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corn each district shall raise in the year. Perhaps the fellah has sown corn, the Board orders cotton; consequently, the farmer's corn crop is rooted up, and the cotton sown. Again, the farmer wants some of his crop for himself. To obtain this, he must take his entire crop to the pasha's warehouse, sell it all at the pasha's buying price, and redeem what he wants for his own use, at his highness's selling price. With such a system can we wonder at the poverty of the land ?-and when we read of the expeditions of the pasha's captains to sack villages, in order to gather recruits for the army, can we wonder that the children are made cyclopes from their youth, in order to escape from the pasha's military service? The pasha prides himself on his Europeanized young men ;-let us see what they are like:

"Again, the pasha is very much commended for sending youths to Europe to learn European sciences. But what kind of characters do they come back? They have a smattering of French, of sciences, and other matters, of all which they have a magpie knowledge. They return, not Christians, but despisers of the Prophet, with their faculties only the more sharpened to avail themselves of every iniquitous mode of rising in the world. They learn a curious sort of apish politeness, very different from either European gentility, or Turkish reserve. In a word, whatever they may be besides, they are generally finished scoundrels, with scarce one single principle of right. I consider a strict Mahometan, setting aside his contempt for others, to be a moral, estimable character; but the new race of Arab-Europeans are real infidels, not even understanding the sciences and arts, by means of which the ancient glory of Egypt is expected to revive. I have seen the style of these semi-Frenchmen in our visit to the different schools; and I confess I think the few that have come back from England, though destitute of the mannerism of the others, are both all the better for it, and have acquired some tolerably solid and useful accomplishments."-Pp. 120-122.

And yet, with all his defects, he is a master-mind, affable, yet keen; resolute, but mild; dignified, yet bold and fearless in his cunning, especially in the opening years of his eventful career. Doubtless he is a great man, but not because he has taught his ministers to sit on chairs, drink wine, speak French, and despise the mosques.

One of the most curious chapters in the "Visit to the East," is that entitled "Buonaparte in Egypt;" in which the author gives some extracts from a French translation of the private journals of two natives, during the invasion of Napoleon. Abdarshahman Gabarti, the chief of these journalists, was a man of some weight and reputation among his people, and a member of Napoleon's divan, before the revolt of Cairo; the other writer, Mou Allem Nicholas el Turki, was a Maronite Christian, and a poet of some fame, at the court of the Emir Beschir. The extracts show how consistent Napoleon was, in "doing at Rome as they do at Rome," and in building up his own power on the ruins of true religion. The birth-day of the prophet gave Napoleon an opportunity of showing his

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reverence for Mahomet and his faith. He paraded his troops through the streets of Cairo, with bands playing, and kept high festival in honour of the prophet. Soon after, the sheikhs wrote thus of their new conquerors :

"The French are the friends of the Sultaun of the Osmanlies, and the enemies of his enemies. Prayer is said in the name of the sultaun. The coin bears the letters of his name. Religion is duly honoured. The French are true believers; they revere the prophet and the Koran; they have treated the pilgrims to Mecca with distinction; they have celebrated the rising of the Nile; and have contributed to the splendour of the birthday of the prophet. The French command us to inform you, that they are taking measures to secure all that is needed for the two sacred towns.

Not long after, the people of Cairo revolted against the housetax, and other grievances, and caused some loss to the invaders before the revolt was quelled. The sheikhs were again ordered to write a letter to the people; in which they spoke of the charity of the great man to the poor, his respect for the religion, and concluded with the advice," Attend to your business, and do your religious duties, and pay the taxes." Napoleon himself addressed a proclamation to the people, which we extract entire :

"In the name of God, the Giver of mercy. Buonaparte, General-in chief of the French army, to the inhabitants of Cairo, great and small.

"Stupid and foolish men, who have no foresight of the end of things, have excited the inhabitants of Cairo to revolt. God has punished their wicked intentions and actions. The Holy One and the Almighty has commanded me to have mercy upon His creatures; submissive to His will, I have pardoned, although in an excess of anger, and much pained at this revolt. As a punishment, I have abolished the divan I had formed, and which would, in two months, have established order in the city. Your tranquillity since then has made me think no more of the crime of the guilty instigators of the revolt, and I meditate the creation of a new divan.

"Ülemas and sheriffs, inform the people, that no one betrays me with impunity he that conspires against me, rushes to his own destruction; no one upon earth being able to save him, he will not escape the wrath of God, whose decree he will not observe. The man that is wise understands that all I have done has been put in execution by the order and will of God alone. A man must be blind, and a fool, to doubt it.

"Inform your people, also, that the Almighty has long ago destined me to annihilate the enemies of Islam, AND TO DESTROY THE CROSS. The Holy God has announced that I should come from the west, to Egypt, to exterminate those that commit injustice: the wise man sees in all the fulfilment of His designs. Inform your people that the Koran has predicted to many what has just happened, and that it contains predictions of what is to happen. The word of God, in His book, is true and just; the proof of this truth is, that the Mussulmen return to me with pure intentions and sincere friendship. Should any among them, through fear of my arms and power, dare to curse and to hate me, they are fools, that know not that God reads the heart, and discerns there what the eye cannot perceive. God will curse and punish the hypocrite, who shall betray me in secret, as well as openly.

"Inform them that I penetrate into the most hidden folds of the human heart. I know, at a glance, what men think, though they keep silence; a day will come, when all secrets shall be revealed. All that I have done, you know, has been

done by the will of God, which none can resist; a man may in vain seek to oppose what God has done by my hands. Happy such as are united in heart with me! Farewell.-Pp. 133, 134.

Such was the beautiful compound of pomposity and blasphemy with which Napoleon prepared his new subjects for his departure to the Syrian campaign. When he returned from before the walls of Acre, he told the oolemas that, much as they then hated the government of the French, "the time would come when they would unbury the bones of the French, to water them with their tears." All Napoleon's declarations in favour of Mahomet and his religion, failed in making the oolemas dupes of his words. "They are lies," said they, "which he propounds to establish himself in Egypt. Is he not a Nazarene, and the son of a

Nazarene ?"

The illustrated books of the savans, their pictures of seas, of plains, of mountains, and all living things, filled with astonishment the mind of the journalist Gabarti; nor could he understand why the French, "if they find an animal which is not in their country, put it in a water which they know, which keeps it a long time from decay." The chemists, with their detonating-powder, Leyden-jar, and gases, were high magicians in Gabarti's eyes.

"The chemist lives in the house of Hassan Kiachef, the Georgian. I have seen there surprising things. They poured into a cup a water prepared, and then a few drops of another water; a smoke of different colours came out of the cup, and afterwards there remained no more water, but a yellowish stone, which they allowed us to touch. They took a quantity of white powder, and, striking it lightly on an anvil with a hammer, it produced a noise like the report of a gun; the chemist laughed at the fear which this caused us. He took a bottle, and, putting it empty into the water, he caused some air to enter it, and afterwards applying a lighted match, it caused an explosion. In short, we saw many curious results of the combination of elements. The physician turned round a wheel, which made sparks; on touching the bottle, there resulted an explosion; when the tip of the bottle is touched, a shock is felt; and if another person touches it, he feels it also. We have witnessed things quite incomprehensible to us."-P. 133.

There is so much truth in the following extract from the chapter on missionary schools in Cairo, that we must make room for it, previous to accompanying the writer across the desert to Petra :

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Pagan religions, as now existing, are transmissive sacerdotal systems which, in some inadequate measure, do interest the affections of the people, and, by force of hereditary associations, absorb successive generations of people into them. Now, the existing pagan systems are evidently in the way of the Gospel, and they must be combated. There is an evident power of fascination in them which firmly retains the mass of the people; and this must be broken. In order to do this, the modern missionary principle is, to educate children in schools in the usual scholastic attainments; let them once become proficients in school knowledge, and they will learn to despise the priestly yoke of their country and kindred. Hence a writer

upon modern missions, on being compelled to confess, with respect to the whole progeny that has passed through the mission schools, that they have not, it is true, become Christians,' comforts himself with saying 'but these their prejudices have been shaken, and the ground has been prepared.' That is, they have come out of the mission schools neither Hindoos, Mahometans, Parsees, or Christians, but a young fry without any religion at all. Now if this is to turn out, hereafter, to the glory of the Christian faith, one thing at least is clear, that the Apostles and their successors did not thus prepare the way for Christ's religion, by leading one generation through an introductory course of atheism, in order to the breaking up of the prejudices which might stand in the way of the Gospel's being received in the next. As if the fool who said in his heart, There is no God, were nearer to the Christian religion than the ignorant worshipper who, according to his light, feels after God, if haply he may find him.”—Pp. 163, 164.

In March, 1840, Mr. Formby and his party placed themselves under the guidance of a fine weather-beaten and tolerablyhonest Arab sheikh, one Suluman Meughyn, who was to convey them across the desert to the convent of Mount Sinai, the rendezvous of the intended party to the tombs of Petra. The desert through which the caravan route to Suez lies, the now so wellbeaten road to the East, presents many features of that peculiar beauty with which the scenery of the desert is characterized. The desert is not the monotonous place we are apt to believe it to be. The confusion of rocks and ravines, of all hues and outlines, here and there the open cavities, dotted with palms, and ending in undulating slopes, tinged with green,—nay, even the very desolateness of the scene is far from monotonous, and, like a Škye terrier, is beautiful in its ugliness. The travellers passed the famous Hadji's Tree, on the borders of the sand, where the portions of the pilgrim's garments, hung up to celebrate their safe return from the holy city, recall the custom of the shipwrecked pagan of hanging up his reeking garments in the temple of the Ocean God.

"Me tabulâ sacer Votivâ paries indicat, uvida Suspendisse potenti

Vestimenta maris Deo."

It is a curious tree, in every respect,-a tree of innumerable small dry branches, on which not a green leaf has been seen for years, and annually blossoming with the parti-coloured tatters of the returning pilgrims. On arriving on the banks of the Red Sea, whilst the caravan went round the head of the water, the party, with the old sheikh, and some of his men, sailed across, and landed on the beach opposite Ain Mousa. The poor Bedouins were quite sea-sick, and, as a wave crested a little whiter than usual, looked grave, and muttered "Howadji el djemet taieeb,"-the camel is better.

The convent of St. Catherine, where the travellers united their party, is imbedded, as it were, in the valley of Sinai, amid almost countless relics of the eventful wanderings of the

children of Israel.

At the very entrance of the valley, tradition points out the rock on which Aaron stood when Israel would not wait for Moses, and murmured-"As for this fellow, we know not what has become of him." Near this is the traditional burying-ground of those whom the pestilence slew for this their rebellion; whilst a little further, a stone, naturally hollowed out, is regarded as the crucible in which Aaron melted down the gold of the Israelites to form the molten calf. Within this valley, too, is the traditional stone on which Moses cast down the tablets of the law, in his anger.

"We then advanced," says the writer, "and, leaning still to the left, entered an entirely different valley, in which there seemed to be an abundance of water, from the unusual luxuriant growth of both the olive and palm-trees. In a little time we came to a large mass of stone, about

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which a number of small fragments were lying, which, we were told, was the stone from whence Moses obtained the water. If this, therefore, be true, we were in the Valley of Rephidim, where was gained the first victory over the Amalekites, the first battle fought by the people after they had left Egypt. I am always sorry to doubt an old tradition, which, in this instance, is supported by the concurrent testimony of the Arabs, who greatly venerate this spot, and does not, therefore, rest entirely on the sole credit of an old monastic legend. But, as you will see hereafter, there is too much reason to question it. It is quite true that the orifices pointed to as those from which the water flowed, are remarkable enough: and, whatever becomes of the tradition respecting it, as the rock in the Valley of Rephidim, I question whether another stone, so remarkably consonant to the history assigned to it, could be found in the whole world. I certainly never saw one."-Pp. 231, 232.

Doubtless there is much credulity, and more error, in the monkish legends, especially in the East; still there is seldom any harm, and, generally, much piety in this belief. Now-a-days

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