The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1844-09-10 00:00:00

NOTICES.

A Voice from North Africa. By Nathan Davis.
Ritchie : Edinburgh.

This little work, possessing claims of peculiar interest
at the present moment when the eyes of Europe are di-
rected to that portion of the globe of which it treats, con-
tains a vast deal of information respecting the religious
rites, the customs and manners of the inhabitants of North
Africa. Though the lamp of Christian truth shone brightly
at one period of the world's history, Mahomedanism now
reigns there ; Christendom forgets, and for centuries has
neglected this benighted country ; and the primary object
of the writer—a missionary of the Church of Scotland—is
to awaken a livelier interest for its social improvement
and spiritual advancement. The introductory chapter
contains a brief history of the successive dynasties of the
country from the victory of the Mahomedan chief Abdal-
lah, in 647, to the reign of the present Bey of Tunis, who
succeeded to the government in 1837. The principal fea-
tures of the inhabitants are presented in a very interesting
and authentic detail of the adventures of a deserter from
the Prussian army, who, after enduring the severest priva-
tions from his intercourse with the Arabs, amongst the
various tribes of whom he spent a considerable time, em-
braces Mahomedanism' and is at present in the service of
his highness, the Bey of Tunis. The remainder of the
work is occupied with a melancholy description of the
moral and intellectual condition of the people—the present
state of education—the relative position of the various
sects into which the inhabitants are divided, and also af-
fords a mass of invaluable statistical matter, most import-
ant in every point of view at the present period. Mr.
Davis is evidently a gentleman of considerable research,
and could not have presented his work at a more accepta-
ble time. We give several extracts from it in other
columns, which we shall continue at intervals for the in-
struction of our readers.

Lacey's Pictorial Handbook of Liverpool
The pressure upon our space, usual during the sitting
of our Assize Courts, has prevented us from bestowing
upon this excellent little Work anything like the notice
which it merits. We now purpose endeavouring to do it
and the public justice, by explaining fully its objects, and
the extent to which its spirited publisher, Mr. Lacey,
has succeeded in carrying them out. From the bare an-
nouncement in an advertisement, the reader would ex-
pect to find in the publication a mere Guide book,
perhaps !uperior to any previous one, but still partaking
of the meagre character of such works. Such however
would be a very erroneous idea to be conveyed of the
Work bafore us. Conveying every necessary detail for
the information and guidance of strangers, and illustra-
ted with a number of beautifully executed engravings
and maps, the literary matter embraces a much wider
scope than that of the generality of works of this des-
cription and may be perused with interest long after the
original purpose of a guidebook has been fulfilled—pe-
rused too by inhabitants as well as strangers in our town.
Upwards of one hundred pages are occupied with a
history of Liverpool, in which its early origin is traced
and its growth from a fishing hamlet to its present im-
portant position is described, evidently with faithfulness
and at the cost of no trifling amount of research on the
part of the author. Many of the det. ils of this history
are highly interesting and some of them we shall pro-
bably take opportunities of quoting, as new to the great
majority of our readers, as they are certainly to oursel-
ves. In addition to this general history we have also an
account of the origin, nomenclature, &c., of the princi-
pal streets, which embraces a number of very curious and
interesting particulars and must have cost great trouble
and pains in collecting. Along with these we have,
under the head of " A week in Liverpool" a copious and
well written description of the objects most worthy the
notice of the stranger in our town—our Docks, Churches,
Public Buildings, and other interesting localities--in
which a vast amount of statistical matter and interesting
information is conveyed in a ple-tsing form, accompanied
with a large number of excellent illustrations. In ad-
dition to this, which may be called the leading portion of
the Work, we have a quantity of useful matter, not only
to the stranger but to the resident as well, which renders
the work one which ought to be in the library, of every
professional person and uvon the desk of every merchant.
We wish it a wide circulation which it eminently de-
serves.