report of the Pelew Islanders-a hint which, with every respect for Captain Hall and his friends at Napkiang, we recommend to all whaling captains in those seas.

Since the publication of Mr White's book, we have learnt, with much indignation, but no great surprise, that our friends the Dutch, who owe to us their very existence as a nation, in the true spirit of their old policy, have become jealous even of the whalers, and have recently raised their port charges so high on all their islands in those seas, that the increased expense of calling for supplies, becomes a very important item in the disbursements of a whaling voyage. Consequently the ships are obliged, ever since this most miserable and inhospitable proceeding, to be fitted out, at great cost, with stores and provisions for two and a half or three years, and sometimes even for four. With all that money, however, can procure, with the very best provisions, and a profusion of every known antiscorbutic that will keep, our gallant seamen cannot be supposed to keep the sea for such a protracted period, without an occasional run on shore, and a dish of fresh meat and vegetables. It is bad enough to be treated as we are by the ignorant and prejudiced natives; but it is really to the last degree humiliating to think, that, in these days, the colonies of an European nation should imitate the barbarous Malays and Japanese, in their unsociable policy; and if they do not actually use the crease' and the cross, yet virtually do us almost as serious an injury, by blocking us out of their ports. We trust that the attention of Government will be promptly called to this abuse, which proper representations cannot fail to remove.

We cannot quit the subject of the China seas without adverting, in terms of the highest praise, to the extensive survey which has for so many years been carried on there, by order, and at the sole expense, of the East India Company. This noble undertaking, though scarcely known in England, is probably the greatest and the most useful hydrographical operation ever entered into by any government. It was commenced in 1806, and concluded in 1822, a period of sixteen years. Captain Daniel Ross, of the Bombay Marine, was intrusted with the execution of this gigantic task; and being a man of talents, scientific knowledge, and the greatest zeal and industry, he has performed it in a most masterly manner. Captains Maughan and Crawford, also of the Bombay Marine, were associated with him in this work; and to their abilities and exertions much of its success is owing. There were never less than two ships employed on this service; and such was the spirit with which the survey was viewed by the

East India Company, that when these ships were captured in the war, and carried to Batavia, two others were instantly purchased at Bengal to carry it on. The expense of the survey must have been, at the lowest calculation, considerably beyond a hundred thousand pounds; and it is very pleasing to remark, that in all this there is not the slightest speck of any monopolizing or illiberal spirit to be seen. As fast as the charts were constructed, they were engraved in England, and immediately placed at the disposal of all the world at very low prices. As it may interest the curious in such matters, we give, in a note, a list of these charts; and we have no hesitation in saying, that these, together with Captain Horsburgh's admirable Book of Directions, and numerous accompanying Charts, form the completest body of hydrographical and nautical knowledge that has ever appeared in the world. * The last named gentleman deserves especial mention on this occasion. He has for many years been Hydrographer to the East India Company; and it is no more than due to his extraordinary industry and sagacity to say, that he has contributed more, by his writings and by his original charts, to the cause of Eastern navigation, than all the other writers and voyagers in the same seas put together.

List of charts made by Captain Ross and his assistants, during the survey of the China Sea.-South coast of China west of Macao, 2 plates. Tien Pak, Hai-lin-shak, and Namo Harbours. Channels and Islands at the entrance of Canton River, 1 large plate. Macao to Lankeet. Canton River. Coast of China east of Macao to the entrance of the Straits of Formosa. Harlem Bay. Lamon and Lamock Islands. Gulf of Petchelee. Harbours on the east coast of China, 2 plates. South coast of Hainan. Paracels and coast of Cochin China, 4 plates. West coast of Palwan. Straits of Mindora and Apo Shoal. Natunas and Tambelan Islands, 2 plates. Straits of Billiton. Straits of Gaspar. South coast of Banca. Lucepara passage. Ilchester Shoal, a part of Lingin. Geldrias Bank, near Rhio Straits. Singapore harbour. North and South Sands. Malacca Straits. Arroa Islands in the same straits.

Captain Ross, along with Captain Crawford, is now examining the islands and coasts on the eastern side of the Bay of Bengal. The Bombay government have also at present two vessels carrying on a survey of the Persian Gulf; and that of Prince of Wales's Island has employed one of the Bombay marine vessels to examine the northern coast of Sumatra, the Straits of Dryon, and the adjacent parts, of which two plates are already engraved. An excellent survey of the east coast of Banca has been made by Lieutenant Robinson of the Bombay Marine, and three charts of the entrance of the Hoogly River by Captain Maxfield.

ART. VII. Memoirs of Captain Rock, the Celebrated Irish Chieftain; with some Account of his Ancestors. Written by Himself. Fourth Edition. 12mo. pp. 376. London,

1824.

TH HIS agreeable and witty book is generally supposed to have been written by Mr Thomas Moore; a gentleman of small stature-but full of genius, and a steady friend of all that is honourable and just. He has here borrowed the name of a celebrated Irish leader, to typify that spirit of violence and insurrection which is necessarily generated by systematic oppression, and rudely avenges its crimes: And the picture he has drawn of its prevalence in that unhappy country is at once piteous and frightful. Its effect in exciting our horror and indignation is in the longrun increased, we think,-though at first it may seem counteracted, by the tone of levity, and even jocularity, under which he has chosen to veil the deep sarcasm and substantial terrors of his story. We smile at first, and are amused-and wonder, as we proceed, that the humorous narrative should produce conviction, and pity-shame, abhorrence, and despair!

England seems to have treated Ireland much in the same way as Mrs Brownrigg treated her apprentice, for which Mrs Brownrigg is hanged in the first volume of the Newgate Calendar. Upon the whole, we think the apprentice is better off than the Irishman: as Mrs Brownrigg merely starves and beats her, without any attempt to prohibit her from going to any shop, or praying at any church, apprentice might select; and once or twice, if we remember rightly, Brownrigg appears to have felt some compassion. Not so old England-who indulges rather in a steady baseness, uniform brutality, and unrelenting oppression.

Let us select from this entertaining little book a short history of dear Ireland, such as even some profligate idle member of the House of Commons, voting as his master bids him, may perchance throw his eye upon, and reflect for a moment upon the iniquity to which he lends his support.

For some centuries after the reign of Henry II., the Irish were killed like game, by persons qualified or unqualified. Whether dogs were used does not appear quite certain, though it is probable they were, spaniels as well as pointers; and that, after a regular point by Basto, well backed by Ponto and Cæsar, Mr O'Donnel or Mr O'Leary bolted from the thicket, and were bagged by the English sportsman. With Henry II.

6

came in tithes, to which, in all probability, about one million of lives may have been sacrificed in Ireland. In the reign of Edward I. the Irish who were settled near the English requested that the benefit of the English laws might be extended to them; but the remonstrance of the Barons with the hesitating King was in substance this:- You have made us a present of these wild gentlemen,—and we particularly request that no measures may be adopted, to check us in that full range of tyranny and oppression in which we consider the value of such a gift ' to consist. You might as well give us sheep, and prevent us from shearing the wool, or roasting the meat. This reasoning prevailed, and the Irish were kept to their barbarism, and the Barons preserved their live-stock.

"Read" Orange faction" (says Captain Rock) here, and you have the wisdom of our rulers, at the end of near six centuries, in statu quo.-The Grand Periodic Year of the Stoics, at the close of which every thing was to begin again, and the same events to be all reacted in the same order, is, on a miniature scale, represented in the History of the English Government in Ireland-every succeeding century being but a renewed revolution of the same follies, the same crimes, and the same turbulence that disgraced the former. But "vive l'Ennemi!" say I:-whoever may suffer by such measures, Captain Rock, at least, will prosper.

And such was the result at the period of which I am speaking, The rejection of a petition, so humble and so reasonable, was followed, as a matter of course, by one of those daring rebellions, into which the revenge of an insulted people naturally breaks forth. The M'Cartys, the O'Briens, and all the other Macs and O's, who have been kept upon the alert by similar causes ever since, flew to arms under the command of a chieftain of my family, and, as the proffered handle of the sword had been rejected, made their inexorable masters at least feel its edge.' pp. 23–25.

Fifty years afterwards the same request was renewed and refused. Up again rose Mac and O,-a just and necessary war en sued; and, after the usual murders, the usual chains were replaced upon the Irishry. All Irishmen were excluded from every species of office. It was high treason to marry with the Irish blood, and highly penal to receive the Irish into religious houses. War was waged also against their Thomas Moores, Samuel Rogerses, and Walter Scotts, who went about the country harping and singing against English oppression. No such turbulent guests were to be received. The plan of making them poets laureate, or converting them to loyalty by pensions of one hundred pounds per annum, had not then been thought of. They debarred the Irish even from the pleasure of running away, and fixed them to the soil, like Negroes.

I have thus selected,' says the historian of Rock, 'cursorily and at random, a few features of the reigns preceding the Reformation, in order to show what good use was made of those three or four hundred years, in attaching the Irish people to their English governors; and by what a gentle course of alteratives they were prepared for the inoculation of a new religion, which was now about to be attempted upon them by the same skilful and friendly bands.

Henry the VIIth appears to have been the first monarch to whom it occurred, that matters were not managed exactly as they ought in this part of his dominions; and we find him-with a simplicity, which is still fresh and youthful among our rulers-expressing his surprise that "his subject of this land should be so prone to faction and rebellion, and that so little advantage had been hitherto derived from the acquisitions of his predecessors, notwithstanding the fruitfulness and natural advantages of Ireland. "-Surprising, indeed, that a policy, such as we have been describing, should not have converted the whole country into a perfect Atalantis of happiness-should not have made it like the imaginary island of Sir Thomas More, where “tota insula velut una familia est !-most stubborn, truly, and ungrateful must that people be, upon whom, up to the very hour in which I write, such a long and unvarying course of penal laws, confiscations, and Insurrection Acts has been tried, without making them, in the least degree, in love with their rulers!

Heloisa tells her tutor Abelard, that the correction which he infflicted upon her only served to increase the ardour of her affection for him;-But bayonets and hemp are no such “amoris stimuli." -One more characteristic anecdote of those times, and I have done. At the battle of Knocktow, in the reign of Henry VII., when that remarkable man, the Earl of Kildare, assisted by the great O'Neal and other Irish chiefs, gained a victory over Clanricard of Connaught, most important to the English Government, Lord Gormanstown, after the battle, in the first insolence of success, said, turning to the Earl of Kildare, “We have now slaughtered our enemies, but, to complete the good deed, we must proceed yet further, and— cut the throats of those Irish of our own party! Who can wonder that the Rock Family were active in those times ? '

pp. 33-35. Henry the 8th persisted in all these outrages: and aggravated them by insulting the prejudices of the people. England is almost the only country in the world (even at present), where there is not some favourite religious spot, where absurd lies, little bits of cloth, feathers, rusty nails, splinters, and other invaluable relics, are treasured up, and in defence of which the whole population are willing to turn out and perish as one man. Such was the shrine of St Kieran, the whole treasures of which the satellites of that corpulent tyrant turned out into the street, pillaged the sacred church of Clonmac

Leland gives this anecdote on the authority of an Englishman.' VOL. XLI. No. 81. K