it by degrading the Percy blood with a sartorial infusion. Margaret's noble marriage was probably an afterthought. She seems to have been originally intended for Jin Vin or Tunstall. We doubt whether any of our readers have been quite satisfied with her elevation to be Countess of Glenvarloch.

The remaining characters, and they are unusually numerous, bear the sceau de Voltaire. It is difficult to select where all are admirable; but perhaps the very best is the King. History presented to the author a character in which reserve and familiarity, avarice and profusion, knowledge of books and ignorance of mankind, the most absolute pretensions in theory, and the meanest practical subservience, are so closely interwoven and so glaringly contrasted, that the boldest colouring could not be accused of caricature. And in the boldest colouring he has indulged; using only the precaution of covering his picture of united wisdom and folly, with a varnish of bonhommie which would have reconciled us to its apparent inconsistences, even if we had not known them to be warranted by history.

Moniplies and Sir Mungo are both portraits of the highest merit: opposed to each other in their principal features-separated again by the peculiarities which give to each of them an existence as individuals, and yet corresponding in one tinge of nationality. Sir Mungo is our favourite-chiefly perhaps from personal feelings. When we found him invested with the office of bore, we prepared ourselves, and with as much resignation as we could muster, for his exercising it after the manner of his predecessors: and we hope we feel properly grateful to our author, and to Sir Mungo, for having abandoned a system which confounded in suffering, the innocent reader with the personages on the stage; and for having adopted one which, while it administers to the latter their fair quantity of torment, spares the former the ennui of hearing it inflicted, by the eternal iteration of the same sentiment, couched in the same expressions.

Vincent and Tunstall do not appear to retain, in the progress of the story, the precise rank which was intended for them at its commencement. The latter, after having been elaborately finished, remains on our author's hands unemployed during the remainder of the work; while Jin Vin acts a more important part than could have been anticipated at his introduction. Well as he is drawn, we must confess we often wished him away: but, in a representation of London at the beginning of the seventeenth century, so important a body as the apprentices deserved perhaps to appear at full length. George Heriot is another full length in the same picture, and not so much the portrait of an individual as the representative of the commercial aristocracy of that period. The

same

same remark applies to most of the remaining figures; they are well made out, and bear the character of the age, and of the situation assigned to them, but they are in general too distant from the spectator, and occupy too small a space on the canvas, for the minute touches which produce individual distinctness.

On the whole, we are not sure that the Fortunes of Nigel' will be a great addition to Captain Clutterbuck's patrimony. In dramatic power, and in the delineation of character, it is equal to any thing our author has written, and there are no words by which higher praise can be given; but the obscurity and improbability of the fable, the uninterestingness of all the actors, excepting the King, and the harassing, or degrading, or painful nature of the scenes through which we follow the hero, will always make it among the last to which we shall recur, while enjoying, what we hope again and again to enjoy, a reperusal of the novels by the Author of Waverley.'

ART. IV.-Travels in South Africa, undertaken at the Request of the London Missionary Society; being a Narrative of a Second Journey in the Interior of that Country. By the Rev. John Campbell. 2 vols. London. 1822.

WITH every feeling of respect for the Directors of the Lon

don Missionary Society,' and every disposition to approve their motives and applaud their exertions-with the utmost readiness to acknowledge the gratification we have received whenever we found (to use their own words) pious missionaries, whilst zealously pursuing their grand object-the conversion of the heathen to Christianity-materially contributing to the stores of general science, and particularly to the advancement of geographical knowledge'-we must honestly confess that the impression left on our minds by the perusal of the present work is not so favourable to their judgment as we could have wished. To speak plainly, the person selected appears but indifferently qualified for fulfilling either of the purposes which the Directors state themselves to have had in view; but more especially that of exploring the treasures of nature.' We are aware of the difficulty of combining the two characters, and of procuring men possessed of the requisite qualifications for instilling into the minds of the lowest of the human species the light of the gospel; and, at the same time, directing their attention to the secondary object of making observations on men and manners and of entering upon physical researches. We know that, in general, these pious men, neither from education nor previous habits, are qualified for such undertakings; yet we also know that there are a few among them, who,

by

by a very short preparation and with a few plain instructions, would be able to note down observations of considerable value to physical science, and to collect objects of natural history at once interesting and important.

From a former work of Mr. Campbell, we judged him to be a person of this description. We could not but observe that, with all his zeal for the conversion of the heathen, his attention was occasionally drawn aside to some of the various objects which passed before him; and we took up the present volume in the full expectation of finding that he had turned the interval between the two Journeys to account, and acquired some preliminary information on the natural objects which promised to solicit his notice. In this we have been grievously disappointed, and are therefore led to conclude either that on his former journey he must have derived some assistance from others, or that, in the late ́one, the directors omitted to furnish him with instructions for collecting subjects of natural history, and to direct his attention to particular objects of interesting inquiry: he could not else have failed to bring back with him a more satisfactory account of his travels into one of those extensive regions of the earth which remains to be explored.' In his First Journey, he considerably enlarged the sphere of our knowledge of Southern Africa; but we cannot say much in favour of the result of his Second Expedition. In going over a great deal of new ground he has collected but few observations, and those are thrown together in a very loose and slovenly manner. A considerable portion of the work is occupied with what he calls the Lives' of a few savages, whose names are now heard of for the first and probably the last time; consisting, as might be expected, of little more than a dull and uninteresting summary of the number of cattle stolen from their neighbours, and of the owners killed in defending them. Another part is made up of the absurd conversations which Mr. Campbell held with the various wild tribes he visited, which tend rather to impress us with an idea of the simplicity of his heart, than of the depth of his understanding. Several of the questions put to these untutored children of nature-to say nothing of those of an irreverent tendency, such as how long God had lived,' &c.-respecting the matter and magnitude of the sun, the stars, the earth, and others far more abstruse and obscure than these, to few of which Mr. Campbell himself could give any satisfactory answer-evince a very lamentable want of the proper mode of dealing with them. In the midst of this idle farrago, however, there is still something left to cull; something that justifies the old adage-Africa semper aliquid novi offert.

Mr. Campbell begins well. On reaching the Gomka, a small

stream

stream that loses itself in the Karroo, or desert, 'I took a ramble,' he says, along its banks'

'Many lizards were running about in various directions. A widespreading mimosa, standing by itself a little way off, attracted my attention by the liveliness of its green foliage and the number of the flowers with which it was studded, and which glittered in the sun like so many newly-coined guineas. It consisted of seventeen long shoots proceeding from one ancient stump; the circumference of the ground which it shaded measured sixty-six steps; our cattle were feeding around, coveys of pheasants were flying over it, butterflies of great beauty were extracting their food from its honeyed treasures, and lizards of various hues were enjoying its shade. Those persons only can appreciate such an assemblage of the most beautiful objects in nature, who have met with them as we have in the midst of a desert. -vol. i. p. 15.

Had we found a few passages of this lively and pleasant strain, we would gladly have followed our traveller in the earlier part of his journey; but as this was not the case, and we have had so many occasions to describe that portion of South Africa which lies to the southward of Orange River, we shall content ourselves with taking up Mr. Campbell at Griqua town, to the northward of that river, where a mission has been established for some years. Mr. Helm, who superintends it, has introduced the Madras system of education, and, by the appointment of four native Hottentot boys as monitors, and the activity and authority displayed by them, succeeded in obtaining an attendance of about one hundred children of both sexes. The town had increased in size, and the buildings were in an improving state. Many of the female inhabitants had adopted the European dress. The scholars, to the number of a hundred, were examined in the Dutch catechism, and 'I never heard children,' says Mr. Campbell, repeat more readily, not only the answers, but many of them, the proofs from the Scriptures.'

About a hundred miles to the northward of Griqua is New Lattakoo, situated near the source of the Krooman, a main branch of the Orange River; and fifty miles beyond that stands Old Lattakoo, which was visited by Messrs. Truter and Somerville some years ago; each of these towns contains about four thousand inhabitants, whom Mr. Campbell sometimes calls Bootshuanas, and sometimes Matchappees. Their king (for every petty chief is a king, in the vocabulary of our author) is named Mateebe. Here also is a mission, apparently in a thriving state: a commodious place of worship had been erected, capable of containing four hundred persons, and a long row of missionary houses, to each of which was attached an excellent garden.

It does not appear, however, that any progress had been made in the improvement of the natives or in the instruction of their children, for, on Mr. Campbell expressing to the king his regret at finding so few children in the school, his majesty carelessly observed, they had to look after the cattle.' From mere curiosity some of the inhabitants occasionally attend the prayer-meetings of the missionaries, but are little solicitous in being instructed in any thing which these pious people have yet proposed to teach them. They appear to be a peaceable and good humoured race, with faculties somewhat obtuse and dull: the men pass the day in indolence, lounging and sleeping in the public squares or enclosures, whilst the women are employed in reaping the corn, or in the various branches of domestic duties. The former, however, tend the cattle, which are sent out to a distance to graze, and are frequently carried off by the Bushmen. On such occasions, the whole male population is summoned to pursue the spoilers, who, if overtaken, are put to death without mercy. On their return from these expeditions, the women and children go out to meet the conquerors, singing and dancing before them till they reach the public square, where a peetso, or general meeting of the captains, takes place, when the chiefs in set speeches relate to the assembly all the circumstances of the contest, and its result.

These Peetsos are also held on any great public occasion, when long orations are delivered by the chief; and the debates are conducted with the greatest freedom and the utmost latitude of speech: from the pauses and measured cadences, Mr. Campbell thought that some of them resembled blank verse. He gives an instance of the liberty of speech in which the orators indulge, by quoting that of a young captain, (a kind of Matchappee dandy,) who told the king, that he did not like to see kings with thick legs and corpulent bodies; they ought (he said) to be kept thin by watching and defending the cattle. The reply of the monarch was not without point:- You come before me powdered and dressed, and boast of your expeditions, but I believe you are unwilling to go on them; you can talk bravely before the women, but I know you too well to take you against those nations'namely, those who had stolen their cattle. These speeches are accompanied with dancing, shouting, and all manner of tumultuous noise. 'Few scenes,' Mr. Campbell says, 'can be conceived more completely savage, almost bordering on the frightful; but the tones of voice and the actions of most of the speakers were oratorical and graceful, and they possessed great fluency of utterance -in fact they exhibited a singular compound of barbarism and civilization.' Had Mr. Campbell ever assisted at a debate in the camp before Troy, we suspect that he would have spoken less

harshly