RUSSIAN BURIAL GROUND.

MR. JAMES's popular Journal of a Tour in Russia, &c., has supplied the above illustration of honours paid to the dead in that country. The Cut represents one of the Cemeteries of the government of Tchernigoff. Mr. James describes it as planted around with trees, and studded thick with wooden crosses, oratories, and other permanent marks of reverence. The general appearance of piety with which these grounds are kept up, their sequestered situation apart from any town, the profound veneration with which they are saluted by the natives, added to the dark and sepulchral shade of the groves, lend them an interest with which the tinsel ornaments of more gorgeous cemeteries can in no degree compare.

ANCESTORS.

SOME nations pay particular attention to the memory of their ancestors. The Quojas, a people of Africa, offer sacrifices of rice and wine to their ancestors, before they undertake any considerable action; and the anniversaries of their death are always kept by their families with great solemnity; the king invokes the souls of his father and mother to make trade flourish and the chase succeed. But the Chinese have distinguished themselves above all other nations, by the veneration in which they hold their ancestors. Part of the duty, according to the laws of Confucius, which children owe their parents, consists in worshipping them when dead.

They have a solemn and an ordinary worship for this purpose, the former of which is held twice a year with great pomp, and is described as follows by an eye witness:-The sacrifices were made in a chapel, well adorned, where there were six altars, furnished with censers, tapers, and flowers. There were three ministers, and behind them two young acolites: he that officiated was an aged man, and a new Christian. The three former went with a profound silence, and made frequent genuflexions towards the five altars, pouring out wine; afterwards they drew near to the sixth, and when they came to the foot of the altar, half bowed down, they said their prayers with a low voice. That being finished, the three ministers went to the altar; the priest took up a vessel full of wine, and drank; then he lifted up the head of a deer, or goat; after which, taking fire from the altar, they lighted a bit of paper, and the minister of ceremonies turning towards the people, said, with a high voice, that he gave them thanks in the name of their ancestors, for having so well honoured them; and in recompense he promised them, on their part, a plentiful harvest, a fruitful issue, good health and long life, and all those advantages which are most pleasing to

The Selector;

AND

LITERARY NOTICES OF NEW WORKS.

HISTORY OF POLAND.

THIS volume, a goodly octavo, will be peculiarly acceptable at the present season. It presents a lucid view of Polish history, from the earliest period to the present eventful moment; and, as a passage of immediate interest, we quote the following character of the President of the National Government of Poland:

This illustrious personage, Prince Adam Czartoryski, is the eldest son of the late prince of the same house, and is descended from the family of Jagellon, the ancient sovereigns of Lithuania. His father was long known, not only as a nobleman of the first rank in Poland, but as one of the most accomplished scholars in Europe. Such was his reputation, that at the period of the last vacancy in the throne of Poland, Poniatowski (afterwards king) was deputed by the diet to propitiate the Empress Catherine, to second the election of Czartoryski; but the deputy's handsome form found such favour in the licentious eyes of the modern Messalina, that he ceased to urge the suit of the diet, and returned the avowed nominee of his imperial mistress. Prince Czartoryski's claims on the throne, popularity, and consequent influence, rendered him odious to the court of St. Petersburg, and when the last act of spoliation was perpetrated, his lands were ravaged, his beautiful Castle of Pulawy destroyed, and a sentence of extermination pronounced against him, unless he would consent to send his two sons, one the subject of this notice, and the other Prince Constantine Czartoryski, as hostages to St. Petersburg. To avoid this wretched alternative, the prince and his princess, who still survive, consented to the separation, and the two young noblemen were placed under the eye of those who were deemed worthy, by the Autocrat, of reforming their principles. The talents displayed by both brothers soon obtained for them the admiration of the court; and as it was of great importance to gain them over, every mark of imperial favour was heaped upon them by the Emperor Alexander, with whom, from infancy, they had established terms of the utmost familiarity. The elder brother held for a long time the portfolio of the Foreign Office, and, in his official capacity, accompanied his imperial master to the scenes of some of his

most serious disasters. During Napoleon's invasion, Prince Constantine was in Poland, and confiding in the integrity of the then master of the destinies of Europe, and breathing naught but freedom for his country, he joined the banners of the invader, and raised a regiment at his own expense to aid in the cause of liberation. At Smolensk he received a severe wound, from the effects of which he has never yet recovered. He resides at Vienna.

The influence of Prince Adam Czar

toryski proved to be singularly useful to Poland after the downfall of Napoleon. He interposed, and interposed successfully, between the anger of Alexander and his suffering country; and, on the establishment of the kingdom of Poland, was appointed the curator of all the universities, both there and in the incorporated provinces. These duties he sedulously discharged, until he was superseded by the notorious Count Novozilzoff. From this period he has lived in retirement, faithfully performing all the duties of private life. The promotion of agriculture, science in all its branches, and kindly offices among mankind, constituted his occupations until recent events drew him from his privacy. The first call was made by the Russian functionaries, as stated in the text, for the purpose of self-protection! the second was. that of his devoted country, when a government was essential to success. He was chosen not only one of the five members of the executive body, but its president, a station which he still honourably fills. Into his new office he has carried all the unostentatious and disinterested virtues that adorned Pulawy, and there is little doubt that if (and no one suspects that such will not be the case) the independence of Poland be fairly won, the choice of his country will point to him as its sovereign. Having finished his academical career at the University of Edinburgh, he early acquired a strong taste for English institutions and for Englishmen, and of this he gave substantial proof by devoting 250l. a-year to the exclusive purchase of English books. His reve nues are enormous; but his liberality is unbounded; and, as it is a rule in his munificent establishment to provide liberally for the families of all his dependants, his means are comparatively restricted, but his personal wants are few; and that he is ready to accommodate himself to circumstances, was well shown by his only observation on hearing of the confiscation of his large property in Podolia by Nicholas. Instead of riding, I must walk, and instead of sumptuous

action thus simply considered; for the labourer was worthy of his hire; but the evasive subtleties and shuffling subterfuges by which the literary intercourse was stubbornly denied, and attempted to be set aside, by Professor White, is matter of perfect astonishment ! In the mean while, Dr. Parr steadily continued his critical labours, believing that the Professor sought no aid but his own. He revised, added, and polished at his entire discretion; and while it is allowed that one-fifth at least, of these lectures are the work of his learned hand, he undoubtedly gave to the whole its last and most effectual polish. The history which belongs to his discovery of the collateral aid of Badcock, is curious and amusing; but can have no place here. It does great credit to the head and heart of Dr. Parr. Thus the reader will observe that no small interest is attached to the volume from which the ensuing extracts are made: a volume, full, doubtless, of extensive and learned research, and exhibiting a style remarkable alike for its consummate art and harmonious copiousness."

WEALTH OF HENRY VII.

THE hoard amassed by Henry, and "most of it under his own key and keeping, in secret places at Richmond," is said to have amounted to near 1,800,000, which, according to our former conjectures, would be equivalent to about 16,000,000.; an amount of specie so immense as to warrant a suspicion of exaggeration, in an age when there was no control from public documents on a matter of which the writers of history were ignorant. Our doubts of the amount amassed by Henry are considerably warranted by the computation of Sir W. Petty, who, a century and a half later, calculated the whole specie of England at only 6,000,000.This hoard, whatever may have been its precise extent, was too great to be formed by frugality, even under the penurious and niggardly Henry. A sys tem of extortion was employed, which "the people, into whom there is infused for the preservation of monarchies a natural desire to discharge their princes, though it be with the unjust charge of their counsellors, did impute unto Cardinal Morton and Sir Reginald Bray, who, as it after appeared, as counsellors of ancient authority with him, did so second his humours as nevertheless

they did temper them. Whereas Empson and Dudley, that followed, being

persons that had no reputation with him, otherwise than by the servile following of his bent, did not give way only as the first did, but shaped his way to those extremities for which himself was touched with remorse at his death." The means of exaction chiefly consisted in the fines incurred by slumbering laws, in commuting for money other penalties which fell on unknown offenders, and in the sale of pardons and amnesties. Every revolt was a fruitful source of profit. When the great confiscations had ceased, much remained to be gleaned by true or false imputations of participation in treason. To be a dweller in a disaffected district, was, for the purposes of the king's treasure, to be a rebel. No man could be sure that he had not incurred mulcts, or other grievous penalties, by some of those numerous laws which had so fallen into disuse by their frivolous and vexatious nature as to strike before they warned. It was often more prudent to compound by money, even in false accusations, than to brave the rapacity and resentment of the king and his tools. Of his chief instruments, "Dudley was a man of good family, eloquent, and one that could put hateful business into good language; Empson, the son of a sieve-maker, of Towcester, triumphed in his deeds, putting off all other respects. They were privy counsellors and lawyers, who turned law and justice into wormwood and rapine." They threw into prison every man whom they could indict, and confined him, without any intention to prosecute, till he ransomed himself. They prosecuted the mayors and other magistrates of the city of London, for pretended or trivial neglects of duty, fong after the time of the alleged offences; subservient judges imposed enormous fines, and the king imprisoned during his own life some of the contumacious offenders. Alderman Hawes is said to have died heartbroken by the terror and anguish of these proceedings. They imprisoned and fined juries who hesitated to lend their aid when it was deemed convenient to seek it. To these, Lord Bacon tells us, were added "other courses fitter to be buried than repeated."§ Emboldened by long success, they at last disdained to observe "the half face of justice," but summoning the wealthy and timid before them in private houses, “shuffled up' a sum

* Bacon, iii. 409.

+ Ibid. iii. 380.

See examples in Bacon, iii. § Bacon, iii. 382. Ibid, 381.

mary examination without a jury, and levied such exactions as were measured only by the fears and fortunes of their victims.-Mackintosh's England, Vol. 2. Spirit of Discovery.

THE COURSE OF THE NIGER.

THE discovery of the termination of the course of the Niger, will be of the greatest importance to geography, to our political power, and to civilization.

With regard to geography, perhaps the contradiction which was afforded by the various sources whence we derived our knowledge of the character of the interior of Africa, and of the course of, next to the Nile, the most renowned, and, as was considered from the same accounts, the greatest river of that country, have in late times given unlimited zest in the pursuit of further information, and has not in the least detracted from the pleasure with which we find that we are indebted to our countrymen for the solution of this all-absorbing problem. It appears, that among the ancients many facts connected with the geography of the interior of Africa were well known, which have still been an object of discussion among the moderns; and of these, we may enumerate the occurrence of a large lake or marsh (for it is either, at different seasons of the year), whose real existence, beyond the speculations of geographers, was very unsatisfactorily established, until the journey of Denham and Clapperton; and the fact of the occurrence of a great river in the west, emptying itself into the ocean, though many were of opinion that it lost itself in an inland marsh, or in the desert, while others supported the opinion of its identity with the Nile of the Egyptians. The researches of Ptolemy and the Arabian geographers on the Nile of the Negroes, and in later times the travels of Leo Africanus, who was a Moor of Grenada, demonstrated the absurdity of this opinion; and how extraordinary that, in the boasted perfection of human intellect, it should have been broached several centuries afterwards, and that the barometric levellings of Bruce should have been necessary to enforce conviction! It is not at all improbable that Hanno, the Carthaginian, as advanced by Macqueen, reached the Bight of Benin, or of Biafra; and certainly the geographical information obtained on these countries by Herodotus and Edrisi was more accurate than the speculations of many modern geographers.

Observation had demonstrated to the moderns that no large river emptied itself into the ocean on the north-west coast, though it required a more accurate acquaintance with the Senegal and the Gambia before it was fully ascertained that they were not the outlets of this great stream. The progress of navigation along the south-eastern shores of Africa also showed that no large river emptied itself into the sea along that coast; while the settlements of the Portuguese on the coast to the south of Cape Lopez, led them, at an early period, to adopt the opinion afterwards supported by Mungo Park and Mr. Barrow, that one or more of the rivers in their vicinity were the outlets of the great river of the interior of Africa. Two celebrated geographers, D'Anville and Major Rennell, however, espoused the theory of the waters emptying themselves into the Wangara, or great marsh; which argument underwent various modifications in the hands of different geographers; and though the probability of its emptying itself into the Gulf of Guinea had been pointed out on the continent, and vigorously supported in this country, an expedition was fitted out to explore the Congo or Zaire, which, though unfortunate to the individuals concerned, was yet satisfactory in a geographical point of view, and demonstrated that the rivers south of Cape Lopez were not the outlets of the waters of the Niger, and gave origin to a speculation which partook of all the characters of a romance of the desert, beneath the sands of which its author buried the gigantic stream, loaded with the waters of the Wangara or Lake Tchad, to make it flow into the Mediterranean at the Syrtis of the ancients.

In the history of geography there are no examples of greater perseverance and courageous determination than in the efforts made to triumph over the difficulties presented in the solution of this important question. Since 1815, there has scarcely a year passed in which a new attempt has not been made; and of these, if we recede a little farther back, twenty-five were made by our countrymen, fourteen by Frenchmen, two by Americans, and one by a German; of which but a small number, since the days of Houghton, have not fallen victims to their heroic devotion.

Mungo Park first observed the direction of the stream which had become as much an object of discussion as its termination; and, strange to say, after the present discovery, it will, in some parts of its course, still remain so. The