Imágenes de página
PDF
ePub

only get rid of the barbarous Venetian dialect of the Italian language, but of the necessity of sending their youth to Bologna, Padua, Pavia and other places on the continent for their educa tion, which has hitherto only produced just such fruit as might be expected from grafting Italian vices on Greek cunning. It has been an object of great attention with Sir Thomas Maitland to establish primary schools in all the islands, and a very heavy expense has been incurred on this head. The long projected university, of which Lord Guilford is the Chancellor, is on the eve of being opened. The old palace of Corfu has been repaired and enlarged for this purpose. The first idea, of Ithaca, was abandoned for various reasons, and, among others, because the gentlemen of the other islands refused to send their sons to this inferior spot. The Ionians themselves have great doubts of the success of this new literary institution; but we apprehend it cannot fail, provided the professors are men of acknowledged talent and will do their duty. It is to be hoped that the study of the English language, laws, and history will form a prominent part of the plan of education.

Considerable improvement in the morals and habits of the Ionians may reasonably be expected from a more familiar use of the English language, by bringing them more in contact with the British residents; and, what is of the utmost importance to them, by tending to produce a change in the secluded habits of the female part of society. The French in Corfu succeeded in breaking that barbarous chain which bound the females not only to their home, but to their retired apartments. In Zante, too, their manners in this respect are slowly undergoing a change, and the women, who were once closely shut up, feel now inclined, and are permitted by their husbands and fathers, to mix with the English, and go to their entertainments. But the number of the latter is so small, and their means of entertaining generally so limited, (notwithstanding what Mr. Hume says of their enormous salaries) that the progress towards mutual intercourse must be very slow.

Little more remains for us but to mention briefly some of the improvements, which have taken place since the Ionian islands came under British protection. We find them, in fact, already summed up in the speech of the President Manzaro, before mentioned, in which he takes a cursory view of the condition of the Ionian islands at various periods, and contrasts their state in the year 1816, with that at the time in which he is speaking. He sets out with Corfu, the seat of government, where every public edifice, he observes, has been repaired and embellished, and many new, useful, and interesting ones been erected; among others, two new markets, offering all the products of the island and of foreign

VOL. XXIX. NO. LVII.

H

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.

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

Dollars. 644,206

The Cash and Credits on the 31st Jan. 1822, amounted to
Cash and Credits on the 31st Jan. 1823, amounted to . 763,099

[ocr errors]

Being an increase of the balance of the former year of : 118,893

[merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small]

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

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 Dueiper, 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.

[blocks in formation]
« AnteriorContinuar »