executed with zeal. Appearances were in other respects promising; a regular communication existed between Mocha and Massuah, or Massowah, as it is here written conformably to the manner in which the inhabitants pronounce it, and between that place and Suakin. Massowah was said to be by no means the unsafe place which Bruce had represented it in his time, and pilots could be procured for the whole way. A dow was hired to go to Dhalac, Massowah, Suakin, and up to the latitude of the river Farat, where lord Valentia meant to end his observations and make the best of his way to Cosseir. This vessel was to go ahead and show the way, and it would enable him to visit many islands which the Antelope might not be able to approach. The first discovery they made on stretching over to the African side was, contrary to Bruce's assertion, "that there was no anchoring ground on the Abyssinian shore, and that you might have your bowsprit over the land without any bottom astern," that the land gradually shallowed to seven fathoms within a quarter of a mile of the shore. On one of the islands they found the tomb of a chief, within a circle of stones; at one end were the bones and shells of several turtles half burnt; in the middle were several drinking vessels, one was an English china sugar basin. The people on the main land gave a fine sheep for some tobacco, but refused a dollar which was offered for it. They passed within five leagues of some small islands called Miseras by the pilot, of which the curious name of the Great and Little Miscores, as laid down in M. Apres de Menouville's chart, is probably a corruption. In fishing from the ship, the hooks caught on some dark brown pieces of coral, from the holes of which issued a great number of living animalculi. Each was nearly brown, about a quarter of an inch long, with a black head. When immersed in water they extended themselves directly; when taken out of it they did not retire, but hung close to the sides, one over the

other. As they drew near Dhalae, the coast seemed tolerably well inhabited, and there was the appearance of a great deal of trade to Massowah. The pilot, that he might reach Dhalac by daylight, anchored off a very picturesque island, in a fine bay, where they had seventeen fathoms, at only three quarters of a mile from the shore. " As no description of the island," says his lordship," has ever been given, and we were probably the first Europeans that had visited it, we called it Valentia.” On a subsequent investigation, he concludes satisfactorily, that it is the Orine of the Periplus. It would therefore have been better to have restored it to its Greek name. The next day they anchored off Dhalac.

They landed on the island of Nokhara, then the residence of the Dola, who had sub-Dolas at every other station. Dhalac el Kibeer had formerly been the principal residence; but they were told the port was bad and could not admit their ship. All the houses here are built of madrapore, drawn from the sea. Lord Valentia walked to the well, which he was surprised to find was a natural one, formed by a chasm in the rock, about ten feet long and three wide, lying seven feet below the level of the ground. It never fails in the driest season, and supplies the whole island. Mr. Salt proceeded to Dhalac el Kibeer, where he found sixteen wells of the same kind. The shepherds were drawing water there for their camels, asses, goats, and sheep; and when these were served they supplied the trough with water for the birds, which arrived in vast flights, particularly doves. These are at some distance from the town. Near it are some large tanks or cisterns, which the natives say were made by the Parsees, who built more than three hundred such; but when these works were formed, or who the people were whom they call Parsees, it is hopeless to discover from their imperfect traditions.

They proceeded to Massowah. The natives perceiving their approach

took them for the Wahabecs, in consequence of which the Nayib came over from Arkeko, and they were all night under arms. The present Nayib is grandson of Ackmed, of whom Bruce speaks so favourably. Lord Valentia explained to him, that the object of his coming was to ascertain whether our ships could with safety pass up this coast to Suez, and obtain water and provisions on the way. He was received with great civility, and every thing, both with the rulers and the natives, went on well. The Nayib is in fact independent. The Janizaries, or Ascarri, as they are here called, though they recognise the sultan as their master, are completely under his influence, and he pays them out of the duties which ought to be remitted to Constantinople. He is on good terms with the king of Abyssinia, from whose dominions a trade is carried on in ghee, hides, gold dust, civet, sheep, and slaves. Many disputes had already occurred between his lordship and captain Keys, who was in every respect unfit for the service on which he was employed. The matter here came to an issue. He positively declared that on the 15th of August he would depart on his return to India. To accomplish the object c of the voyage by that time was impossible, and lord Valentia had no alternative but to return to Mocha, from whence he sailed in another vessel for Bombay.

From hence he communicated to marquis Wellesley the result of his voyage, and urged him to have the survey of the Red Sea continued from Massowah to Cosseir. He himself had now resolved upon returning to Europe by the Persian guif, and therefore requested letters to the pacha of Bagdad. As six weeks would elapse before these could be received from Calcutta, he employed the interval in travelling to Poonah. The first object which he saw, on reaching the main land, was the body of a wreich, who had died of hunger, for which the vultures and dogs were disputing. Drought had

caused a scarcity, and that had been made a famine by the Mahratta war. Holkar and Scindiah laid waste whole provinces, leaving neither tree nor habitation standing through a vast extent of country. The British government was never before felt to be so great a blessing. They procured rice from Bengal, with which twelve thousand people were daily fed at. the publick expense. Yet this (a liberality which never was equalled in the East) extended comparatively but a little way; and their utmost care could only palliate the evil in that narrow circle to which it extended. Lord Valentia describes the children as living skeletons, scarcely a muscle to be seen. Dead bodies in every state of decay were lying along the road. Even so near the seat of government as Panwell, captain Young employed twelve men to bury the victims of this famine, and they sometimes buried thirty in a day. They passed by wretches who were too weak to raise themselves up to receive the food that was offered them. Many were murdered for the rice which they received from British charity. Colonel Close fed fifteen hundred people daily at Poonah, even before he was aided by a subscription collected at Bombay by lady Mackintosh. The sight of the food rendered them frantick, and he was obliged to distribute his alms in money, which did not operate in the same manner upon their feelings. During the whole of this dreadful visitation, grain passed up to Poonah through villages where the inhabitants were perishing themselves, and seeing their nearest relations perish, and yet not a single tumult took place, nor was one convoy interrupted. Such is there signation of the Hindoos! All that a government could do was done by the government of Bombay. The powers of man are unhappily far less efficient in doing good than evil; enough, however, was done to prove how great a blessing it is for the Hindoos to be under the British dominion: and it may safely be affirmed that the alms thus

bestowed have strengthened our empire in that part of Hindoostan more than could have been done by the most powerful army that England could send out. Je definis ainsi le droit de conquête, says Montesquieu, un droit necessaire, legitime, et malheureux, qui laisse toujours à payer une dette immense, pour s'acquitter envers la nature humaine. Wo be to them who wantonly contract this debt;-it had been better for them never to have been born-but blessed are they who repay it as our countrymen have repaid it in Bombay.

The trade of Bombay is far inferiour to what it has been. This is owing to an indulgence imprudently granted to the Arabs, particularly to the Imaum of Muscat; and it will be well if no other evil arises from it. They enter their vessels as English, and sail from one part of the peninsula to the other, without having a single European or a rupee of English property on board. They have a French protection also; and of course are either French or English, as suits their convenience. In fact, much of their trade lies to the Isle of France, where they carry rice, and bring back prize goods at half price; a system every way detrimenal to British interests. It injures the regular trade of Surat and Bombay, and it encourages the French privateers, who, but for this vent, would have no means of disposing of the property they capture. Frequently, the Muscat flag is only a cover, and the goods exported to Arabia are French property. The Arab navy is in consequence rapidly increasing, while our traders there can hardly find employment for their men.

The Parsees are numerous in Bombay. Lord Valentia considers them as an important barrier against the more powerful casts of India, and bears testimony to their good conduct and superiour morality. There is not a single prostitute or concubine of their sect in the settle.

ment. The attack of sir William Jones upon Anquetil du Perron, is here spoken of with censure; and it is alleged that, before his death, he was convinced of his errour. The works, indeed, which that extraordinary, but respectable enthusiast brought home, must be regarded as the most important which we have yet received from the east. Two centuries ago Anquetil du Perron would have been the founder of a new monastick order, or the reformer and saint of a relaxed one. His ardour was more happily directed, yet an age of literature and a country of philosophists could not subdue his innate fanaticism, and he contrived to blend austerities which St. Macarius or St. Romualdo might have admired, with a system of eastern philosophy. "Bread and cheese," he says, "to the value of the twelfth part of a rupee, and water from the well, are my daily food. I live without fire even in winter. I sleep without bed or bed-clothes; neither do I change or wash my linen. I have neither wife, children, nor servants. Having no estates, I have no tie to this world. Alone and entirely free, I am in friendship with all mankind. In this simple state, at war with my senses, I either triumph over worldly attractions, or I despise them; and, looking up with veneration to the Supreme and Perfect Being, I wait with impatience for the dissolution of my body.”

Lord Valentia's plans were fortunately changed by the arrival of despatches from marquis Wellesley, recommending a continuation of the survey of the Red Sea, and expressing a hope that he might be induced to complete what he had so well begun. This was sufficient to renew his lordship's zeal, which was seconded with becoming liberality by Mr. Duncan at Bombay. The Panther cruiser was made ready, and lieutenant Charles Court appointed to command her, in consequence of the very high character which he bore as a seaman and a man of sci

ence. Lord Valentia was properly permitted to choose his officers; and lieutenant Maxfield, who had been on the former expedition, and then proved his zeal and ability, was appointed to the Assaye, a small French schooner, which was to accompany them as a tender. Captain Rudland, of the Bombay army, obtained permission to join the party, and proceed by this route to England. Two time-keepers and the other requisite instruments were furnished by government, and captain Court was instructed to keep a table for his lordship at the expense of the Company. Private villany had well nigh frustrated all his zeal and the good intentions of the government. It was found, after they had put to sea, that in the vessel, which was reported ready for service, there was not a single buoy; and similar deficiencies were daily discovered. On their voyage they injured the capstan; and it appeared, upon examination, that, though newly put together, it was made of old wood, partly consumed by the dry rot. The casks leaked out nearly the whole of their contents; for they were made of old, worm-eaten ship timber; yet they had been received into the publick stores at Bombay as new, and issued again as such. Such is the knavery on one part and the neglect on the other in the marine department.

During his former visit at Mocha, lord Valentia had had some disputes with the Dola upon the prevailing system of encouraging our sailors to desert; a system carried on so extensively as to be a very serious inconvenience. This is not done from any religious motive, but from the old notion of the Moors and other Orientals, that all Christians understand gunnery. The captain of the renegadoes is an Italian, who came to Mocha many years ago as master of a native vessel from India, turned Mahommedan, sold both ship and cargo, and shared the profits with the Dola. This villain is now the

main agent in seducing others. He watches for them on the pier, gets them to the Jews town, where he makes them drunk, then carries them to the Dola, and the temptation of women soon completes the business. Numbers were thus deluded away while our fleet was here. It was then thought expedient to conciliate the Yemen government; and, though threats were used by several officers, nothing was done, and the Arabs were confirmed in their insolence by our forbearance. Such forbearance is always bad policy. It is as much the duty of a great nation never to submit to wrong, as never to offer it. One of these renegadoes sent to beg a bible of lord Valentia, who accordingly gave him one, and wrote to him upon the criminality of his conduct. He returned a long answer, in which he said that he could now be as good a Christian as before, and indeed that he had more time to pay his respects to God Almighty. It is not a little curious that the very system of procuring converts, which the Dola so anxiously pursued, should now conduce to his greatest danger. All the old renegadoes have deserted to the Wahabees, and were ready to march with them against Mocha, with every foot of which they are well acquainted.

At Mocha they hired a dow to accompany them as far as above Suakin. The Assaye was sent forward to Massowah with letters for the Nayib, informing him of lord Valentia's intention to visit him, and requesting that two pilots for Suakin might be procured. Dhalac was appointed as the place of meeting. Five days afterwards the Panther sailed with the dow in company. The Assaye joined them at the appointed place. The same friendship on the part of the Nayib existed; and captain Court, Mr. Salt, and captain Rudland, made a tour of eight days through the southern and eastern parts of the island of Dhalac. The result of their observations, as affecting the veracity of Bruce, will

best be given in lord Valentia's own words:

"This second tour of Mr. Salt through Dhalac, has completely proved that the account of it, as given by Mr. Bruce, is in a great degree false; and leaves it extremely probable, that he never landed on the island. The three hundred and seventy cisterns, all hewn out of the solid rock,' have, after the most minute investigation, been reduced to less than twenty; and of these not one is to be found at Dobelew, where he asserts, as an eye witness, that they are neglected, and open to every sort of animal, and half full of the filth that they leave there after drinking and washing in them.' If the plan of the island of Dhalac, the harbour of Dobelew, and the surrounding islands, as laid down by that excellent hydrographer, captain Court, and now given to the publick in my chart, be compared with the description of Mr. Bruce, hardly one point

of resemblance will be found between the two; and I trust there will be no doubt in the publick mind to which the credit ought to be given.

"The round harbour of Dobelew, with its narrow entrance, is no where discoverable; and the town itself, instead of be ing, as he states, three miles S. W. of the harbour, is, in fact, on a parallel with the northern extremity of Irwee, which forms the harbour, and is an island; a circumstance which ought to have been known to him had he actually been on the spot.

It is not, however, with captain Court only that Mr. Bruce differs; his bearings, as given by himself, are irreconcilable: and, after several attempts, it was found im possible to lay down the islands between Jibbel Teir and Dhalac from his account; which is much to be regretted, as it is improbable that any other traveller will venture through the shoals on the eastern side of the island, when so much safer a passage is afforded on the western.

"The account given by Mr. Bruce of the animals drinking out of the cisterns, and washing in them, is evidently untrue, from the construction of them, as described by Mr. Salt, they being arched over, with a hole in the centre.

"The impudence ascribed by Mr. Bruce to the women of Dobelew makes me still more doubtful of his having been at that place; since it is hardly probable that they would have totally changed their habits in a period of thirty years, during which time it is evident that their poverty had not diminished.

"The errours in Mr. Bruce's account of Dhalac-el-Kibcer, its harbour, and the

numerous tanks on the island, might have been excused, had he stated the circumstances less positively, and given them only as he received them by the report of

the inhabitants. In Mr. Salt's first visit to Dhalac-el-Kibeer, he heard from several, that there was a tradition among them of three hundred and sixteen tanks; and this tradition was probably mentioned to Mr. Bruce, and, if given by him as such, would have been justifiable. The same observation will hold good respecting the harbour, which, from his journal, it is evident he could not have seen, and to which he only transfers the information that was given him respecting Nokhara. I can by no means extend the same indulgence to his account of the islands, and their relative bearings. When a person attempts to give geographical information to the publick, it be accurate; and that he should not give, is necessary that his information should as certain, a single circumstance, of which he has not positively informed himself. That Mr. Bruce, on the contrary, has erred in many points, and falsified in others, must be clear by a comparison of his own bearings with each other, and of the whole with the chart of captain Court. I feel him to be the less justifiable on this occasion, as he had it in his power to give a true account of the island, and its dependencies; for his having been at anchor somewhere near Dobelew is proved by his knowledge of the names of the numerous islands in its vicinity, and by his having stated its latitude as 15° 42' 22", which is 44" Vol. II. p. 236. within two miles of its true position, 15°

At Massowah an attempt was made to extort money from them by the brother of the Nayib, who was Dola of Arkeko, and Sirdar or commander of the Janizaries, here called Askaris. This personage demanded a thousand dollars for the anchorage of the two vessels. It had been settled with the Nayib only the evening before that no English ships should ever pay anchorage; and upon this insolent claim lord Valentia sent word to the Dola, that his countrymen never paid it any where; that he had no right to demand it; and that if he did not immediately send a man to make an excuse for his insolence, the Panther would sail in the morning for his town of Arkeko, and burn it to the ground. This resolute answer settled the