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operate upon the line of communication of the hostile army with its own country."

For various, and perhaps sufficient reasons, orders have gone out to dismantle many of these fortresses. It is difficult to help regretting it, however necessary and expedient it may be. Is it impossible that the time may come when India will be emptied of troops by the urgent needs of some great European struggle, with which we shall sympathise too much not gladly to make every sacrifice? Then we, a handful of men amid angry populations, may again wish for strongholds of security to fly to, till the storm be over. Who can tell?

Of late years, indeed, changes in the modes of war have shorn the forts of their honours. As living powers in the country, they are now comparatively unimportant. We are no longer afraid of them. The descendants of their former owners have almost ceased to put any trust in them. They are things of the past. It is not impossible, indeed, that they may some day be again manned with warriors, and play their stirring part in future struggles of their country. But now they lie neglected and forsaken, or put to uses quite other than those for which so many lakhs were expended on their erection. But I am not sure that the pleasure of living in the past rather than in the present, together with the sympathy one feels with fallen greatness and dimmed glories, has not added a charm of which they could not otherwise have been possessed; and one loves the giant crags, and rude and crumbling fortifications, none the less, because they have been distanced in the race, and are now decidedly behind the age, and because they stand amid their highland summits and fern-clad hills, with a melancholy grandeur, no longer what they were. The world has swept by them," civilisation" declines to acknowledge them; and the busy nineteenth century knows them not.

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Once they were everything: active centres of political life; and the great nurseries of military spirit; the keys, and keepers too, of the surrounding countries; the refuge in every hostile storm of invasion; the founts from

whence, like lava from mighty craters, flowed forth the fiery hordes which desolated India. They were the receptacles of wealth and of wisdom; the much desired prizes for which each conqueror strove; the suppressed premiss in every negotiation; the seats of government; the schools of youth; the resource of a dignified old age. Undoubtedly, too, they were the foster-mothers of Mahratta nationality, and interwoven with every element of the national greatness. They reared the hardy tribes which have been called the Goths of India, If a time of prosperity came, it was spent in strengthening their fortifications; if adversity, in defending them to the death; it was only disaster when they had to be given up. On their summits, treaties were framed, and terms were signed, with the luxurious princes of the plains of India; to their subterranean chambers were carried the plunder of great cities in all parts of Asia; and in their dungeons, still horrible to behold, were confined the captives, male and female, torn from the homes of the enemies of their country. Ah! and many a dark and thrilling deed of blood and cruelty has been perpetrated in those now silent recesses. Along their proud ramparts, troops of richly-dressed and well-armed men were ever moving. Bright silken ensigns threw broad folds over their towers; and the numerous cannon of their bristling battlements woke up ever and anon the echoes of the surrounding mountains. It was a gay and gallant scene. In a

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Alas! they are nothing now. very few of them, a havildar and a few sepahis still keep the gate; but hundreds of them-by far the larger number-are marked in the lists of the quartermaster general as deserted" or "destroyed." They are all silent now; witnessing, indeed, to later times, and to degenerate races, of the great deeds of their forefathers, of self-sacrificing heroism, and desperate courage, and high hopes, which seem as if they have, for ever, mouldered cold and low.

But, whatever yet survives of the ancient Mahratta spirit, is to be found among the children of their defenders ; the old men who, as Inamdars or Wuttundars, or in humbler positions still,

live in the villages which lie around their bases-villages which were once protected and oppressed by turns by their powerful neighbours, but were always proud of the relationship. And here, by the dim glimmer of their winter fires, or the brighter glare of their summer moon, stories of the olden time are still told by the descendants of their hereditary garrisons; and "folk-lore" retailed by the old Eshkur to his brother Mahars, which keeps from total extinction, at least among the aboriginal tribes, that old spirit of independent patriotism which is what makes any country worth belonging to a spirit which only ceased to have political importance at the subjugation of Umerji Naik in 1838. But their tales are "tales of their grandfathers” now; of times when powers ruled who were of the same faith, and the same blood, with themselves; and when their arms went out to give laws to, and gather tribute from, all the wide plains of India which lie between the Coleroon and the Indus.

THE ASPECTS OF

ANGLO-INDIAN LITERATURE,

PAST AND PRESENT.

Ir we fairly consider the subject under consideration, it will at once be apparent that India has produced men who have developed a healthy literature in the East, as well as having contributed valuable works to that of the mother country. It will not be necessary to enumerate the works of every one of these men, though such names as Sleeman, Lawrence, Cautley, Outram, and Kaye, are not likely to die out of the recollection of the public. All these are men who have served long periods in this enervating climate, yet their minds never succumbed to that apathy which is the bane of an existence here, and which is but too sure to seize upon us, unless by vigorous endeavours we resist its approach. And study will accomplish this desirable end. It is true, we have not at the present time any great number of local journals; those that exist being chiefly of interest to particular parties, and occasionally contributed to by them. Yet there is VOL. I.-3

a large field for an author who would give up his time to the correct pourtraiture of men and manners, scenes and incidents, in this country, which. have ever been imperfectly described.

But the one great fact stands out broadly to our intellectual vision, and gives us the true reason why we have not a permanent literature of our own: it is, that however good the indigenous commodity may be, it must, to obtain favour, be branded in England. In fact, our reasoning is false, and we rather prefer to take the recommendation of an English publisher to exercising our own judgment; and the consequence is, that we have such works as "The Timely Retreat,"―a book that no publisher would have given £10 for, had not the mutinies been then the subject of hourly conversation. Mr. Bentley, we are informed, gave £200 for it; and the result is, that a second work by the young lady authors-" How we Spent the Autumn"-is now published. In England, book-making is a profession, and a speculation; and, every now and then, a good work out of its season, like "Adam Bede," for instance, comes upon as like a monster gooseberry, or early peas, and celery. The trade only publish at certain periods, and we look forward to a crop of novels quite as eagerly, and with quite as much certainty of realisation, as we do to grouse and partridge-shooting, the arrival of the overland mail, or any other permanent circumstance.

But people out here the reading public, as opposed to the writing onehave little else to beguile their time with than reading; and surely it is possible to supply as good pabulum as much that appears in the cheap series of works now scattered over the wideworld. We may not have a Thackeray, a Dickens, or a Bulwer, amongst us ; but there are men who could write as well as many others whose writings are recognised by the English publie, and command a large and extensive sale and circulation.

There is nothing now left, even on the eastern side of India, but the "Calcutta Review," and its circulation cannot be very great in those quarters to which an interesting magazine would have the entrée. The articles

in it are either feeble or laborious. Abstruse subjects have been discussed in its pages, ably and well; but the lighter portion of its pages has generally been trashy. Madras and Bombay have no serial whatever.

To soothe our grief for friends we left behind;
With thee to while the sultry, sullen day,
In talk of thy loved brother, far away.
Alas! how human hopes but bloom to fade-
In Melita's lone isle thy grave is made;
Valetta's churchyard holds thy dear remains,
Valetta's churchyard all our hopes contains !
March.

2.

"Twas thus I breathed, while faith and hope

were low

Sad accents of anticipative wo:
(Pacing the high Barracka* to and fro)—
Thou art more gracious than our thoughts,

O GOD!

inhale

There are plenty of travellers, sportsmen, and others, whose experiences would be particularly interesting. The sportsman is frequently something of a naturalist, a geologist, or a geographer, and can interlard his notes by flood and field with much information that is not only calculated to be instructive, but highly interesting. During that time when the late Sir Henry Elliot, and Henry Torrens (Master Matthew) wielded their goose-quills, there was a perfect galaxy of writers who catered for the public. There were Cobb, Hurry, Stocqueler, Captain Macnaghten, Dr. Grant, H. M. Parker, Hume, and a host of others, whose lucubrations are scattered through the "Bengal Annual," Treading the narrow way that leads to hea

an

the "Meerut Universal Magazine," &c. &c. These have died out long ago, as have some of those gentle spirits whose wit sparkled in their pages, and whose mirth flowed like amber stream. Their places for a time were filled up, but there was no enterprise to carry out the undertaking, and very little encouragement for a projector of a serial to go on with his labours.

The present time finds us in Bombay without one medium of amusement, in the shape of a literary vehicle, and we deplore the circumstance. We ask the public for the remedy-their support.

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Thy mercy turns aside the uplifted rod.
Our child shall live-dear GOD! shall live to
Health in his native England's balmy gale!
Farewell! thy Father treads the Indian shore,
And thy sweet face may glad his eyes no more!
Enough if there while Jesus' lore he teach,
Good news of thee thy parents' ear shall
reach,-

News which shall glad a parent's heart to hear,
That thou art walking in His faith and fear,
And, hand in hand, ye two beloved boys,-

venly joys.

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May.

with short sighs,

We gazed on the seal,-sad, silent token
That our infant-pride, our gentle-eyed,
In life's young golden morn had died!

When the ship flew fast, and the white walls
passed,

Of the generous shore where we saw thee last, We were cheered the while, as we thought of the smile

That would welcome our babe in his own birth-isle!

"Look, brother, look at this pictured book!
"S stands for the ship which the storm-wind
shook.

"Play, brother, play! the live-long day-
"We will laugh, brother, laugh, and love
alway!"

Hush, sweet boy, hush!-how his pale cheeks
flush!

Heard ye a sound as of swift wings' rush?
Our infant-pride, our gentle-eyed-
They have borne him away to The Crucified.

August.

* The Barrackas, Upper and Lower, are beautiful arcades, erected as promenades for the Knights of St. John, at Valetta. They were originally roofed, to exclude the sun's scorching rays; but after the insurrection in 1775, the roofs were removed, as it was found that here the seditious priests had held their meetings. There is a very fine view of the sea and harbour from the Upper Barracka.

ROUNDABOUT PAPERS.

I.

A GOOD DEAL ABOUT COBWEBS ; AND SOMETHING ABOUT LORD CLYDE, AND FEVER.

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WHO that has lived long in India does not know what it is to have an attack of Fever! How his bones all ache, and his eyeballs seem to press hard into his brain; and how, a few days afterwards, he shakes with cold, though the mercurial finger of the thermometer points at 100°; and how, with blue pinched features, his teeth chatter enough to shake out all the stopping"-if, indeed, he has been so unfortunate as ever to have gone through a dentist's hands; and then, how, suffering a rigour of cold such as Captain M'Clintock in all his Arctic voyaging never experienced, he dives beneath a mountain of bed-clothes, crying for more, until Nature has come to the rescue, and relieves him by torrents of perspiration; and then follows the racking headache, of Nasmyth's hammer pitch; and the pitiable state of prostration, which induces you to call General Quinine to the rescue,we don't mean Lord Clyde, who has been funnily called by that name, we shall say why presently; but we mean the white, glistening, micaceously shining powder we know so well, which is yielded by beautifully arborescent shrubs, growing over the Andes mountains, at an elevation of from twelve hundred to ten thousand feet; and which Linnæus called Cinchona, in compliment to the Countess of Cinchon, who brought specimens of the bark of these bushes to Europe in 1639,since which time, and until very lately, its reputation has been increasing, and unrivalled. We write until lately, because, a short time ago, some learned doctors, of marvellous faith, would have us swallow cobwebs instead of Quinine, -we don't mean the Cobweb that Bottom the Weaver threatened to make bold with, in case he, Bottom, should cut his finger; but true and veritable spiders' webs, such as the Arachnidans sling hammock fashion in the angles of our rooms, among our books, and inside the legs of our unworn boots. Just fancy a regimental apothecary receiv

ing some such prescription as the following:

R.-Dried and pounded Spiders' Web, 1 drachm.

To be made into twelve pills with Morning Dew, for Captain Sabretache. Picture the puzzled countenance of the hero of the pestle! The conclusion he would arrive at would be, that the Surgeon had discovered dirty, and cobweb-covered shelves, and bottles, and had found him sleeping late, when the sun had dissipated the dew-drops. Consider, too, for a moment, the spider's labour in producing sixty grains of cobweb, when it is taken in view that the threads of the minutest spider are so fine, that four millions of them would not equal in thickness one of the hairs of our beards! But the webs are rapidly spun: who has not observed in a single night, in England, the whole garden side decorated with cobwebs, each gauzy fibre bent with the weight of glistening dew-drops, and the whole woven in regularly geometrical figures. It seems to us, that a spider takes a vast amount of trouble in making such a beautiful snare, which, after all, may furnish him with but a single mosquito for a meal, or, if he has selected a bad position for his network, the first rude blast of wind, or a dry leaf falling on it, may tear it into shreds. However, like the Publishers of our Miscellany, they are not easily disheartened, for the spiders' store of silken material is almost inexhaustible,-they only require encouragement to spin again: so the Publishers of our Miscellany will spin yarns that shall reach posterityprovided only that encouragement be afforded them.

But to return to cobwebs : they are the reproach of a good housewife, and sign of neglect. If we see a door bound hard and fast to its framework with spiders' web; its keyholes and hinges covered with them also; we naturally infer that door is never opened. So the Jews say that David, and his three hundred men, remained undiscovered in the Cave of Adullam, because a spider wove a web across the entrance of the cave, which being observed by Saul, led him to the inference,-the cave was uninhabited! We might say a great deal more

about spiders' webs, and should like to know how they cure our fevers ; and in our professional ignorance we should like to know why silk, fresh from the silk-worm, should not suffice as well, since both this and cobweb, in a fluid state, appear alike. The latter is contained in a set of glands near the spider's tail (if, indeed, he possesses one), and then issues from the delicately minute apertures of the spinning apparatus, where, by the help of two palpiform organs, it is manufactured into the delicate silken thread which forms the web.

Spiders formerly were called Insects, and classed with them; but are now excluded from that joyous throng, and placed among disagreeable, but more appropriate companions-the Scorpions and Mites, and the parasite which causes the affection which shall be nameless.

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Lord Clyde used to command the Indian Army; but he has gone home now. Punch stood "attention" him; but the Nation did not. The Chief was, perhaps, more memorable in India-and he left an Order on record about Quinine. Following the example of the Dictator, he visited the hospitals in person, and found one without Quinine. Had he read this "roundabout paper," he would perhaps have ordered a general advance to be made on all the cobwebs in the neighbourhood, and they might have been collected. In that same Order, too, he told Medical Officers they did not command their Regiments, a fact which must have been previously, and painfully, apparent to many.

II.

ABOUT A GOOD MANY THINGS.

"BE it true, as how I've a heerd tell, Maister as a hooman a got one more rib in her side nur a man?" was a question asked us when once visiting some of the poor in a village in England. Well, there was nothing very wonderful in that either. Good man, he had studied his Bible, and met with many things, he said, that "took a plaguey, soight o' larning" to understand, and "there be so few o' your sort, as ull 'splain things to we poor folk; the parsons we gets be a deuced soight too high larned for we like." The amount

of respect we met with on these visits was wonderful; but if we approached unawares, and took the matron of the house by surprise, we often heard small exuberances of wrath not intended for our ears, such as "Drat the little monkey-if he aint bin and gone and dirted his clean pinafore all over, just as I bin and rubbed my knuckles to rags, to make un look dacent, like other folk's childurn! Well, if childurn baint-Ax pardon, your worship, but really my life is worrited out o' my poor body"! We wont keep the scene in England longer, for there is such a very nice Club in Byculla, though the presiding spirit has left the place, but "methinks I see him now," and it was such a good-looking spirit, and in the flesh too,-just like we who write these "roundabout papers." We often think of his pleasant face, his excellent dinners, and his hospitality; and we cannot help thinking how nice his portrait would look, hanging side by side with that of the old gentleman who founded the Club, and we are sure it would be a handsomer picture. Oh! what a lot of Rupees-so bright and shining— with Her Majesty's effigy on one side, and a wreath of something from the vegetable world on the other, did this good Doctor turn out from the Mint of Bombay. Pass round the hat, then,

this very night begin, at that big table. Chink! chink! chink!-Ah! we knew it would be so: how the very rupees, with the unknown wreath from the vegetable kingdom, tumble in! "Bring pen, ink, and paper, waiter!" -one seldom carries a purse about in this country. No time should be lost, as our subject has lived five years over half a century; he is going to leave India for ever. They used to say, in England, Doctors and Stilton cheeses improved by age. improved by age. The present Minister for India does not think so : we agree with him. Come, you old fogies! pack up your carpet bags; go home you superannuated ones!What! you have nothing to put into the carpet bag, eh? The sun has shone fifty-five years, and you have made no hay; yet you blame an enlightened Government, who prefer energy and youth to the ripe experience of age! Come, come, the Briton and his lion are privileged to

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