(Jacques), early acquired deserved celebrity as the founder of a new school in French poetry, but, unfortunately, his ambition extended with his fame, till he left behind him as many didactic poems as Sir Richard Blackmore has epics, and, we suspect, the greater number of them are already almost as little known. The author of the Jardins, indeed, will always hold his rank among poets, but it would have been no great misfortune to his memory if he had written little more.

He was born on the 22d of June 1738, in the neighbourhood of Clermont in Auvergne. His father was a man of neither fortune nor family, but he was connected by his mother with that of the Chancellor de l'Hopital. With very slender means of support, he was educated at Paris, and made such progress in his studies, as augured well for his future distinction. When his education was completed, he was forced to accept of a very low situation, as a teacher in the college of Beauvais, but this was soon exchanged for the more honourable station of Professor of Humanity at Amiens. After returning to Paris, where he likewise obtained a Professorship, he speedily acquired a considerable poetical name, and was encouraged, by the younger Racine, to give to the world a translation of the Georgics of Virgil, which he had begun at Amiens. This translation was a bold attempt for a French poet. The muses of that nation were but little conversant with a country life. They had been reared in courts, and seemed incapable of assuming any other tone than that declamatory one in which kings and princesses might be supposed, however erroneously, to give utterance to their tragic woes; or that elegant and complimentary style in which the interests, the intrigues, and the morality of polite life, find a much truer and more adequate expression. Racine and Boileau, in a word, had fixed the poetry of their nation; within the limits which they had prescribed for it, it was perfect in its kind, and this made it appear still more hopeless to attempt to extend it farther. Voltaire, indeed, had given a wider compass to the language of tragedy; in his spirit of universal dominion, he had attempted the epic, but had failed: he was more successful in transusing into the guarded regularity of French poetry, some of the wilder graces and eccentricities of the Italian; but even he would have shrunk from the unprecedented audacity of walking his courtly muse over a ploughed field, or bringing her within the steam of a dunghill. We are told, accordingly, that he was greatly struck with the enterprise and the success of Delille, and that, without any personal acquaintance with our poet, he, of his own accord, recommended him and his work to the good graces of the Academy. It was not, however, till some years afterwards, that Delille became a member of that celebrated body. He now aimed at a higher distinction than even a finished translation of the most finished poem in the world could confer upon him; and in the Jardins, which he published a few years after his reception in the Academy, he made good his pretensions as an original poet. The mantle of the Roman bard still, indeed, seemed to enfold him, and, if we can pardon a few French prettinesses, there is no didactic poem in any language, we believe, which approaches so closely to the polish, the grace, and the tenderness of Virgil, as the Jardins of Delille.

It is an unfortunate thing for a poet to become too ambitious, especially if his former success renders him inattentive to the steps by which he was conducted to fame. After his Georgics had put him at the head of the poets of his country, Virgil, in obedience to the calls of gratitude and of patriotism, rather than of ambition, ventured upon his grand national epic: an arduous effort even for him! Yet by never losing sight for a moment of his own strength and his own weakness, he has been enabled, (although his heart never seems to have gone along with it, and he was at last, as is well known, quite dissatisfied with his own work,) to complete an undertaking which, in the judgment of posterity, has for ever encircled his modest brows with a glory, second only to that which beams from the divinity of Homer. His French disciple, who seemed for a time to be humbly treading in his steps, wanted, however, the composure of a Roman head. After the success of his Jardins, Delille appears to have forgotten where the strength of his own genius lay; that he was nothing at all if he was not cautious, select, elegant, and pathetic,—that the world did not expect to be deluged by his poetry, but to be refreshed by its gentle and winding streams,—that there was no necessity, in a word, for his writing a great deal, but the very greatest for his continuing to write infinitely well. The subject upon which he next laboured was an unhappy one. Without any great portion of Imagination of his own, he projected a poem on that vague and indeterminate theme: he sets out, accordingly, at a pitch which he cannot keep up,—he then loses himself in indistinct metaphysics,—and the want of any limit to his subject, tempts him into a wandering and interminable style of composition, which is at complete variance with every thing like point, polish, and elegance. Before he had gone far in the composition of this poem, which was not, indeed, published till after many of his other works, he made a voyage to Constantinople, in the train of the ambassador M. de Choiseul Gouffier. He did not lose this opportunity of visiting Attica and the Troad, and we might have hoped, that some glowing sketches of scenes so inspiring to a poet, would have relieved the heaviness of his *Imagination*. But the following is the only passage in all that long poem which pretends to catch any portion of their divine influence.

Lorsque de l'univers l'aimable enchanteuresse L'imagination, me porta dans la Grèce, Je ne m'attendais pas qu'un jour mes propres yeux Verraient ces belles meres, ces beaux champs, ces beaux cieux ; Je les ai vus ! Mon coeur a tressailli de joie : Homère m'a guide dans les champs ou fut Troie. Pour moi, ses vers divins peuplaient ces lieux deserts, Et ces lieux, à leur tour, m'embellissaient ses vers. Un delir charmant, qu'il m'inspirait sans doute, D'enchanteurs sans nombre avait semé ma route ; Je ne demandais plus, pour traverser les flots Ni le secours des vents, ni l'art des matelots ; Je disais aux tritons, aux jeunes nereides, De pousser mon vaisseau sur les plaines humides. Tout a coup sur ces mers, à mes yeux s'est montré Un stupide Pacha, d'esclaves entouré ; Tout s'est desenchanté, &c.

In spite of this tremendous Pacha, whose stupidity appears to have been somewhat infectious, our poet, while he resided at Constantinople, was almost in the daily habit of passing over to the coast of Asia, and studying his poem amidst the inspirations of its splendid scenery. Yet we cannot be persuaded that his enthusiasm, amidst these classical regions, was very profound or genuine; if it be true that he stated it as one of his greatest enjoyments, while resident among them, that he could go every day to breakfast in Asia, and come back again to dine in Europe.

On his return to Paris he prelected, in his capacity of Professor, on the Latin poets, and was attended by a numerous audience, who were delighted, not only with his critical observations, but with his beautiful recitation. He indulged them, too, with his own verses; and in this way, we believe, the choice morceaux of his poem on Imagination were familiar to the public long before it came into their hands. Delille continued to advance in fame and fortune, though without hazarding any more publications, till the period of the Revolution, when he was reduced to poverty, and sheltered himself in retreat from the disasters which surrounded him. He quitted Paris, and retired to St Diez, the native place of Madame Delille, and here he completed, in deep solitude, his translation of the Æneid, which he had begun many years before. A residence in France soon, however, became very undesirable, and he emigrated first to Bâle, then to Glairesse in Switzerland; a charming village on the lake of Bienee, opposite Rousseau's island of St Pierre. Much delighted with this enchanting country, and with the reception which he met from its inhabitants, he occupied himself constantly in the composition of poetry, and here finished his *L'Homme des Champs*, and his poem on the *Trois Règnes de la Nature*. We have censured Delille for writing too much; but an excuse may be found for him in the horrors of the times, and the necessity of some object to interest his mind, and relieve it from the oppression of his misfortunes. He would probably have adopted a course more favourable to his fame, had not the Revolution sent him adrift upon the world. His next place of refuge was in Germany, where he composed his *La Pitié*; and finally, he passed two years in London, chiefly employed in translating *Paradise Lost*. In 1801, finding that he might return safely to Paris, he did so, carrying with him his immense *Poetical Encyclopedia*, and from that time he sent poem after poem into the world, till at last he himself quitted it on the first of May 1813, at the age of 75. In his latter years he had lost, in a great degree, his sight, which gave him an opportunity to open one of the cantos of his *Imagination*, with an imitation of that noble passage in which our sublime poet laments a similar misfortune.

Voila que le printemps reverdit les coteaux, Des chaînes de l'hiver dégage les ruisseaux, Rend leur feuillage aux bois, ses rayons à l'aurore ; Tout renait ; pour moi seul rien ne renait encore.

Delille appears to have been a person of a very amiable and simple character; his conversation full of a child-like gaiety; his writings always moral and pious. He was a man, too, of courage and firmness. In his voyage to Attica, his little vessel was pursued by pirates, and very nearly overtaken. All on board were in consternation. The poet very coolly observed, "these rascals are not aware that I shall make them very ridiculous in an epigram." A finer instance of his resolution occurred during the tyranny of Robespierre. That wretch ordered him to compose a hymn on occasion of an impious fête, which Delille refused to do, and replied to the threats which were made him, *Que la guillotine était fort commode, et fort expéditive*. Being still urged to comply, he did write an ode, in which he took occasion to paint (a theme we may believe not very agreeable to the heroes of the Revolution) the terrors which immortality held out to the guilty, and its consolations to the virtuous under misfortune. This was very noble; but, wearied out afterwards by his long banishment, he does not appear to have been equally sturdy when he put forth his poem of *La Pitié*, on his return to Paris. Unfortunately he had already given it to the London booksellers; and, in their edition, there were various attacks on the proceedings of Napoleon, and expressions of great devotion to the exiled family. But when he found himself under the Consular government, he made considerable alterations on his poem. It was published in Paris about the same time that it appeared in London; and, like the statue with two faces, it was quite a different thing, according to the side of the channel on which it was contemplated. On a general estimate of the genius of Delille, we must consider him as a poet of much refinement and delicacy; but of no great power or stamina. Upon the pleasing subject of rural life, he dilates with great beauty and felicity. There are, too, throughout his poems, very splendid descriptions of all kinds, but he weakens them constantly by diffusion; and there is very little art or elegance in his connections or transitions. He set out well, but he afterwards attempted more than he could compass. It is a pity that he was able to read any language but French and Latin, or that he should have ever wandered beyond the precincts of nature and of Virgil. It has occurred to us in reading Delille, that, with all his beauty of versification, and occasional facility of expression, he yet shows, in his later works especially, a great ignorance of the line of distinction between prose and poetry. This is a curious subject of discussion; and we know not that it has ever been accurately examined. There may be very eloquent and very animated prose, which yet, if versified, would make but indifferent poetry. Delille very nearly versifies some of the pathetic passages in Rousseau's Heloise; but in his hands they are anything but poetical. On the other hand, there are poems on subjects that are more naturally treated in prose, but which, by the art of the poet, acquire the character of poetry. The satires of Horace, which he himself calls "Sermoni Propiora," Dryden's Religio Laici, and still more the Epistles of Pope and Boileau, have all, doubtless, a poetical character, although there is in them no passion, and very little imagery. Didactic poetry, in general, is an invasion upon the precincts of prose composition; but how wonderfully have some poets invested it with the attributes of the highest inspiration! One half of Lucretius is mere reasoning; yet even in his reasonings we see a poet. There is the animation, the diction, the rapidity of poetry; and that overflowing of mind with which he is constantly breaking out of his reasonings, and running into the most brilliant conceptions and pictures, is its very soul. Virgil, too, in his Georgics, is poetical from beginning to end. No man who ever wrote seems to have seen more distinctly than this great master what it is that peculiarly constitutes poetry, or was so capable of diffusing it over the most unpromising parts of his subject. Perhaps the charm consists very much in selection. A prose writer accumulates image upon image, when he wishes to make a forcible impression; translate these into verse, and some of them will appear insignificant, some of them low, and the quantity of them tedious. This is often the effect of Delille's descriptions. A poet like Virgil, again, fixes upon some one striking feature of the conception which he wishes to impress—some thought that breathes, and word that burns; and giving us these, he not only gives us the image which he expresses, but the full force of many kindred images which are kept behind, but which our imaginations, when thus seized, can easily body out for themselves.

Delille has left behind him little prose. His preface to the translation of the Georgics is an able essay, and contains many excellent hints on the art and the difficulties of translation. He wrote the article La Bruyere in the Biographie Universelle. The following is the list of his poetical works: 1. Les Georgiques de Virgile, traduites en vers Francais, Paris, 1769, 1782, 1785, 1809. 2. Les Jardins, en quatre chants, 1780. Nouvelle edition, Londres, 1800; Paris, 1802. 3. L'Homme des Champs, ou les Georgiques Francaises, 1800. 4. Poésies Fugitives, 1802. A Collection given under the title of Poésies Diverses, 1801, was disavowed by Delille. 5. Dithyrambe sur l'Immortalité de l'Ame, suivi du passage du Saint Gothard; poème traduit de l'Anglais de Madame la Duchesse de Devonshire, 1802. 6. La Pitié; poème en quatre chants. Londres et Paris, 1803. 7. L'Enseide de Virgile, traduite en vers Francaises, 1805. 9. L'Imagination, poème en huit chants, 1806. 10. Les Trois Regnes de la Nature, 1809. 11. La Conversation, 1812.

DEMERARA or DEMERARY, a colony belonging to Great Britain, in the northern part of South America. It is now composed of what formerly constituted the two governments of Demerara and Essequibo; both of which having been permanently secured to Great Britain by the peace of 1814, have been formed into one settlement, and now constitute but one province. Stabroek, the principal city, and the seat of the government, is in lat. 6° 46' north, and 57° 45' west longitude from London. It is bounded on the east by a line drawn from the mouth of Albany creek, in a south-east direction, which divides it from the British colony of Berbice, and on the western side by the river Pomaron, which divides it from Spanish Guyana. Its northern boundary is the Atlantic Ocean, and its southern is undetermined.

On this coast the tides rise to the height of from sixteen to twenty-four feet. The river Demerara has a bar across its mouth, which prevents ships of large burden and correspondent draught of water from entering it. Vessels not drawing more than fourteen feet may be loaded in the river; but those of greater draught must complete their loading without the bar. At Stabroek there are convenient wharfs towards the river, but they are only safe for small craft to lie alongside them, on account of the withdrawing of the tide, and the declivity of the bank. Vessels, therefore, are compelled to load and discharge their cargoes in the middle of a rapid stream. The other river, the Essequibo, has no bar, and is easily entered by the largest merchant ships, but they must also be loaded and unloaded in the stream. Although the cultivation in Demerara at present exceeds that on the Essequibo, yet the greater depth of water in the latter river, and the absence of a bar at its entrance, will, at no distant period, raise its settlement above that on the former river.

The river Demerara is navigable for ships, about fifty miles above Stabroek, and perhaps even higher; but as there are no plantations at a greater distance, no accurate survey of it has been taken. At 130 miles from its mouth are considerable cataracts, beyond which the Europeans have not explored; but the Arrowauk Indians, who descend in large canoes, represent it as accessible above the cataracts, to a much greater distance than they are from the sea. Information respecting the river Essequibo is equally obscure. About sixty miles from its mouth it is divided into three branches, the easternmost of which proceeds from the supposed lake Parima, on which the imaginary city El Dorado was expected to be found. Another branch called the Cayonny, is supposed to be occasionally connected with the river Orinoco; but the woods are so difficult of access, the swamps so extensive, the country so unhealthy, and the inhabitants so irritable, that probably many years must elapse before our geographers can become acquainted with the origin and courses of these vast rivers which water the whole of Guyana.

The first settlements on the river Essequibo were made by the Dutch in 1706, and those on the Demerara in 1746. But the colonies made a very slow progress in cultivation for a long period after their first establishment; and even in their origin a considerable portion of the largest capitals was furnished by British subjects. They continued to languish during the whole of the first few years of their settlement, solely from the want of capital; since the fertility of the soil seems to have been known from the commencement. In the year 1781 they surrendered to a small British squadron, and at the conclusion of the peace in 1783 were given back to the Dutch. In 1796 they were again taken, and at the peace of Amiens again given up. During this latter period very considerable British capitals had been embarked in the cultivation of the colony, the proprietors of which became much embarrassed by its cession; but the progress of improvement was scarcely arrested, when the war, again breaking out, it was surrendered to a British armament, which, though incompetent to take forcible possession, was sufficient to justify the surrender of its willing inhabitants.

As the progress of the settlement had been principally owing to British capital, it seemed but just that it should be permanently ceded to the nation with whom it was most intimately connected, and from which its prosperity had arisen; and accordingly the King of the Netherlands has, by the last treaty, given it up permanently to Great Britain.

As the cultivation is solely carried on by the labour of negro slaves, the importation of that unfortunate race, from the time it came into our possession, until the abolition of the slave trade, is the most certain criterion of the increase of cultivation.

Slaves imported into Demerara and Essequibo.

| Year | Slaves | |------------|--------| | From 1st Oct. 1803, to 5th Jan. 1804 | 5876 | | 1805 | 5458 | | 1806 | 2249 | | 1807 | 2211 | | 1808 | 1422 | | **Total** | **17216** |

Though all the tropical productions are raised in Demerara with great facility, the principal articles sugar, coffee, and cotton, seem to be more exclusively produced than in our other colonies. Of late the improvements made in their sugars have been considerable, and the cultivation of that article, at present, very much predominates.

Provisions for the maintenance of the negro population are wholly raised within the colony; which, combined with the great fertility of the soil, gives such a superiority over the islands which have been long cultivated, that if the removal of the slaves from one colony to another were allowed, now that it is become securely British, a very large proportion of the negroes from the islands would be immediately transferred by their masters to form new plantations on the banks of the Berbice, the Demerara, and the Essequibo.

Demerara enjoys, in common with the other colonies in Guyana, another advantage over the islands, in the abundance of timber which its forests furnish. The trees on the low grounds, near the settled parts, are, indeed, of such hard wood, as to be worked with difficulty; but they supply all the staves necessary for their sugar casks. Other kinds of timber for rum puncheons and for their buildings are imported from North America at present; but by ascending to a higher level of country, a sufficiency of proper trees might be cut down, and conveyed by the river, to supersede the necessity of depending on importation.

Though situated almost under a vertical sun, the Climate-country is more healthy than any of the islands, which probably arises from the greater equality of the temperature. The constant regularity of the trade-winds during the day, and of the land breezes which succeed them in the evening, joined to the invariable length of the nights, with their refreshing dews, renders the heat far from excessive; and Europeans find it less oppressive than even in Barbadoes, which is accounted the most temperate of all the tropical islands.

The only division of seasons known is the wet and the dry, each of which occurs twice in the year, and continues about three months. In the month of May the showers begin, and gradually increase until the month of June, when the rains become incessant, frequently accompanied with most violent thunder. In the beginning of July the rain gradually diminishes, and entirely ceases by the commencement of August. The same course is observed as the sun approaches the tropic of Capricorn, but the rains are of shorter duration, and of less force, than when the sun advances towards the tropic of Cancer, and are seldom attended with any thunder. From the peculiar character of the seasons, the operations of agriculture proceed with equal steps, and each half of the year is alike favourable for planting and harvesting the produce.

The soil in this colony is perhaps equal in fertility to any in the world. It has a blue marly appearance, mixed in part with the remains of sea-shells; and has been transported as manure for the lands in Barbadoes, which had been previously exhausted. It has been known to produce thirty crops of ratoon canes in succession, without replanting, whereas in the islands they seldom calculate on more than two. The cultivators have had recourse to various expedients for diminishing the excessive richness of the soil. This is sometimes effected by cropping it for two or three years with plantains, and afterwards with sugar canes; but the first, second, and sometimes even the third crop of canes are so luxuriant, as to be unfit to make sugar, and are therefore used only for rum.

The whole of the cultivated land, extending about fifty miles from the sea-shore inwards, is flat and level, without a single hill, and so low, that during the heavier rainy season, it is frequently covered with water to the depth of two This produces an effect similar to the prolific overflowing of the Nile. It deposits a rich muddy clay, which has formed a stratum of twelve or fourteen inches in depth, and is perhaps the cause of the fertility which we have already noticed.

From this low situation of the ground, the planters have been compelled, in bringing the land into cultivation, to surround it on two sides with deep dikes, to convey the water to the river, and to construct sluices, which resist the tides, and prevent the sea water from flooding their lands. Besides those trenches which convey the backwater from the plantations, each estate is intersected with smaller trenches, by means of which, in small flat-bottomed boats, the whole conveyance of the produce, from one part of the estate to another, is effected. The canes are thus carried from the field to the sugar mill and the still-house; which much diminishes the labour of horses and mules. The plantations are divided into beds of thirty-two feet in breadth. Between each of these is a small trench or ditch, dug two feet in width and three feet in depth; the mould which is removed in forming these ditches is thrown on the beds, which are thus raised above the natural level of the surface. On these beds the cotton-trees are planted in rows at six feet distance, in the richest soil, and where it is supposed to be less rich at a somewhat greater distance. The coffee trees are planted in rows from nine to twelve feet asunder, and, as they will only flourish under the shade, the intermediate spaces are filled either by plantain trees, or the bois immortel, which grows to the height of twelve or fourteen feet.

The cultivation of this settlement requires the application of a considerable portion of manual labour, and its future increase, notwithstanding the fertility of its soil, must depend on the quantity of labour that can be applied to it. The keeping up the embankments which prevent the backwater from overflowing the estates, is a great and constant labour, and the eradicating weeds, which grow as luxuriantly as any other crop, requires no inconsiderable attention and exertion. Although the colony contains nearly 62,000 negro slaves, yet they must, from natural causes, for some time diminish every year; whatever provision may be made for their subsistence, or whatever alleviation may be afforded to their toil. It is well known, that, from obvious causes, as long as the slave trade continued, a far greater proportion of males than of females was imported. Without a tolerable equality between the sexes, it is not possible that population should increase; but when the number of males very far exceeds that of the females, it must necessarily diminish till this equality is reached. We cannot exactly ascertain what are the relative numbers of the two sexes in Demerara; but it is certain that the males far exceed the females; according to one calculation, in the proportion of four to one; according to another, in the proportion of five to two. Whatever the disproportion may be, it is clear, however, that the increase of population must depend on the number of females. The males, who are now the greater number, will diminish with most rapidity, but whenever the period shall arrive in which the females shall equal the males, or even somewhat exceed them, the course of population may take an opposite direction, and begin to increase. This, however, supposes that there shall be a sufficiency of food, that the labour be not excessive, and that the promiscuous intercourse between the sexes be abolished, which, though almost a necessary consequence of the inequality of the sexes, is the bane of happiness, and tends to increase the evil of depopulation.

If this view be correct, we must, for a period of years, look to a gradual diminution of the labour at present applied to the soil. When the sexes shall reach nearly to equal numbers, we may calculate that the planters will have been taught, by the gradual decrease of their labourers, the value of their strength and lives; they will, therefore, for their own interest, apportion both their labour and their subsistence, in such a manner as shall most effectually promote their happiness, and consequently their increase.

It is only from the increase of the negro population, and from its increase in the way we have pointed out, that any hopes can be entertained of the extension of cultivation in these provinces. The labour of the fields cannot be endured by the whites; the attempts to cultivate by Chinese have hitherto failed; and no new attempts of the kind seem likely to be made.

The aboriginal inhabitants, whether Caribs or Aboriginal Arrowaws, have no disposition to labour. They are of feeble frame and indolent disposition, and obtaining the means of bare subsistence with little effort, no inducements are likely to lead them from their accustomed roving independent life, to those settled and quiet habits which cultivation requires. The present utility of the Indians to the colony, arises principally from the aversion and even hatred which subsists between the Indian and negro races. This converts them into useful allies, whenever an insurrection of the negroes is contemplated or commenced, and prevents the desertion of the latter, from the knowledge that, if they escape into the woods, they can scarcely avoid being captured by the roving Indians, and conducted back to receive from their masters the assigned punishment. The Indian tribes, bordering on this colony, have been often described; we shall, therefore, only say of them, that their numbers are small, and gradually diminishing, and that when they visit the Europeans on the coast, they appear mild and gentle towards them; but discover, by every significant symptom, their hatred and disdain of the negroes, with whom nothing can induce them to associate, except the thirst for spirituous liquors, to the love of which they are addicted, with all the characteristic greediness common among savages.

The government of the colony has not been inattentive to that important branch of internal policy which regards roads, bridges, embankments, and sewers for draining. The roads are kept in excellent order, and by the help of a sewer tax, the other rural public works are maintained on a respectable and beneficial footing.

By the terms of the capitulation, the Dutch colo- nial laws govern in this settlement. At first the Dutch proprietors were the most considerable, and consequently it was but right that they should be ruled by laws, with whose forms and principles they were familiarly acquainted. As the British proprietors have increased, and now far outnumber the Dutch, the same laws have been continued. They are so interwoven with all the institutions and habits of the colonists, and the security of the property so much depend upon them, that no considerable alteration could be made without rendering the right to much of the property unsettled; therefore, it is probable they will continue unchanged; especially as it is allowed by all the colonists, that, when honestly and skilfully administered, the laws of Holland are well calculated for the circumstances of the country.

When the colony first came into possession of the British, the proceedings in the courts of law were all carried on in the Dutch language; and this created suspicion in the British inhabitants, whether well or ill founded, that no justice could be obtained in the courts between a British and a Dutch party. Since the colony has become permanently attached to the British government, the English language has been ordered to be used in all law proceedings, and by the advocates; and, though this has produced the whimsical exhibition of Dutch lawyers studying the English language, and English lawyers studying Dutch law, yet the practice has succeeded so far as to reconcile the inhabitants to the system, and to give them confidence in its purity.

A practice rather than a law, for it seems to have grown up in the colony, and become established without any express enactment, deserves to be noticed on account of its importance to European capitalists who may be tempted to invest money on colonial securities. No man can grant a mortgage on his landed property until he has advertised in the Colonial Gazette his intention to do so. When it is so advertised, any one of his simple contract creditors may effectually stop the mortgage till his debt is satisfied. The reason of this rule is, that a West India proprietor may not be enabled to go to Europe,—dissipate his property there by a mortgage,—secure those who have supplied him with the means of supporting his extravagance, and thus defraud those who, during his absence, have supplied his estate with the necessaries which were indispensable for its cultivation. As far as this rule tends to secure the West Indian creditor, it ought not to be complained of; nor perhaps has the European capitalist, who lends his money on a colonial security, without clearly understanding the laws or rules of the colony in which the security exists, any great reason to complain. It has, however, frequently occurred, that mortgages upon estates in the Dutch colonies have been negotiated in England, the money advanced, and the security supposed to be perfected, when a number of creditors within the colony, with simple contract debts, have appeared, whose claims were equal there to those of the mortgage. These must be satisfied before his security can be valid, or if he forecloses, they must be admitted with him as concurrent creditors.

The Governor of Demerara is maintained by a salary drawn from England. The internal government is supported by taxes paid by the inhabitants. Besides that for keeping the sewers and dikes in repair, which is before noticed, an annual tax of about 5s. Sterling on each slave is levied. The accounts are kept in Dutch money, and exchanged in their European transactions, into Sterling at very variable rates of exchange. A quantity of silver, colonial money, has been coined in England for the use of the province, which forms the current money in all small negotiations. The value of the pieces are about 3s. and they are found highly convenient in the exchanges of property within the colony.

The free inhabitants of the colony, including whites, mulattoes, and blacks, scarcely exceed 3000, or not more than one in twenty to the number of slaves; a greater disproportion than exists in our colonial islands. The greater part of these are in Stabroek, the capital, which is the seat of government, and the head-quarters of the armed force. It is a small town, defended by a fort. Its inhabitants of all kinds are about 5000. The customhouse is here, the fees of which, with all the care of the commissioners who lately went from England to regulate them, are still enormous.

As no part of this colony has been explored with much attention beyond the limits of the cultivation of sugar, coffee, and cotton, we know little of the mineral history of the country. Above the cataracts, there is abundance of red and white agates, which remain untouched by the natives, from superstitious fears, which represent them as dedicated solely to the service of some magical invocation, practised by their priests. There are likewise a variety of stones, which appear to contain valuable ores, and probably gold and silver may be hereafter discovered. It is possible that the stories collected by Sir Walter Raleigh from the concurrent reports of various natives, though greatly exaggerated, may not have been altogether without foundation. We are, however, very ignorant on this subject, and there is no immediate prospect of our ignorance being removed.

The cocac, coffee, plantain, banana, and cocoa trees have been so often described, that any extended notice of them would be unnecessary. The trees peculiar to this country deserve shortly to be remarked. The pigeon or Angola pea tree is a branchy shrub, about nine feet high, covered with smooth, long, narrow-pointed leaves. Its flowers are of the papilionaceous kind, and are succeeded by numerous pods, of a russet colour, shaped like those of the English pea, but rather more flat. These are divided into four or five cells, containing the peas, which, though somewhat astringent, are agreeable and nutritious. The Arnolta or Roucou tree is usually about nine feet in height, with long narrow green leaves, in alternate order, the middle and transverse ribs of which are of a red colour. The flowers are pentapetalous, and of a bluish yellow colour. From the middle of the petals rises a style containing the embryo of the pods, which incloses that containing the seeds. These, when ripe, are covered with a beautiful crimson pulp. The seeds macerated in the juice of lemons, in which the gum of the manna tree has been dissolved, yields the celebrated pigment with which the natives decorate their bodies. The vegetable musk plant is about four feet high; it produces a pod whose cavities are filled with small oval seeds of a dark brown colour. These diffuse the smell of musk, and are replete with an oil used as a specific for the bite of the venomous snakes, and for that purpose taken internally, as well as applied externally to the wounded part. The silk cotton tree is about 100 feet in height, and twelve feet in circumference; its trunk continues undivided to seventy or eighty feet from the ground. Within a pod of a conical form, about four inches in length, is contained a short fine silky filament, the crops of which are triennial. The trunks of the trees, hollowed by fire, furnish canoes to the Indians, frequently of seventy or eighty feet in length. Gum Anime is the product of a tree forty feet high, with few leaves, and those near the top; they are small, a dark green, and oval. From incisions made in this tree, a whitish resinous gum exudes, with a grateful smell and pleasant taste. It is used by the natives as a remedy for pains in the stomach, rheumatism, and headaches, and in Europe for varnishing carriages. Troolies are perhaps the largest leaves that have been hitherto noticed. Each leaf is supported by a single stem, arising immediately from the root, which runs through the whole length of it. These stems are very strong, are about three inches in circumference at the root, and gradually taper to the termination of the leaf. The fibres are strong, and closely connected from one end to the other, without any sections or divisions. Ten or twelve of these leaves usually grow in one cluster. They are commonly from twenty to thirty feet in length. The flowers are clusters of a yellowish white, and produce a great number of large globular nuts, covered with a thick hard black shell, through which there is a hole to the kernel. It resembles a hand grenade in weight, size, and hardness. As the leaves of this singular plant will last many years, they are used for the covering of the houses, and are found to be a protection against the most violent rain.

The animals of Demerara most common are those whose original races were imported from the ancient continent; horses, asses, cows, sheep, and hogs. These scarcely vary from the same animals in Europe, except that the sheep, as in all the tropical countries, have their wool converted into hair.

The native goat of Guyana is of a much smaller size than the goat of Europe; its hair is similar, its horns slender and incurvated downwards, and it is more prolific than the European breed, usually producing from three to five kids at each birth. There are two kinds of deer, one of the same size as those of Europe, the other about one-third less. They feed on the meadows, and approach very near to the plantations, but, being very active and fleet, can with difficulty be caught, unless they get into the rivers, when they are easily taken by the Indians. The two kinds of wild hogs, the peccary and the warre, are very abundant; the former having on its back a gland which was formerly mistaken for its navel, which secretes a milky liquid of a musk-like smell, and which, unless removed the instant it is taken, communicates its flavour to the whole carcass, rendering it disgusting to European palates.

The monkeys of all kinds are very numerous, from the ouran outang, the largest, to the sacca winkee, which does not exceed, exclusive of its tail, six inches in length; its tail is about nine inches long. The tigers, which are neither so strong nor so fierce as those of Africa, frequently make incursions on the plantations, and carry away hogs, sheep, and other domesticated animals, and sometimes have attacked, and even destroyed men.

The diseases to which the inhabitants are subject differ but little from those experienced in other tropical countries; but the leprosy is much more frequent, and more violent, than it is known to be in any other situation. It is supposed to be highly infectious, and those afflicted with it are carefully sequestered from society in remote situations in the forests. The yellow fever, though it has sometimes visited Demerara, has been less extended and less fatal than in the more northern part of America, whether insular or continental.

Natural History of Guiana, London, 1769.—Bolingbroke's Voyage to Demerary, 1807.—Stedman's Surinam, 1806.—Parliamentary Papers.—Various Manuscripts.