Printing for the Blind, 197 Process for obtaining Epsom Salt, 156 Punishment, Criminal, in Ceylon, 2 Raleigh, Sir W., lines by, 22 Recreation, proper mode of using, 156 certain remedy for grief, 111 sense of in affliction, 220 ABBEY CHURCH, Bath, 89 leaf and blossom of, 216 Eolian Harp, 225 Alby (France) Cathedral of, 209 Arch of Septimius Severus, 33 Bath, Abbey Church, 89 Bern, Switzerland, Town of, 17 Caffres and their kraals, 217 Canton, scene on the river at, 161 Cardona, salt mountain at, 184 Cartland Craigs and Bridge, 32 Cedar of Lebanon, 200 cone of, 200 leaf, flower, and Religious principle, balance of mind Robin, peculiarity of the song of, 53 Russian Vapour Baths, 125 St. Goar, remarkable Echo at, 151 53 Scenery, Australian, 142 Science, Amusements of, No. I., 141- remarks of Bishop Horne on, 99 Seed, selections from, 150, 156, 157, 195 Servants, gratitude of old, 135 Shetlanders, superstitions of, 182 Southey, lines by, 46, 111 Spring, lines on, 100 Starch used for Lozenges, 135 Studious life not prejudicial, 140 Ages, No. 1., 21-II., Mythology- Switzerland, Town of Bern in, 18 Great Maple, or Sycamore, 144 Hand of Glory, 128 Hemp and Flax, sorting and drying Hunting Horn, Ancient, 4 Jewish Trumpet, 4 leaves, blossom, and seed. Lime Tree, 64 Magic Square and Circle, 142 Mer de Glace, ou Mont Blanc, 241 Morris Dancers, ancient English, 153 Natives of New South Wales fishing leaves and blossoms Oriental Plane, 236 Palace of the Caesars, Rome, ruins of, Pan Pipes, Ancient, 28 Port Jackson, Fort Macquarie and Turnesole, Manufacture of, 213 Value of a good name, 151 Domestic happiness, 195 Van Tromp, anecdote of, 4 127 Kingdom, agency of the, Virtue, what compared to, 27 Traveller, 61 Wither, lines by, 112 Woody Fibre, an article of food, 181 Yew Tree, ancient, in Dibden church- Young Chemist. No. VII., 92-VIII., Men, rashness of, 195 leaf, fruit, and catkins of 192 of, 88 leaves and blossoms Whampoa Pagoda, 168 Yew Tree, ancient, in Dibden church. yard, 48 UNDER THE DIRECTION OF THE COMMITTEE OF GENERAL LITERATURE AND EDUCATION APPOINTED BY THE SOCIETY FOR PROMOTING CHRISTIAN KNOWLEDGE. CRIMINAL PUNISHMENT IN CEYLON. AMONG the blessings resulting from the introduction of Christianity into heathen countries, is that amelioration of the sanguinary rites and customs which formerly appertained to the idolatrous practices of the people, as well as to the punishment of crimes among them. The vast regions of the eastern world teem with gratifying instances of the gradual triumph of the pure principles of our holy religion over the barbarous practices of the people in former days, but though much has already been accomplished, much, very much, still remains to be done. Every pure worshipper of his God, every lover of his fellowcreatures, must therefore take a heartfelt interest in the progress and success of that great work of Christian enlightenment, which, under the blessing of Providence, is rapidly dispelling the mists of heathenism and barbarity that have during so many ages shrouded those interesting countries. We have already, on several occasions*, drawn the attention of our readers to the vast and beautiful island of Ceylon, and we have been enabled to do so with the greater effect, in consequence of having been allowed access to the collection of curious and valuable drawings, belonging to the Right Honourable Sir Alexander Johnston. To that gentleman, formerly chief judge of the colony, the natives of this island are mainly indebted for the right of trial by jury, the introduction of which we described in our sixth volume, and it was during his residence in the island, that the drawings in question, illustrating the manners and customs, the history, and the rites and superstitions of the people, as well as the natural history of the country, were made, under his own direction, and chiefly by native artists. The drawing from which the engraving on the preceding page is taken, forms part of that collection; and it will at once be seen, from its rudeness and the peculiarity of its details, that it is a mere imitative production of an untaught native. It is, however, singularly faithful in its portrayal of the frightful events of that revolting tragedy which it is intended to commemorate. It represents the butchery of the wife and family of a distinguished native, who had been involved in some of the disturbances common to the barbarous state of things under which the people lived, by the command of the king of Candy; but it is gratifying to add, that it was the last instance of so frightful an occurrence, punishments of this revolting character being now abolished under British influence, and the advancing enlightenment of Christianity. The dreadful tale is thus told by Dr. Davy, in his History of Ceylon :— Eheylapola (Adigèr, or prime-minister, to the king of Candy), with some of his adherents, fled to Colombo to seek protection from the British, and Molligoddé (the king) returned to Candy, with a crowd of prisoners, forty-seven of whom were impaled. One high officer, Pusilla Dissave, had excited the king's displeasure, by a present which, through the ignorance of his brother, was offered in a disrespectful manner. The brother was imprisoned: the Dissave was soon suspected of correspondence with Eheylapola, and a letter from their chief, abusive of the king, having been found in the possession of one of the attendants, Pusilla was considered guilty, his eyos were plucked out, his joints cut, and after this torture he was beheaded. Some old offence was again ript open, and all the head men supposed to have been concerned in a rebellion which had been suppressed, were summoned to appear at Kandy. They were tried by a commission of three chiefs, of whom Molligoddé, whose authority they had opposed, was one, * See Saturday Magazine, Vol. VI., pp. 91, 100, 106, 114, 143, 158, 173. and were condemned to death: after a severe flogging about seventy were executed, all of them men of some consequence in their district. These transactions were horrible; but what remains to be related is worse. Hurried along by the flood of revenge, the tyrant, lost to every tender feeling, resolved to punish Eheylapola, who had escaped, through his family, which remained in his power: he sentenced the chief's wife and children, and his brother and his wife to death-the brother and children to be beheaded, and the females to be drowned. In front of the queen's palace, and between the figures of their idols, the wife of Eheylapola and his children were brought from prison, where they had been in charge of female gaolers, and delivered over to the executioners. The lady, with great resolution, maintained not only her own and her children's innocence, but also her lord's, at the same time submitting to the king's pleasure, and offering up her own and her offspring's lives, with a fervent hope that her husband would be benefited by the sacrifice. Having uttered these sentiments aloud, she desired her eldest boy to submit to his fate; the poor boy, who was eleven years old, clung to his mother terrified and crying; her second son, nine years old, heroically stepped forward,he bid his brother not be afraid-he'd show him the way to diet! By one blow of a sword the head of this noble child was severed from his body; it was thrown into a ricemortar, the pestle was put into the mother's hands, and she was ordered to pound it. One by one, the heads of all her children were cut off, and one by one the poor mother-but the circumstance is too dreadful to be dwelt on. One of the children was a girl; and to wound a female is considered by the Singalese a most monstrous crime another was an infant at the breast, and this was plucked from its mother's breast to be beheaded. During this tragical scene, the crowd who had assembled to witness it wept and sobbed aloud, unable to suppress their feelings of grief and horror. One of the chief officers for showing such tender sensibility. was so affected that he fainted, and was expelled his office During two days the whole of Candy, with the exception of the tyrant's court, was as one house of mourning and lamentation; and so deep was the grief, that not a fire (it is said) was kindled, no food was dressed, and a general fast was held. After the execution of her children the sufferings of the mother were speedily relieved. She and her sister-in-law, and the wife and sister of Pusilla Dissave, were led to a little tank in the immediate neighbourhood of Candy, and drowned. Such are the prominent features of this period of terror, which even now no Candian thinks of without dread, and few describe without weeping. This boy, and his conduct on the occasion here described, suggested one of the incidents in Miss Baillie's drama called The Bride. Johnston, for the purpose of being translated into the languages, Miss Baillie's dramas were written at the suggestion of Sir Alexander and acted before the natives of the East, the fondness of those people for scenic representations, rendering that a desirable mode of inculcating principles and sentiments directly opposed to many of their cruel customs. NOTHING is more unpleasing than to find that offence has been received when none was intended, and that pain has been given to those who were not guilty of any provocation. As the great end of society is mutual beneficence, a good man is always uneasy when he finds himself acting in opposition to the purposes of life; because, though his conscience may easily acquit him of malice prepense, of settled hatred, or contrivances of mischief, yet he seldom lence, that he has not been hindered from consulting the can be certain that he has not failed by negligence or indocommon interest by too much regard to his own ease, or too much indifference to the happiness of others.-Rambler. LIFE is a voyage, in the progress of which we are perpetually changing our scenes; we first leave childhood behind us, then youth, then the years of ripened manhood, then the better and more pleasing part of old age.-SENECA. THAT we ought to do an action, is of itself a sufficient and ultimate answer to the questions, Why we should do it ?how we are obliged to do it? The conviction of duty im. plies the soundest reason, the strongest obligation, of which our nature is susceptible,-WHEWELL. THE WONDERS OF NATURE. FROM partial consideration of things, we are very apt to criticise what we ought to admire; to look upon as useless, what, perhaps, we should own to be of infinite advantage to us, did we see a little further; to be peevish where we ought to give thanks; and at the same time to ridicule those who employ their time and thoughts in examining what we were,—that is, some of us most assuredly were,-created and appointed to study. In short, we are too apt to treat the Almighty worse than a rational man would treat a good mechanic; whose works he would either thoroughly examine, or be ashamed to find any fault with them. This is the effect of a partial consideration of nature; but he who has candour of mind and leisure to look further, will be inclined to cry out: How wondrous is this scene! where all is formed To frame a world, who cannot frame a clod ?- BENJAMIN STILLINGFLEET. Ir being impossible for the mind of man to be always intent upon business, and for the body to be exercised in continual labours, the wisdom of God has therefore adjudged some diversions and recreation (the better to fit both body and mind for the service of their Maker,) to be both needful and expedient; such is the constitution of our bodies, and the complexion of our minds, that neither of them can endure a constant toil, without some relaxation and delighting diversion. As a bow, if always bent, will prove sluggish and unserviceable; in like manner will a Christian's mind, if always intent upon the best things: the arrow of devotion will soon flag, and fly but slowly towards heaven. A wise and good man, perhaps, would wish that his body needeth no such diversion; but finding his body tire and grow weary, he is forced to give way to reason, and let religion choose such recreations as are healthful, short, recreative, and proper to refresh both mind and body.-BURKITT MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS. No. I. WIND INSTRUMENTS. THE earliest record we possess of instruments of music, is to be found in the Sacred Volume itself, where the state of the world before the flood is 66 noticed. Tubal is said to have been "the father of them that play upon the harp and the organ;" but it is not to be supposed that these words refer to instruments resembling the harp and organ of modern times. Musical instruments were employed in very early times, when it was intended to show honour to any person;-Laban said to Jacob, Why wouldest thou run away privately, and not acquaint me, that I might have brought thee on the way with joy, and with songs, and with timbrels, and with harps?" In the times of David and of Solomon, they were employed in religious services; "David and all Israel played before the Lord on all manner of instruments made of wood, on harps, and lutes, and timbrels, and cornets, and cymbals." It is also clear that music was employed by the Jews on many other occasions, at funerals and weddings, at harvesthome, and at festivals of all kinds. The history and the monuments of ancient Egypt have many accounts and representations of musical instruments, and recent discoveries have brought to light several of these, so that we have ocular demonstration of their existence and form. So celebrated were this ancient people for their musical talents, that the distinguished philosophers of Greece braved many dangers, in their anxiety to study the science in Egypt, and this was in times when the inhabitants of the banks of the Nile were far from being in the same high state of civilization as their forefathers had been in earlier times. Musical instruments may be properly arranged in three sections, namely, wind instruments, as the trumpet, the organ;-stringed instruments, as the harp, the violin, &c.; and instruments of concussion, in which the sound is produced by striking a sonorous body, as, for instance, the drum, bells, &c. The vast number of different instruments of music which have been invented in various ages of the world, render it necessary, in describing them, to follow some arrangement similar to that noticed above. It is impossible, at the present day, to say to which we should give a preference on account of priority of invention, although it is most likely that instru-. ments with strings were the last invented of the three kinds, we shall, therefore, in the first place, describe those in which sound is produced by the application of wind; of these we may suppose the trumpet, or rather horn, to have been first used. This instrument, in its rudest form, was readyfashioned to the hand of man; the horn of a ram or of an ox, or some of the larger kinds of sea-shells, of a lengthened form, would soon be discovered to possess the power of producing sound by being blown into through a small hole at the pointed extremity. In the ancient representations of the attendants on the heathen sea-gods, we frequently see a large shell employed for this purpose. Hyginus, a Latin author, who wrote in the time of the Emperor Augustus, gives the following account of the first use of the sea-trumpet.—“It was Tyrrhænus who discovered the trumpet: his comrades lived upon human flesh, on which account the neighbouring inhabitants, looking on them with horror, fled on every side. Tyrrhenus, to induce them to return, seeing one of his companions dead, pierced a shell, and commenced blowing on his newly-invented instrument, to recall the inhabitants of the village, and to let them see These rude instruments would naturally be improved in the course of time, and we find trumpets of the following description in use, in after-times, among the Romans, and other ancient nations. Fig. 1, a Roman lituus, in brass; fig. 2, a singularly-shaped horn, used at triumphs, and on other great occasions; figs. 3 and 4, Jewish trumpets; in later times the trumpet has been much improved; fig. 5, an ancient hunting-horn. The hunting-horn and the bugle are the simplest in construction; then comes the French-horn, with its numerous coils, which, being easily separated, allow the instrument to be adjusted to different keys. The sackbut, or trombone, is another modern arrangement of the horn; in this case the note is altered by lengthening or shortening the tube, which is in two pieces, one sliding in the other. Fig. 6 represents an instrument made, by the natives on the Gold Coast of Africa, from the tusk of an elephant, which is hollowed out with immense labour; a square hole is made near the thickest extremity, and a somewhat loud, but disagreeable sound, is produced by blowing in at the aperture. This mode of producing sound from a hollow tube, appears to be a near approach to the discovery afterwards made, that different notes could be produced from the same tube, by merely opening or closing a series of small holes in its length, as in the case of the flute. This improvement in wind-instruments will form the subject of a future paper. FROM Mertola I rode over a large tract of country, abounding in cork, and covered with lavender and cistus, to a ruined house, then used as an inn, and situated in the heart of the wilderness, many miles distant from any other habitation. Here I stopped, for I was ill, and too exhausted to proceed further. Two noble storks were perched on a low tree near the house, and guarded a huge nest which they had built in its branches, while the lesser birds, availing themselves of window-frames that never yet enclosed a pane of glass, had made their habitation in the ceiling of my room, and flew to and fro in utter disregard of mortal man. I was drinking tea, when the Borderer entered, and informed me that some peasants had intimated their intention of invading my apartment. They said that in their youth they had often heard their fathers speak of the English, but had never themselves seen an individual of that nation, and were anxious to avail them selves of the present opportunity. I desired Juan to give my compliments, and say I should have great pleasure in being exhibited. On the strength of this invitation some wild-looking fellows appeared, and standing in a row fixed their stupid eyes upon me, as if determined to enjoy a perfect view of the wild beast; thus they gazed continuously upon me for some minutes, but never uttered a word, and at length departed as they came, without the slightest salutation [Portugal and Gallicia.] THE brave Dutch Admiral, Van Tromp, who was a large heavy man, was challenged by a thin active French officer. "We are not upon equal terms with rapiers," said Van Tromp, "but call on me to-morrow morning, and we will adjust the affair better." When the Frenchman called, he found the Dutch admiral bestriding a barrel of gunpowder. "There is room enough for you," said Van Tromp, "at the other end of the barrel; sit down, there is a match, and, as you were the challenger give fire." The Frenchman was a little thunderstruck at this terrible mode of fighting, but as the Dutch admiral told him he would fight in no other way, terms of accommodation ensued.-GILPIN. |