by an aged native, dressed in a costume As a commercial site, the advantages of which might have dated from the days of Port Essington are great. Its harbor is Valentyn. 'He wore a large wig, a three- magnificent; sufficient in extent, according cornered hat, short breeches with large knee-buckles, and a coat with wide sleeves, ruffles, and spacious skirts; while on his feet he had high shoes, with heavy silver buckles.' According to Lieutenant Kolff, the attachment which prevails towards the Dutch government, throughout this part of the Archipelago, is extremely strong; and an impartial witness, Sir Edward Belcher, (in his voyage round the world,) bears testimony to the same fact. to Captain Stokes,* to hold the largest fleet, and its neighborhood abounding with ship timber. The climate of the spot on which the new settlement of Victoria is situate, seems not to be well spoken of; but that of the neighboring region, in general, is thought to be dry and healthy at most seasons. But whether Port Essington be adapted for extensive European settlement or not, it will undoubtedly form a station in that great line of Steam Navigation, which is one Passing on from one verdant spot of day to connect England with New South earth to another, and scarcely ever loosing Wales, by the way of India; and to become sight of land, we reach the belt of exten- one of the chief high-roads of nations. sive Islands which forms the southern skirt The dangers of Torres' Straits, which must of the great archipelago; of which Timor be passed before reaching it from Sydney, is the principal. These contain only a few once so generally dreaded by European nasettlements of degenerate Portuguese, in-vigators, seem to have nearly disappeared fected with the national vice of slave-trad- before the progress of more accurate knowing. Scenes of wonderful luxuriance and ledge. beauty here alternate with the desolate lava- But North Australia offers far more imporfields of the mightiest of known volca- tant promises, as being itself a field of future noes; the noise of the eruption of Sum-commerce and production. It is a region bawa, in 1815, was heard at the distance of of vast extent, abounding with vegetable and 900 miles. The surface of these islands, animal life, but almost unpeopled by native in most instances, ascends gradually from races. The soil generally rests on a sandthe north to a great height, and then de- stone base, and appears to be as favorable scends precipitously to the south, into a deep for pastoral pursuits as in the south of the bight of the ocean. From many of the Continent; though the climate will probaprecipices of Timor, which, says Mr. Earl, bly be found better adapted for rearing overhang the sea, a line of great length will horses and cattle, than sheep. But the not reach the bottom. But before the sailor, land is also extremely well suited, in partisteering to the southward, has lost sight of cular districts, for tropical cultivation ; esthe mountains of Timor, he has passed the pecially that of cotton-possibly also of 'blue water;' and is already in the green sugar. As, however, the climate will and shallow sea, above the great bank which scarcely favor European Emigration, it stretches from the shore of Australia;-so may be thought that we are already lords of near lay the unsuspected Continent, Terra tropical wildernesses enough; without adAustralis Incognita, to those early naviga-ding another fertile desert to our gigantic tors, to whom the eastern archipelago was possessions. But the peculiar feature in already familiarly known. Within 300 the case of North Australia is, that it is an miles of Timor is the Cobourg Peninsula ;' the most northern part of Australia, on which is situated the new British settlement of Port Essington. The history of the foundation of this young colony, is detailed by Mr. Earl, in the little volume mentioned at the head of this article. He was Commissioner of Crown Lands there. The coast had been partially explored by Captain Stokes, and by Captain Grey. The settlement was planned and executed in 1838, under the auspices of Sir Gordon Bremer; and there is reason to suppose that it will prove a very important acquisition. unoccupied region, within immediate and easy reach of some of the most teeming and migratory nations of the globe. There are no Colonists so industrious as the Chinese; none, perhaps, more adventurous than the Malays. Instead of having to force a niggardly supply of free labor, by devices too nearly resembling the usages of slavery, there is every reason to suppose that to this region we might attract it unsolicited, and in overflowing abundance. The neighboring islands of the Archipelago are *Discoveries in Australia, with a Narrative of Captain Stanley's Visits to the Islands in the Arafura Sea. up, over-peopled. From their Christian popu- epicures;-varying in value from one hunlation alone, if Mr. Earl's conjectures are dred and sitxy, to thirty guilders the picul, correct, a very valuable supply might be ob- (of 133 lb. avoirdupois.) Now the immetained. Celebes is the seat of a peculiarly diate importance of this piece of commerenterprising and locomotive race of people. cial information is, that the Cobourg peninNor are the millions of Hindostan, and sula, on which Port Essington is situated, still more populous China, at any unman- affords in its sandy inlets a prodigious ageable distance. The natives of the supply of trepang. It is already much vidifferent countries of the East,' says Mr. sited for this purpose by the prahus of MaEarl, are each proficient in different kinds cassar; and the following is the tempting of labor. Thus the Malay is best adapted account given by Mr. Earl of the mode of for clearing new lands;-the Chinese be- procuring and preparing it. ing unaccustomed to these operations, from their country having been long under cul- 'In point of size and appearance it resemtivation. The latter, again, are the best bles a prickly cucumber, except that the color agriculturists, and the most skilful manu- is a whitish brown. I here allude to the most facturers of raw produce; while the natives common description; for there are several varieties, one of which is perfectly black. The of India prove superior herdsmen. They trepang is found in all the sheltered harbors, are all acquainted with the culture of cot- where it gropes about the bottom, and feeds ton, but not in an equal degree; the Chi- upon weeds and mollusca. It is taken at low nese and natives of continental India water upon the shoals or mud banks, over claiming the precedence. The Indian which the fishermen wade knee deep in water, laborer is contented with simple food, but dragging their boats after them; and when the is expensive in his clothing, and therefore feet come in contact with the slug, it is picked the best customer to the British manufac-sionally search in deeper water, when the fishand thrown into the boat. They occaturer. The Chinese laborer wears little ermen avail themselves of the services of the clothing, but expends a considerable por- natives, who are expert divers; or, if they cantion of his wages in rich food. The native not obtain such assistance, they prick for them of continental India is sparing in every with barbed iron darts, provided with long thing, and saves his wages bamboo handles. The process of curing is back to his own country.' very simple. The slug, on being taken from the boat. is simmered over a fire, in an iron This propensity of the Chinese for 'rich caldron, for about half-an-hour; after which it food,' is a matter of so much importance as is thrown out upon the ground, and the operato deserve a short digression; for it is one tion of opening commences, this being effected of the most important sources of commerce, by a longitudinal cut along the back with a at the present day, to a considerable part sharp knife. It is then again placed in the of the Indian Archipelago, with its twenty caldron, and boiled in salt water, with which a or thirty millions of inhabitants. Never quantity of the bark of the mangrove has been mixed, for about three hours, when the did the gluttons of Imperial Rome explore outer skin will begin to peel off. It is now such distant seas and coasts for mullets and sufficiently boiled, and after the water has been drained off, the slugs are arranged in the drying houses, (small huts covered with mats,) upon frames of split bamboo, spread out immediately under the roof. Each slug is carefully placed with the part that has been cut open facing downwards, and a fire is made as are yearly ransacked to supply the Man-underneath; the smoke of which soon dries darins of the Flowery Land, with edible birds' nests, sharks' fins, and trepang. The trepang is a kind of holotheria, sea-slug, or polypus, which the Chinese convert into soups and ragouts. Its fishery employs an incredible number of hands. Mr. Earl does not hesitate to say, that it is now the principal source of wealth' to the once famous Spice Islands of the Dutch. More than twenty different species of this delicate creature are enumerated by Chinese Enterprise in Tropical Australia. By S. W. murenas, to carry - quando omne peractum est Et jam defecit nostrum mare, dum gula sævit, Earl. the trepang sufficiently to permit its being packed in baskets or bags for exportation.*. No question but that' British capital and industry' will soon be applied with the usual energy, to the task of supplying the tables of the Celestials' with this slimy luxury. As we have turned the solitary islet of Ascension into a kind of Turtle Preserve for the Aldermen of our own cities, so will the Cobourg Peninsula become a nursery of sea-slugs * Enterprise in Tropical Australia, p. 83. for the profounder gourmands of Pekin; and who can estimate the importance of so widely and home-felt a traffic? Here, then, the magnificent problem of founding a free community of mixed races -an asylum for the victims of the various oppressions of the Eastern Archipelagomay possibly be worked out on a scale deserving of so vast an experiment. The principles which have proved so successful in the development of the little Communities of Penang and Singapore-where tribes the most opposite in character live together in harmony-may here be applied to a Continent. There is here room to receive the overflow of the swarming millions of China and the Islands; and to nurse the miscellaneous colony under the flag of Britain, until a new Union like that of America, though composed of men of other kindreds and widely different habits, may have spread itself over the tropical half of Australia. which impels us on in our career. A Sir 'It is, indeed,' says Captain Stokes, to the country behind-at present unvisited, unexplored, a complete terra incognita-and to the islands within a radius of 500 miles, that we must look, if we would form a correct idea of the value of Port Essington to the Crown. At present, it may seem idle to some to introduce these distant places as elements in the discussion of such a question; but no one who reflects on the power of trade to knit together even more distant points of the earth, will think it visionary to suppose that Victoria must one day -insignificant as may be the value of the districts in its immediate neighborhood-be the centre of a vast system of commerce;-the emporium, in fact, where will take place the exchange of the products of the Indian archipelago, for those of the vast plains of Australia. It may require some effort of the imagination, certainly, to discover the precursor of such a state of things in the miserable traffic now carried on by the Macassar proas; but still, I think, we possess some data on which to found such an opinion; and I am persuaded that Port Essington will ultimately hold the proud positioning, military and naval officers alone can afI predict for it.* This is no baseless speculation, distant though the period of its accomplishment may be. It is nothing more than the fair development of those social tendencies and wants which every one may see in actual operation;-a dream, but pregnant with truth; a single life may see it fulfilled. The case of Mr. Brooke proves, among many things besides, of how little use it is to oppose the traditionary coldness and caution of the Colonial office, to the unforeseen force * Discoveries in Australia, Vol. ii. p. 359. ford to undertake the government of our smaller colonies; because they alone can retain their professional employment and prospects, along with those slender and precarious offices. To a civilian, the acceptance of such a place is generally ultimate ruin. And yet, many of our colonial difficulties have arisen from warlike governors not seeing their way clearly, under circumstances where talents and habits of a different order from theirs were required;-talents and habits, the exercise of which, in more fortunate instances, has rescued Colonies from depression produced by bad measures, and calmed the fury of dissensions which former striking and eventful changes of the thirty want of judgment had provoked. subsequent years of peace which, especially But we must not trespass further beyond in this country, have marked the onward our present province; and must avail our-progress of social reform and scientific wonselves of some after occasion to show, how der. It is evident that it must yet require the introduction of better regulations into a considerable number of volumes to emthis great branch of service, might, with no brace and detail all those years and their great increase of expenditure, go far towards developments. Under these circumstances meeting the pressing demand for talent and we shall abstain from doing more than encharacter, in a sphere of which the import- deavoring to give a general idea of the ance and the difficulty are likely to augment spirit and manner in which the work is exat such a rate as to set all existing official ecuted. routine at defiance. Australia is tempting ground to imaginative, as well as practical speculators; and it would have given us pleasure, had Captain Stokes' recent work, named among the others at the head of this article, happened to attract our notice somewhat earlier, to have introduced our readers more in detail to the narratives of adventure, and other important matters, contained in it. A separate article, indeed, might well be devoted to it. But we have already wandered even further south of the Straits of Singapore,' than the Dutch expounders of the treaty of 1824; and must return to the mysterious Continent on some after and fitter opportunity. The idea of this History of Our Own Times' is excellent. It is evident that for general readers, and for all who are desirous of possessing a clear and continuous narrative of those stirring times, there needs a careful and skilful gleaning of the most. essential matter out of the minute details, and the many political disquisitions of the more voluminous histories. For schools, for young people, for all who would arrive at a comprehensive and well-grounded conception of the transactions of the last half century, the most remarkable period of the modern world, such a work is absolutely necessary. Well grounded in the perspicuous narrative of such a work, they are then better able to comprehend, to lay hold of, and retain the more expansive statements of larger histories; and in most of the qualities that should distinguish such work, we have no hesitation in saying that this history is in successful possession. It is written with remarkable perspicuity, and in general, judgment of the real and relative importance of the circumstances which it deals with. There is a great air of imHistory of Our Own Times. By the Au- partiality, wherever foreign facts and perthor of The Court and Times of Fred-sonages are concerned; the style is pure erick the Great,' Vol. I. and II. Colburn, London, 1834 and 1845. From the Eclectic Review. HISTORY OF OUR OWN TIMES. THIS work, of which one volume was published in 1843 and a second just recently, comes down only to the year 1797, and terminates with the Battle of Camperdown. At this period the Reign of Terror in France was ended; Buonaparte had put down the insurrection of the sectionaries with cannon, and by his campaign in Italy had commenced that great and amazing career, which laid all Europe, England excepted, eventually at his feet. The volumes yet to come have, therefore, to narrate the mighty and crowding events of those unexampled years of warfare, which were terminated by the Battle of Waterloo, and the general peace in 1815, and the not less VOL. IX. No. II. 11 and good, and it has a temperate tone that pleases the reader and makes him deliver himself up willingly to the guidance of the author. But the history has, notwithstanding, one serious defect, and this we must endeavor to make plain, not because we would have the reader to put the work itself aside, for it is well calculated, this failing being once understood, to aid his acquirement of a knowledge of the history of his own times, but to put him on his guard, and thus to enable him to read on in perfect security, having the key to the author's little foible in his hand. That foible, and we dare say it is a most honest one, in the author, is that of a quiet conservatism which sways him, perhaps unconsciously, in his treatment of our own do mestic transactions and personages. There is nothing vehement or rampant about him, he aims at no sophistical eloquence, or fiery declamation, which might bring over his readers to his own views of such things, in fact, to the ideas of a political party. But the tendency to such party notions is not the less there, and so gently, and devoid of passion does it reign and run through the narrative, that young and unsuspicious readers might not soon, or perhaps not at all perceive its existence, and thus unawares might receive a distorted impression of things. In short, the author is, perhaps constitutionally, a settled conservative, quiet and amiable as he is. This we shall soon make apparent, and this once apparent, his history may be read with certain advantage, and no great danger. · London, and witnessed the sensation created by her abduction, or her absconding with the prince. We learn from the Beckford Conversations, lately published in the New Monthly Magazine, that she was married to the prince at Kew, by Dr. Wilmot, and that Pitt, afterwards Earl of Chatham, was present at the ceremony. What is worse, George carried her off from her friends when she was on the point of marriage with a young man of her own society, and who pursued after them and entreated him in a distraction of distress to give her up, but in vain. With the characteristic obstinacy which afterwards led him to persist in the unconstitutional taxation and coercion of America, till he lost it to this country, he married Hannah Lightfoot, and when he had children by her, coolly This tendency is discernible in the tone abandoned her at the age of twenty-three, in which he generally speaks of the leaders and married Charlotte of Meclenburg of reform. Charles Fox is styled the Strelitz. Now this fact must be very emwould-be champion of liberal sentiments barrassing to the laudators of the domesand opinions,' vol. i. p. 69. George the tic virtues of George III., and therefore III. is lauded in the hackneyed phrase they boldly slide over it. The writer of of a prince endeared to his people by his the Pictorial, History must be thrown by it private virtues; though it is unquestionable that he was a bigamist; and what would be thought of the private virtues of a man in private life who married one wife, and then during her lifetime married a second. If it be scandalous in private life, nay severely amenable to the laws, how much more reprehensible ought it to be in the person of the monarch on whom all eyes are fixed, and who, as the appointed guardian of the laws, should be the last to set the example of violating them, and especially in the department of domestic The domestic history of George III. is morality, on the practice of which this na-one of the most awful that ever befell a tion so justly prides itself. There is, however, a singular ignorance in our historians on this part of the character of George III., or as singular an attempt to pass him off as much better than he was. In Knight's Pictorial History of England, we are gravely treated to this declaration :Though so young, healthy, and robust, and though his predecessors had been so old, he was the first prince of his house to do without a mistress. A few months after his accession he married,' &c. Vol. i. of the Reign of George III. p. 6. ess? into a particular dilemma. If George III. was the only one of his house, at that time, who had done without a mistress, what was Hannah Lightfoot? She was, in fact, his lawful wife: for there was then no law to prohibit the members of the royal family marrying subjects; it was George himself, taught by the trouble and the crime in which he found himself involved, who, on the plea of his brother of Cumberland's vile deeds, brought forward and passed the Royal Marriage Act. monarch. The consequences of his concealment of his first marriage, were terrible to his peace of mind, and to that of more than one of his children, and in this fact are we to seek for the true causes of the overthrow of his intellect. It is not common that virtuous parents bring up a whole family of licentious profligates, and yet what family ever exhibited such a troop of the most shameless and sensual ones, as that of George III.? He saw his sons seduce and abandon one woman after another, even when, as in the case of Mrs. Jordan, they too had families, and he could Had this writer never heard of such a person as Hannah Lightfoot, the Quaker-not reprimand them, for he knew his own Her history is well-known, most thoroughly authenticated; her children are still living, and well-known too, and till lately, persons were living who were in story better than they who now act the historians seem to do. It is high time that history should, however, speak the truth, and the highest praise that can be allowed |
