an authentic picture of a very peculiar state of society, and traits of native character, differing in no small degree from those depicted by Mr. Crawfurd as belonging to the whole Archipelago. It opens with a sensible and well-written address, by Sir T.S. Raffles, who probably will in no great length of time bring the districts of Sumatra contiguous to our settlement, into the same state of prosperity as the island of Java enjoyed under his most judicious and active sway.

The Reports are highly interesting, and the Appendix contains statistical details and tables of population, &c. of the town and adjacent districts; an interesting report on the cultivation of spices; and an official document on the general salubrity of the settlement, in which we are happy to find that the long prevailing error in regard to the unhealthiness of the place is corrected; and that it is abundantly proved, through the whole of the volume before us, that Bencoolen stands as high in point of salubrity as any part of the eastern islands.

The principles on which the native administration of the country is now conducted are detailed in the Government Regulation, which forms part of the Appendix, with another on the subject of debtors and slaves, from which we have the satisfaction to observe that, by a judicious modification of the native usages, the suppression of slavery has been substantially effected,-without violence to the prejudices and feelings of the people, or injury to private property.

Upon the whole, the information contained in this volume, enables us to conclude that a greater extension of European capital and enterprize is alone wanting to render Bencoolen a valuable and important possession; and we are not aware that the same objections apply to colonization in the Malay islands, as are urged against it on the peninsula of India; nor do we believe that the East India Company, under existing circumstances, would oppose it: on the contrary, we find a right of property in the land recognized in the present colonists; and that, in order to improve the agriculture of the country, the Company themselves at one period actually sent out, at their own cost, no less than sixty Europeans as settlers. Sumatra offers greater advantages for colonization than any of the West India Islands. The land near Bencoolen has been for the most part cleared of forest, and may be obtained on most moderate terms; labourers can be procured without having recourse to slavery, and the soil is well adapted for every species of tropical cultivation. Besides the spices, sugar, coffee, pepper, &c. may be extensively cultivated; and the vicinity of the Indian and China markets, in addition to those of

Europe,

Europe, gives the Sumatran cultivation an essential advantage over the West Indian planters, to say nothing of the difference of climate, the absence of the yellow fever, and the total exemption · from hurricanes.

Our limits do not admit of our entering upon the miscellaneous subjects in the other volume. It contains, besides botanical and zoological descriptions,* particular accounts of Bali, Timor, Borneo, and the Sulo islands, with other papers of minor importance. The object of the volume appears to be preservation of occasional notices on subjects connected with the Eastern Islands, which are too desultory and unconnected for separate publication. We highly approve of the plan, and are inclined to think the general adoption of a similar one in our colonies would be attended with beneficial results. We shall look with some interest for the succeeding volumes, in which we shall hope to find accounts of some of the recent journeys and discoveries which are understood to have been made in the interior of Sumatra and the adjacent islands.

ART. VI. Irish Melodies, by Thomas Moore, Esq. with an Appendix containing the original Advertisements, and the Prefatory Letter on Music. Sm. 8vo. London. 1822.

WE have much pleasure in finding these poems, at length, in a

form by which they come legitimately under our cognizance; a pleasure in which the author would appear not to partake; for we have the usual prefatory affectation, of strong objections to the publication, and extreme reluctance, overcome, in the ordinary mode, by the creeping out of incorrect and spurious copies. We deviated from our common practice, by giving our opinion of the poetry of the first four numbers before it was disjoined from the music. Our business is now, therefore, with the four which followed. The songs are, for the most part, equally beautiful with those which

* Among others, we have pretty full accounts of the Sumatran camphor, the Sago tree, the Varnish tree, two new and very singular species of Nepenthes, and a minute description of an extraordinary gigantic flower, the discovery of which was communicated by Sir S. Raffles to Sir Joseph Banks in 1818. It is found to be parasitic on the lower stems and roots of the Cissus angustifolia of Roxburgh, and is, when fully expanded, in point of size the wonder of the vegetable kingdom; the breadth across, from the tip of oue petal to the tip of the other, being little short of three feet! the cup is estimated to be capable of containing twelve pints, and the weight of the whole is from twelve to fifteen pounds. In the last Number of the Linnean Transactions there are several drawings and a particular description of it; the plant is there appropriately named Rafflesia.'

preceded

preceded them; but we should have been glad to have some variety of sentiment; and, as we take for granted Mr. Moore will write songs till the day of his death, we beg leave to suggest to him, that the love of one's country, of the wine of other countries, and of the women of all countries, are not the only subjects upon which songs may be written.

As to the elegance of the greater part of the poetry of this volume, there can be but one opinion. All we intend, therefore, is to offer a few remarks on what we consider the best and the worst of the poems before us. The beauty which this author has peculiarly to himself, is the mixture of tenderness with mirth. His melancholy is not often despairing, and his gaiety seldom escapes him without a tone of more prevailing sadness." It is not the force of sentiment which strikes us, for that is often wanting; but the pervading warmth and freshness of feeling, and buoyancy of spirit, which are ever present in the lightest, and in the most mournful of his moods. We have said that energy of sentiment is often wanting; perhaps however there is as much of it as was to be expected in a volume of songs; and it is to be observed that where Mr. Moore aims most at strength, there is still the same exquisite delicacy, and distinctness of language, for which he is elsewhere remarkable. This is the more pleasing, as we have often to regret the attempts in this way which are made by many, whose powers extend merely to the writing a pretty song, and whose verse therefore, like a swollen stream, loses in clearness what it gains in loudness.

The love-songs have all the fervour of sincerity, not the depth of constancy, of feeling. There are a very few of them too like the productions of days when song-writers were worse poets, and, for the most part, in worse plight than they are now ;-too like the many effusions which were wont to be addressed to the Phillis or Chloe of a starved imagination, when the poet sang of love he never felt, for the sake of bread which he too often failed to find; but even in these there is always some stray charm which makes up for all. The rest have the air of being written in a fit of admiration, true - however transient; and for a real living object; but none of them have the deep spirit which promises permanence in the passions of which they are the impress: we read them, certain of the warmth of feeling which has prompted them, but with no assurance of any two of them having been inspired by the same object; or that such might not be inspired by any given number of young ladies, who were lucky enough to come in Mr. Moore's way, and strong enough in their charms to seduce him to a sentimental condition.

Mr. Moore's wit is nothing more than easy and playful. We doubt if his temperament be favourable to the more forcible species.

Our

Our very greatest wits have not been men of a gay or vivacious disposition. Of Butler's private history nothing remains but the record of his miseries, and Swift was never known to smile. Men of saturuine tempers find a refuge in the ridiculous when their minds are sore and wearied with the conflict of life; and perhaps, if such were to examine the periods of their mental operations, they would find they had started the most ludicrous ideas in bitterness of spirit. At those times the mind is very highly, though painfully excited, and, if it be naturally strong, its impressions of every kind being aggravated, the relief which it has the power of throwing in by means of ludicrous associations will share the force of its other impulses, and acquire more from the contrast with them. The will of Chatterton may be alleged as a strong evidence of this condition of the mind; and indeed his whole character, his long fits of moroseness, and his bursts of levity are equally in point. Mr. Moore's wit is here such as we should have looked for from his general turn of mind, pleasant and harmless, neither powerful nor

severe.

There is a sort of apology made for irregularities of verse, as required to adapt the measures to the music. This is quite unnecessary. If the novelty and variety of the cadences; the proper, though unusual, regard to quantity as well as accent; if the ease, lightness and grace of the versification are to be attributed to the attention given to the music they were to accompany, these effects assuredly require no apology. We are disposed to believe that, as far as quantity is concerned, much has been suggested by the music. The perception of rhythmical cadence is a pleasure often enjoyed by those who have not an ear otherwise musical; yet we have no doubt that such an ear is a great assistance to writers of irregular verse, whose faculty of inventing new, as well as of imitating old modulations, is an important part of their powers; and it is only by this assistance, we apprehend, that the effects of quantity will be fully appreciated. Few English verses are to be found of the same author, which, read with attention to quantity, are so musical, and without it, would be so much the contrary, as the following stanzas.

'I'd mourn the hopes that leave me,

If thy smiles had left me too;

I'd weep when friends deceive me,
If thou wert like them untrue.

But while I've thee before me,

With heart so warm, and eyes so bright,

No cloud can linger o'er me,

That smile turns them all to light!

'Tis not in fate to harin me,

While fate leaves thy love to me;
'Tis not in joy to charm me,

Unless joy be shared with thee;
One minute's dream about thee
Were worth a long, an endless year
Of waking bliss without thee,

My own love, my only dear!'

Two more follow, of which the latter seems only added lest any of Mr. Moore's pieces should escape the metaphor which always lies in readiness to seize upon them. We may also recommend to him, adverting to the words in italics, to consult the 'vox stellarum' of his ingenious namesake the Philomath. We repeat that we know of few English verses in which quantity is made of equal avail; an example of those few may be taken from a translation by Sir W. Jones; in the same measure, we believe, as the original Persian. Boy, bid the liquid ruby flow,

And let thy pensive soul be glad,

Regard not what the zealots say;
Tell them their Eden cannot show
A stream so clear as Rocnabad,

A bower so sweet as Moselay.'

Here the spirit of the versification depends, first, upon the quantity given to the antepenult syllable of each line, which syllable is never, but in the fifth line, terminated by a mute consonant; and secondly upon the accent of the second syllable; and the versi fication would have been improved, if that syllable had never been terminated by a semi-vowel: for it is always to be observed, that accent without quantity is best aided by mutes, and that quantity (which, in English at least, always implies accent) is best without them, mutes serving to acuminate the accent, vowels to stretch the quantity. While gazing on the moon's light' (p. 56.) is another good example of this kind of melody. Indeed versification is a point in which it seems impossible for Mr. Moore to get wrong. Like the toy which was the admiration of our childhood, let him fling his verse, however carelessly, into what attitude he will, it never fails to light upon its feet. All these songs are so well known, that we wish to be sparing in our extracts. We give the following in the author's peculiar manner.

'Oh! had we some bright little isle of our own

In a blue summer ocean far off and alone,

Where a leaf never dies in the still blooming bowers;

And the bee banquets on through a whole year of flowers;
Where the sun loves to pause,

With so fond a delay,

That the night only draws

A thin veil o'er the day;

Where