The Press. — London, England, 1856-08-02 00:00:00

AUGUST 2, 1856. is sufficient here to note the highest point reached, and to glance at the results of the voyage. The voyagers, as a general rule, found the natives friendly, and strongly inclined to trade. The river-bordering countries possess resources of inexhaustible natural wealth, if they could be developed. The cotton-tree was abundant; cam-wood was plentiful palm oil cou ld be produced without limit; and it seemed probable that immense quantities of ivory could be procured as soon as a regular trade sprang up. At Arufo some specimens of lead ore were obtained ; it contained six teen hundred of lead and three ounces of flue silver to the ton of twenty hundred weight, It is said to be in abundance, and to be found near the surface." At Igbegbe, at the confluence, ivory, tobacco, shea-butter. and red pepper were purchased; but the agent was so tied down as to price that he could not make a fair offer for commodities. On their return voyage, they attended the market at Igbegbe, and heard many African tongues : Among articles for sale we noted palm oil, palm-nut oil, shea-butter, cotton, cloths, mats, bags, calabashes, pepper, cam-wood, magnificent yams, tomatos, papaws, plantains, bananas, corn, beer. We also visited a blacksmith's shop, and inspected a brewery of rather a simple description. The decks of the Pleied were covered with traders and their gear, and active trade went on, the women proving the keenest hands. --- - It may be doubtful whether purely trading expeditions up the Niger would at present answer; but there can be no doubt that the trading capabilities of Central Africa are in exhaustible, and that could a trade be once established it would very soon grow in im portance and be self-sustaining. Mr. Hutchin son points to the cheering fact, that of palm oil alone— I►uring the past year 27,000 tons were imported into Liverpool alone, and above 31,000 tons, the aggregate atnount from Western Africa, into the different ports of the United Kingdom. Yet this amount may be doubled, if not trebled, by the employment of people in the inner country for its manufacture, as I have seen the tree from which the palm•nut is obtained grow as far up as Shiro, a distance of 400 miles from the mouth of the The great obstacle to the growth of produc tive industry and of legitimate trade in Africa is the slave trade. This odious traffic operates prejudicially iu three ways at least:—First it keeps the native States at war with each other, and thus sinks them into deeper barbarism ; secondly, it seems more profitable than any other kind of trade, and is therefore chosen in preference ; and, thirdly, it continually diminishes the productive power of the country by taking away its living strength. How is this traffic to be best abolished? We have tried repressive measures in vain. In his very sensible remarks on this subject, Mr. Hutchinson shows that an enormous sum is annually paid by Great Britain to maintain the African blockading squadron, that hun dreds of valuable lives are sacrificed in the effort, and that, after all, the only effect is slightly to advance the price of slaves by in creasing the risks of the trade. Mr. Hutchin• son says:— The external slave trade will be only put an end to when the chiefs and masters in Africa are taught and understand how far more profitably to themselves they can exercise slave labour in the cultivation of their soil, than by selling it; they will soon be brought to see that it is not consistent with common sense transporting away the native Africans to Brazil, to cultivate and manufacture sugar—to America, to grow and pick cotton —to Cuba, to aid in the tilling of tobacco, when the very same products can be obtained from their own ground at home. With this will be generated also a desire and a power amongst the slaves to work for their own emanci pation, of their anxiety to do which I have evidence in a fact communicated to me by the Rev. ➢lr. Crowther, that several hundred slaves have so purchased their liberty at Abbeokuta. The immense increase in palm-oil, and other exports from Africa, during the past ten years, will clearly disprove the fallacy that the native Africans are averse to labour. At. Sierra Leone, at Akkra, at Lagos, and at Old Calabar, I have met negroes thirsting for the knowledge to turn the resources of their districts into the proper channel ; but, unfortunately, no aid was nigh to give in• struction to these aspiring men. It becomes, then, a practical question of the greatest moment whether a small portion of that sum expended on the Wcst African squadron might not be advantageously devoted to the opening up and encouragement of regular trade in Central Africa. This expedi tion cost 0,0001. Were two such expeditions THE PRESS. sent every year, the expense would not be alarming. When the way was once prepared, and the native chiefs were made sensible of the advantages of intercourse with us, trade would speedily support itself. It appears that a sum of one hundred pounds was devoted to the purchase of articles suit able as presents for the native chiefs. The amount in our opinion was too small. We strongly advise that whenever presents are made they be of real intrinsic worth, and good of their kind. The Africans will soon learn the true value of their presents, and it will be sound policy to give them such things only as they will prize, and as will lead them to ardently desire further intercourse with us. The experience of some years past is so highly favorable to the establishment and spread of civilisation in Africa, as to well deserve national encouragement. The natives are evidently capable of very considerable progress in industrial arts ; and in so unex plored a country as Africa, what sources of unimagined wealth may not be opened by in telligent enterprise? The benefits to be con• ferred, not only on Africa itself, but on the whole world, by developing the natural re sources of that mighty continent, are to bo but faintly apprehended even in imagination at the present time. A :commencement has been made; and the saying of Lucian is true, —" To begin is half the battle." Of the two narratives, we think the pre ference is due to that of Mr. Hutchinson, as being the most modest and lucid. But from Dr. Baikie's volume we extract a paragraph containing a fair summary of the results of the expedition : We have discovered a navigable river, an available high- way, conducting us into the very heart of a large continent, and by means of its branches and ramifications we are brought into immediate contact with many thousand miles of country. We have found these regions to be highly favored by nature, teeming with animal life, and with fertile soils abounding in valuable vegetable products, and adapted by diversity of position, of elevation, and of cha meter for all the varied purposes of tropical agriculture. We have met on friendly terms with numerous tribes, all endowed by nature with what I may term the " commercial faculty," ready and anxious to trade with us, and to supply us from their inexhaustible stores with immense quanti ties of highly-prized articles, most valuable for various economical appliances. We can likewise indicate a most important outlet for home manufactures, as the unclad millions of Central Africa must absorb thousands of car• goes of soft goods, eagerly bartering their raw cotton, their vegetable oils, and their ivory, for our calicoes and cloths. Thus we can confidently point out for those who follow a fresh field for energy and activity, an unbroken ground, where both honour and riches may be reaped. Both books would-have been the better for a little more of that literary cultivation which teaches that the first aim of such narratives is to describe in the simplest manner the objects witnessed. There are attempts at tine or " gentish" writing in both books, which some what detract from their intrinsic value. PERIODICAL LITERATURE. Blackwood opens this month with an admirable essay on Macaulay. The idea, rather suggested than expressed, that Macaulay does for history what Mr. Charles Kean does for Shakespeare, is extremely felicitous. The story of " The A thelings "is continued with great spirit; it is a thoroughly natural tale. "A Visit to Selborne," and "Seaside Studies," are espe cially agreeable subjects during such weather as the present. "Tickler among the 'Thieves" is humorous, but scarcely equal to last June's " Tickler." Aytoun's " Bothwell," and the " Sketcher" papers, are the two literary reviews of the number, and " India under Lord Dalhousie," the politico-historical one. Fraser this month has a great and agreeable variety of articles. We are glad to see the com mencement of a new tale, by the author of "John Halifax," entitled "The Double House." "A I'eep into the Principalities " is sensible and impartial. " Life at the Water Cure" is an amusing and, we imagine, useful article, setting forth all the pecu liarities of that healing course, and commenting sagaciously on Mr. Lane's enthusiastic description. "The Opera Season of 1856," " Life and Manners in Persia," and " A Midsummer Day with the Poets," are the principal remaining articles. The Dublin has an excellent list of articles— eleven out of fourteen being purely literary ones. The " Story of the Darragh " grows interesting. " 'I he Progress of the British Navy," " Cyprus," " French Versions of Shakespeare," and " Gossip on Fortune," will perhaps be the most generally ac ceptable—the second and third mentioned especially. 'O The " Gossip on Fortune," however, is a most able and attractive essay of a kind we see too seldom. " Modern English Latin Verse " is a sketch of the progress of Latin poetry in this country from the time of Buchanan to the present day. The review of " Montgomery's Life" is a well.written critique, giving us most of the interesting circumstances of the poet's career. The poetical pieces by Mr. Frank Davis and Mr. Mortimer Collins are all meritorious, though we hope the latter gentleman does not intend to desert rythm, as he has done in the serenade of " Troilus." " Reformatory and Industrial Schools" and "Popular Education" are both valuable articles. Bentley this month gives us an interesting instal ment of " The Spendthrift," the best which has yet appeared. The review of "The Attache in Madrid" is a well-arranged article, with some lively extracts ; and the memoirs of Charles Young, the actor, is a pleasing and laudable contribution. Monkshood writes this month on Coleridge. " Mary Goring" is one of the regular Bentley stories—short, pregnant, and amusing. The Eclectic Review contains an excellent article upon " Low Life in London," a forcible review of the Austrian Concordat, and rather a silly one of " Lamartine's Characters." The article on " Modern Painters " seems well written and moderate. PUBLICATIONS RECEIVED.--JULY 31. BOOKS. Kars, and Our Captivity in Russia. Colonel Atwell Lake. The Happy Cottager. Drafts fu r Acceptance. The Deserted Infe. Bothwell. A Poem. Essays, Critical and Imaginative. The Austrian Dungeons in Daly. Bentley Newby Routledge C. H. Clarke Blackwoods Ditto Rontledge Ferny Counties. Lovell Ree - Ve The Life and Adventures of James P. Beekwourth. Sampson Low and Son TEXT OF SHAKESPEARE. TO THE EDITOR OF " THE PRESS." Sir,—ln the third act of Henry VIII., sc. 2, we find the following speech of Wolsey : I do profess That for your highness' good I ever laboured More than mine own : Mal am have and will be-- (Though all the world should crack their duty to you And throw it from their soul: though perils did Abound as thick as thought could make them, and Appear in forms more horrid)--yet my duty, As doth a rock against the chiding flood, Should the approach of this wild river break, And stand unshaken yours. With regard to the incomprehensible words in italics, commentators have uniformly adopted one or other of two courses. They have either held the passage to be corrupt without offering any emenda tion, or supposed the sentence to be unfinished, without perceiving that no possible addition could have made sense of the words as they stand. Mr. Collier's corrector is silent. I venture to make a slight alteration, perfectly obvious, and, as I would fain believe, uerfectly satisfactory both in meaning and metre : I do profess That for your highness' good I ever laboured More than mine own, that am your slave and will be, Though all &c. I profess, says Wolsey, that I labour more for your good than for my cwn, since I ever have es teemed and ever shall esteem myself a slave whof.e work belongs to you, my master, and not to myself ; the duty I thus owe you shall never be denied, even though all else should fail you. There is no reason that the parenthesis should continue to interrupt the sense of the passage.—l aro, yours obediently, B. BICKLEY ROGERS. Wadham College. TO THE EDITOR OF " THE PRESS." Sir,—ln The Merry Wives of Windsor, Mr. Collier's MS. corrector, probably incited thereto by his own appreciation of creature comforts, proposes a change in the text which is truly laughable. Minn host of the Garter, urging Dr. Coins in his pursuit of Anne Page, tells him : I will bring thee where Mistress Anne Page is, at &farm house feasting, and thou shalt woo her. Cried game, said I well ?—Act ii. 6c. 3. Mr. Collier observes, " The difficulty has been how to make any sense out of cried game," and he ap proves of the alteration made by the old corrector of this expression to "curds and cream," as "the most ordinary objects of feasting at farmhouses at that time." In the first sketch of this play by Shakespeare published in 1602, theretore twenty-one years before the " first folio," entitled, " A most pleasaunt and ex cellent conceited comedie of Syr John Falstaff.? and the !tterrie Wives of Windsor, iScc.," we find the pas sage thus given , f