by the Hotooas, or gods; in which case a new pig, bird, or flower forthwith occupies the place of that destroyed. Like all places of the kind, it is very difficult to be found; but once on a time a Tonga canoe was driven thither by stress of weather. The crew were short of victuals, and not knowing where they were, they landed, and proceeded to gather some bread-fruit ; but to their utter amazement they could no more grasp it than if it had been a shadow! They walked through the trunks of trees, and passed through the substance of the houses, without feeling any resistance; and at length the Hotooas themselves appeared, and completed the amazement of the Tongese by walking through their bodies as if they had been of air. "Go away immediately," said the Hotooas; "we have no proper food for you; and we'll give you a fair wind, and a speedy voyage home." Profiting by the good-natured offer, they put to sea directly; and after sailing for some days with the utmost velocity, they at last got safe to Tonga. But in a short space of time they all died—not as a punishment for having been at Bolotoo, but as a natural consequence-the air of Bolotoo, as it were, infecting mortal bodies with speedy death. We cannot conclude this notice of the imaginary realms which fancy has located in various parts of the world, without adverting to the celebrated fable of El Dorado, which for ages dazzled and deluded the most gallant adventurers of Europe. Misled by the imperfect science of his day, the illustrious discoverer of the New World imagined that one part of Southern America was nearer the sun than the rest of the world; and influenced by the fervour of his imagination, and the novelty of the scenes around him, he deemed that there the original paradise of our race was to be found. This idea of Columbus seemed to be confirmed by the reports of the natives; and soon it became generally credited that a golden region existed in the interior of the country lying between the rivers Orinoco and Amazons. Its rocks were represented as impregnated with gold, the veins of which lay so near the surface as to make it shine with a dazzling resplendency; and its capital—Manoa— was said to consist of houses covered with plates of gold, and to be built upon a vast lake called Parima, the sands of which were auriferous. Among the many stories told of this wealthy region, one Martinez, a Spaniard, deponed that, having been made prisoner by the Guianians, he was by them carried to their golden capital, where he remained several years, and was then conveyed blindfold to the borders, that he might not be able to make known the approaches to that envied principality. Von Huten and his companions in arms solemnly averred that they saw-but, by a body of ferocious Indians, with whom they had a long and bloody combat, were prevented from reaching— a place containing structures whose roofs shone with all the brilliancy of gold. The tales of this golden land were not altogether fabulous, and the recent investigations of Humboldt afford an explanation of many of these recitals. When near the sources of the Orinoco, he informs us, he found the belief in El Dorado still existing among the natives, and he points out the district between the sources of the Rio Essequibo and the Rio Branco as furnishing the groundwork of the fiction. "Here, in a river called Parima, and in a small lake connected with it called Amucu, which is occasionally much augmented by inundations, we have basis enough on which to found the belief of the great lake bearing the name of the former; and in the islets and rocks of mica-slate and talc which rise up within and around the latter, reflecting from their shining surfaces the rays of an ardent sun, we have materials out of which to form that gorgeous capital whose temples and houses were overlaid with plates of beaten gold. . . . We may judge of the brilliancy of these deceptious appearances, from learning that the natives ascribed the lustre of the Magellanic clouds, or nebulæ of the southern hemisphere, to the bright reflections produced by them." Moreover, we find an old resident in Guiana representing part of the country as abounding in "mines of white stone, in which are much natural and fine gold, which runneth between the stones like veins." Another says—“ The high country is full of white sparre; and if the white sparres of this kind be in a main rock, they are certainly mines of gold or silver, or both. I made trial of a piece of sparre, and I found that it held both gold and silver, which gave me satisfaction that there be rich mines in the country." So late as the middle of last century, a Spanish company attempted to extract gold from these alluring rocks; but after great loss had been incurred, the undertaking was abandoned. Yet am I disposed to attach so much faith to the old traditions that I expect to see gold-seeking ere long resumed in the actual region of this old Eldorado. Though enterprise succeeded enterprise to discover this fabulous kingdom, each new adventurer experienced little difficulty in finding comrades to embark with him. The excitement in Europe was extraordinary. In Spain, we are told, "the desire to be included in the adventure excited an eager competition, and led multitudes to dispose of their property-even landed estates-never doubting to be repaid tenfold from the treasures of Eldorado." For long the belief lingered in the hearts of men. In the early part of last century the Jesuit Gumilla unhesitatingly embraced the old opinion; and about 1770, Don Manuel Centurion, then governor of Spanish Guiana, was so ardent in his faith, that one more expedition set out on this luckless enterprise. Of this party only one man returned to narrate the disasters which had overwhelmed his comrades! Thus terminated the dream of the golden utopia; and with its sad tale of rash enthusiasm we close our sketches. If of less airy form than its predecessors, it was equally delusive as they, and infinitely more fatal to the enthusiastic spirits who adventured on its search-foremost and noblest among whom was our own gallant Raleigh. All the sufferings of those ardent adventurers-some in search of riches, others with the higher but still vainer dream of Eden in their hearts-hardly convinced them that Eldorado was but a fiction of their heated fancy. Toiling onwards in courageous hope, everything seemed to them to announce their approach to the golden land: rocks of mica glittering in the sunbeams were its golden barriers, the hues of sunset were its gorgeous skies. But vanity of vanities was all their searching. Hunger and pestilence and fatigue thinned their ranks and bowed their spirits; and many a gallant heart, worthy of a nobler fate, thus fell a victim to its high-wrought fancies amid the wilds of Guiana— "All o'erspent with toil and anguish, L OUR INDIAN EMPIRE IN ancient Rome, the triumphal processions that ever and anon passed along the Via Sacra, "purpling the street," served vividly to impress the minds even of the unthinking masses with the grandeur and far-reaching extent of the empire that owned the sway of the Legions. Stalwart Angli and blue-eyed Germans, -Persians and Parthians from their Orient hills and sands,— a queen from lonely Palmyra, Jews torn from Jerusalem, dusky slaves from the Nile,-paintings and godlike statues from Greece, alternating with troops of wild beasts of strange aspect or startling bulk from the African deserts,-passed in turn before the proud eye of the Roman multitude. Living symbols and brilliant samples of the various provinces and conquests were transported bodily and exhibited solemnly in the Imperial City. We have a homelier way of doing things now. Europe, as she gets older, is losing her regard for pageantry. Far in the depths of Scythia, indeed-in a region then so waste that Roman Legionary never pressed its soil-we recently witnessed, on the coronation of the Czar, a sudden outburst of imperial pageantries, which find a parallel only in the pages of Roman history or in the sculptured processions of the ancient Empires of the Orient. It needs symbol and ceremony, and a mighty dazzle at Moscow, to pierce the wastes of Muscovite darkness, and make known to the dull unlettered mujik the might and resources of the Czar. But the British people know and read, and their Government speaks to |