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foreign countries; and numerous edifices, all constructed in good taste upon Grecian models. New roads have been opened and the old ones repaired: a new college is in progress, and institutions, with suitable funds, are established for the instruction of youth. The patrimony of the church, that fertile source of plunder, has been guaranteed, and its ministers rendered respectable; and the churches themselves, from a most ruined and dilapidated state, put into substantial repair.

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In Zante the completion of the grand Mole forms a secure and convenient harbour, and attracts to that valuable island a great increase of shipping and foreign commerce. A grand aqueduct, far advanced in its progress, will afford a copious supply of fine water to the town. The streets of the capital, and the roads into the interior have been widened and repaired. Two hospitals have been erected, the one for the poor and infirm inhabitants, the other for the military; and a noble street has been built along the sea-shore a mile in length, forming a delightful promenade. The public lazarettos are made larger, and put into the best state of repair; and (as at Corfu) the department of health, through a judicious and attentive superintendence, affords security to the people from the most dreadful of all calamities. Similar improvements have taken place in Cefalonia, and in all the inferior islands: every where cultivation and commerce are seen to flourish, and industry is rewarded, because,' says the speaker, the people are protected by a government just in its operations, and firm in its principles.'

The best proof, however, of the general prosperity of the Ionian islands is the regular progressive improvement of the revenues, with an actual reduction of taxation. In Sir Thomas Maitland's speech to the assembly on the 1st of March of the present year, he observes, on noticing the promising aspect of their financial affairs, that

The Cash and Credits on the 31st Jan. 1822, amounted to
Cash and Credits on the 31st Jan. 1823, amounted to

Dollars. 644,206 763,099

Being an increase of the balance of the former year of

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The whole receipt within the year was
The whole expenditure

Surplus Revenue within the year

The President Manzaro, in stating the benefits which the islands have derived from British protection, goes on to observe, 'You can well remember that, whilst a spirit of turbulence was

agitating

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agitating almost the whole globe, your country remained the most secure, and the most tranquil in the world; and that whilst war, famine, pestilence, and anarchy surrounded you on every side, you continued to enjoy the blessings of peace, the security afforded by the laws, the ease occasioned by plenty, the participation of every honest pleasure, and the blessings of freedom, ensured by a government of more moderation than any other by which you were ever before governed.' And, he adds, 'this government usurps nothing-it demands no loans-it imposes no capitation taxes-it forces none to buy its rotten corn-it allows no arbitrary and uncertain emoluments-it lays on no requisitions -it pays punctually the rent of the houses taken for public use, and the salaries of the public functionaries-it requires no gratuitous services-it does not collect vexatiously the public imposts-it repairs all the public buildings and churches-it embellishes the islands with new edifices-it makes new roads, and puts in order the old ones-and so far from being in debt, it has a surplus, after paying all expenses, of 600,000 dollars. This state of prosperity is evidently the result of a mode of administration, which former governments did not understand, or were not disposed to adopt.'

Such is the evidence of that disaffection' and misery' under which the Ionian people are said to be groaning!' Our liberals will no doubt discover, that the president is a creature of Sir Thomas Maitland's;' that he is paid an enormous salary,' &c. But the very few remaining factious and discontented families, the only persons on the whole of the seven islands, who have not signed voluntary addresses of congratulation and acknowledgment for the many benefits derived from British protection, will hardly venture now to class the voluntary expressions of the public feeling, among those statues, busts, triumphal arches, and fulsome addresses, which Mr. Hume accused the Lord High Commissioner of having, 'for his own aggrandizement, contrived to induce the people of the Ionian islands to grant

him.'

If there be any truth in this charge, we can only say, that the character of Sir Thomas Maitland must have undergone a complete change since he was governor of Ceylon; for we well remember, that when he heard of the intention of the civil and military servants to present him with an address and a splendid memorial of the sense they entertained of his conduct as governor and commander of the troops in that island, he immediately circulated the memorable order of the late Sir James Craig, applicable to all meetings of military men to pass their sentiments on the conduct of their superiors; and a copy of

it was also sent to the several civilians in the island; which, of course, put a stop to further proceedings: though we believe that some time after, when all his influence had ceased on the island, they transmitted to England a splendid token of their affectionate remembrance and esteem.

Whatever compliments, therefore, the people of the Ionian islands might have been induced to make, from invariable habit, and prejudices to which they always have been and still are attached,* as is well known to every body but Mr. Hume, such compliments were voluntary on their part, and we venture to assert, without any contrivance or any wish of Sir Thomas Maitland, who, if we know any thing (as we believe we do) of his real character, views with contempt all the calumnies which have been so industriously heaped upon him on this as well as other subjects.

We shall now conclude with an extract from the Address of the people of Cerigo, a remote island, on which, we believe, neither Sir Thomas Maitland nor any of the higher functionaries of the government ever set foot, and the natives of which may consequently be considered as unbiassed by personal influence. It is dated in September, 1822, after, as they observe, five years experience of the Constitutional Charter, the result of which is thus summed up a mild and moderate government; justice impartially administered; the finances prosperous without the aid of a capitation tax or gabelle; the public institutions improving and encouraged; talent and industry rewarded and distinguished; and finally, every thing that can contribute to private advantage or public benefit cherished and promoted.'

ART. V.-Notes relating to the Manners and Customs of the Crim Tatars; written during a Four Years' Residence among that People. By Mary Holderness. London. Second Edition, 1823. sm. 8vo. pp. 108.

THE eastern frontier of Europe has been subject, from a very

early period, to the successive incursions of an homogeneous race, not more remarkable for ferocity of manners than for uncomeliness of person. The Huns and the Tartars, though by far the most celebrated, and perhaps the most mischievous of this ugly catalogue, form, in fact, but a small sample of the incalculable swarms, who with names as uncouth but more varied than their faces, have at sundry intervals been cast across the Volga, from the uncultivated plains of northern Asia. Differing, per

A bust of Sir Thomas Maitland, or whosoever happens to be governor, is to be seen in every legislator's and judge's house.'-Goodisson.

haps,

haps, in the intensity of their deformity, in the quantulum of their civilization, sometimes even in their language, they still are sufficiently distinguished as belonging to the same great family, not only by the evidence of cognate physiognomy, but also by the striking peculiarity of their nomadic mode of life. Neglecting the advantages of agriculture and architecture, to a degree not usual even among savages, vagrancy with them was not, as with the Teutonic barbarians of the north, an occasional and temporary expedient, but the most essential principle and unchangeable practice of their unsettled existence. Their riches consisted almost entirely in the vast herds of horses and other cattle, which the exuberant and boundless herbage of their native wilds enabled them, without much difficulty, to rear; but the necessity for a frequent change of pasture, making change of habitation likewise requisite, it is easy to perceive why the Tartar proprietor became a wanderer and a dweller in tents.

Pastoral vagrancy, indeed, may be said to be the badge of all these tribes; but not theirs were the pastoral virtues of orthodox and legitimate Arcadians. Graziers by profession, sometimes sportsmen for variety, but invariably robbers by inclination, they were better known than trusted, from the Amur to the borders of the Caspian, and were universally recognized as the most successful of breeders, the most expert of bowmen, the most impudent and impracticable of thieves.

Such was the character of the wild and hard-featured Asiatic hordes, which, while the western and more civilized portion of Europe was occupied by nations of a Gothic origin, made the less inviting territories of its eastern frontier, an easy prey. The first of these invaders, to whom history introduces us, after the well known visitation of the Huns, (who seem strictly to have belonged to this division of the human species, and appear, from the description of Ammianus, to have been Kalmucks of the very worst physiognomy,) is a people called Ogurs or Onogurs,* by the Greeks, perhaps the Ogres of our early apprehensions. These monsters began to figure about the middle of the fifth century, when, growing weary of hunting beavers on the Irtish, they migrated in a body to the Sarmatian plain, where they remained errant between the Caspian and the Dneiper, till lost at last in succeeding hordes of kindred barbarians, they bequeathed their name to Mr. Newberry and the nurseries. With these, or not long after them, arrived the Bulgarians,† a nation of

* Pris. Exc. de Legat. 42.

+ Zonaras, xi. 55. Theophan. 125. The Bulgarians first attacked the Roman provinces in 501.

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similar origin and habits, who (quasi Vulgarians or Volgarians) are supposed, by some writers, to have derived their appellation from an original settlement on the banks of the Volga. Whether, however, the river named the people, or the people named the river, is a question too important for us to decide, especially as it is, we understand, still very warmly disputed among the learned of the Russian universities. Next in order is the sanguinary irruption of the Avars, who yoked women to their waggons like buffaloes; a people as savage and frightful as the Huns, great in body and proud in spirit,' but who, even in the midst of their most unwarrantable excesses, are described as betraying some regard to the graces of personal appearance, since they braided their long hair into a series of tails, which were tastefully diversified with ribbon.* Before the year 568, they had overrun and pillaged all the country between the Volga and the Elbe; and in the reign of Heraclius, Baian, their khan, who, in spite of his unclassical chevelure, was ambitious of being admitted into the number of Roman patricians, was with difficulty prevented from succeeding in an attempt, which he directed against Constantinople+ itself. The power of the Avars fell before that of the Khozars, who, towards the end of the seventh and at the beginning of the following century, extended their dominion over the Crimea, and a vast tract of country which is now comprised in the southern governments of Russia. Unlike the banditti whom we have hitherto had to deal with, this horde seems to have made no inconsiderable progress in the Asiatic path of civilization. Though the ancient practice of living in tents (the wild liberty of which has so many charms for those habituated to its use) had not been abandoned by a numerous division of the tribe, the khans and richer Khozars were already getting reconciled to the restraints and comforts incident to the possession of permanent walls, and had even been accustomed to the confinement of crowded towns, which they inhabited with some degree of splendour. Their capital was a city called Atel, not far from the present site of Astrachan, where their khan had a palace, constructed with burnt bricks; and where his court was supplied, through the commerce of his subjects, with the tapestry of Persia, the honey of Russia, and the costly black fox skins of Siberia. The town was surrounded, according to Ebn Haukal, by corn-fields and gardens, to the distance of twenty parasangs. Agriculture was much encouraged, and in the southern provinces the vine is said to have been cultivated. The khan himself appears to have been a despot of the finest oriental

* δεδεμενας πρανδίοις. Theophan. p. 196. + Gibbon, iv, 518. Ouseley's Ebn Haukal, 186.

cast.

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