stronger. Such a result must be deprecated by all, as it would inevitably change a colony destined, we trust, to become eminent for morality and intellect, into a state of society little better than what exists in Carolina or Alabama. It is not merely the social depravity which would be perpetuated for centuries along the western shores of Australia, but that young colonies, which, under present circumstances, are destined to become sources of light and civilization to the Indian Archipelago, might render each of those beautiful islands another Texas or a den of outlaws and pirates.

If the new colonies must advance more slowly from the want of convict or slave labour, they have the advantages of a sound morality and a most healthy state of society; and the importation of English labourers will increase as the colonies are better known, and the advantages they offer to the labourer and mechanic better appreciated. The northern colonies of the United States, which are now the first in the Union for civilization, wealth, and industry, were developed without the aid of compulsory labour; and, to all practical purposes, New England was as remote from the emigrant a century and a half ago as Australia is now. In the paper on South Australia, the consideration of the due supply of labour will be more carefully considered ; for we know of no want so urgent as to require to be supplied by immoral means.

A few colonists in King George's Sound were so ill advised as to have applied to government for a supply of convict labour, under the plausible ground that such assistance was neces sary for the construction of roads, and opening a communication between King George's Sound and Swan River. In this case, it is justice to state that such an application was not encouraged by the majority of the colonists, and, fortunately for the applicants themselves, they were not cursed with an answered prayer. It is evident that the absence of convict labour is at. tended by many counterbalancing advantages they have the blessing of the full enjoyment of English laws and trial by jury, which, in the perverted community of New South Wales, has rather been an evil than a security, and has often guaranteed impunity to the offender. The young colony may also anticipate, and reasonably claim, a charter of self-govern

ment as soon as its population is sufficiently numerous to require it, while, in the penal colonies, a representative assembly would only be the addition of another element for evil in a society where the germs of honesty and mutual confidence scarcely exist, if they have not yet to be implanted.

The present state of Western Australia does not, however, indicate a rapid progress in wealth and population, and its rate of advance appears to be very slow, especially when compared with the newer establishment of South Australia. Some of the causes of this have been already pointed out, but will be still more apparent when we consider the different system followed in the newer colony. The following is a statement of the condition of the different settlements in Western Australia :-Freemantle is a small town at the entrance of the Swan River, and contains several hotels, which are so well conducted as to please even the fastidious taste of the Indian invalid. Perth, the capital of the new colony, is about ten miles further inland, and passage boats ply regularly between the two towns. About seven miles farther up the Swan River, is the little settlement of Guildford, and beyond the Darling range is the small settlement of York, which is situated in one of the most valuable pasture districts of the colony. The only remaining settlement deserving of notice is that of King George's Sound, it being the most southern station in the colony, and a most desirable one on account of the unrivalled excellence of its harbour; but the resources of the colony must be much better developed before the value of this part of the country can be properly estimated. The land in the neighbourhood of King George's Sound is, perhaps, the best in the colony; but as the Sound is to leeward of Cape Leuwin, it is much more disadvantageously situated for voyages to India during six months of the year. A most important undertaking for the benefit of the colony, would be a road between Perth and King George's Sound; but many years must elapse before a land communication between two stations two hundred miles apart can be undertaken. The colonists in Western Australia are, therefore, chiefly settled on the rich alluvial soil on the banks of the Swan River and its tribu. taries; while the towns of Freemantle, Perth, and Guildford, are so many stations connecting this narrow belt of

settlers. The remote settlement of York, beyond the Darling range, is analogous to the settlement of Bathurst, beyond the Blue Mountains, in New South Wales; and in both cases the surrounding district is well adapted for colonization. The remote and unconnected settlement in King George's Sound may be considered as having as intimate a dependence on Adelaide as on Perth.

The population of the colony is very limited, and does not appear to be increasing from any influx of emigrants. It is an unfortunate circumstance, that although ten years have now elapsed since the colony was founded, still the population scarcely exceeds two thousand, while the population of South Australia is more numerous in a fifth of the time. In the year 1832, the population amounted to only 1510, while in 1836 it had risen nearly to 2032; and this increase has taken place, not from emigrants but from births, a conclusive proof that the colony is at best stationary. The state of its revenue affords the same results as the stationary condition of its population. Its revenue amounted in 1837 to £4,568, while the expenses of the colonial government was aided by an annual parliamentary grant of £6,000. The value of the exports appears to be increasing more rapidly than could have been anticipated. In 1834 their value amounted to upwards of £1,000, and in 1837 the sum was little short of £7,000. Whatever causes may have contributed to this result, it cannot be traced to any physical inferiority of the soil or climate on the contrary, the balance of advantages appears to be on the side of Western Australia. emption from droughts, owing to its exposure to the westerly breezes, and its easy access at all times of the year to the regions to the west of New Holland, give it a considerable superiority over New South Wales; and in nothing is it inferior to South Australia. In the respectability, wealth, and intelligence of its settlers, Western Australia ought to take, perhaps, the first rank among her neighbours, and their resources were very considerable; and still we must admit, that although the settlement will continue to advance, yet, in the meanwhile, it has proved a failure. Many causes have concurred to produce this unfortunate result, and some of them we have already alluded to, and others may be briefly stated

Its ex

now, although they will become more apparent after the history of South Australia has been investigated. We have already mentioned the absurd system followed in disposing of land, and also the failure of the plan of taking out indentured servants; so that in the two circumstances of prime importance in establishing the colony, there was a want of foresight in obviating very obvious difficulties. Above all, in founding a new colony, much depends on the success in the first instance, or at least in anticipating and providing for every possible contingency. Of these difficulties, which could scarcely avoid being foreseen, was the undoubted fact that for one or two years the colonists would require to obtain provisions from extrinsic sources; and the first scheme of colonising the Swan River appears to have prepared to meet this difficulty, and in the plan which was adopted, the government expressly warned the colonists that no supplies were to be procured for them. The result of this improvidence was, that while within fifteen days' sail of Batavia, and twelve days' of Hobart Town, the colony was frequently on the verge of famine, during the three first years of its progress. The anticipation of such a state of things, and the adoption of the obvious remedies, might have prevented much misery in the settlement, and, what was perhaps of equal importance, have prevented many prejudices which still exist against the colony, as a place where the settlers have to struggle for years with the most serious privations. On the first intelligence of the hardships of the new colony, the stream of emigration was put an end to, which otherwise, if supplies of food could have been purchased, might have flowed on in an uninterrupted manner. This difficulty was, perhaps, increased by another circumstance, resulting from the very excellence and superiority of the colonists above those who usually break ground in such an undertaking, being mostly professional men; and with a scarcity of mechanics or men bred to agriculture, it is no wonder difficulties were encountered, which might have been avoided had there been a larger proportion of emigrants of the quality alluded to.

But, to trace all these misfortunes to their source, they originated, we are of opinion, in the want of a systematic plan of proceeding, and in having no

body of men resident in London to urge their interests and anticipate their difficulties on all occasions. In this respect the South Australian colony has been got up in a more artist-like manner, and to this a great proportion of its prosperity is owing. The commissioners for the colony of South Australia had as strong motives as the colonists themselves to promote its success. Their character as men of prudence and foresight was at stake, and the responsibility they incurred was of a most serious nature, and, what is not without its weight, their pride as philanthropists and political economists was stimulated to acquit themselves well. In the new colony no complaints of famine have been

heard. Preparations had been made for the reception of the emigrants as they arrived, and the high price of land prevented them from diffusing themselves over the country before their society had attained any degree of stability. In addition to this, the South Australian commissioners have most perseveringly kept their institution before the public; its principles have been discussed in every newspaper and magazine; and while it is advancing with unexampled rapidity in population and wealth, its superior reputation has tended powerfully to deflect emigrants from Western Australia, when they might settle in the latter colony without encountering any of the difficulties which embarrassed the first settlers.

THE engaging Miss La Creevy in Nicholas Nickleby has satisfactorily shown that there are but two schools of portrait painting in existence-the serious and the smirk. Whatever is not one must inevitably be the other of these-middle course there is none. Now, without for a moment detracting from the originality of the observation, I would beg to observe that the manner in which poor Ireland has been painted for years past has long since suggested such a thought to my mind; and I would appeal to the mayor of Cork, Mr. Nolan, my curate, and several other respectable individuals, if I have not frequently, in conversation with them both before dinner, and after, made the remark.

With one class of writers we are all miserable, wretched, half-starved creatures-our only pastime, till the crop comes in, being piking a Protestant or roasting a Rector, without any, the vaguest ideas of law or justice-living ever in debt, and dying "like a horse, with our shoes on."

With the other we are industrious, intelligent, happy-minded, and honest -grateful for kindnesses and longsuffering under misrule-our greatest failing consisting in the fact, that we are satisfied with little, and occasionally very happy with less. Such are our

The Popular Songs of Ireland. Notes, by T. Crofton Croker, Esq.

One

portraits as sketched by all the artists to whom we have been sitting for centuries; and I would challenge you to produce one who has not painted us, either "serious or smirking." expends every epithet of the language to represent our country as a kind of Elysium upon earth-and the other, like our great national poet, pronounces Ireland a beautiful country to live out of.

For ourselves and in our neighbourhood we are reckoned no mean authority upon many subjects-our mind is not made up: we have long been of opinion that we have great capabilities-that, is a whig phrase we learned at the assizes-and are often disposed to indulge in a sanguine vein, as we contemplate the increasing peace and prosperity of late years, influenced, doubtless, by the resistance to rent and tithes-two shameful imposts-and those generous gaol deliveries of our never-to-be-forgotten viceroy. These, indeed, appear to us the great secrets of governing Ireland, whose evils we firmly feel are agrarian, not politicalnot agrarian in that absurd sense of Sadler and Inglis, who, in their ignorauce, raved and ranted about "short leases and cottier tenements." No such thing. The evil lies in the exaction of a rent-the sweat of the poor

man's brow-that goes to pamper the rich man's meal. What, we would ask, did my Lord do for farmer Doyle, that he should give him his potatoes and wheat: and the same of tithes. And as to that vile infringement of personalliberty-imprisonment in a gaol-talk of British freedom after that! Besides, just think of the grand jury rates those same gaols cost. When we were a gossoon, some five and fifty years since, we well remember holding an argument with Darby Hanigan, our schoolmaster, on this head. Darby used to enforce the payment of a halfpenny entrance for every boy, for his share of the birch rod, whose benefit he was sure one day to reap, we argued that we preferred spending the money in gingerbread, and declining all claim, and lien, upon the rod then and in future. Make the application of this principle to the gaols, and think of the saving to the poor man, not to speak of the comfort.

My Lord Ebrington, you have just landed, they tell me, and if you are not going away soon, will you make a trial of these methods a little longer? for besides being a "heavy blow and a great discouragement to Protestantism," as your friends say in the House, you will find that they will bear very heavily on property altogether. No thing will remedy absenteeism so soon as a man's having no receipts from his agent-there is one evil remedied. Nothing will make men feel the miseries of Ireland so soon, or so effectually, as a little fellow-suffering. Let Lords Donoughmore and Mount Cashel go to bed supperless for a few evenings, and we will hear them then on the state of the country.

You'll not have then to complain of a long calendar at the assizes-for there will be no jails. Nor any backwardness to convict in the jury-for they will be no prisoners.

Think, only think, then, of what a figure you'll make in the House, if any troublesome fool like Lord Roden or Devonsher Jackson gets up and asks for papers respecting the state of crime in Ireland. "There are none," says you.

"No papers?" "Devil a one."

"Nor trials ?" "Devil a trial." "Nor prisoners, nor commitments, nor hangings, nor any other diversions for the grand jury?"

Maybe you'll not triumph over the Tories that day.

Reflect for a moment upon the channels through which you will be

diffusing the blessings of peace and plenty. There will be no parsons, nor tithe proctors, nor education societies, no stipendiary magistrates, no peclers, no coroners. I am drawing no delusive or imaginary picture of happiness in all this. Where is real pleasure, fun, and joviality to be found, if it be not in an Irish fair? What with whiskey, spoliawn, (broiled beef,) fighting, kissing, singing, yelling, fiddling, hugging, and crying, the whole population is engaged. Such, upon a great scale will be the state of the country at large, from Carrickfergus to Cape Clear. It will be all Donnybrook, and Donnybrook too, without any lord mayor, or alderman to meddle and interfere with it. God forgive me, but I cannot contemplate such a picture, like a loyal subject of the present day, my heart yearns for such blessings upon my poor, distracted country. The great reproach that all travellers have heaped upon us is, that, however other nations are progressing, Ireland is Ireland still. Follow up the hints of your dear, departed predecessor, my lord, and the devil a man will throw this in our teeth, for they'll not know us from South Sea Islanders. Those who amused themselves by tracing our origin from the Phenicians, had better lose no time, for there will not be many tracks to guide them a few years hence; for as the quarts and tumblers dance and set to each other as the table shakes, in the chorus of a drinking song, so will the very round towers tremble in the general hilarity of the island. But why indulge such dreams of happiness? English influences still prevail over and disgrace us, and the very books upon our table are in that language. But what is all this? -we have upset our tumbler of punch upon Lady Chatterton-so, while we are drying her ladyship, let us have a peep at little Crofton Croker, for a pleasant bit of a leprechaun he is. "Popular Songs of Ireland," he calls his book. The phrase is half a tautology, for what songs are not popular songs in Ireland, except the "Boyne Water," and "Croppies lie down?" and even these, they say, there are some depraved wretches who sing also.

Croker begins his book by a rambling, struggling preface-half historical, half-critical, all nonsensical-about where he has got his melodies. The only difficulty we could ever see in the matter is, where to stop collecting. The songs of Ireland might be published, like the abridgment of the

statutes, in fifty volumes folio, and after all we would engage to supply an appendix of ten more. The praises of St. Patrick come first. Church and State, says the ritual; but why not begin with the ladies, Crofton? "Place aux dames," we used to say at St. Omer's, when we were studying the Humanities; however, we must take him as we find him. Of the three canticles in honour of the saint, the only really good one is that by Maginn, and formerly published in Blackwood's Magazine. This is indeed an excellent chant, and nothing can exceed the verse in which the tastes of the people at this day are traced to an ancient miracle of the church.

"You've heard, I suppose, long ago,

How the snakes, in a mauner most antic, He marched to the County Mayo,

And trundled them into th' Atlantic.
Hence, not to use water for drink,

The people of Ireland determine :
With mighty good reason, I think,
Since St. Patrick has filled it with vermin,

And vipers, and such other stuff!"

We shall not track our author through his twaddling and tiresome eulogies upon shamrocks and potatoes, but come at once to the true source of Irish inspiration :-the mountain dew. And here let us once for all enter our protest against the spirit and style of Crofton's volume. This chapter, the most important one of the volume, commences with an extract from Barrow-Wheel-Barrow, as he is called, most properly, for his racketty, cardriving, and most absurd tour round Ireland in three weeks, or something like that. What an authority upon potteen-what an opinion upon punch. The poor, innocent Cockney, that could not tell the difference between parliament and the small still, is referred to, and by an Irishman, too, on such a subject. Shame upon thee, little Crofty-have ye no decency?

But it is evident that he knows little or nothing of the matter himself by the selections which follow. We find none of those racy, mellow, old songs, that gladden the heart and warm the life's blood. Far from it the few he gives are poor, washy, slip-slop concerns, that never were, never could be, popular in Ireland or any where else. Where is that glorious old chant "The Jug of Punch ?" where the "Cruiskeen Lawn ?" breathing a sentiment so natural and pious withal, as that in the verse

"And when grim death appears, in a few but pleasant years,

And tells me that my glass it is run, I'll sing-Begone you knave, for great Bacchus gives me lave

To take another Cruiskeen Lawn, Lawn,
Lawn.
To take," &c.

Compare this and the other verses, which we know you are singing to yourself by this time, with the trashy stuff about "joys of wine," " sparkling juice," and the other beastly nonsense he quotes, and then read the following:

"There seems a natural and instinctive fondness in the inhabitants of damp and mountainous places for ardent spirits; and, perhaps, every where, in vacant and unemployed minds, there is similar fondness; for a love of sensation seems the strongest appetite or passion of our nature. For the purpose of speedy intoxication whiskey is superlative; and when, to physical and other general causes, are added the more powerful moral ones of his condition, it is little wonderful that the Irish peasant should seek, in the Lethean draught, oblivious happiness; and regard the inventor of his beloved liquor as a greater benefactor than Ceres and Triptolemus put together."

any

Oh, blessed Virgin! to think that man, at the present civilized period of the world, should set about an explanation of why 'people like whiskey." Like whiskey!

Crofton, my friend, "you are not"as my esteemed old companion Maxwell would say "you are not the man for Galway;" and if you can do no better than this, we'll never borrow money to drink with you. I wish you heard old Major Wemyss, the district paymaster at Cork, sing any one of his two hundred and eighteen staves in honour of strong drink, and you'd never have written this-or Hewson Nixon, of Kilkenny, that pleasant fellow that sings better and rides harder with foxhounds than any man in his own good county, stone blind though he be. It is a mercy to him that he never can see your book, and we hope no one will be cruel enough to read it to him. Long life to you, Hewson; and here's your We wish health in my fifth tumbler. we could season it by hearing you once more sing your own beautiful ballad beginning

"Arralı, Prince Esterhazy,
Now can't you be easy,"