Great care also is taken to destroy the After being gathered, the leaves are suspended by threads of cocuiza (the American agave), their ribs are taken out, and they are twisted into cords. Were the culture and trade free, Cumana might almost furnish Europe with this commodity, so valuable as a branch of trade. Indigo is also produced here: there are in all four species of plants which furnish this article of commerce. publication, and to say more would be misplaced, since the work itself is so completely within the reach of all readers. ACCOUNT OF GREENLAND. From a Journal of a Voyage to Greenland, and of a seven-years Residence between the 60th and 77th degrees of north latitude. By Carl Ludwig Metzler Gieseke, a native of Augsburg, and now Professor of Mineralogy at Dublin. Investigation of the cause of Easter 1818 It is evident that the reform of the Nicene mode of calculating time by the lunar cycle of nineteen years, adjusted to a solar cycle, in which six hours were substituted for 5 48′ 57′′ in every year, though it approximated more nearly to accuracy, was still incorrect; and as very minute discrepancies being repeated, through the lapse of centuries, at length constitute a serious portion of time, it seems equally clear that the error in the Gregorian period, or new style, has now reached a quantum sufficient to cause the wrong ap Jaguar tigers are found in this district, of the immense size of six feet in length. They are so strong as to be able to drag off a horse, and so amaz-pointment of the ensuing Easter. ingly fierce that they not only do not flee from men, but will even leap into the waters of the Oronoko to attack the Indians in their canoes. The mistake arises from all the ec baffles This the Greenlander can eat the leaves and roots clesiastical tables laying down the full-present picturesque views. moon for the twenty-first of March next, instead of the true time, by astronoOur space forbids us to enter at pre-mical calculation, at 44 minutes past sent into any of the geological matter 2 p. m. on the twenty-second, which is so copiously handled in the portion of a Sunday; and as the Church directs, the volume which we have analyzed; that "Easter Day, (on which the rest nor can we even visit the volcanic, or of the Moveable Feasts and Holidays rather meteoric, districts of Cuchivano, depend) is always to be the first Sunday which afforded so much food for re- after the full moon, which happens upon search to the travellers. In these parts or next after, the 21st day of March; the sugar-cane, and cotton, and coffee- and if the full moon happens on a tree flour ish; wild silk (seda silvestre) Sunday, Easter-day is the Sunday the most eautiful woods for turnery, Easter Sunday is fixed for the very day is found suspended from the branches; after;" it consequently happens, that unknown to Europe, abound; and every of the full moon, which ought to have thing bespeaks the bounty of nature, indicated it for the ensuing Sunday, acsave only man who knows not how to cording to the church rule, had the convert into 'sefulness the blessings calculation been correct, as it is dewhich surround him. fective. L The contrast here afforded to Greenland, as described, in a succeeding page, is well worthy the contemplation of every reflecting minu Proposals for forming an infallible table, and several other points alluded to, deserve consideration; but we have said enough to attract notice to this The country affords the botanists only alpine plants, mosses, and lichens. No tree rears its head; the dwarf birch, and the arctic willows (salix reticulata, myrrhinites sal.) creep with difficulty, seeking protection from the wind and cold between broken fragments of stone. Only of the rhodiola rosea, the knots of the polygonum viviparum, the flowers and leaves of the saxifraga oppositifolia. But the European, when pressed by hunger, eats with him the oxalis, the angelica, the cochlearia, the vaccinium uliginosum, and the not attain longevity; 50 years is a very vaccinium myrtillus. The natives, bowed down by the severity of the climate, do great age among them. They belong to the Mongol race; the women have, on an average, only three or four children; but they bear with great ease. The natives are of a yellowish complexion, have black, thick, stiff hair; their lips are * The original has, for these two last, Rauschbeere, and Blaubeere; we believe they are the bilberry, or whortleberry, perhaps the cranberry, thick, their eyes jet-black and small, but penetrating. Their hands and feet are small, and well shaped. Their stature seldom exceeds five feet; the women are not perceptibly shorter, and as strong, being hardened by labour for they cover boats, build houses, assist in the fishery near home, and do all kinds of work, except such as is more remote. Except very long hair (Gieseke saw women whose hair was three ells (about six feet) long) they have no beauty in any respect, not even a good shape; and they lose the freshness of youth in their first childbed. They always live as near as possible to the strand, because the cold is there more moderate, and for the sake of catching seals. Except their dogs, they have no cattle; these dogs, which serve them for horses and beasts of burden, live on the refuse of fish, which they find on the coast, and often on the alga marina. They are wild and savage, attack strangers, are faithful to their masters, but ill tempered, and never caressing. The sea-shore is throughout rocky and full of cliffs; no proper meadows between, but turf moor, a soil covered with sour grass, which every where sinks in; but there is moss enough, and on the rocks a great quantity of lichens, of various and beautiful colours, thick, and of luxuriant growth; thyme and angelica fill the solitary plains with perfume. The waterfalls of the great glacier descend magni ficently into the sea between the rocks, clothed with richly coloured mosses. suffer want in the long winters. They have | veller met with, first between the 70th and Their love to their children is boundless! they not only never punish them, but patiently suffer themselves, without exception, to be struck by them; the children (and this is surely a proof of a good disposition) become notwithstanding, when they are grown up, affectionate and obedient to their parents. The men never beat their wives, are not jealous, and have no reason to be so, except when Europeans land, whose attentions to their ugly partners they consider as the greatest honour. The Greenlanders cannot live out of their own country, and die pining away after their icy shores. A fifth part of the people, thinly scattered along the coast, are still heathens. The Christians, as they are called, are not distinguished by more refined ideas or morality. Those who are not Christians have scarcely a glimmering of abstract ideas. They do not adore an omnipotent good being, but an omnipotent evil being; they therefore believe in sorcery, and are extremely superstitious. They bend the heads of the dead upon the knee, lay them between split slates, in a kind of square chest, and pile a great quantity of stones upon them, that dogs and foxes may not devour the corpses. They sometimes put in the grave some delicacy which the deceased was particularly fond of when alive; thus Gieseke saw a seal's head laid in the stone chest. They are not much acquainted with brandy, but love it extra beat their wives and children. ORIGINAL CORRESPONDENCE. letter from Sir William Herbert, of St. SIR, Peruse this letter in God's name : be not disquieted: I reverance your hoary hair. Altho' in your son I find too much folly and lewdness, yet in you I expect gravity and wisdom. It hath pleased your son, late of Bristol, to deliver a challenge to a man of mine, on the behalf of a gentleman (as he said) as good as myself; who he was, he named not; neither do I know. But if he be as good as myself, it must either be for virtue, for birth, for ability; or for calling and dignity. For virtue I think he meant not; for it is a thing which exceeds his judgement. If for When the sun returns after the long birth, he must be the heir of an earl; the night, they hail it with dances and cries of heir in blood to ten earles; for, in testimony joy, and call these days only, the feast. thereof, I bear their several coats. BeThey have no kind of tradition, but in the sides, he must be of the blood Royal; for, long nights compose a kind of stories of by my grandmother Devereux, I am lineally ghosts, &c. which are always forgotten, and and legitimately descended out of the body succeeded by new ones. They dread and of Edward the Fourth. If for ability, he avoid the places where any one is buried. must have a thousand pounds a year in The increasing depopulation of this coast possession, a thousand pound a year more dates from the time when the Europeans in expectation, and must have some thoubrought them the small-pox and another sands in substance besides. If for calling disease: all cutaneous disorders are very and dignity, he must be a knight, and dangerous in this climate. Their greatest lord of several seignories in several kingdelicacies are the eggs of the birds of pas-doms, and likewise of his county, and a sage and water-fowl; but these cannot be Councellor of a provence. Now, to lay all kept, because the birds appear in the hot circumstances aside, be it known to your months of May, June, and July; they are son, or to any man else, that if there be also very fond of the blue muscle, which any one who beareth the name of a gentlethe sea throws on their shores in great man, and whose words are of reputation in quantities. They pass the long night in a his county, that doth say, or dare say, that state between dreaming and waking; they sleep, wake, and eat, during this time, with out regard to time and order. The inhabitants build their houses almost always in the nooks of rocks, and leaning against the rocks. The mica-slate (glimmer-vagantly, are easily intoxicated, and then schiefer) which is easily split into tables, furnishes them with the materials; of this they build walls, with alternate layers of turf, which they line inside with moss: the roof is of bushes interwoven, (as they are wholly destitute of wood, and the ships seldom bring any) which they cover flat with turf. This miserable roof seldom affords shelder, and must be frequently renewed. A small square low room forms the inside of the dwelling; generally 15 feet square, in which often twenty people live day and night! The window openings are covered with the entrails of seals; a long passage of stone and turf, but so narrow and low, that only one person can crawl through at a time, leads to this den; before and near it, all the dirt and refuse of the seals is piled up, to keep them warmer. The beds of the rich consist of moss and seal skins; the poor lie on the bare ground. They never make fire, because they have neither roofs nor chimneys; but their train oil lamps serve them for warmth and for cookery. The seal's flesh is soon stewed, in pots which hang by straps of seal skin. It is very hot in these huts or dens, the fil-pect a rich harvest of mineralogical and thiness of which is horrible! They are utterly destitute of forethought; thus, when they have been uncommonly successful in catching fish or seals, they do not bury the overplus in the snow against a time of need; hence they often have done unjustly, spoken an untruth, staind my credit and reputation in the matter, or in any matter else wherein your As the traveller is a zealous mineralogist, son is exasperated, I say he lieth in his and pupil of Werner, the world may ex-throt, and my sword shall maintain my word upon him in any place or provence wheresoever he dare, and I stand not sworn to observe the peace. But if they be such as are within my governance, and over whom I have no authority, I will, for their reformation, chastise them with justice; and, for their malapert misdemeanor, bind them geological facts, as well as some meteoro- The following day, at seven in the morning, we were waked by the bright beams of the sun; the sky was serene, and blue. A perpendicular column of smoke rose from Etna into the air. We got ourselves ready in haste, and, to the astonishment of the good Gemmellaro, and every body at Nicofosi, we were mounted in an hour for the third time, to try our fortune once more against the volcano, which had hitherto been so impracticable to our wishes. Accompanied by the friendly, sensible, and bold guide, Antonino Barbagallo, we left Nicolosi, and rode without stopping past the lava beds, to the Goat's Cavern, at the end of the woody region. Here, under the agreeable shade of the oaks, we took a slight breakfast; the lovely green of the forest, blended with the purest azure of the heavens, and a shepherd played romantic airs on his flute, while his nimble goats grazed on a little spot, in the middle of the once fluid ocean of fire; the dark blue sea, mingled in the distance with the placid sky -Oh! what delight then filled our souls! The faithful mules carried us again through the intricate lava paths into the desert regions; but this time we passed without visiting the fatal Grotto del Castelluccio, to the house of Gemmellaro, sometimes full of apprehension, as the clouds began again to cross one another rapidly; but yet there were moments when the sky was quite clear and serene. Here, at Gemmellaro's house, we already enjoyed a part of the heavenly prospect which awaited us, over the sea and the whole island. The clouds floated rapidly in large masses, as if to a battle; every thing was in commotion, and, most of all, our souls. Our excellent Antonino contrived to prepare for us, in haste, a little dinner. We soon had the snow and lava fields, at the foot of the immense ash cone, behind us, and now actually ascended it; a troublesome way, as at every step we sunk in the loose volcanic sand, losing almost as much back as we gained forwards; but joy gave us wings. Already we had passed over the beds of yellow sulphur; already the ground under us began to feel hot in places, and to smoke out of many hundred little craters; while round the summit itself the clouds sometimes collected in thick masses, and sometimes allowed us to see clearly the grand object of our wishes. At last the guide, who was some steps before us, called out, Behold here the highest crater :" these words gave us new speed, and in a few minutes we stood towards Italy and Africa; and we saw the sea flow round Cape Trapani. At our feet lay the bold rocks of the Eolian Islands, and from Stromboli a vast column of smoke rose above the waves. The Neptunian and Heroan mountains, covered with the thickest forests, extended before our eyes in all their branches over the whole island. To the east we saw, as on a large map, the whole of Calabria, the Gulph of Tarento, and the Straits of Messina. But how is it We instantly determined to descend into the crater, and though our resolute guide assured us beforehand, that it would now be impossible, as the smoke did not rise perpendicularly, but filled the crater, he was willing to make a trial. We followed him a little way, but the thick, almost pal-possible to excite, in the mind of a person pable sulphureous vapour, soon involved us at a distance, even a faint conception of in a thick night, and would have burst the the innumerable brilliant colours of the strongest lungs. sky, the earth, and the sea, which here almost dazzle the eye? We then went up to the southern horn, and here lay astonished on the hot sulphur, After we had contemplated this astonishamidst smoke, vapours, and thunder. The ing scene for about two hours, we quickly hot ashes burned us, the sulphureous va- descended the cone to Gemmellaro's house, pours stifled us, the storm threatened to where we made the happiest triumphal rehurl us into the abyss; our souls were past that was any where celebrated at that scarcely equal to the irresistible force of moment,-at least at so great an elevation. the sublimest impressions. In the vallies Antonino then sent the sumpter horses beneath, full of black lava and white snow, down to the Grotto del Castellucci by the and over the bright surface of the sea, other guide; but we ourselves took the diwhich looked like a plane of polished steel, rection to the west, all with closed eyes, and seemed to lean obliquely to the sky, led by our guide, to the brink of the Val immense hosts of clouds sailed slowly del Bue. We have already observed that along; but when they came near to the this most horrid abyss that ever our eyes volcano, the furious hurricane, in which beheld, was caused by a subterraneous torwe could scarcely keep our feet, seized rent of lava, which undermined all the them, and precipitated them with gigantic mountains that stood above it ;-hence the force ten thousand feet down on the plains infernal brown-red colours of this preciand seas of Sicily and Italy. We then pro-pice, which is many miles in length; and ceeded round the edge of the crater to the though we could not see any trace of vegenorthern horn: and here enjoyed a pros- tation, yet the diversity of tints was inpect, which in sublimity, and overpower-finite. We rolled down large blocks of ing grandeur, doubtless exceeds any thing lava, but they broke into dust before they that the faculties of man can conceive. The had fallen one half of the dreadful way, and clouds of smoke rose from the crater, where we did not hear them strike in their dethe raging storm, which, like artillery, or scent. Compared with this horrid cleft of innumerable bells, drowned every other the lava, even the abyss of the Rhine at the sound, rent them asunder, and, with the Viamala, in the Grisons, is pleasant and rapidity of lightning, threw them into the agreeable. Here we look, as it were, into abyss below. The pointed cone on which the heart of desolation. While we were we stood was covered with a yellow sul- still contemplating this extraordinary valphur, white salt, and black ashes. The ley, Etna itself prepared for us a new and sun appeared very strange through the wonderful sight. As the sun was descendyellow sulphur, and gave to this singular ing into the western sea, the gigantic picture such a terrible and savage tone, shadow of the volcano projected for many that in looking only at the objects imme-miles over the blue sea, towards Italy, and diately surrounding us, we could not help then rose, like an enormous pyramid, high fancying ourselves in the horrid dominion in the air, on the hedge of the horizon, so of the prince of the infernal hosts. Every- that the stars seemed to sparkle upon its where we beheld the war of the elements, summit. desolation, and conflagration: nowhere a living creature, or even a blade of grass, which these contending elements had spared. What a scene must it be, when the volcano throws the column of smoke and fire, which it perhaps raises from the bottom of the sea, twenty thousand feet towards the heavens! So ended this richest and happiest day of our journey, and perhaps of our lives. We then mounted our mules, which brought us in safety over the rugged fields of lava, in profound darkness, about midnight, to Nicolosi, where the worthy Gemmellaro waited for us with impatience. Transported with our success, we filled him But if we turn our eyes to the distance, also with the greatest pleasure, and it was it really seems as if we beheld here all the not possible for us to go to sleep. We magnificence of the earth at our feet. We spent the greater part of the night rejoicoverlook the vast mountain, which has it-ing with him and our brave Antonio Barself risen out of the earth, and has pro- bagallo. duced around itself many hundred smaller ones, clothed in dark brown;-the purest azure sky reposes over the land and sea; the triangle of Sicily stretches its points We cannot subjoin a better Appendix to this very interesting description of one of the most magnificent scenes in Nature, JOURNAL OF THE BELLES LETTRES. than the following Obervations from the pen of our Countryman, whose physical powers (as related in the Literary Gazette of the 17th instant) did not enable him to prosecute the arduous enterprize in which his German companions at length succeeded: SIR, To the Editor of the Literary Gazette, No. 50, Stafford Place, Pimlico, As I have the honour to be the English- Your most obedient Servant, GEORGE RUSSELL. OBSERVATIONS made by MR. GEORGE RUSSELL in ascending Mount Etna, on the 30th and 31st May 1815, O'Clock. Degrees 34 P. M. 87 At the Grotto del Castelluccio 44 Upon the snow and lava, about 1000paces from the Casa Inglese, and within 1000 feet, in height, of the Cima, or 54 top of the crater Water boils on the natural or sea level 212 200 190 Do. at the Grotto del Castelluccio Do. within the crater 33 OBSERVATIONS made by the "Three German re-attempt the ascent of Mount Etna. Nicolosi Commencement of the At the Grotto del Castel- At the Casa Inglese 9 At the Cima, or top of the crater Ditto Ditto 31 sett. 294 stand. 28 ditto. The circumference of Mount Etna, about 180 miles. The height above the level of the sea, agreeably to trigonometrical observations made in the EMENDATION OF MILTON. To the Editor of the Literary Gazette. "But cloud instead and ever-during dark Of Nature's works to me expung'd and ras'd, "Presented with a universal blank; All Nature's works to me expung'd and ras'd," THE ALISMA PLANTAGO. (For the Cure of Hydrophobia.) We have already called the attention of the Public and of the Faculty to the Alisma Plantago, of which a drawing is annexed; and which is at present the subject of general investigation upon the continent, as a specific for the cure of hydrophobia. Whether it possesses the qualities attributed to it in Russia and Germany, or not, we have discharged our duty in producing not only a written description of it, and the assertions respecting its healing powers, but also a picture of the plant itself, for pondent; extracts from whose letter, accomwhich we are much indebted to the correspanying the drawing, we also subjoin. In reply to these two crities, Mr, Todd, To the Editor of the Literary Gazette. in his late edition, assures us that “there is little difficulty in this passage, if we con- SIR,-In compliance with the wish exsider wisdom as the genitive case of Na-pressed in one of the Numbers of the LIture's works and of wisdom, &c. TERARY GAZETTE, by a Correspondent, I But in this proposition Mr. Todd has have sent for your acceptance a drawing of fallen into a bull, which it is strange should the reputed valuable plant Alisma Plantago. give a figure of a more perfect specimen ; have escaped so accurate a critic. His I regret much that I am not enabled to reading is, "An universal blank of wisdom at one entrance quite shut out." Now, yet this may serve to give some idea of the how it can be an universal blank, and yet character of the plant. It grows, I may excluded at only one entrance, I leave to venture to say, in most parts of Suffolk, Mr. Todd to explain. With humble dif- certainly with us in great abundance, to the fidence I would propose that the And co-height of two feet above the surface of pulates to But in the 45th line, as thus: ponds and ditches, bearing white flowers, But, instead of the return of the seasons, inclining more or less to a purplish tinge, &c. cloud and ever-during dark, and wis- from the middle of June to August. I have dom at one entrance quite shut out, sur-endeavoured to express the form of the rounds me,' is my lot" the rest of the sentence being taken parenthetically At any rate, whatever becomes of my proposition, and it is very slightly urged, Mr. Todd's must fall to the ground. cannot do better than refer to Dr. Smith's | mer notice : JUVENIS. On the Alisma Plantago Aquatica Linn, as | The accounts lately received from Russia The members found that this conserve had greatest and most certain of all antidotes to hydrophobia, viz. the cauterizing of the part bitten, can hardly be superseded and rendered unnecessary. When the hydrophobia has really broken out, phosphorus and arsenic (according to the remarkable experiments made with them by the late Dr. Zinke, at Kahla) seem worthy of particular attention; but of course only in the hands of able physicians. For the rest, the Alisma Plantago, as a remedy for the bite of mad dogs, and of other poisonous animals, is by no means a new remedy. Dioscorides knew and recommended it; and Pliny, lib. x. says expressly of it, Prodest ad omnes bestiarum morsus illita et pota. At a later period it was recommended by Marcellus Empiricus; and in the 16th century by the great Casalpinus. MOSAIC PAVEMENTS. Chablais' having employed workmen to dig Rome, January 2.-The Duchess of in search of antiquities at the countryseat which she inhabits, they have discovered, on the summit of a hill, four square chambers, of different sizes, adorned with Mosaic pavements. In the first, the pavement is not remarkable, except for its in the middle, a Greek Menander, surfine compartments. In the second is seen, rounded by stars, differing from each other entirely the smell and taste of the root, third, besides the merit of the Mosaic, there by the enamel of their colours. In the and by no means disagreeable, only the after-taste is rather sharp and bitter. It is is in the centre Ulysses bound to the probable this conserve may, like others, mast of a ship; on a shoal is placed a retain its efficacy for half a year, or longer. On the other side, Scylla having the upper rower, and a syren with a lyre in her hand. This preparation, therefore, seems to deserve attention, though the use of the pow-terminating in three dogs' heads, which part formed like a woman, and the lower der, carefully prepared from the fresh devour three carcasses: she has an oar in root, slowly dried, should not be neglected. her hand, and beats these animals. On I would also particularly recommend a sa- the right of Scylla, a little cupid is flying on a tigera woman, pointing to a seamonster, holds a veil in her hands, which, inflated by the wind, floats over her head. In the fourth, numerous fish, of different species, adorn the Mosaic, which is inclosed in a border, handsomely ornamented. Ulysses is again seen; the magician Circe appears to him: it seems that the hero has forgotten Penelope. At the four angles are little subjects alluding to the adventures of Ulysses; and on the four sides are represented birds of different species. turated tincture of the root. To prepare this tincture, it would perhaps be best to employ the roots carefully dried in the shade in hot weather. To one part of the root, cut small, or coarsely pounded, I should add eight or ten parts of rectified spirits of wine, and distil it for five or six days. I intend to say something more, for the use of medical men, in the Medical Journal, respecting this remedy, and its The following paragraph appeared in the pharmaceutic and therapeutic character, acTimes Newspaper subsequent to our for-cording to which it must be placed in the same class as Valerian Calamus, Celtis Austr. &c. I must remark, that however desirable the discovery of a remedy for that most dreadful of all disorders the hydrophobia may be, we must not place our hopes too confidently in that now announced, till a sufficient number of authentic experiments, made by men of real science, have been instituted; and if, as every one must wish, we should receive more and authentic cases of the preventive efficacy of this root, taken before the hydrophobia really breaks out (and we are informed, by written communications from Russia, coming from a most respectable and credible source, that dogs, when bit, instinctively look for this root); yet still the simultaneous application of the "The celebrated Dr. Frank has sent a considerable quantity of the roots of Alisma Plantago to the hospitals of the Duchies of Parma, Placentia, and Guastalla, inviting the physicians to make trials of that root on persons attacked with hydrophobia. It is known that a popular opinion prevails in Russia, that this root is an infallible remedy in that frightful distemper, and it infinitely interests humanity to ascertain whether or not this opinion be well founded." To this we think it proper to add, without remark on our parts, the only other notification on the subject which has met our inquiries. THE FINE ARTS. THE BRITISH INSTITUTION Will open on Monday with a numerous collection of the works of living British Artists. We have only been able to take a general glance at the Gallery; from which we think we may pronounce that it is equal, if not superior in merit, to any Exhibition which has preceded. We noticed particularly a very noble picture of Uriel, by Allston;-it is a prodigious advance, even in his promising talents; and we |