But it soon appeared that a hippopotamus is not so easily slain; for he rose again ere long close to the same spot, and apparently not much concerned at what had happened, though somewhat more cautious than before. They again discharged their pieces, but with as little effect as formerly; and, although some of the party continued firing at every one that made his appearance, they were by no means certain that they produced the slightest impression upon any of them. This they attributed to their having used leaden balls, which are too soft to enter his almost impenetrable skull. It appears from what they witnessed, that the hippopotamus cannot remain more than five or six minutes under water. One of the most interesting parts of the amusement was, to witness the perfect ease with which these animals quietly dropped down to the bottom; for the water being exceedingly clear, they could distinctly sce them so low as twenty feet beneath the surface".

The following account of the killing of an hippopotamus can scarcely fail to be interesting to our readers. It is extracted from "The New Excitement for 1841," published in Edinburgh:"We have translated the following account of the mode of killing the hippopotamus in Dongola, from the travels of Dr. Edward Kuppell, a careful observer, and a trustworthy writer. Dongola is a narrow slip of country lying on both sides of the Nile, and extending southward from 19° 43′ of north lat. for about 170 miles, measured along the coast of the

stream.

"The harpoon, with which the natives attack the hippopotamus, terminates in a flat oval-shaped piece of iron, three-fourths of the outer rim of which are sharpened to a very fine edge. To the upper part of this iron one end of a long stout cord is fastened, and the other is tied to a thick piece of light wood. The hunters attack the animal either by day or by night; but they prefer daylight, as it enables them better to escape from the assaults of their furious enemy. One part of the rope, with the shaft of the harpoon, the hunter takes in his right hand; in the left he holds the rest of the rope and the piece of wood. Thus armed, he cautiously approaches the animal when he is asleep during the day on some small island in the river, or he looks for him at night, when the hippopotamus is likely to come out of the water to graze in the corn-fields. When the huntsman is about seven paces from the beast, he throws the spear with all his might, and if he is a good marksman the iron pierces through the thick hide, burying itself in the flesh deeper than the barbed point. The animal generally plunges into the water; and, though the shaft of the harpoon may be broken, the piece of wood that is attached to the iron floats on the surface, shows what direction he takes. There is great danger if the hippopotamus spies the huntsman before he can throw his spear. He then springs forward with the utmost fury, and crushes hin at once in his wide open mouth; an instance of which took place while we were in the country.

"As soon as the animal is fairly struck, the huntsmen in their small canoes cautiously approach the floating wood, and, after fastening a strong rope to it, they hasten with the other end towards the large boat which contains their companions. The huntsmen now pull the rope, when the monster, irritated by the pain, scizes the boat with his teeth,

and sometimes succeeds in crushing or overturning it. In the mean time his assailants are not idle; four or five more harpoons are plunged into him, and Sen Notes to "Nubia and Abyssinia." Edinburgh: Oliver and Boyd.

every effort is made to drag the beast close up to the boat, so as to give him less room to plunge about in. Then they try to divide the ligamentum nucha with a sharp weapon, or to pierce his skull. Since the body of a full-grown hippopotamus is too bulky to be pulled out of the water without a great number of bring the pieces to land. In the province of Dongola hands, they generally cut him up in the water and

not more than one or two of these animals are killed

in a year. From 1821 to 1823, inclusive, nine were killed; out of which number we despatched four. The flesh of a young hippopotamus is very good, but the full-grown ones are generally too fat. They weigh as much as four or five oxen. made into excellent whips, and will furnish from 350 to 500. No use is made of the teeth.

The hide is

"One of the hippopotami which we killed was a very old fellow, and of an enormous size, measuring 131 tail. His incisive teeth were 26 French inches long, French feet from the nose to the extremity of the measured from the root to the point, along the outer bending. We fought with him for four good hours by night, and were very near losing our large boat, and probably our lives too, owing to the fury of the animal. As soon as he spied the huntsmen in the small canoe, whose business it was to fasten the long rope to the float, he dashed at them with all his might, dragged the canoe with him under the water, and smashed it to pieces. The two huntsinen with difficulty escaped. Of twenty-five musket-balls aimed at the head from a distance of about five feet, only one pierced the skin and the bones of the nose: at each snorting the animal spouted out large streams of blood on the boat. The rest of the balls stuck in the thick side. At last we availed ourselves of a swivel; but it was not till we had discharged five balls from it at the distance of a few feet, and had done most terrible damage to the head and body, that the colossus gave up the ghost. The darkness of the night increased the danger of the contest, for this gigantic animal tossed our boat about in the stream at his pleasure; and it was at a fortunate moment indeed for us that he gave up the struggle, as he had carried us into a complete labyrinth of rocks, which, in the midst of the confusion, none of our crew had observed.

"For want of proper weapons the natives cannot kill an hippopotamus of this size; all they can do to drive him from their fields is to make a little noise in the night, and to keep up fires at different spots. These animals, from their voracity, are a curse to a whole district; and in some places they are so bold that they will not quit the fields, which they are laying waste, till a great number of men come out with poles and loud cries to attempt to drive them away.

"The hippopotamus was observed in great numbers in the Niger, by Richard and John Lander, and that not without some apprehensions from their boldness and power.

"They rose, observe the narrators of the expedition, in incredible numbers very near us, and came plashing, snorting, and plunging all round the canoe, and placed us in imminent danger. Thinking to frighten

them off, we fired a shot or two at them; but the noise only called up from the water and out of the fens about as many more of their unwieldy companions, and we were more closely beset than before. Our people, who had never in all their lives been exposed in a canoe to such huge and formidable beasts, trembled with fear and apprehension, and absolutely wept aloud. quently upset canoes in the river, when every one of Our people tell us that these formidable animals fre

them is sure to perish. These came so close to us that we could reach them with the butt-end of a gun. When I fired at the first, which I must have hit, every one of them came to the surface of the water, and pursued us so fast over to the north bank, that

it was with the greatest difficulty imaginable we could keep before them. Having fired a second time, the report of my gun was followed by a loud roaring noise,

and we seemed to increase our distance from them.

There were two Bornou men among our crew, who were not so frightened as the rest, having seen some of these creatures before on lake Tchad, where, they say, they abound.

"However, the terrible hippopotami did us no kind of mischief whatever. No doubt at first, when we interrupted them, they were only sporting and wallowing in the river for their own amusement; but, had they upset our canoe, we should have paid dearly for it."

The Cabinet.

FALSE UNITY.-Temptation yielded to, becomes sin, and thereby ceases to be felt as temptation. In proportion as it is successfully resisted, it is keenly felt. The assault so dexterously made upon Jesus, was felt in its full intensity, because there was in him no yielding to break the blow. Again he appealed to the scriptures of truth as the standard of his duty, and finding it there written, "Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve," he rejected the proffered bribe, and with righteous indignation, rising into a tone of holy authority, he said, "Get thee hence, Satan." "And the devil departed from him for a season." The temptation was a false millennium, to be attained and enjoyed in the indulgence of human feelings, and not in a strict adherence to the revealed law of God. The same in principle is urged now on the members of Christ, and, alas, with too fatal success. The language of the tempter is, "You shall have a glorious reign of peace and concord, a perfect state of society without any religious feuds or differences; no bigoted exclusion, no sectarian jealousy, no collisions or separations because of speculative dogmas; all shall be millennial harmony and good humour, yea, and he has the effrontery to add, Christian charity too. If you will only have me as your chief, and aim at the peace I promise, by suppressing the truth of God; or so ingeniously mixing it with falsehood, that no one can tell distinctly which is which, and therefore every one shall regard or disregard both alike. Is not peace the grand object? Present peace and harmony, blending all classes and denominations of men in unity and concord? Well, if an universal aim after this can be more effectually secured by combining with the natural

pursuits of the human mind as much of God's truth as can be made to harmonize with human reasou, and may even seem to be the discovery of human reason, so that it may be introduced without giving offence; let this be done by all means: it will make the temptation the stronger over another class of my dupes. But especial care must be taken to avoid (while you must stoutly deny that you exclude) whatever in the word of God is peculiar, pointed, saving, because this will inevitably mar unanimity."-Rev. H. M'Neile.

OBSCURITY OF PROPHECY.-Length of time, by the changes which it makes in the customs and manners of mankind, on which the figures of speech depend, and by various other means, brings an obscurity on the most perspicuous writings. Among all the books now extant, none hath suffered more from this

cause, in its original perspicuity, than the bible; nor prophetic books, in particular passages; but, notwithhath any part of the bible suffered equally with the standing the great and confessed obscurity of particular parts of the prophecies, those which immediately concern the Christian church are for the most part, so far at least as they are already accomplished, abundantly perspicuous, or incumbered with no other difficulty than the apostle's rules of exposition will remove; nor does the obscurity of other parts at all lessen the certainty of the evidence which these afford. The obscurity, therefore, of the prophecies, great as it is in certain parts, is not such, upon the whole, as should discourage the Christian laic from the study of them, nor such as will excuse him under the neglect of it. Let him remember that it is not mine, but the apostle's admonition, who would not enjoin an useless or impracticable task, "to give heed to the prophetic word."-Bishop Horsley.

INFLUENCE OF THE SABBATH.-I have often

heard it remarked by Christians of a serious and devout disposition, to whom the sacred day of rest had become, through habit and principle, a season of halthe sabbath, the sun did shine more bright, the works lowed delight, that it seemed to their eyes as if, on of God appear more beautiful, the fields more fresh, the flowers more sweet, and all the face of nature to wear an unusual and a fitting stillness. It is not that the sun does shine more bright, or that the fields are indeed more fresh, or the flowers more sweet, upon this than upon any other day. It is only that we are apt to think thus because our minds are attuned to order hearts are harmonised by the general repose and reguand to piety and to contemplation. It is because our larity around us. We look upon the joyful countenance of man, we hear no strife, we see no sorrow; labour is at an end, quietness is upon the scene, and our affections are weaned from earthly and fixed upon heavenly things. The goodness of God and the beauty of holiness force themselves into our thoughts, and in the fulness of the feeling we almost fancy that the inanimate creation has been taught to sympathise with the benevolence of our own souls, and to remember, like ourselves, the sabbath of God. This is mere imagination; but then it is a godly imagination, and God forbid that, by pointing out the cause of the delusion, I should rob the amiable mind of any Christian of a pleasing sentiment which he would wish to cherish, and which cannot possibly be productive of any evil effects.-Rev. C. Benson.

Poetry.

POWER AND GENTLENESS; OR, THE CATA-
RACT AND THE STREAMLET*.

NOBLE the mountain stream,
Bursting in grandeur from its vantage ground;
Glory is in its gleam

Of brightness-thunder in its deafening sound!

Mark how its foamy spray,
Tinged by the sunbeams with reflected dyes,
Mimics the bow of day,
Arching in majesty the vaulted skies.

* From Poems by Bernard Barton.

Thence in summer-shower,
Steeping the rocks around. O tell me where
Could majesty and power

Be clothed in forms more beautifully fair?
Yet lovelier in my view

The streamlet, flowing silently serene;
Traced by the brighter hue

And livelier growth it gives-itself unseen!

It flows through flowery meads, Gladdening the herds which on its margin browse; Its quiet beauty feeds

The alders that o'ershade it with their boughs.

Gently it murmurs by

The village churchyard-its low plaintive tone
A dirge-like melody,

For worth and beauty modest as its own.

More gaily now it sweeps

By the small school-house, in the sunshine bright, And o'er the pebbles leaps,

Like happy hearts by holiday made light.

May not its course express,

In characters which "they who run may read," The charms of gentleness,

Were but its still small voice allowed to plead?
What are the trophies gained

By power, alone, with all its noise and strife,
To that meek wreath unstained,

Won by the charities that gladden life?

Niagara's streams might fail,

And human happiness be undisturbed;
But Egypt would turn pale

Were her still Nile's o'erflowing bounty curbed!

Miscellaneous.

DEVIL WORSHIP IN THE EAST.-The superstition and ignorance of the people around us continue apparently unabated. At the present time there is a number of Buddhist priests at a temple about two miles from us, who have been brought from some distance by the people of the neighbourhood to read Bana, and celebrate the idolatrous rites of their religion. Every day an abundance of food is taken to these priests, for their maintenance, with tomtoms and processions. In a month or two a grand religious ceremony is to take place; and it is said that 720 rix-dollars, or 541. sterling, will be collected from these poor people, for paying the priests, and defraying the expenses of their exhibitions. A new Buddhist temple also is in the course of erection at Majuwana, a village about three miles to the southwest of us, and where we have always had a school. The manner in which money is here collected for temples, &c., it may be interesting to relate to you: it is really a plan so simple, and yet effectual, as to be worthy of attention and application to a better purpose. A number of persons agree, if possible, to build a temple, and the expense is estimated: the sum is then divided into shares: each person takes an equal share, and promises to pay, by a certain time, the sum allotted to him. Suppose that the temple will cost 801., and that there are forty persons willing

to subscribe toward it, each person holds himself responsible to pay, either in money or paddy, 2. In this way money is collected, and provision for temples and ceremonies made. Devil worship also still maintains its hold of the people. Not long since I was present at a devil-ceremony: though I do not frequently attend on such occasions, as I find the people are so excited and carried away at the time that they pay no serious attention to any thing that is said. This ceremony, however, was performed for one of my servants; and I therefore went to expostulate with his friends and the priest upon what they were about to do. The priest was quite ready to confess that what he was doing was foolish and wrong; but he said it was his business: he had sold himself to the devil, and must therefore do the devil's work, even though he knew he was destroying his soul thereby. My servant was insensible and helpless; and therefore had no power, if he had the inclination, to prevent his friends from doing these wicked things for him. His case being considered desperate, a peculiar ceremony was performed for his recovery, the abominable characteristics of which I will briefly relate to you. First, the priest pretended to discover, by means of a piece of thread tied round the patient's arm, what devil was afflicting him; and a fowl and other articles of food were then ordered by the priest to be procured. At night, incantations, as are usual in such cases, were made. After a certain time, the priest went to an old grave, which he had before marked, and took out some human bones, together with a human skull. He then proceeded to a newlymade grave, and over it cooked the food which had been prepared, using the skull for a vessel, and the bones as part of the fuel. The food was then taken back to the house, and dedicated to the devil, with various incautations and ceremonies; and was raised by a pole into the air, for the devil to feed upon. The

priest, after other incantations, &c., returned to the newly-made grave alone, in the middle of the night, and lying upon it, professed to sleep for half-an-hour. At the conclusion of that time, he rushed back to the company, seized two flaming torches, and danced round like a madman, professing to have been possessed by the devil while sleeping on the grave, and telling those present what was the disease of the patient, what medicines should be used for him, &c., which he said the devil had, during his frenzy, communicated to him. Whether those possessions are real or not, it is impossible to say; but the natives generally believe that they are, and I cannot but confess that I think so too. Thus are these poor crea tures led captive by Satan at his will. Their minds are, as might be expected, most degenerate and puerile. They are the slaves of ignorance, fear, and superstition; and what is infinitely worse, they reject the only remedy which can avail for their recoverypeace and salvation.-Rev. H. Powell.

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ALEXANDRIA*.

ALEXANDRIA is the chief maritime city, and long the metropolis of Lower Egypt. As this city owed its foundation to Alexander the great, the Old Testament canon had closed before it existed; nor is it often mentioned in the Apocrypha, or in the New Testament. But it was in many ways most importantly connected with the later history of the Jews-as well from the relations which subsisted between them and the Ptolemies, who reigned in that city, as from the vast numbers of Jews who were settled there, with whom a constant intercourse was maintained by the Jews in

* From Kitto's "Cyclopædia of Biblical Literature." Edinburgh, Black. From this very valuable work, which we have already recommended, the above extract is taken, as calculated ta give the reader a fair estimate of the publication. The view of Alexandria, which is that used in the work, and which has been kindly furnished to us, affords a good specimen of the illustrations.-ED.

VOL. XV.

the

Palestine. It is perhaps safe to say that, from the foundation of Alexandria to the destruction of Jerusalem, and even after, the former was of all foreign places that to which the attention of the Jews was most directed. And this appears to have been true even at the time when Antioch first, and afterwards Rome, became the seat of power to which the nation was subject. Alexandria is situated on the Mediterranean, twelve miles west of the Canopic mouth of the Nile, in 31° 13' N. lat. and 25° 53′ E. long. It owes its origin to the comprehensive policy of Alexander, who perceived that the usual channels of commerce might be advantageously altered; and that a city occupying this site could not fail to become the common emporium for the traffic of the eastern and western worlds, by means of the river Nile and the two adjacent seas, the Red Sea and the Mediterranean; and the high prosperity which, as such, Alexandria very rapidly

A A

attained, proved the soundness of his judgment, and exceeded any expectations which even he could have entertained. For a long period Alexandria was the greatest of known cities; for Nineveh and Babylon had fallen, and Rome had not yet risen to pre-eminence and even when Rome became the mistress of the world, and Alexandria only the metropolis of a province, the latter was second only to the former in wealth, extent, and importance; and was honoured with the magnificent titles of the second metropolis of the world, the city of cities, the queen of the east, a second Rome (Diod. Sic. xvii.; Strab. xvii.; Ammian. Marcell. xxii.; Hegesipp. iv. 27; Joseph. Bell. Jud. iv. 11, 5).

The city was founded in B.C. 332, and was built under the superintendence of the same architect (Dinocrates) who had rebuilt the temple of Diana at Ephesus. As a foreign city not mentioned at all in the Old Testament, and only accidentally in the New (Acts vi. 9; xviii. 24; xxvii. 6), it is introduced into this work only on account of its connection with the history and condition of the Jewish people. To the facts resulting from or bearing on that connection, our notice must therefore be limited, without entering into those descriptions of the ancient and the modern city which are given in general and geographical cyclopædias. It may suffice to mention that the ancient city appears to have been of seven times the extent of the modern. If we may judge from the length of the two main streets (crossing each other at right angles) by which it was intersected, the city was about four miles long by one and a half wide and in the time of Diodorus it contained a free population of 300,000 persons, or probably 600,000, if we double the former number, as Mannert suggests, in order to include the slaves. The port of Alexandria is described by Josephus (Bell. Jud. iv. 10, 5); and his description is in perfect conformity with the best modern accounts. It was secure, but difficult of access; in consequence of which a magnificent pharos, or lighthouse, was erected upon an islet at the entrance, which was connected with the mainland by a dyke. This pharos was accounted one of the "seven" wonders of the world. It was begun by Ptolemy Soter, and completed under Ptolemy Philadelphus, by Sostratus of Cnidus, B.C. 283. It was a square structure of white marble, on the top of which fires were kept constantly burning for the direction of mariners. It was erected at a cost of 800 talents, which, if Attic, would amount to 165,000l.; if Alexandrian, to twice that sum. It was a wonder in those times, when such erections were almost unknown; but, in itself, the Eddystone lighthouse is in all probability ten times more wonderful.

The business of working out the great design of Alexander could not have devolved on a more fitting person than Ptolemy Soter. From his first arrival in Egypt, he made Alexandria his residence and no sooner had he some respite from war, than he bent all the resources of his mind to draw to his kingdom the whole trade of the east, which the Tyrians had, up to his time, carried on by sea to Elath, and from thence, by the way of Rhinocorura, to Tyre. He built a city on the west side of the Red Sea, whence he sent out fleets to all those countries to which the Phoenicians traded from Elath. But, observing that the Red

Sea, by reason of rocks and shoals, was very dangerous towards its northern extremity, he transferred the trade to another city, which he founded at the greatest practicable distance southward. This port, which was almost on the borders of Ethiopia, he called, from his mother, Berenice; but, the harbour being found inconvenient, the neighbouring city of Myos Hormos was preferred. Thither the products of the east and south were conveyed by sea; and were from thence taken on camels to Coptus, on the Nile, where they were again shipped for Alexandria, and from that city were dispersed to all the nations of the west, in exchange for merchandise which was afterwards exported to the east (Strabo, xxii. p. 805; Plin. Hist. Nat. vi. 23). By these means the whole trade was fixed at Alexandria, which thus became the chief mart of all the traffic between the east and west, and which continued to be the greatest emporium in the world for above seventeen centuries, until the discovery of the passage by the Cape of Good Hope opened another channel for the commerce of the east.

Alexandria became not only the seat of commerce, but of learning and the liberal sciences. This distinction also it owed to Ptolemy Soter, himself a man of education, who founded an academy, or society of learned men, who devoted themselves to the study of philosophy, literature, and science. For their use he made a collection of choice books, which by degrees increased under his successors until it became the finest library in the world, and numbered 700,000 volumes (Strab. xvii. p. 791; Euseb. Chron.) It sustained repeated losses, by fire and otherwise, but these losses were as repeatedly repaired; and it continued to be of great fame and use in those parts, until it was at length burnt by the Saracens when they made themselves masters of Alexandria, in A.D. 642. Undoubtedly the Jews at Alexandria shared in the benefit of these institutions, as the Christians did afterwards; for the city was not only a seat of heathen, but of Jewish, and subsequently of Christian learning. The Jews never had a more really learned man than Philo, nor the Christians men more erudite than Origen and Clement; and, if we may judge from these celebrated natives of Alexandria, who were remarkably intimate with the heathen philosophy and literature, the learning acquired in the Jewish and Christian schools of that city must have been of that broad and comprehensive character which its large and liberal institutions were likely to produce. It will be remembered that the celebrated translation of the Hebrew Scriptures into Greek [septuagint] was made, under every encouragement from Ptolemy Philadelphus, principally for the use of the Jews in Alexandria, who knew only the Greek language; but partly, no doubt, that the great library might possess a ver sion of a book so remarkable, and, in some points, so closely connected with the ancient history of Egypt. The work of Josephus against Apion affords ample evidence of the attention which the Jewish scriptures excited.

At its foundation Alexandria was peopled less by Egyptians than by colonies of Greeks, Jews, and other foreigners. The Jews, however much their religion was disliked, were valued as citizens; and every encouragement was held out by Alexander himself and by his successors in Egypt,