The Press. — London, England, 1855-04-28 00:00:00

Ann, 28, 1855. results. But the actual fact is, that the popu- lation is steadily increasing, that theft and beggary are scarcely known, and that the people are contented and prosperous. Their condition, it is said, contrasts most advan tageously with that of portions of the popula tion on the northern coasts of Scotland. The Government monopoly is certainly attended with some advantages:— The Government seem to deal direct with the consumers and producers by retail, without the intervention of shops or middlemen, and thus many intermediate profits are saved to the inhabitants. For many years, the opening of the trade of these islands to general competition has been the subject of discussion in Denmark, but as yet no steps have been taken iu that direction, and it may be questioned whether it would be wise so to do. No doubt the present system is in direct violation of all the established maxims of political econo mists, and tends to isolate the inhabitants from intercourse with other nations, as well as to prevent the full develop ment of their resources, nor can there be a doubt that the Feroes might be made to support a more numerous popula tion. The people are however so well off, that we believe the actual yield of happiness and innocence per acre, in proportion to the fertility of the soil, to be greater than that of any other European country. Extravagance with its attendant crimes is not bred by foreign example ; the variety of their occupations, consequent upon the absence of all division of labour, renders them very intelligent, and they are besides religious, well fed, and contented. Their great fault is an indifference, almost a repugnance, to the introduction of improvements into their methods of fishing, manufacturing, and farming; and this no doubt is a great evil, attributable to their peculiar circumstances ; but it seems to us far more than compensated by their many blessings. - - Trades are so little known that each family is accustomed to supply its own wants — another gross violation of economical rules : There are few shops, except the three large Government stores, in these islands, as the inhabitants supply most of their wants at home. Division of labour, so much extolled by political economists, is little practised here—every fa mily spins, weaves, dyes, cobbles, and tailors for itself; so that all their garments, with the exception of linen shirts, which are only used by the few, are manufactured entirely at home, from the time the materials leave the animals' backs to the final stitch which completes them for those of their second wearers. The capital, Thorshaven, contains about 120 houses built of one story only, and it is noticed as an " interesting feature in their " construction that the outer doors have no " looks—a testimony to tho honesty of the in " habitants of which no other European " capital can boast." The people are remark able for their longevity : Out of every 1,000 deaths, 319 take place after the age of seventy ; whereas in Denmark, in the same number, the proportion who outlive that Scriptural limit is only 187. It is related that one man married at the age of 90, had his first babe when he was 103, and lived to see his wife the mother of five thriving children. Of the simplicity of the people some amusing instances are given. While smoking a cigar on deck— One of the sailors came aft, and, touching his hat, drew our attention to a funeral procession which was moving in the direction of a little burial-ground outside the town. We instantly ran down fur our glaeses,intending to send home a minute account of so interesting and touching a cere mony ; but, on bringing them to bear upon the shore, it proved to be only our own skipper, who having made him self smart had landed for a quiet walk, and whose gold band had procured for him the attendance of nearly all the children and half the grownup people of the place. Our features, which had been screwed up for sympathy, were convulsed with laughter, and Jack went forward, no doubt to tell his comrades how well he had unintentionally sold the " Governor;" for under that paternal title every owner is known in his own forecastle. Was there ever a yacht voyage without some practical joking? The only example recorded here,however,was of a very harmless Observing that two boats had put off from this village and were reconnoitring us at a most respectful distance. we determined to try the effect of two hideous masks upon their unsophisticated minds. Accordingly two boys duly decorated with them, and in their red yachting caps, were sent off in the punt. The smaller of the native boats beat a retreat directly she saw ours lowered ; but the crew of the other, which was larger, consisting of ten men, pulled boldly up to welcome the strangers, and as they neared took off their hats. Our hearts smote us when we wit nessed this politeness, but it was too late; the boats had drifted close to each other, and our boys, who had not yet shown their faces, turned round to return the salute. The effect was electrical; in an instant the ten caps were re. placed upon their respective heads, and the owners of them were pulling away as if for their lives. The sea•serpent himself could not have created a greater sensation, and our two urchins, who chased the Feroese some little way, were soon distanced. The different sizes of the boats and their crews formed a most ludicrous contrast; and pro bably the small stature of the boys made them the more alarming, as Landt enumerates among the list of spectres supposed to haunt the Feroes, Niagruisars, or " small THE PRESS. beings in human form, with red caps on their heads, which are supposed to bring good fortune to the place where they have taken up their abode." We never tried any more tricks on the natives, and felt half ashamed of this one when we saw the extremity of their fears. The authors say no more of themselves than is necessary to explain their cruise. The Maria was a schooner-yacht of eighty-three tons, with a crew of a captain, four men, two boys, a cook, and a steward—a party of nine with the two narrators, one or both of them being clever draughtsmen, as the volume con tains many spirited illustrations. The Maria sailed from Dublin on the 31st of May, and after a tedious voyage reached Mull on the 4th ofJune, and the Feroo Islands on the 11th. Their appearance at a distance was desolately sublime : A first approach to the Feroe Islands, even on this their tamest side, is very striking. Their sides are almost every. where perpendicular precipices to a considerable height above the water's edge, though broken near the top by grassy slopes and terraces. The few practicable landing places, and nearly all the villages, are concealed in the fiords, or behind projecting rocks ; so that the shores, when viewed from the sea, appear singularly inaccessible and uninhabited. To us they presented their wildest and most deserted aspect, for not a boat was to be seen in any direction; and towards the afternoon those driving moun tain mists, which the old Northmen conceived to be the shades of their forefathers flitting by, swept along the 'oasts, adding greatly to the gloom of the scene, and making us doubly anxious to secure a safe anchorage before the whole group relapsed into its normal obscurity. One of the grandest features of the coast is the Myling Head, which rises up from the sea like a perpendicular wall : The western face of the Myling Head overhangs the sea, but its summit is accessible from this bay by an even grassy ascent, so steep as to be barely practioable. We toiled slowly up it, and when near the summit, consisting of a sharp ridge formed between this side and the over hanging face of the cliffs, dropped upon our hands and knees, and, creeping to the edge, looked down 21,400 feet into the sea below. A stone which we dropped was more than eight seconds in falling, when we lost sight of it in the glare of the water. The drawing at page 58 gives an admirable view of this mighty precipice—one of the finest, we imagine, from its extreme boldness, in the world. It well deserves description from a poet's pen. Another of Nature's mighty marvels is the head of Kunfie, " a " mountain of the same shape and almost as " regular and formal as the great pyramid at " Cairo, while a number of equal-sized steps up " its sides greatly increases the resemblance. Other cliffs are in the shape of forts and ruins, presenting, though on a far grander scale, the same appearance of regularity and workman ship which make portions of our own coast:, so picturesque. One island, known as the Storr Diamond, can only, from its rock-bound coast, be visited at favorable times. The clergyman who visits it has to be hoisted up its preci pitous sides in a basket, and may be kept there for weeks together. The clergy have indeed to lead a hard and perilous life, travel. ling being of the wildest and most rugged cha racter. These islands have a milder climate than might be supposed ; yet it is probable that they have at a comparatively recent period (in a geological sense) undergone a great change, as the rocky soil bears no wood now, though remains of trees are dug out from bogs in great quantities. The facts as to change of climate in high northern latitudes within the historical epoch deserve close investi gation. We cannot refuse credit to those northern chronicles which represent Green land as a country fertile in vegetation, Iceland as covered with forests and allowing the culture of grain, and Vinland as a land of grapes. Since the period of those chronicles there can have been no sensible diminution of the earth's heat, and the theory of Mr. Hop kins, in his book on " Terrestrial Magnetism," seems the most probable that thete is, through the action of magnetism, a movement of land to the North Pole, there perhaps to be submerged, while islands and continents rise in the southern hemisphere. The authors had the satisfaction of wit nessing a fine whale-hunt. The whales, how ever, are not the large Greenland species, but a smaller kind, about twenty-four feet long at maturity, and herding in shoals of from fifty to a thousand : When they are seen approaching any island, messenger are despatched. and hay tires lighted on the hills, to summon aid ; while the boats close at hand drive them, by shouting and splashing the water, into the nearest conve- 405 nient bay, and keep them there until men arrive in suffi cient numbers to begin the onslaught. We found the whales, in this instance, were being hunted into the har bour of Westmanushaven, a place sixteen miles distant by water. The entrance to the bay was closed with a net, and strongly guarded, yet three times the whales charging together broke into the open sea, and were as often driven back : At last, much wounded and harassed, they were fumed into a narrower part of the bay. All their enemies pressed round them at once; and the animals, either wild w ith fear, or completely bewildered as to the direction of the sea, dashed towards the shore, carrying many of the boats with them iu the rush. On a flatter beach they would all at once have been stranded; but this VMS so steep and rocky, that, after two or three minutes' melee, during which the boats and whales were all mixed up together in one fight ing, struggling wave, only one third of them were killed, aril the remainder reached deep water again. The r e al sport was, however, over, and what followed was merely s sickening, though useful, piece of butchery, in which we took no part. Those which were nut taken, having lust their leader, never reunited, but rolled groaning in the bay, quite blinded by their own blood, and thus fell victims in detail to their pursuers. • • • • • After the herd was completely broken up and separated, we landed, and fiom a commanding cliff viewed with ad- vantage the strange spectacle below. The bay was, without exaggeration, red with blood : some boats were towing deal whales ou shore ; others were spearing the few remaining lively ones ; while all round the beach, men, up to their necks in the water, were actively engaged in the great work of slaughter. Occasionally thu boatmen would hook one more lively than they supposed it to he, which would tow their boat rapidly about, ur break away from them, or lie lashing up clouds of water in its agony. Nut a single fish escaped. The few that had an opportunity of doing so returned in search of their leader, and shared the fate of their companions ; and in two home from the commence ment the whole 212 were destroyed. The authors remained at these islands only six days, but as happily they had fine weather they made good use of their time, and have, by aid of pen and pencil, given us a most pleasing account of a region little known, yet remarkable for magnificent scenery and the primitive character of its people, and likely to afford, we should imagine, facts of peculiar interest to the geologist, though on this puirit the well-written narrative is silent. Westward Ho ! or, the Voyages and Adventures of Sir Amyas Leigh, Knight, in the Reign of her afoot Glorious Ikkjesty Queen Elizabeth. Ben. dered into Modern English by Charles Kingsley. Cambridge : Macmillan and Co. THE design of this novel is, in the author's own words, to set forth " that type of English " virtue at once manful and godly, practical " and enthusiastic, prudent and self-sacrificing, " which was exhibited by the worthies whom " Elizabeth without distinction of rank or age " gathered round her in the ever glorious wars "of her great reign." The hero's adventures may be divided into three parts—(for of his first voyage to the South, under Sir Francis Drake, we aro told nothing)—viz., his service in Ireland, under Winter ; his second voyage to America, as captain, in pursuit of a young Devonshire girl who had eloped with a Spaniard ; and his share in the discomfiture of the Spanish Armada. These various por tions of the work we have perused with very unequal interest ; and up to the time of Amyas's second expedition we must confess that notwithstanding the ghostly exhortations of his friend Salvation Yen, a kind of maritime Tregarva, we found his narrative at times ex ceedingly dull. But once fairly beyond the line, with the gorgeous tropic scenery spread out before him, the cries of the enslaved Indians ringing in his ears, and the avenging guns of the Devonshire gentlemen booming over the purple seas, and Mr. Kingsley be comes at once graphic, eloquent, and pathetic. The most beautiful portraiture in the book, and, indeed, one of the most interesting characters we have met with in fiction for a long time, is the wild girl Ayaeanora. She is discovered by the wanderers in one of the most lovely retreats of that lovely region, the Queen and prophetess of a decayed Indian tribe, and acts on this occasion as mediator between the English and her own people. Amyas is touched by her exquisite beauty and lofty spirit, and doubts not that he now for the first time gazes on a genuine daughter of the Sun and descendant of the old Peruvian Meas whose story had filled his imagination. The fair savage is on her part not insensible "lii