feracissima enim hæc insula dicitur, et preterea auri multum efficere." This enigma remained inexplicable till Sir William Jones furnished the solution, by mentioning that Jaba, or Java, signifies barley in Sanscrit, and hence the hordei insula of the antient geographer. Most of the names of these isles, both antient and modern, are derived from the Sanscrit; Sabadiva, the company islands, three being arranged opposite to each other; Manila, the isles of gems; Cumbava, the isles shaped like a water jar; and Mallica, (the Moluccas), isles abounding with the nyctanthes, or Indian jasmine; for which see Rumphius, in his Flora of Amboyna.

The celebrated bread-fruit, the soccus lanosus, granosus, et sylvestris, of Rumphius, is frequent in these islands. It begins to appear in the eastern parts of Sumatra, where it is named by the Malays, Soccum Capas; again in Prince's Island, about Bantam, and in Malacca; and, finally, in all the islands to the east, and from thence to Otaheite, and many others in the South Sea.

Celebes is prodigiously mountainous and lofty; the mountains increase in height towards the central parts, and are generally richly cloathed with wood. In Macassar, as well as in Mindanus, are some active volcanoes. Mr. Loten informed me that none of the Indian islands had such grand and beautiful scenery. It abounds with rivers, which spring high in the mountains, and precipitate down vast rocks, among a sylvan scene of lofty and singular trees. The lakes and more still parts of the rivers give security to numberless water fowls of the larger and more clumsy kinds, which retire there by fear of the crocodiles, which haunt the lower and marshy parts. These are not deserted by the lesser palmated birds, such as ducks and teal, which, being quick-sighted and nimble, easily evade the approach of the enemy.'

Near to Java, we find the isles of Madura and Bali, names celebrated in the Puranas. " When the Dutch touched here, (says Mr. P.) in their first voyage of the year 1595, they found them governed by a king, who appeared in great state, was attended by his guards, and drawn in a chariot by milk white oxen. The great men were carried in their bamboo palanquins, and lived in the highest luxury. The religion was then paganism; and the women, as in India, devoted themselves to the funeral pile on the decease of their husbands.'

Stretching eastward from Java, a chain of isles extends almost to the vicinity of New Holland. The latter, Mr. Pennant contends, should be named a continent, on account of its large dimensions. America itself is but an insulated continent, superior as it may be to that of New Holland.'-Here the author recapitulates the various navigators by whom this island was visited, from the beginning of the seventeenth century, to the formation of the settlement at Botany Bay in 1787.

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1787. In 1627, the famous Commodore Peter Nuyts sailed along the coast,' (the south east coast) and made many attempts to land, but was always repulsed. Is not this a proof that the southern shores of New Holland possess a superior population, and a superior valour in the inhabitants, to all the rest of the known parts of this vast country.'-The selection of New Holland, for the settlement of our convicts, is far from happy, in the opinion of Mr. P. who thinks that the superior fertility of one of the isles of New Britain would have rendered it a preferable situation.

It is a popular opinion, (says the author,) that the expence of transportation of the convicts amounted to three hundred pounds a man, including the provision made for their cloathing and support for some small time after their landing. I was in hopes that two pamphlets published by Debrett in 1791, 1792, under authority of goverment, would have confirmed or refuted the report, especially as one of them pretended to give an account of the expences; but the detail is so very imper. fect, that I am not able to satisfy either my own or the reader's curiosity. The immense expence we have been at in sending provi sions from hence, from the Cape of Good Hope, and from China, gives reason to imagine that our colony has been at the point of starving.'

We now proceed to the Faunula of New Holland, as the work can afford no information relative to the recent circumstances of our infant colony.-The genus of Opossum, it is said, furnishes more species than any other found in this country, and some of them of most singular and wonderful kinds. We find five species mentioned, including the gigantic and spotted kangaroos, and the kangaroo rat. The flying opossum has membranes extending from leg to leg like a flying squirrel, and the fur is exquisitely fine. Many species of parrots are found in New Holland; and pigeons are very numerous. The superb warbler has forehead and cheeks of the richest coerulean colour; from the cheeks a narrow band of the same surrounds the hind part of the neck, belly white, all the rest of the plumage black, tail very long; a most beautiful bird: from Van Diemen's Land, and other parts of New Holland.' This bird is of the passerine genus. The black swan is in size superior to the white. The bill is of a rich scarlet; near the tip is a small yellow spot: the whole plumage is of the most intense black, except the primaries and secondaries, which are white; the eyes black, the feet dusky; it is found in Hawkesbury River, and other fresh waters near Broken Bay, and has all the graceful action of the white kind.'-The cabbage-tree, or Areca sapida, (which may be cut through with a single stroke of the axe) is the only tree of any use in building. The very

largest

largest trees, lofty and spacious as they appear, are so brittle that, when sawn, they fall in pieces.

From New Holland, the author proceeds north to the Arrau Isles. We are now (he says) arrived within reach of the perfumed air of the Molucca, or famous spice islands, a land of romance, where nature assumes a new shape in picturesque scenery, and in the beautiful and singular form of numbers of the animal and vegetable creation, whether inhabitants of land. or water.' The long celebrated Manucodiatæ, or birds of paradise, first begin to appear in these islands; and Mr. P. discusses the question, whether these animals were known to the antients. Few birds are more circumscribed in their limits than these; which are confined within the Papira Islands and that of New Guinea, and are found only from lat. 8° south, to lat. 3° north of the equator, and between longitude 127 and

140.

They are supposed to breed in New Guinea, and to reside there during the wet monsoon, but retire to the Arrau Isles, about a hundred and forty miles to the east, during the dry or western monsoons. In the east monsoon they moult their long feathers, but recover them in the west. They always migrate in flocks of thirty or forty, and have a leader, which the inhabitants of Arrau call the king: he is said to be black, to have red spots, and to fly far above the flock, which never desert him, but settle where he settles. They constantly avoid flying with the wind, which ruffles and blows their loose plumage over their heads, and often forces them down to the ground, from which they are unable to rise without some advantage: hard showers of rain are equally destructive to them. When they are surprized with a strong gale, they instantly soar to a higher region, beyond the reach of the tempest; there they float at ease in the serene sky, on their light flowing feathers, or pursue their journey in security; during their flight, they cry starlings, but in the distress of a storm blowing in their rear, they When they express it by a note resembling the croaking of ravens. alight, it is in the highest trees, the king taking the lead; they prefer the varinga parvifolia, on the berries of which these birds and various sorts of parrots feed; some say that they feed on nutmegs, on butterflies, and even small birds; the strength of their claws favours that opinion; yet that circumstance may be requisite to birds, which are always to live perched.'

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In lat. 4° 30' south, lie the Spice Islands, which have received their denomination from Banda, the most considerable. As they are now in the possession of the British, we may hope for a more particular account of them than has hitherto appeared. They seem to have been thrown up by the sea, by the effects of subterraneous fire. Lofty mountains, says the Abbé Raynal, the summits of which are lost in the clouds, enormous rocks

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heaped

heaped one upon another, horrid and deep caverns, torrents which precipitate themselves with extreme violence, volcanoes perpetually announcing impending destruction; such are the phænomena that give rise to this idea, or assist in confirming it. In Gunongapi, is a volcano which constantly emits smoke, sometimes accompanied by a crackling noise; and the surface of the island is covered with sulphur and chalk. The growth of nutmegs has been confined to three of these islands by the Dutch, who extirpated the trees on all the rest, in order to secure the monopoly. From a statement published since these isles came into our possession, and long subsequent to Mr. Pennant's sketch, it appears that the islands of Banda contain 5763 inhabitants, of which 119 are Europeans; and the south-west islands contain 38,266, of whom 2322 were converts to the Christian faith. Amboyna is about 30 leagues to the north-west of the Banda Isles. This is in respect to cloves, what those are in respect to nutmegs. The Dutch have made it the great and sole plantation of that valuable spice. They destroy with the same zeal all that they can find on the islands within their reach,'-As a more particular and authentic account of these islands has recently been given, by at gentleman employed in the expedition which subjected them to the British crown; and since the history of the aromatic trees which afford the nutmeg and the clove can boast of little novelty; we will leave the Moluccas, and proceed easterly through the islands inhabited by the Papus, and terminated by New Guinea, where Mr. Pennant closes his researches.

The large island of Gilolo is not classed among the Moluccas, though contiguous to them; like them, it abounds in the sago and bread-fruit trees: the first, indeed, is common to all the islands east of Sumatra. The Papua islands stretch. hence to New Guinea;-they were visited in 1769 by M. Sonnerat and M. Le Poivre, who were sent from the Isle of France to procure nutmeg plants. These islands, with New Britain and New Ireland, are inhabited by the same warlike race, named Papus. The aspect of these people is frightful and hideous; the men are stout in body, their skin of a shining black, rough, and often disfigured with marks like those occasioned by the leprosy; their eyes are very large, their noses flat, mouth from ear to ear, their lips amazingly thick, especially the upper lip; their hair woolly, either a shining black or hiery red: M. Sonnerat imagines the last to be owing to some powder.' The existence of a race of negroes in these islands so remote from any people of the same configuration, and so incapable of navigating from Africa to Occupy these sequestered shores, is a circumstance which

cannot

cannot but suggest some singular inferences. Endeavour straights, which separate New Guinea from New Holland, are 10 leagues in length, and about 5 in breadth. Mr. Pennant makes the circuit of the island; and thus,' said that venerable and now deceased writer, concludes the last great labour of my life.'

This work will be found to contain, perspicuously arranged, much of the information which Europe possessed respecting India beyond the Ganges, before recent and authentic writers elucidated those countries by more ample details. The Flora Indica, annexed to the volumes, is copious; and as an abridgement of the labours of the Dutch botanists, it probably is not without its utility. Our numerous extracts supersede the necessity of farther observations.

ART. XII. The Christian Preacher; or, Discourses on Preaching, by several eminent Divines, English and Foreign, revised aud abridged; with an Appendix on the Choice of Books. By Edward Williams, D. D. 12mo. pp. 496. 4s. 6d. Boards. Wills,

&c. 1800.

TH

HIS volume would afford materials for more remarks than our confined pages can admit. As a compilation, it will not be expected to display much ability or learning in the editor; yet in its progress it seems naturally to lead to observafions and inquiries which might attract attention, but to which we can allot but a very brief notice. Of the seven discourses contained in it, the first was written by Bishop Wilkins, under that well-known title, "The Gift of Preaching :" but, though it was valuable when it first appeared, it is now almost obsolete. It wears the marks of an author slowly emerging from the clouds and confusion of scholastic terms and divisions, though a careful reader may extract from it some good sense and useful instruction: but it is indeed perplexing, and very tedious. Something of a like kind is to be said concerning the last discourse" On the Composition of a Sermon," by the Rev. John Claude; translated and published, several years ago, by the Rev. R. Robinson, of Cambridge; at which time it was acknow leged, with truth, that the performance derived its principal value from the original notes which Mr. R. subjoined; since the work itself is systematical, mystical, and tiresome. These two articles, with the Appendix, form a principal part of the volume before us.

Of the second and third discourses, which were composed by the Rev. John Jennings, formerly tutor in a dissenting See M. Rev. for March 1779, vol. lx i. p. 100. N 4

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