a group of islands to the south-east of Hawaii, we are told that children are sometimes, during seasons of extreme scarcity, killed and eaten by their parents, to satisfy hunger. With the Society Islanders, the rules of the Areoi institution, and family pride, were the principal motives to its practice. If the rank or family of the mother was inferior to that of the father, his relations or friends usually destroyed the child. More frequently, however, the mother's rank was superior to that of the father. In this case, her relations, in order to avoid the degradation which they supposed it would entail on it would entail on their family or class in society, almost in variably murdered the child. The regulations of the Areoi society were not only abominable and vicious, but exceedingly cruel, and, excepting the chiefs, no member was allowed to be a parent. Any woman belonging to them, who should suffer one of her offspring to live, would be immediately expelled. The reason generally assigned for this was, that nursing children quickly diminished the personal charms of the mother. Excepting the latter, which operates in a small degree, none of these motives actuate the Sandwich Islanders: those, however, by which they are influenced are equally criminal. Some of the natives have told us that children were formerly sacrificed to the sharks infesting their shores, and which through fear they had deified; but as we have never met with persons who have ever offered any, or seen others do it, this possibly may be only report. The principal motive, with the greater part of those who practise it, is idleness; and the reason most frequently assigned, even by the parents themselves, for the murder of this practice; and the parents naturally became exceedingly attached to their children, as was the case, under similar circumstances, in India. As parental affection increased, they began to view with abhorrence a crime, their former familiarity with which is now surprising even to themselves; and, in order to mark their sense of its enormity, the very first article in the code of laws proposed by the chiefs, and adopted by the people in most of the Society Islands, shortly after their reception of Christianity, is a prohibition of infanticide, annexing the punishment of death to its perpetration, under any circumstances whatever. In the Sandwich Islands, although not abolished, the missionaries have reason to believe it prevails less extensively now than it did four or five years ago. The king, and some of the chiefs, especially Karaimoku, since they have attended to the precepts of Christianity, have exerted themselves to suppress it: but the people do not very well brook their interference; so that, notwithstanding their efforts, it is still practised, particularly in remote districts, but in general privately, for fear of detection and punishment. We shall relieve our readers, after their children, is, the trouble of bringing these painful scenes, by a description them up." pp. 300, 301. Many of the infants in the Sandwich Islands are buried in the houses in which both parents and child had resided together. In the floors, which are frequently of earth or pebbles, a hole is dug, two or three feet deep, into which they put the little infant, placed in a broken calabash, and having a piece of native cloth laid upon its mouth to stop its cries. The hole is then filled up with earth, and the inhuman parents themselves have sometimes joined in treading down the earth upon their own innocent but murdered child.' p. 302. This practice, dreadful as it is, is scarcely, if at all, more atrocious than some of the customs which still continue to prevail among the natives in our own eastern territories, and happily it seems to be much more speedily about to cease. When the natives of the Society Islands embraced the Christian religion, they immediately refrained from from of the almost amphibious habits of the islanders. "There are perhaps no people more accustomed to the water than the islanders of the Pacific; familiar with the sea from their birth, they lose all dread of it, and seem nearly as much at home in the water as on dry land. There are few children who are not taken into the sea by their mothers the second or third day after their birth, and many who can swim as soon as they can walk. The heat of the climate is, no doubt, one source of the gratification they find in this amusement; for it is scarcely possible to pass along the shore where there are any inhabitants near, and not see a number of children playing in the sea. Here they remain for hours together; and yet I never knew of but one child being drowned during the number of years I have resided in the islands. They have a variety of games, and gambol as fearlessly in the water as ground. Sometimes they erect a stage the children of a school do in their playeight or ten feet high on the edge of some deep place, and lay a pole in an oblique direction over the edge of it, perhaps twenty feet above the water; along this they pursue each other to the outermost end, when they jump into the sea. Throwing themselves from the lower yards, or bowsprit, of a ship, is also a favourite sport; but the most general and frequent game is swimming in the surf. The higher the sea and the larger the waves, in their opinion the better the sport. On these occasions they use a board, which they call papa hé náru (wave sliding board,) generally five or six feet long, and rather more than a foot wide. Each individual takes his board, and, pushing it before him, swims perhaps a quarter of a mile or more out to sea. They do not attempt to go over the billows which roll towards the shore, but watch their approach, and dive under water, and allow the billow to pass over their heads. When they reach the outside of rocks, where the waves first break, they adjust themselves on one end of the board, lying flat on their faces, and watch the approach of the largest billow, they then poise themselves on its highest edge, and, paddling as it were with their hands and feet, ride on the wave, in the midst of the spray and foam, till within a yard or two of the rocks or the shore; and when the observers would expect to see them dashed to pieces, they steer with great address between the rocks, or slide off their board in a moment, grasp it by the middle, and dive under water, while the wave rolls on, and breaks among the rocks with a roaring noise, the effect of which is greatly heightened by the shouts and laughter of the natives in the water. Those who are expert frequently change their position on the board, sometimes sitting and sometimes standing erect in the midst of the foam. The greatest address is necessary in order to keep on the edge of the wave: for if they get too forward, they are sure to be overturned; and if they fall back, they are buried beneath the succeeding billow." pp. 344-346. "We have seen Karaimoku and Kaikioeva, some of the highest chiefs in the island, both between fifty and sixty years of age, and large corpulent men, balancing themselves on their narrow board, or splashing about in the foam, with as much satisfaction as youths of sixteen. They frequently play at the mouth of a large river, where the strong current into the sea, and the rolling of the waves towards the shore, produce a degree of agitation between the water of the river and the sea, that would be fatal to an European, however expert he might be; yet in this they delight and when the king or queen, or any high chiefs, are playing, none of the common people are allowed to approach these places, lest they should spoil their sport. p. 347. " volcanic formation of the island of Owhyhee. The missionaries visited the great volcano of Kirauea, and have given a most interesting account of their journey, and of the sublime phenomena which they witnessed. The narrative of this journey will be found very attractive to the scientific as well as the general reader, for the sake of its geological, mineralogical, and botanical details. The table of contents announces, the burning chasm at Ponahohoajourney from Kapapala-lodging in a cavern-reflection from the volcano by night-departure for the volcano-volcanic sand--superstitions of the natives respecting the Ohelo-description of the great volcano - pools of water---banks of sulphur-appearance of the volcano at midnight-traditions and superstitions of the natives connected with it-names of the gods by whom they suppose it inhabitedthe little Kirauea-Ancient Heiau on the summit of a precipice – Mouna Roa-probable structure of the island. From these copious memoranda we extract the following notices. "About two P. M. the crater of Kirauea suddenly burst upon our view. We expected to have seen a mountain with a broad base and rough indented sides, composed of loose slags or hardened streams of lava, and whose summit would have presented a rugged wall of scoria, forming the rim of a mighty caldron. But instead of this, we found ourselves on the edge of a steep precipice, with a vast plain before us, fifteen or sixteen miles in circumference, and sunk from 200 to 400 feet below its original level. The surface of this plain was uneven, and strewed over with huge stones and volcanic rocks, and in the centre of it was the great crater, at the distance of a mile and a half from the precipice on which we were standing. Our guides led us round towards the north end of the ridge, in order to find a place by which we might descend to the plain below. As we passed along, we observed the natives, who had hitherto refused to touch any of the ohelo berries, now gather several branches, and, after offering a part to Pélé [the goddess of the volcano], eat them very freely." "Several of them told us, as they turned round from the crater, that after such acknowledgments they might eat the fruit We have already noticed the with security. "We walked on to the north end of the ridge, where, the precipice being less steep, a descent to the plain below seemed practicable. It required, however, the greatest caution, as the stones and fragments of rock frequently gave way under our feet, and rolled down from above; but, with all our care, we did not reach the bottom without several falls and slight bruises. of the great gulf, and apparently quite detached from it. The streams of lava which they emitted rolled down into the lake, and mingled with the melted mass there, which, though thrown up by different apertures, had perhaps been originally fused in one vast furnace. "The steep which we had descended was formed of volcanic matter, apparently a light red and grey kind of lava, vesicular, and lying in horizontal strata, varying in thickness from one to forty feet. In a small number of places the different strata of lava were also rent in perpendicular or oblique directions, from the top to the bottom, either by earthquakes, or other violent convulsions of the ground connected with the action of the adjacent volcano. After walking some distance over the sunken plain, which in several places sounded hollow under our feet, we at length came to the edge of the great crater, where a spectacle, sublime and even appalling, presented itself before us. Astonishment and awe for some moments rendered us mute, and, like statues, we stood fixed to the spot, with our eyes riveted on the abyss below. Immediately before us yawned an immense gulf, in the form of a crescent, about two miles in length, from north-east to south-west, nearly a mile in width, and apparently 800 feet deep. The bottom was covered with lava; and the south-west and northern parts of it were one vast flood of burning matter, in a state of terrific ebullition, rolling to and fro its fiery surge' and flaming billows. Fifty-one conical islands, of varied form and size, containing so many craters, rose either round the edge or from the surface of the burning lake. Twenty-two constantly emitted columns of grey smoke, or pyramids of brilliant flame; and several of these at the same time vomited from their ignited mouths streams of lava, which rolled in blazing torrents down their black indented sides into the boiling mass below. ་ "The existence of these conical craters led us to conclude, that the boiling caldron of lava before us did not form the focus of the volcano; that this mass of melted lava was comparatively shallow; and that the basin in which it was contained was separated, by a stratum of solid matter, from the great volcanic abyss, which constantly poured out its melted contents through these numerous craters into this upper reservoir. We were further inclined to this opinion, from the vast columns of vapour continually ascending from the chasms in the vicinity of the sulphur banks and pools of water, for they must have been produced by other fire than that which caused the ebullition in the lava at the bottom of the great crater; and also by noticing a number of small craters, in vigorous action, situated high up the sides "The sides of the gulph before us, although composed of different strata of ancient lava, were perpendicular for about 400 feet, and rose from a wide horizontal ledge of solid black lava of irregular breadth, but extending completely round. Beneath this ledge the sides sloped gradually towards the burning lake, which was, as nearly as we could judge, 300 or 400 feet lower. It was evident, that the large crater had been recently filled with liquid lava up to this black ledge, and had, by some subterranean canal, emptied itself into the sea, or upon the low land on the shore. The grey, and in some places apparently calcined, sides of the great crater before us; the fissures which intersected the surface of the plain on which we were standing; the long banks of sulphur on the opposite side of the abyss; the vigorous action of the numerous small craters on its borders; the dense columns of vapour and smoke, that rose at the north and south end of the plain; together with the ridge of steep rocks by which it was surrounded, rising probably in some places 300 or 400 feet in perpendicular height, presented an immense volcanic panorama, the effect of which was greatly augmented by the constant roaring of the vast furnaces below." pp. 205-208. "We partook with cheerfulness of our evening repast, and afterwards, amidst the whistling of the winds around, and the roaring of the furnace beneath, rendered our evening sacrifice of praise, and committed ourselves to the secure protection of our God. We then spread our mats on the ground; but as we were all wet through with the rain, against which our hut was but an indifferent shelter, we preferred to sit or stand round the fire, rather than lie down on the ground. Between nine and ten, the dark clouds and heavy fog, that, since the setting of the sun had hung over the volcano, gradually cleared away, and the fires of Kirauea, darting their fierce light athwart the midnight gloom, unfolded a sight terrible and sublime beyond all we had yet seen. "The agitated mass of liquid lava, like a flood of melted metal, raged with tumultuous whirl. The lively flame that danced over its undulating surface, tinged with sulphureous blue, or glowing with mineral red, cast a broad glare of dazzling light on the indented sides of the insulated craters, whose roaring mouths, amidst rising flames and eddying streams of fire, shot up, at frequent intervals, with loudest detonations, spherical masses of fusing lava, or bright ignited stones. "The dark bold outline of the perpen dicular and jutting rocks around, formed a striking contrast with the luminous lake below, whose vivid rays, thrown on the rugged promontories, and reflected by the over-hanging clouds, combined to complete the awful grandeur of the imposing scene. We sat gazing at the magnificent phenomena for several hours, when we laid ourselves down on our mats, in order to observe more leisurely their varying aspect; for, although we had travelled upwards of twenty miles since the morning, and were both weary and cold, we felt but little disposition to sleep. This disinclination was probably increased by our proximity to the yawning gulf, and our conviction, that the detachment of a fragment from beneath the overhanging pile on which we were reclining, or the slightest concussion of the earth, which every thing around indicated to be no unfrequent occurrence, would perhaps precipitate us, amidst the horrid crash of falling rocks, into the burning lake immediately before us. "The natives, who probably viewed the scene with thoughts and feelings somewhat different from ours, seemed, however, equally interested. They sat most of the night talking of the achievements of Pélé, and regarding with a superstitious fear, at which we were not surprised, the brilliant exhibition. They considered it the primeval abode of their volcanic deities. The conical craters, they said, were their houses, where they frequently amused themselves by playing at Konane, (a game resembling drafts;) the roaring of the furnaces and the crackling of the flames were the kani of their hura, (music of their dance,) and the red flaming surge was the surf wherein they played, sportively swimming on the rolling wave." pp. 214-216. "But the magnificent fires of Kirauea, appeared to dwindle into insignificance, when we thought of the probable subterranean fires immediately beneath us. The whole island of Hawaii, covering a space of 4000 square miles, from the summits of its lofty mountains, perhaps 15,000 or 16,000 feet above the level of the sea, down to the beach, is, according to every observation we could make, one complete mass of lava, or other volcanic matter, in different stages of decomposition. Perforated with innumerable apertures in the shape of craters, the island forms a hollow cone over one vast furnace, situated in the heart of a stupendous submarine mountain rising from the bottom of the sea; or possibly the fires may rage with augmented force beneath the bed of the ocean, rearing through the superincumbent weight of water the base of Hawaii, and, at the same time, forming a pyramidal funnel from the furnace to the atmosphere." pp. 229, 230. But we must stop short. Our opinion of the volume has been already expressed; and we shall be rejoiced at an extensive sale of it, which we trust will greatly promote the momentous object which the missionaries, both American and British, have so warmly at heart. May the blessing of God continue to prosper, as it has already so remarkably done, their truly benevolent and Christian labours. LITERARY AND PHILOSOPHICAL INTELLIGENCE, GREAT BRITAIN. &c. &c. PREPARING for publication:-Part I. in 3 vols. containing the Four Gospels (to be succeeded in the course of the year by Part II. in 2 vols., containing the Acts and the Epistles), of "Recensio Synoptica Annotationis Sacræ;" being a Critical Digest and Synoptical Arrangement of the most important Annotations, Exegetical, Philological, and Theological, on the New Testament; by the Rev. S. T. Bloomfield, M. A. ;-A History of the Mahrattas, By Capt. J. G. Duff;-Illustrations of Anglo-Saxon Poetry; by the late Rev. I. I. Conybeare;-Journal of a Voyage up the Mediterranean, prin cipally among the Islands of the Archipelago, and in Asia Minor; by the Rev. Charles Swan. In the press :--A Volume of Sermons on the Ten Commandments; by the Rev. John Graham, of York ;-A Translation of Llorente's History of the Inquisition;-A Mission to the East Coast of Sumatra, with a Visit to the Batta Cannibal States; by J. Anderson. The cenotaph to the memory of the Princess Charlotte by Mr. Wyatt, for which about fifteen thousand pounds were subscribed, at a guinea each person, has recently been erected in St. George's Chapel, Windsor. The design is to represent the moment of death. Floating above the bier is a full-length figure of the Princess ascending to the skies. The difficulties of the times are particularly seen, as might justly be expected, in a great depreciation in the price of works of mere taste and art. At the recent sale of Lord Berwick's celebrated collection of pictures, a fine painting by Murillo was sold for little more than onefifth of what Lord Berwick gave for it; and another by Guido for three hundred and seventy guineas, although Lord Berwick gave for it one thousand and fifty. His lordship did not obtain these works of art by private purchase, but in the same way that they were disposed of, by public auction. FRANCE. The minister of marine has requested the Academy to draw up a statement of the various subjects to which the attention of the expedition of discovery under Captain Durville, in preparation at Toulon, should be directed. The vessels are nearly equipped. 66 The Academy of Sciences and Letters at Dijon has proposed, as the subject of their prize of eloquence for the present year, a comparison between Saint Bernard and Bossuet, in respect to their writings, their character, and the influence which they respectively exercised over their contemporaries." The French Academy have elected the duke de Montmorency as a member of their learned body. The inaugural oration of the duke was an eulogium upon St. Vincent de Paul and works of Christian charity. M. de Chateaubriand followed in nearly the same strain. French literati complain that the literary institutions of France is being perverted from the purpose for which they were designed, to the dissemination of the opinions of the Jesuitical party. The At a recent sitting of the Academy of Sciences, M. Saint-Hilaire presented a mummy of an Egyptian crocodile, seven feet and a half long, and in perfect preservation. This mummy clears up a scientific question which has long been agitated, whether in the Nile there are more than one species of crocodile. M. Cuvier would admit but of one species of these animals. M. Geoffroy St. Hilaire, on the contrary, maintained that the word suchus meant a distinct species, whose disposition was milder than that of the common crocodile. The It is in contemplation to build an iron suspension bridge across the Neva at St. Petersburgh, with an arch of 1022 feet span. EGYPT. The population of Egypt is estimated at 2,514,400 persons of whom about 200,000 are Copts, or descendants of the ancient Egyptians: 2,300,000 are Tellahs, a mixed race of Arabs, Persians, Syrians, and Egyptians, and 14,000 are foreigners. The number of villages in the country is 3,475, about one half of which are in Lower Egypt. UNITED STATES. The Committee on public lands have submitted, for the consideration of Congress, a bill, creating a fund for the support of common schools in the several States. The bill provides, that after the first of January next, fifty per cent. of the nett proceeds of the moneys accruing from the sales of the public lands shall be appropriated to the support of common schools; the money to be annually invested, by the United States, in some productive fund, and the interest apportioned among the several States, according to the ratio of the representation of each state in the house of representatives. The income from the sales of the public lands is estimated at more than 2,000,000 dollars annually. Very large sums are already appropriated in the various States to this object. In that of New York, for instance, the State School-fund yields at present 30,000 dollars annually; and an equal sum is raised for the same object, by taxation, in the several school districts. In pursuance of the President's recommendation, an observatory is to be erected at Washington, at an estimated cost for the buildings of about 14,750 dollars, and an annual expenditure of 4,000 dollars for the salaries of the officers and other expenses. A most praise-worthy act has been passed by the Legislature of the State of |