with the plague on board, but the precautions were so great that it never spread through the island.-When the plan of the fort Cottonêre was shewn to Lewis XIV. he said, " It is a very fine work, but to be useful, it ought to be here."—It is astonishing to see the grandeur, fine architecture, decorations, marbles, and paintings of the churches in the Maltese villages. In no part of Europe are the country churches so sumptuous. If all the lands in Malta were sown, the produce would be sufficient for the maintenance of its inhabitants; but as the cultivation of cotton is more lucrative, they prefer it to corn, which is imported from Sicily and Barbary: and the magazines in the castle. of St. Elmo were generally provisioned for three years. The cotton plants are sometimes left in the ground for three or four years, and staked every spring, as raspberry plants are in England. This method saves the trouble and expence of sowing and cultivating it annually. In fruitful soils, every square piece of ground, containing 420 geometrical yards, produces 500 pounds of cotton.-Vegetables are very fine, and the fruits delicate. The oranges are well known. Flowers have a finer scent than any elsewhere, particularly the roses, so much esteemed by the Romans. Cicero reproaches Verres for being carried, like the kings of Bythinia, in a litter, on cushions of Maltese roses. The honey has a delicious flavour, and the ancients compared it to that of mount Hybla; Cicero says it is superior to that of any other country; and Verres carried off 400 jars (amphora) of it. They reckon in the island above 80 fountains of fine water, which throw up such quantities, that in winter the greatest part runs into the sca.-Beef, veal, pork, and lamb are excellent, and game very common. The cranes of Malta made one of the luxurious dishes of the votaries of Lucullus and Apicius. The sheep are particularly productive; they have sometimes four, and commonly three lambs every year. There are a great many birds of passage, and falcons, which the Order used to send as presents to the courts of Europe. An animal peculiar to the island, is the small dog with long silken hair, which Buffon calls Bichon; and says it is a double mixture, proceeding from the little Spanish dog and the barbet. Linnæus mentions, that to impede its growth, its back bone should be rubbed with spirits of wine mixed with sour oil, and very little food given to it. Aristotle says, that, for their size, they are of the most perfect proportions. Timon paints to us the Sybarites going to the bath, followed by little Maltese dogs; but they have very much degenerated within these few years. The terra Melitensis is a bole, very compact and heavy; it is esteemed as a cordial and sudorific, and is similar to the earth of Lemnos, so much boasted of in medi. cine. The calcareous earth is supposed to have a great affinity with the kaolin, to which china owes all its solidity. Prince Lambertini in Rome has made some experiments with this earth, relative to the composition of china, and he found it had the same properties as the kaolin.'

To a traveller who runs through Sicily, where there are neither roads nor inns, and who must be a pensioner on the bounty of the monks, who I acknowledge (as a tribute of gratitude) are most hospitably inclined towards our bodies, but our poor souls they con

.

sider as doomed to eternal perdition,-the difference on landing in Malta is wonderfully striking. In Sicily you may travel a whole day without meeting a human being, and every object wears the marks of poverty and desolation; but Malta all is life, animation, and activity; and all the luxuries of mental and animal gratification are spread out be fore you The Maltese speronara's are long, narrow, flat 6 oared boats, made entirely for speed and will bear almost any sea in the Mediterra nean. A speronara often brings over from Sicily four bullocks, a distance of at least 80 miles, and the channel is reckoned very dangerous; the prow is particularly sharp, and has an eye painted on each side; some of them have a fixed awning, under which two persons may sleep very comfortably. In the summer of 1796 we hired two to convey us to Naples, for ten louis each. When the wind will not al. low of their using the sail, they row; but they do not pull their oars as we do, but push them always fronting the prow of the boat, and very seldom sit down. In calms they sing hymns, and invoke the Virgin for a prosperous gale; but alas! during our passage she was deaf to their prayers (probably on account of two heretics being on board,) for we were fourteen days making the passage; and night and day did these hardy sailors incessantly row.-The inhabitants of Gozo are said to be more industrious than those of Malta, as they are more secluded from the world and have fewer inducements to idleness. Their coverlits and blankets are much esteemed, and their silk stockings remarkably fine; some, they pretend, have been sold for ten sequins a pair. The red kind of oranges are produced from the common orange bud, engrafted on the pomegranate stock. The sugar cane is cultivated with success in Gozo, though not in any considerable quantity.'

Hence it appears that Mr. W. is not merely an epitomizer, but that he has himself visited Malta in the year 1796. Since that period, however, what changes has the island experienced !

A list of errata is subjoined, but it does not include all which the reader will find. In more than one place, the word miasma occurs for miasmata.

A map of Malta and Gozo faces the title of this neat little volume.

ART. X. The Opportunity; or Reasons for an Immediate Alliance with-St. Domingo. By the Author of " the Crisis of the Sugar Colonies." Svo. pp. 156. 58. sewed. Hatchard. 1804.

THE

HE same clear and penetrating mind which evinced itself in the "Crisis," &c. (see M. R. Vol. xl. N. S. p. 73 is displayed, with undiminished lustre, on the present occa sion; and the sound good sense which this pamphlet contains will doubtless recommend it to the serious consideration of Government. The author, in addressing himself to the Prime

5

Minister,

Moy.

Minister, reminds him of those doctrines, advanced in "the Crisis," which events have elucidated; and calls on him to improve an opportunity of securing the good and of averting the evil, to which the new order of things in the West Indies promises to give birth. Amid the singular changes which "fill the modern cup of alteration," that which has taken place in the condition of the Negroes in the West Indies is not the least considerable; and it may lead to consequences of which short-sighted politicians are not aware. A colony of African slaves fighting for liberty against their former masters, and establishing themselves as an independent state, on one of the largest and most prolific islands of the Antilles, in spite of the strenuous exertions of one of the most powerful of the European Governments, is a phenomenon of which, even in the present circumstances of our empire, we ought not to lose sight. The question, which this sensible writer proposes for discussion, is, What is the line of conduct which a British Minister ought, at the present juncture, to adopt towards the people of St. Domingo?' and he offers it as his decided opinion that our Ministry ought, without delay, to acknowlege the liberty of the Negroes of St. Domingo, to enter into foederal engagements with them as a sovereign and independent people; and not only to grant, but, if necessary, to volunteer a guarantee of their Independence against the Republic of France.'

To prove that this advice is not the fruit of rashness, but of sound judgment, is the object of the pamphlet before us; and the ingenious author invites the Minister to contemplate the question in the several lights in which it may be placed. He is fully persuaded that the line of conduct here recommended is absolutely essential to every plan of colonial policy, from which future security can be expected.

It was the opinion of this writer, and of other gentlemen well acquainted with the West Indies, that the Consul of France would be foiled in his views respecting St. Domingo ; and that the contest would terminate in the establishment of the Sovereignty of the African race over that large and fertile island. Such has been the event. A new nation has, as it were, arisen out of the sea; and respecting this new people, we must adopt one of these four lines of conduct: . to interdict all commercial intercourse whatever between his Majesty's subjects and the people of St. Domingo; 2. to permit such intercourse, but without any conventional basis; 3. to enter into some commercial treaty or convention with the Negroe chiefs, not involving any relations closer than those of

general

general amity and trade; or, 4. to adopt the decisive measures which this author ventures to recommend.

The first of these plans not being capable of complete execution, and if attempted being likely to operate more to our injury than to our benefit, is briefly dismissed by the author.

On the second, he observes that without a compact we can have no permanent privilege or favour in the ports of that

island.'

We are now in a situation to become not only the most favoured nation at St. Domingo, but even perhaps to obtain from this new people a monopoly of their trade; for we who alone can defy the resentment of France, can alone venture to contract with them at this critical period any foederal relations. Herein consists one material advantage of that opportunity, to which I invite your attention.'——

A treaty of some kind, is the necessary medium of such an important acquisition; and if we are content with a mere tacit allowance of general trade, we shall be rivalled by other powers; and soon, in consequence of the advantages of neutral navigation now possessed by them, shall be undersold and virtually excluded from this valuable branch of commerce. We shall gratuitously relinquish in favour of America, Denmark, and Sweden a great, and perhaps hereafter an inestimable boon, which the circumstances of the present war, as some compensation for its evils, happily throw within our

reach.

North America bids fairest to be our great rival in the future trade of St. Domingo; but as the injured islanders have seen the American flag bringing supplies to their oppressors, during the deepest horrors of the late dreadful contest, they can at this moment have no predilection for the people of that country; while our present hostility to the Republic, and the assistance we have given in blocka ding the French armies in their ports, must dispose them very favourably towards ourselves.'

Extend your view, Sir, to that future complete restitution of the agriculture of this vast island, which is at least a possible, and in my poor judgment, no improbable, or distant event. Reflect that upon

such a restitution, we might import from St. Domingo, alone, far more in bulk and value of the rich tropical productions than all the other islands in the West Indies now collectively afford, and have a million or more of new transatlantic customers to lay out in our manufactures nearly the whole value of their produce; and then ask yourself whether such prospects as these, with such present benefits in advance, ought to be wantonly or for slight reasons renounced? Reject them at this moment, and they will certainly be lost for ever.'

The third plan is condemned as an half and inefficient measure; and the superior policy of the fourth is fully explained:

A treaty or an intercourse merely commercial, would be so far from producing these important consequences, that our disposition to form such relations, and to stop short at that point might furnish

arguments

arguments against us to the advocates of the Republic. Such a half measure under present circumstances, might speciously. nay, it might truly, be represented, rather as a proof of our incurable hosti. lity to the freedom of the African race in the Antilles, than any symptom of a contrary disposition. That we advanced so far, might be reasonably acribed to commercial cupidity; that we offered no closer relations, could only be accounted for by what may be too fairly imputed to us, a bigoted antipathy to the new order of things in St. Domingo.'

The writer deprecates the return of this island under the dominion of France, and urges the Minister to take prompt and effectual measures for preventing it:

We must not again suffer fifty or sixty thousand French troops to be transported to the West Indies; for we cannot rely that the folly and bigotry of the present, or any future French government, will again deliver us from the jeopardy of such an experiment. Had not the present war arrived in time to stop the pretended Louisiana expedition, we might have found that even the proud and inexorable Consul, when on the point of a new quarrel with this country, could have sacrificed his thirst for African blood, to his hatred of England; and found better employment for his recruited army, than hunting down with blood hounds their human game among the Mornes of St. Domingo.'

Reasoning on the nature of the case, the author thus attempts to justify the treaty which he urges us to make with the new sovereign of St. Domingo, who has restored to it the antient name of Hayti:

France, by her own act,-whether intentionally or through the unforeseen effect of her domestic revolutions, is immaterial,-has created a new political power in the Antilles; a power dangerous perhaps in itself, but which in her hands would inevitably be destructive, to the security of its colonial neighbours. She has therefore imposed upon us a necessity of treating this new power as independent; and of engaging it, if we can, in such connections, as may exclude her influence or authority over it in future.'

That St. Domingo, whatever course we take, will one day be mistress of the Western Archipelago, is indeed highly probable; and that the shocking slavery of our colonies cannot much longer be maintained, is sufficiently certain; but by a just and rational policy, we might be enabled to look forward to the progress not only of Afri can freedom, but of African sovereignty, in the West Indies, with satisfaction rather than dismay.'

The author thus concludes his reasoning and advice:

The grand consideration of all is the highly probable, and most pernicious alternative to this alliance, a reconciliation between the new people and France. That they may not speedily become your formidable enemies, you must make them your obliged allies. You must guarantee their independence against the Republic, that

they