and drag their wounded length: it should certainly have terminated where the interest ceases, at the death of Madame de Vernon; but, instead of this, the scene-shifters come and pick up the dead bodies, wash the stage, sweep it, and do every thing which the timely fall of the curtain should have excluded from the sight, and left to the imagination of the audience. We humbly apprehend, that young gentlemen do not in general make their tutors the confidants of their passion; at least we can find no rule of that kind laid down either by Miss Hamilton or Miss Edgeworth, in their treatises on education. The tutor of Leonce is Mr. Barton, a grave old gentleman, in a peruke and snuffcoloured clothes. Instead of writing to this solemn personage about second causes, the ten categories, and the eternal fitness of things, the young lover raves to him, for whole pages, about the white neck and auburn hair of his Delphine; and, shame to tell! the liquorish old pedagogue seems to think these amorous ebullitions the pleasantest sort of writing in usum Delphini that he has yet met with. By altering one word, and making only one alse quantity, we shall change the rule of | cannot endure this Paris; I have met with ever Horace to "Nec febris intersit nisi dignus vindice nodus Inciderit.". so many people whom my soul abhors." And the accomplished and enraptured Leonce termi nates one of his letters thus: "Adieu! Adieu, my dearest Delphine! I will give you a call tomorrow." We doubt if Grub street ever im ported from Caledonia a more abominable translator. Delphine and Leonce have eight very bad typhus fevers between them, besides hemoptoe, hemorrhage, deliquium animi, singultus, hysteria, and faminei ululatus, or screams innumerable. Now, that there should be a reasonable allow- We admit the character of Madame de Verance of sickness in every novel, we are will-non to be drawn with considerable skill. There ing to admit, and will cheerfully permit the heroine to be once given over, and at the point of death; but we cannot consent, that the interest which ought to be excited by the feelings of the mind should be transferred to the sufferings of the body, and a crisis of perspiration be substituted for a crisis of passion. Let us see difficulties overcome, if our approbation is required; we cannot grant it to such cheap and sterile artifices as these. The characters in this novel are all said to be drawn from real life; and the persons for whom they are intended are loudly whispered at Paris. Most of them we have forgotten; but Delphine is said to be intended for the authoress, and Madame de Vernon (by a slight sexual metamorphosis) for Talleyrand, minister of the French republic for foreign affairs. As this lady (once the friend of the authoress) may probably exercise a considerable influence over the destinies of this country, we shall endeavour to make our readers a little better acquainted with her; but we must first remind them that she was once a bishop, a higher dignity in the church than was ever attained by any of her sex since the days of Pope Joan; and that though she swindles Delphine out of her estate with a considerable degree of address, her dexterity sometimes fails her, as in the memorable instance of the American commissioners. Madame de Staël gives the following description of this pastoral metropolitan female: are occasional traits of eloquence and pathos in this novel, and very many of those observations upon manners and character, which are totally out of the reach of all who have lived not long in the world, and observed it well. The immorality of any book (in our estimation) is to be determined by the general impression it leaves on those minds, whose principles, not yet ossified, are capable of affording a less powerful defence to its influence. The most dangerous effect that any fictitious character can produce, is when two or three of its popular vices are varnished over with every thing that is captivating and gracious in the exterior, and ennobled by association with splendid virtues: this apology will be more sure of its effect, if the faults are not against nature, but against society. The aversion to murder and cruelty could not perhaps be so overcome; but a regard to the sanctity of marriage vows, to the sacred and sensitive delicacy of the female character, and to numberless restrictions important to the well-being of our species, may easily be relaxed by this subtle and voluptuous confusion of good and evil. It is in vain to say the fable evinces, in the last act, that vice is productive of misery. We may decorate a villain with graces and felicities for nine volumes, and hang him in the last page. This is not teaching virtue, but gilding the gallows, and raising up splendid associations in favour of being hanged. In such an “Though she is at least forty, she still ap- union of the amiable and the vicious, (espepears charming even among the young and cially if the vices are such, to the commission beautiful of her own sex. The paleness of of which there is no want of natural disposiher complexion, the slight relaxation of her tion,) the vice will not degrade the man, but features, indicate the languor of indisposition, the man will ennoble the vice. We shall and not the decay of years; the easy negli- wish to be him we admire, in spite of his vices, gence of her dress accords with this impres- and, if the novel be well written, even in consion. Every one concludes, that when her | sequence of his vice. There exists, through the health is recovered, and she dresses with more whole of this novel, a show of exquisite sencare, she must be completely beautiful: this sibility to the evils which individuals suffer by change, however, never happens, but it is al- the inflexible rules of virtue prescribed by soways expected; and that is sufficient to make ciety, and an eager disposition to apologize the imagination still add something more to the for particular transgressions. Such doctrine natural effect of her charms."-(Vol. I. p. 21.) is not confined to Madame de Staël; an ArcaNothing can be more execrable than the dian cant is gaining fast upon Spartan gravity; manner in which this book is translated. The and the happiness diffused, and the beautiful bookseller has employed one of our country-order established in society, by this unbending men for that purpose, who appears to have been very lately caught. The contrast between the passionate exclamations of Madame de Staël, and the barbarous vulgarities of poor Sawney, produces a mighty ludicrous effect. One of the heroes, a man of high fastidious temper, exclaims in a letter to Delphine, "I * Perhaps a fault of all others which the English are least disposed to pardon. A young man, who, on a public occasion, makes a false quantity at the outset of life, ean seldom or never get over it. discipline, are wholly swallowed up in compassion for the unfortunate and interesting individual. Either the exceptions or the rule must be given up: every highwayman who thrusts his pistol into a chaise window has met with unforeseen misfortunes; and every loose matron who flies into the arms of her Greville was compelled to marry an old man whom she detested, by an avaricious and unfeeling fa ther. The passions want not accelerating, but retarding machinery. This fatal and foolish sophistry has power enough over every heart, | types of which Mr. Lane, of the Minerva Press, not to need the aid of fine composition, and very prudently keeps ready composed, in order well-contrived incident-auxiliaries which Ma- to facilitate the printing of the Adventures of dame de Staël intended to bring forward in the Captain C and Miss F, and other incause, though she has fortunately not suc-teresting stories, of which he, the said inimiceeded. table Mr. Lane, of the Minerva Press, well knows these sentiments must make a part Another perilous absurdity which this useful production tends to cherish, is the common notion, that contempt of rule and order is a proof of greatness of mind. Delphine is everywhere a great spirit struggling with the shackles imworld around her; and it is managed so that her contempt of restrictions shall always appear to flow from the extent, variety, and splendour of her talents. The vulgarity of this heroism ought in some degree to diminish its value. Mr. Colquhoun, in his Police of the Metropolis, reckons up above 40,000 heroines of this species, most of whom, we dare to say, have at one time or another reasoned like the sentimental Delphine about the judgments of the world. M. de Serbellone is received as a guest into the house of M. d'Ervins, whose wife he debauches as a recompense for his hospitality. Is it possible to be disgusted with ingratitude and injustice, when united to such an assemblage of talents and virtues as this man of paper possesses? Was there ever a more deposed upon her in common with the little lightful, fascinating adulteress than Madame d'Ervins is intended to be? or a povero cornuto less capable of exciting compassion than her husband? The morality of all this is the old morality of Farquhar, Vanburgh, and Congreve that every witty man may transgress the seventh commandment, which was never meant for the protection of husbands who labour under the incapacity of making repartees. In Matilda, religion is always as unamiable as dissimulation is graceful in Madame de Vernon, and imprudence generous in Delphine. This said Delphine, with her fine auburn hair, and her beautiful blue or green eyes (we forget which), cheats her cousin Matilda out of her lover, alienates the affections of her husband, and keeps a sort of assignation house for Serbellone and his chère amie, justifying herself by the most touching complaints against the rigour of the world, and using the customary phrases, union of souls, married in the eye of heaven, &c. &c. &c., and such like diction, the To conclude-Our general opinion of this book is, that it is calculated to shed a mild lustre over adultery; by gentle and convenient gradation, to destroy the modesty and the caution of women; to facilitate the acquisition of easy vices, and encumber the difficulty of vir tue. What a wretched qualification of this censure to add, that the badness of the princi ple is alone corrected by the badness of the style, and that this celebrated lady would have been very guilty, if she had not been very dull! MISSION TO ASHANTEE.* [EDINBURGH Review, 1819.] CAPE COAST CASTLE, or Cape Corso, is a Durham to Edinburgh; and yet the kingdom factory of Africa, on the Gold Coast. The of Ashantee was, before the mission of Mr. Portuguese settled here in 1610, and built the Bowdich, almost as much unknown to us as citadel; from which, in a few years after- if it had been situated in some other planet. wards, they were dislodged by the Dutch. In The country which surrounds Cape Coast 1661, it was demolished by the English under Castle belongs to the Fantees; and, about the Admiral Holmes; and by the treaty of Breda, year 1807, an Ashantee army reached the it was made over to our government. The coast for the first time. They invaded Fantee latitude of Cape Coast Castle is 5° 6′ north; again in 1811, and, for the third time, in 1816. the longitude 1° 51' west. The capital of the To put a stop to the horrible cruelties comkingdom of Ashantee is Coomassie, the lati-mitted by the stronger on the weaker nation; tude of which is about 6° 30′ 20′′ north, and the longitude 2° 6' 30" west. The mission quitted Cape Coast Castle on the 22d of April, and arrived at Coomassie about the 16th of May-halting two or three days on the route, and walking the whole distance, or carried by hammock-bearers at a foot-pace. The distance between the fort and the capital is not more than 150 miles, or about as far as from *Mission from Cape Coast Castle to Ashantee, with a Statistical Account of that Kingdom, and Geographical Notices of other Parts of the Interior of Africa. By T. EDWARD BOWDICH, Esq., Conductor London, MurJav, 1819. to secure their own safety, endangered by the Ashantees; and to enlarge our knowledge of Africa-the government of Cape Coast Castle persuaded the African committee to send a deputation to the kingdom of Ashantee; and of this embassy the publication now before us is the narrative. The embassy walked through a beautiful country, laid waste by the recent wars, and arrived in the time we have mentioned, and without meeting with any remarkable accident at Coomassie, the capital. The account of their first reception there we shall lay before our readers. "We entered Coomassie at two o'clock, pass ing under a fetish, or sacrifice of a dead sheep, wrapped up in red silk, and suspended between two lofty poles. Upwards of 5000 people, the greater part warriors, met us with awful bursts of martial music, discordant only in its mixture; for horns, drums, rattles, and gong-gongs, were all exerted with a zeal bordering on frenzy, to subdue us by the first impression. The smoke which encircled us from the incessant discharges of musketry, confined our glimpses to the foreground; and we were halted whilst the captains performed their Pyrrhic dance, in the centre of a circle formed by their warriors; where a confusion of flags, English, Dutch, and Danish, were waved and flourished in all directions; the bearers plunging and springing from side to side, with a passion of enthusiasm only equalled by the captains, who followed them, discharging their shining blunderbusses so close, that the flags now and then were in a blaze; and emerging from the smoke with all the gesture and distortion of maniacs. Their followers kept up the firing around us in the rear. The dress of the captains was a war cap, with gilded rams' horns projecting in front, the sides extended beyond all proportion by immense plumes of eagles' feathers, and fastened under the chin with bands of cowries. Their vest was of red cloth, covered with fetishes and saphies in gold and silver; and embroidered cases of almost every colour, which flapped against their bodies as they moved, intermixed with small brass bells, the horns and tails of animals, shells, and knives; long leopards' tails hung down their backs, over a small bow covered with fetishes. They wore loose cotton trowsers, with immense boots of a dull red leather, coming half way up the thigh, and fastened by small chains to their cartouch or waist belt; these were also ornamented with bells, horses' tails, strings of amulets, and innumerable shreds of leather; a small quiver of poisoned arrows hung from their right wrist, and they held a long iron chain between their teeth with a scrap of Moorish writing affixed to the end of it. A small spear was in their left hands, covered with red cloth and silk tassels; their black countenances heightened the effect of this attire and completed a figure scarcely human. "This exhibition continued about half an hour, when we were allowed to proceed, encircled by the warriors, whose numbers, with the crowds of people, made our movement as gradual as if it had taken place in Cheapside; the several streets branching off to the right presented long vistas crammed with people; and those on the left hand being on an acclivity, innumerable rows of heads rose one above another: the large open porches of the houses, like the fronts of stages in small theatres, were filled with the better sort of females and children, all impatient to behold white men for the first time; their exclamations were drowned in the firing and music, but their gestures were in character with the scene. When we reached the palace, about half a mile from the place where we entered, we were again halted, and an open file was made, through which the bearers were passed, to deposit the presents and baggage in the house assigned to us. Here we were gratified by observing several of the caboceers (chiefs) pass by with their trains, the novel splendour of which astonished us. The bands, principally composed of horns and flutes, trained to play in concert, seemed to soothe our hearing into its natural tone again by their wild melodies; whilst the immense umbrellas, made to sink and rise from the jerkings of the bearers, and the large fans waving around, refreshed us with small currents of air, under a burning sun, clouds of dust, and a density of atmosphere almost suffocating. We were then squeezed, at the same funeral pace, up a long street, to an open-fronted house, where we were desired by a royal messenger to wait a further invitation from the king."-(pp. 31-33.) The embassy remained about four months, leaving one of their members behind as a permanent resident. Their treatment, though subjected to the fluctuating passions of barbarians, was, upon the whole, not bad; and a foundation appears to have been laid for future intercourse with the Ashantees, and a mean opened, through them, of becoming better acquainted with the interior of Africa. The Moors, who seem (barbarians as they are) to be the civilizers of internal Africa, have penetrated to the capital of the Ashantees: they are bigoted and intolerant to Christians, but not sacrificers of human victims in their religious ceremonies;-nor averse to commerce; and civilized in comparison to most of the idolatrous natives of Africa. From their merchants who resorted from various parts of the interior, Mr. Bowdich employed himself in procuring all the geographical details which their travels enabled them to afford. Timbuctoo they described as inferior to Houssa, and not at all comparable to Boornoo. The Moorish influence was stated to be powerful in it, but not predominant. A small river goes nearly round the town, overflowing in the rains, and obliging the people of the suburbs to move to an eminence in the centre of the town where the king lives. The king, a Moorish negro called Billabahada, had a few double-barrelled guns, which were fired on great occasions; and gunpowder was as dear as gold. Mr. Bowdich calculates Houssa to be N. E. from the Niger 20 days' journey of 18 miles each day; and the latitude and longitude to be 18° 59′ N. and 3° 59′ E. Boornoo was spoken of as the first empire in Africa. The Mahometans of Sennaar reckon it among the four powerful empires of the world; the other three being Turkey, Persia, and Abyssinia. The Niger is only known to the Moors by the name of the Quolla, pronounced as Quorra by the negroes, who, from whatever countries they come, all spoke of this as the largest river with which they were acquainted; and it was the grand feature in all the routes to Ashantee, whether from Houssa, Boornoo, or the interme diate countries. The Niger, after leaving the lake Dibbri, was invariably described as dividing into two large streams; the Quolla, or the greater division, pursuing its course southeastward, till it joined the Bahr Abiad; and |