troduced by Ali Bey, as forbidding his disciples to worship him!!!

our blessed Lord and Redeemer, when in Rev. xxii. 8, 9. he finds this worship solemnly interdicted? Or, if he should

word Lamb has been changed into Angel,
he confirmed in the
instilled at

afterwards find in a new edition that the قوزينگ اياغنه سجد اتمک ایچون

millea not be care period into the mind دو شدم اما بكا صاقن اتمه ديدي بن

of every Mohammedan, that the Christians سنگ و انبیا قرنداشارد

they still prosecute the same system of و بو کتاب سوزلرینی حفظ ایدناری -humble opinion, of itself sufficient to ex یولداشی ایم جناب باریه شجده ایله

'I fell down to worship at the feet of the LAMB; but he said unto me: Beware thou do it not: for I am thy fellow-servant, and of thy brethren the prophets, and of them that keep the sayings of this book: WORSHip the divinE MAJESTY.' When I first read this passage I conceived it possible that the word Lamb might have been substituted for Angel by mere inadvertence; but after reflecting on the other passages where there is evidently an effort made to diminish the glory of the Saviour, I feel no hesitation in pronounc ing it to be designed." P. 42.

We can really proceed no farther in our task of selection: and if there be any of our readers, that after this wish for farther proof, we must refer them to the pamphlet itself. We pass over the two remaining heads of omissions and additions, and hasten to the conclusion of this important document.

"Such is the substance of what has oc curred to me in perusing the three books of the New Testament above specified. To enter into all the minutia would require a volume, and would be altogether foreign to my present purpose, which is

not to furnish the Committee with a revised text, but simply to point out some of the leading features of the version, that they may proceed without delay to take such measures as will put a speedy and effectual stop to the circulation of those gross corruptions of the word of God which have been, or are intended to be

sent out under their sanction, to the fountain-head of Moslem influence. If we would heal the deadly waters which flow from that source, we must be careful that the salt which we would throw into them be incorrupt, and in full possession of its savour, else it will be good for nothing, but to be cast out and trodden under foot of men. What must a learned Effendi think of our inconsistency, in worshipping

not only falsified their Scriptures previous

to the appearance of Mohammed, but that

corruption? This consideration is, in my

cite the Committee to use every possible effort in preventing copies from coming into the hands of Mohammedans. If the Testament be allowed to circulate in its present state, it will assuredly furnish weapons to be employed against the sacred cause we wish to promote.

"In concluding, I beg to recommend to the most serious attention of the Committee, the importance of suffering no version of the Holy Scriptures to be published under their sanction that has not been made by individuals whose consciences are swayed by a deep sense of the divine authority, or critically examined by such as are skilled in the principles of Biblical interpretation. No elegance of style, nor beauty of execution, can ever compensate for an erroneous representation of the original text.

And could this document, the public will reasonably ask, have reached its destination? Could it ever have been laid on the table of the Bible Society, and submitted to the consideration of their Committee?

Strange as it must appear, this document did reach the Society, was read, considered, and slighted!!! Let us hear Mr. Henderson's account;

"We are too apt to imagine that others must see an object in the same strong point of view in which it appears to ourselves, and feel surprized that our conclusions should differ so widely from each other. This was my case on the present

thing like justice be done to the text, to
nearly a third part of the volume*; and
"Thirdly, the pernicious consequences
to be apprehended from the exhibition of
snch an accumulation of errors to the view
of the Mohammedan world.

"Bat the question may be put: Is it advisable in any case to publish tables of errata along with editions of the Holy Scriptures designed for popular use? Whatever use may be made of such tables by more enlightened readers, and how easily soever they may be able to reconcile them with the integrity of the Divine Oracle, it is evident they will be viewed in a very different light by those of more limited habits of thought, and that their direct tendency on the minds of this class of readers, is to shake, if not entirely to destroy, their belief in the doctrine of the inspiration of the Holy Scriptures. The following extract of a letter from one of my correspondents at Astrachan, dated May 7, 1822, fully proves the baneful influence of this proposed mode of emendation.

"Some time ago two Georgians called on us; the one was from the celebrated city of Shiraz, the modern Areopagus of Persia; the other from Isphahan, the ancient metropolis of that empire. The former was servant to the Shah's son, the go vernor of Shiraz. We inquired if he had heard any thing of the learned and pious Martyn? He said he had seen him; but being a servant, he could not presume to speak with one who had admittance to his master's table. He had been early carried into Persia as an exile, was compelled to renounce the religion of his fathers, and become a Mohammedan, but had recently effected his escape from the slavery of his cruel oppressors. Being able to read Per. sic, he had on a former occasion received a copy of the New Testament; but, not understanding the table of errata, he was alarmed lest it might be a false gospel he had received from us; and the inquiries which he made respecting the authenticity of the Persic version, shewed the uneasiness which the errata had occasioned in his mind.

"Now it may fairly be asked: If such was the effect produced by a table of errata on the mind of one naturally partial to Christianity, as a hereditary form of religion, what must be its influence on those who are its determined enemies? Must

There is not a page, nor scarcely a verse in the volume, that does not contain something or other of an objectionable nature.

not the followers of Mohammed, who are accustomed to regard every word and every letter in their sacred books with the highest veneration, and denounce the most awful penalties against whosoever alters them, be inspired with the idea that the Christians think lightly of the Scriptures in which they profess to believe, and in translating and printing them, proceed upon principles of mere mercantile speculation? The assertion may, I believe, be hazarded without any fear of contradiction, that the Bible Society durst not venture to circulate, even among professing Christians, an edition of the Scriptures which they have been taught to venerate as the infallible word of God, containing an exhibition of faults at all resembling that which it is resolved to submit to the inspection and contempt of infidels.' P. 57.

As to the defence set up on the score of the incorrectness of all first editions of a new version, another argument urged in defence of the version in question, Mr. Henderson says, that there is nothing in the versions of Luther or the work of Ali Bey,"-nay, that Wiclif" at all symbolizing with in truth, the present version has not even the plea of being a first version.

"Situated (Mr. Henderson rémarks) as I have been in Russia since the commence. ment of this investigation, and necessarily prevented by my official duties from instituting a collation, I am not prepared to give any decided opinion respecting an original relationship between the translation of Ali Bey, and that published by Seaman; but I strongly suspect, that great as is the discrepancy between them in point of style, and the rendering of particular passages, they will be found to have been more or less connected with each other. At all events the Paris edition is not the first edition of the New Testament in the Turkish language. That of Seaman, to which reference has just been made, was published at Oxford, in 4to. in the year 1666. Of the version made by Brunton, chiefly with the aid of Seaman's, two edi tions have appeared: the first at Karass, at the entrance of the Caucasus, in 1813, and the other at Astrachan, in 1818, both in 8vo. This latter version has been designated The Tatar Testament, and the Nogai Testament, but I can assure the public there exists no translation of any part of the New Testament in the dialect of the Nogai Tatars, and the language

of the version is in the strictest sense of the word Turkish, though in as plain a style as any used in Turkish writings.

"From this statement, it will be seen that the Paris Testament, so far from be

ing the first, is in fact the fourth edition of the Turkish New Testament. Is it not then matter of regret, that possessing, as the Committee did, access to at least two of the preceding editions, they should not have availed themselves of the advantages naturally to be expected from a collation of the texts they exhibit, but that, on the contrary, they should have been compromised by the publication of an edition which not only sinks in comparison with those which preceded it, but is totally unfit for circulation under the name of the pure word of God? They are, to say the least, Christian translations. The version

of Ali Bey is truly Mohammedan. Not to

insist on the style, I may just observe here that it exhibits the Mohammedan God, Mohammedan geuii, Mohammedan saints, Mohammedan conversion, the Mohammedan faithful, the Mohammedan Scriptures, the Mohammedan Sabbath, the Mohammedan Antichrist, and the Mo

hammedan Paradise!" P. 60.

And this is the version which the British and Foreign Bible Society persist in circulating!!! Of the purity of another Oriental version, the Arabic, very strong doubts are entertained: the corruption of this is surely (unless Mr. Henderson can be contradicted) placed beyond doubt; what security then have we, in the conduct of the Committee of the British and Foreign Bible So ciety, for the purity of any other version?

our work. We do not profess in the technical sense, which the word has now acquired, to be Reviewers; but when we have met with a work, whose general design and principles we approve, and the execution of which upon the whole appears to us to be good, we are glad, and we think, that we do no more than our duty, to recommend it to the notice of our readers, and to give them a brief sketch of its contents.

But

The Widow's Tale falls precisely within these predicaments. It is a tale of considerable interest, sweetly and simply told, breathing affectionate feelings, and built upon religious principles. Perhaps, if we were instituting a rigid examination, we might here and there require a little more fire and vigour, and might object to the metre, which has not nerve or strength or variety enough, to sustain a long narration. these observations would not only be out of their place here, but misapplied to their object. The book lays no pretensions to a place among the higher classes of poetry: it performs what it professes, and it will gratify those who are contented only to expect from it a calm and soothing amusement for a leisure hour. There are those, we imagine, both in the higher and lower, the busy and retired classes of life, to whom pleasure of this sort is peculiarly sweet. Such recreation is in accordance with the even tenor of some lives, and in pleasing contrast with the agitated current of others. To those, indeed, who are busily en

The Widow's Tale and other Poems. By the Author of Ellen Fitz-gaged in the conflict of the world, arthur. 6s. 6d. London. 1822. there must be moments, when to unbend the bow, and retire from the tumult, must be especially delightful. The very strain and exultation of the spirit, the brilliancy and dazzling glare of its pleasures, or the overanxious importance of its pursuits, must require, at intervals, that sort of amusement, which brings with it all the refreshment of repose, without the tedium of idleness.

WE promised our readers in a former Number a short notice of the poem, the title of which stands at the head of this article, and we now sit down to redeem our pledge. After the observations which we then made, it will not be expected, that we should enter into any severe critical examination of this little volume. Indeed, regular literary criticism can never be the direct object of any part of

We will not anticipate one part of the pleasure of our readers, who

may be induced by what we say,
to have recourse to the poem itself,
by analysing its story. It is in sub-
stance a tale of severe afflictions,
borne cheerfully under the belief
of a superintending gracious Provi-
dence, and finally ending in that
sort of alleviation, which, though it
cannot destroy the recollection of
the past, nor prevent an occasional
sigh for the blessings of which we
have been bereft, yet sheds a gleam
of sunshine over our declining days,
and makes us feel, that we are not
without the comforts of this life,
while it directs our main hopes to
another.

The poem opens with the follow-
ing lines of beautiful description:-
The yellow beams of evening light
Down aspen glen were streaming bright:
On either side tall cliffs arose
In their deep shadows of repose,
But catching lights, obliquely glancing,
Touched many a crag's projecting edge,
And many a sun-bright bough was dancing,
Outstarting from its rocky ledge.
And a little stream from stone to stone,
As it leapt with mirthful music down,
Glittered and gleam'd in the slanting ray
A scatter'd shower of diamond spray.
Half down one rifted side was seen
A little shelf-a platform green-
A nook of smiling solitude,
Lodg'd there in Nature's frolic mood.
There many an ash and aspen grey
From rent and fissure forced it's way,
And where the bare grey rock peep'd
through,

Lichens of every tint and hue,
Marbling it's sides, and mossy stains
Enseam'd their vegetable veins.
The streamlet gush'd from that rocky wall,
And close beside it's sparkling fall
A little cot, like a martin's nest,
Clung to that lonely place of rest.
The living rock it's walls supplied
North, east, and south-the western side
With fragments of the pale grey stone
Was rudely built, whose silv'ry tone
Contrasted with it's chaste repose
The holly-hock, and briar-rose.

A little patch of shallow mould
Was gay with flowers-there spik'd with
gold

Tall rockets bloom'd, and burrage blue,
There thyme and penny-royal green,
And pinks and sweet valerian grew;
And balm and marjoram were seen,
And many a herb of virtue known
To rustic pharmacy alone.

P. 1-3.

great poetic merit in this descripIt appears to us that there is tion; without being unnecessarily and tediously minute, it yet sets before us a number of features, which must strike forcibly every one who has been a dweller or a wanderer in mountain scenery. It recalls to our mind many a similar sunny spot; grey cottage perched on the ledge we fancy we have seen the little of garden-ground on the side of the mountain, with its black-bird singing over the door, and its gawdy flower-bed before it. But the beauty ber of the features painted and of the description is not in the numworked up, but in the selection of them; they are such as set the reader's mind at work, and make him, by the force of association, draw for himself the complete picture which he most delights in. This is the great merit and excellency of poetic sketching; instead of presenting the same picture to every body, which only those of accordant tastes can really derive pleasure from, it contents itself with giving only those materials from which every person, however varying in prepossessions, may frame for himself the picture which he most admires.

In the path leading to this little cottage a traveller appears, " in coarse and tattered garb," and looking like a sailor returned from sea; he is seated on the rock, and silently contemplates the scene before him.

Beneath the thatch where woodbines clung, At the door of the cottage, placed

In wicker cage a blackbird hung,
And a ceaseless murmur met the ear
From the busy hum of a beehive near.
In many a crevice of the rock

The wall-flower and far-fragrant stock
Sprung up, and ev'ry here and there,
Collected with industrious care,

3

in a chair, is a blind old woman, and beside her a merry-hearted blue-eyed girl, who has just been reading to her grandmother from the Bible. The stranger approaches and is hospitably received; it soon