flew as occasion offered. The hawks generally raked in the pheasants while flying; but if they took to the reeds or bushes they soon caught them.

"After proceeding about two or three miles farther into the forest we came to a tall wood, where we found several sorts of deer. The young men went in and beat the woods, while the rest of the company remained without. We saw much game pass us, but nobody drew a bow until the emperor had killed a stag, which he did very dexterously with a broad-headed arrow; after which the princes had leave to kill several bucks, among which was one of that species that bears the musk, called kaberda in Siberia.

“We had now been six hours on horseback, and I reckon had travelled about fifteen English miles, but no end of the forest yet appeared. We turned short from this wood southward, till coming to some marshes overgrown with tall reeds we roused a great many wild boars; but as it was not the season for killing them they all escaped. The hunting of these fierce animals is reckoned the most dangerous of all kinds of sport except the chase of lions and tigers. Every one endeavoured to avoid them, and several of them ran furiously through the thickest troops of horse. The emperor was so cautious as to have a company of men armed with lances to guard his machine.

"We continued the sport till about four o'clock, when we came to a high artificial mount of a square figure, raised in the middle of a plain, on the top of which were pitched about ten or twelve tents for the imperial family. This mount had several winding paths leading to the top, planted on each side with rows of trees in imitation of nature. To the south was a large basin of water with a boat upon it, from whence, I suppose, the earth has been taken that formed this mount. At some distance from the mount tents were erected for the people of distinc

to render their movements irksome; but they still pushed on rapidly, and on the 5th of January, 1722, arrived at Moscow, where they found the czar and all his court, who had recently removed thither from Petersburg.

Peter, surrounded by his courtiers, the general officers, and the nobility and gentry from all parts of the empire, was making great preparations for the celebration of the festivals appointed to be solemnized in commemoration of the peace concluded at Aland in 1721, between Russia and Sweden, after a war of more than twenty years, when our traveller arrived; and as he appears greatly to have admired the policy of Peter on most occasions, he was particularly gratified at the present exhibition. He observes that Peter, even in his amusements and times of diversion, made use of all possible means of inspiring his people with a love of what was useful; and as the Russians had a peculiar aversion to shipping, his principal aim in the shows exhibited at Moscow was to dispel that prejudice, by impressing upon their minds that it was owing to his naval power that the peace had been obtained.

"The triumphant entry," says Bell, "was made from a village about seven miles from Moscow, called Seswedsky. The first of the cavalcade was a galley finely carved and gilt, in which the rowers plied their oars as on the water. The galley was commanded by the high-admiral of Russia. Then came a frigate of sixteen small brass guns, with three masts, completely rigged, manned with twelve or fourteen youths habited like Dutch skippers, in black velvet, who trimmed the sails, and performed all the manœuvres of a ship at sea. Then came most richlydecorated barges, wherein sat the empress and the ladies of the court. There were also pilot-boats heaving the lead, and above thirty other vessels, pinnaces, wherries, &c., each filled with masqueraders the dresses of different nations. It was in the

month of February, at which time all the ground was covered with snow, and all the rivers frozen. All these machines were placed on sledges, and were drawn by horses through all the principal streets of Moscow. The ship required above forty horses to draw it. In order to its passing under the gates the topmasts were struck, and, when passed, set up again; besides which, the gateway was dug as low as was necessary for admitting it to pass.'

As soon as these festivals were concluded, Peter, who had been invited into Persia with an army by the shah, who required his aid against the rebellious Afghans, prepared to march southward; and Bell, who was thought to understand something of Persian manners, having spent some time in the country, was engaged by the czar's chief physician to accompany the expedition. Accordingly, the troops having been embarked on the Moskwa, they descended by water to the Caspian Sea, and made for the shores of Daghestan, where they landed and encamped. They then proceeded along the seashore to Derbend, where the fleet containing the provisions, stores, &c. for the army was wrecked upon the beach. This gave Peter a plausible excuse for returning home without affording the shah the desired aid. Indeed, the whole expedition appears to have been a mere piece of treachery got up for the purpose of obtaining possession of Derbend; for "the emperor determined," says Bell, "to leave things in the state they were in, and to return again to Astrakhan by the same way we came, leaving a garrison at Derbend sufficient to secure the advantage he had gained."

We now lose sight of our traveller for fifteen years, the whole of which, however, he spent in Russia. In 1737 the war with Turkey, which had begun in 1734, began to grow disagreeable to the Russian court, the Ottomites, in spite of their barbarism, being more obstinate in the field than their polished enemies of the north had anticipated. Under these cir

cumstances, it was thought advisable to negotiate a peace; but as the Turks made no proposals, and as in time of war no subject of Russia, or Germany, the ally of Russia, was admitted into the dominions of the sultan, Bell, who appears to have been greatly respected both for his character and abilities, was prevailed upon, "at the earnest desires of Count Osterman, the chancellor of Russia, and of Mr. Rondeau, his Britannic majesty's minister at the court of Russia," to undertake the journey. He departed from Petersburg on the 6th of December, 1737, and arrived at Constantinople on the 29th of the next month. With respect to his commission, he merely observes that he punctually conformed to the terms of his instructions. His negotiations did not detain him long. He left Constantinople on the 8th of April, and on the 17th of May arrived at Petersburg. Here he concludes his account of himself and his travels. In the decline of his life he returned to Scotland, where he resided at Antermony, his native place; and it was there that, surrounded apparently by affluence, and enjoying the most ample leisure, he wrote his excellent and interesting account of his travels, the first edition of which appeared in 1762 His death took place in 1780.

JOHN LEDYARD.

Born 1751.-Died 1730.

THIS traveller, who for enterprise and courage has seldom been surpassed, was born in the year 1751, at Groton, a small village on the river Thames, in Connecticut, in the United States. He had, at a very early age, the misfortune to be deprived of his father; and although his mother, a woman of remarkable

piety and benevolence, discharged with exemplary affection her duties towards him and her other children, notwithstanding a second marriage, this circumstance cut him off from all those advantages which the moral education received in a well-regulated family under the paternal roof confers. Owing in a great measure to the political condition of the country, but principally, perhaps, to the restlessness of his own character, his youthful studies were irregular and ill-directed. He frequently changed his inclinations in the choice of a profession. At one time the law, at another the career of a missionary among the Indians, captivated his fancy. When both these schemes of life had been, one after the other, abandoned, his imagination appears to have dwelt with complacency for a moment on the peaceful studies and noiseless, though important, avocations of a country clergyman.

The completion of the slender education which he received was effected at Dartmouth College, an institution established by the Rev. Dr. Wheelock, in the back woods, with the benevolent design of scattering the seeds of religion and civilization among the Indian nations. Here Ledyard, whose mind was as impatient of the salutary restraints of discipline as that of any savage upon earth, exhibited unequivocal tokens of those locomotive propensities which afterward goaded him into rather than directed him in his romantic but almost aimless wanderings over the greater part of the habitable world. For ordinary studies he had evidently no aptitude. He read, indeed, but it was such reading as beguiled away the time, and nourished the fantastic vagaries of his, imagination, without much enlarging his mind, or knitting his character into firmness or consistency. In many respects he scarcely yielded to the knight of La Mancha. What does the reader think he carried with him to college, whither he was proceeding for the purpose of fitting himself for spreading the