rive fome advantage from thefe quarrels: fome fell their protection, others their intereft. Hence a fpirit of intrigue and cabal, which has diffused venality thro' every clafs; and hence perquifites for the Motfallam, which annually amount to upwards of one hundred thoufand piafters. Every pilgrim pays him an entrance fee of ten piafters, and another for an efcort for the journey to the Jordan, without reckoning the fines impofed in confequence of the imprudencies committed by thefe ftrangers during their ftay. Each convent pays him fo much for the privilege of proceffions, and fo much for all repairs they undertake, befides prefents on the acceffion of a new fuperior, or a new Motfallam; not to speak of private gratifications to obtain fecret trifles they folicit; all which is carried to a great length among the Turks, who are as well verfed in the art of fqueezing money as the most able law practitioners in Europe. Befides all this, the Motfallam collects duties on the exportation of certain fingular commodities from Jerufalem, I mean beads, relics, fanctuaries, croffes, paffions, agnusdei's, fcapularies, &c. of which near three hundred chefts are fent off annually. The fabrication of thefe utenfils of piety procures fubfiftence for the greatest part of the Chriftian and Mahometan families of Jerufalem and its neighbourhood; men, women, and children, are employed in carving, and turning wood and coral, and in embroidering in filk, with pearls, and gold and filver thread. The convent of the Holy-land alone, lays out annually to the amount of fifty thousand piafters in thefe wares; and thofe of the Greeks, Armenians, and Copts, taken together, pay a ftill larger fum. This fort of commerce is the more advantageous to the manufacturers, as their goods coft them little befide their labour; and the more lucrative for the fellers, as the price is enhanced by fuperftition. These commodities, exported to Turkey, Italy, Portugal, and more especially to Spain, produce a return of confiderable fums, either in the form of alms or payments. To this the convents join another not lefs important article of traffic, the visits of the pilgrims. It is well known that at all times the devout curiofity of vifiting the holy places, has conducted Chriftians of every country to Jerufalem. There was even a time when the minifters of religion taught it was indifpenfably neceffary to fal vation; and this pious zeal pervading all Europe, gave rife to the Crufades. Since their unfortunate iffue, the zeal of the Europeans cooling every day, the number of pilgrims has diminished; and is now reduced to a few Italian, Spanish, and German monks, but the cafe is different with the Orientals. Faithful to the fpirit of paft times, they continue to confider the journey to Jerufalem as a work of the greatest merit. They are even scandalized at the relaxation of the Franks in this refpect, and fay, they have all become heretics or infidels. Their priests and monks, who find their advantage in this fervour, do not ceafe to promote it. The Greeks, especially, declare, that the pilgrimage enfures plenary indulgence, not only for the past, but even for the future; and that it abfolves not only from murder, inceft, and pederafty; but even from the neglect of falling and the non-obfervance of festivals, which are far more heinous offences. Such great encouragements are not without their effect; and every year a crowd of pilgrims, of both fexes and all ages, fet out from the Morea, the Archipelago, Conftantinople, Anatolia, Armenia, Egypt, and Syria, the number of whom, in 1784, amounted to two thousand. The Prefent Situation of the City of Jerufalem. The monks, who find, by their regifters, that formerly ten or twelve thousand annually made this pilgrimage, never cease exclaiming, that religion rapidly decays; and that the zeal of the faithful is nearly extinguifhed. It must be confeffed, however, that this zeal is rather expensive, fince the most moderate pilgrimage never cofts lefs than four thousand livres, (one hundred and fixty-fix pounds), and fome of them, by means of offerings, amount to fifty or fixty thoufand, (twenty-five hundred pounds). Yafa is the port where the pilgrims difembark. They arrive in November, and repair without delay to Jerufalem, where they remain until after the feftival of Eafter. They are lodged confufedly, by whole families, in the cells of the convents of their refpective communions; the monks take efpecial care to tell them that this lodging is gratuitous; but it would be neither civil, nor very safe to depart without making an offering greatly exceeding the ufual price of apartments. Besides this, it is impoffible to difpenfe with paying for maffes, fervices, exorcifms, &c. another confiderable tribute. The pilgrim muft alfo purchase crucifixes, heads, agnus-dei's, &c. On Palm-funday, they go to purify themfelves in the Jordan, an expedition which likewife requires a contribution. One year with another, it produces to the governor fifteen thousand Turkish fequins, or four thousand fix hundred and eighty-feven pounds; about one half of which is laid out in the expences of the efcort, and the fums demanded by the Arabs. The reader muft confult particular relations of this 263 pilgrimage, to form an idea of the tumultuous march of this fanatic multitude into the plain of Jericho ; the indecent and fuperftitious zeal with which they throw themselves, men, women, and children, naked into the Jordan; the fatigue they undergo before they reach the borders of the Dead-fea; the melancholy inspired by the fight of the gloomy rocks of that country, the moft favage in nature; their return and vifitation of the holy places; and the ceremony of the new fire, which defcends from heaven on the holy Saturday, brought by an angel. The Orientals ftill believe in this miracle, though the Franks acknowledge that the priests retire into the Sacrifty, and effect what is done by very natural means. Eafter over, each returns to his own country, proud of being able to rival the Mahometan in the title of Pilgrim *; nay, many of them, in order to diftinguish themselves as fuch, imprint on their hands, wrifts, or arms, figures of the cross, or fpear, with the cypher of Jefus and Mary. This painful, and fometimes dangerous, operation † is performed with needles, and the perforations filled with gunpowder, or powder of antimony, and is never to be effaced. The Mahometans have the fame practice, which is alfo to be found ainong the Indians and other favages, as it was likewife among feveral ancient nations with whom it had a connection with religion, which it ftill retains whereever it prevails. So much devotion does not, however, exempt thefe pilgrims from the proverbial cenfure thrown upon the Hadjes; fince the Chriftians fay likewife: beware of the Pilgrims of Jerufalem. Anecdotes *The difference between them is, that thofe of Mecca are called Hadjes, and thofe of Jerufalem Mokodfi, a name forined from that of the city, El-Kods. I have feen a pilgrim who had lost an arm by it, the cubital nerve being wounded in the operation. 264 WILL Anecdotes of Bellenden and of his Writings *. VILLIAM BELLENDEN, or Ballantine, author of a work lately republished, was, in 1602, Profeffor of Humanity, or Belles-lettres, at Edinburgh, and Master of the Requests to James I. who had fo high an efteem for him, that he enabled him to live in eafy circumftances at Paris, where he wrote thefe three books; the first intituled, De Statu prifci Orbis in Religione, Re politica, et Literis; or, the State of Religion, Politicks, and Literature, in the old World, both before and after the Flood. The fecond and third contain the opnions of Cicero on matters of the bigheft importance, delivered in his own words. Thefe books were by their author dedicated to Charles, Prince of Scotland and Wales, afterwards King Charles I. and to his brother Henry. The prefent editor has thought proper to infcribe them to Mr Burke, Lord North, and Mr Fox, whofe refpective portraits are prefixed to each dedication; and whofe talents and virtues he celebrates and defends in a preface of 76 pages, containing a very free and beld difcuffion of our public men and measures in very claffical language, and a ftrong and fatirical reprefentation, under borrowed names of antiquity, of the chiefs of the other party, or the prefent miniftry. Bellenden wrote another work, published after his death, "De tribas Luminibus Romanorum," whom be conceives to be Cicero, Seneca, and the elder Pliny,, The editor gives an account of this work, from whence he took the idea of drawing his characters of the three luminaries of Great Britain. He marks the proficiency in Greek and Roman literature which once diftinguished the Scotch, before the civil diffentions drove their brightest geniuses abroad, and celebrates the ardour for philofophy and literature so prevalent in North Britain at present. Dr Middleton has been charged with borrowing not only the matter, but the arrangement of his "Life of Cicero," from Bellenden, without the leaft acknowledgement, and the editor confeffes himself of this opinion. Certain it is, that Dr M's reputation as a writer among his contemporaries made them more partial to him than the cooler reflection of pofterity has been, and the plagiary was overlooked in the fine writer. Yet we believe it is a wellknown fact, that all the translations of the extracts from Cicero's letters and fpeeches interwoven in that Life, were executed by another hand, and betray their inferiority to the body of the work as well as to the fucceeding tranflation of Mr Melmoth. It is furprifing how little is known of Bellenden or his writings. The editor of this work is faid to be the very learned author of "A Dif courfe on Education," lately mafter of the free-fchool at Norwich, and now fettled on a benefice in Warwickshire. D. H. ΤΗ Mifcellaneous Foreign Intelligence. HE Univerfal Dictionary, com- by order of the Emprefs of Ruffia, piled by the celebrated Pallas, has excited the curiosity of men of • Gentleman's Magazine. letters, Mifcellaneous Foreign Intelligence. letters, from the moment in which 265 nually published a 4to. volume, intitled Ephemerides Societatis Meteorologica Palatina. At Strafburg, the Academy of that place has juft publifhed Dr Blair's Sermons, tranflated into German, from the eleventh edition of the French translation, by Dr Froffard; together with a preliminary dif courfe on the eloquence of the pul pit; and a fermon by the translator, preached by him in the French chapel of St James's, and before the Stadtholder at the Hague. Dr Uno Van Troil, the gentleman who travelled with Sir Jofeph Banks to Iceland, and whofe Let ters on that country were published, was fome time ago created Archbishop of Upfal in Sweden. At Groffenendorf, which belongs to the Landgrave of Heffe Caffel, about five leagues from Hanover', there are fome cold fulphureous fprings, abounding in afphaltum, which have lately acquired great reputation for the cure of gout, palfy, cutaneous difeafes, and thofe of the lungs. The Landgrave has ordered baths to be erected at this place, with every convenience for the ufe of those who may be inclined to feek relief in fuch diseases from these waters. M. Schroeter is foon to publish an account of them, with a defcription of the country adjacent. Account of a new Method of boiling IN the memoirs of the Royal So ciety of Agriculture at Paris, there is the defeription of a kitchen utenfil called the American Kette, because it was firft ufed by the Americans in dreifing potatoes. In this veffel pot-herbs, roots, fruits, rice, eggs, &c. are exposed to the fteam of boiling water, a method by which they are very fpeedily K k Vide Edin. Mag. vol. I. p. 262. made made ready; they preferve their natural tafte, which is partly loft by the method of decoction; when thoroughly boiled, they are notwithftanding firm, their colour is not altered; and lastly, the extract has no communication with the part that is to be eaten. This utenfil is a pot, having a yeffel within it made of tin-plate, full of holes this latter contains the vegetables that are to be boiled; and a fufficient quantity of water being poured into the pot, it is fhut clofe with a lid. The advantages of this veffel are not confined to those above enumerated, for vegetables may be prepared in it not only with the hardest waters, but with fea-water, in as great perfection as with that of the pureft fpring. Sketch of the Life of Aikman the Painter. 7ILLIAM AIKMAN, an eminent painter, was the fon of William Aikman of Cairny, Efq; * by Margaret, fifter of Sir John Clark of Pennycuik, Baronet. He was born on the 24th of October 1683, and being an only fon, was educated by his parents with great care, and deftined for the profeffion of the law. Nature, however, having deftined him for another more elegant, not lefs liberal, and certainly much more engaging profeffion, it was fortunate that he was permitted to follow the bent of his inclination. Mr Aikman having exhausted all the means of his improvement in his own country, went to Italy about the year 1705; where, after a refidence of five years, chiefly at Rome, he ftudied the beautiful monuments of the art, and painted under the instructions of the beft artifts. He returned to Britain about the year 1710; and being not only a good painter, but an accomplish, ed and agreeable man, he became acquainted with the most eminent perfons in his native country. John Duke of Argyle in particular, honoured him with his friendship and patronage, and was the first who introduced him at London, and to Sir Godfrey Kneller, whofe manner he is faid to have imitated in the latter part of his life. Mr Aikman was in the habits of friendship with a great many of the moft eminent perfons of his time, and particularly with the celebra ted Thomfon, whofe modefty re quired much of Mr Aikman's affift ance, when he came first to London. The remembrance of this cir cumftance, and of the many agree able hours he had spent in Mr Aikman's company, who was a moft agreeable companion, called forth Mr Thomson's mufe at the death of his friend, in the following poem. O COULD I draw, my friend, thy genuine mind, View'd He was Sheriff-depute of Forfarfhire, a lawyer of eminence, and in the re mination for a Lord of Seffion's gown at the time of his death. |