lential region in which we were cooped up during nine melancholy months; and whilst I cannot help pointing out how erroneous were his opinions, I willingly conclude my remarks upon him by saying "Peace to his manes!" But I forget that all my readers are not as well versed in Burmese history as myself, and ere I continue my tale, I must state who the people were that now defied us. To Colonel Symes we are indebted for an exceedingly entertaining account of the Burmese prior to 1795, the date of his embassy; and to illustrate these sketches, it is merely requisite to follow his path from the middle of the last century, when Alomprah occupied the Burmese throne. This great man was the founder of the present Burmese empire, which, previous to his time, consisted of several independent kingdoms. Ava and Pegue were the most important of these; Arracan, Assam, Munnipoor, and the Shaan territory, were less considerable; whilst Siam, which occupies the eastern portion of India ultra Gangem, had at all times retained her independence, and kept the kingdoms of Ava and Pegue in check. The latter were constantly at variance, and as fortune favoured their arms, so was one state tributary to the other; in 1750 the Talliens, or Peguers, had attained the supremacy, and the King of Pegue was represented at Ava by his brother, who, as viceroy, governed the conquered kingdom. The heir to the throne of Ava had sought refuge amongst the Shaans, and the two countries seemed to be almost amalgamated, when a trifling dispute that occurred relative to the payment of tribute caused an insurrection which eventually led to the downfall of the Tallien dynasty, and the elevation of the house of Alomprah in its stead. Monchaboo, the village where the first display of resistance was made to the Tallien viceroy, is about thirty miles north of Ava, and there Alomprah, the future conqueror of the East, pursued the humble occupation of huntsman, from whence he derived the name of Aumzeah, by which he was originally known. His sylvan pursuits, whilst they imparted energy to his body, had not impaired the qualities of his mind; to a daring courage he united decision of character, and a spirit of enterprise that led him onward, from step to step, until he terminated his brilliant career on the throne of the kingdom of which he had been one of the humblest subjects; and although these sudden elevations are of more ordinary occurrence in the East (where the successful chieftain too often supplants his master) than in Europe, where merit and talent is crushed beneath the colossal power of ancient habits and a calculating routine of policy, yet I think that in many respects Alomprah may bear a comparison with Napoleon. Like him, he sprang from nothing; like him, destroying the power that had usurped the crown of his legitimate sovereign, he seized the diadem only to place it on his own brow; and carrying the parallel still farther, he, like Napoleon, deemed the possession of one kingdom insufficient to gratify his ambition, and he successively attacked and annexed to his empire those adjoining states that were unable to contend with the superior courage and numbers of his victorious army. Thus did he, reversing the former state of those kingdoms, annex Pegue to Ava, and after destroying the ancient capital of Pegue, (which, from its wealth and the extent of its walls, had long formed the theme of praise of the earliest Eastern travellers,) he marched into Siam, and had succeeded in conquering a large portion of its territory when death put an end to his victories. He transmitted the sceptre in peace to his son; and his successor, following his line of policy, made an easy conquest of Arracan, Assam, and Munnipoor, the reigning families being disposed of according to the usage of Eastern nations. Some fell by the sword, others by poison; and although scarcely eighty years have elapsed since the destruction of Pegue, the ancient race that ruled within its walls is extinct, and the royal family of Arracan has shared the same fate. Munnipoor and Assam being later conquests, still possessed claimants for their thrones; and this circumstance we turned to our advantage during the course of the war in which the overweening pride and audacity of the Burmese had now involved The immediate cause of hostilities was a dispute that had arisen relative to the right of sovereignty over the little islet of Shapune, at the mouth of the Tek Naaf, the river that formed the boundary between Arracan and the British district of Chittagong. A collision took place between the advanced posts of the two parties; redress was refused by the Burman court, and war was declared by the British. us. Madu Cher, who now fills the Burman throne, is the seventh monarch of the race of Alomprah, and possesses his ancestor's thirst for conquest; for, from what we heard subsequently, it appears that in invading the British territory he was actuated by the chimerical idea of annexing Bengal to his dominions, and felt so confident of success that he had entrusted the Maha Bundoolah, his celebrated general, with a pair of golden fetters for the use of the GovernorGeneral of India. The idea of any native power attempting to conquer our provinces is so absurd, that we cannot but smile at the ignorance of the Burmese, in imagining that with their resources they could contend with us on our own ground; but their ignorance on every subject that related to us, whilst it concealed from them the extent of our power, likewise prevented their availing themselves of a moment of weakness, when Calcutta itself was perfectly vulnerable to an attack from Maha Bundoolah's army after its victory at Ramoo. The Burman chief might have embarked his army in canoes, and hastening through the Sunderbunds, have reached Calcutta without much opposition; and, divested as the capital then was of European troops, the result of a battle might have been doubtful. But such a hardy project could scarcely present itself to the mind of a general whose whole knowledge of the art of war had been acquired in a campaign against the Assamese. The inhabitants of Calcutta, when we arrived there, little anticipated the possibility of such a contingency. They affirmed, that our debarkation at Rangoon would act like a blister upon the Burmese, and oblige them to withdraw all their force from the frontier of Chittagong to oppose us; and they affected to believe that we should meet with very little opposition, as the Burmese were badly armed, and only possessed a few matchlocks and scarcely any artillery. The correctness of this opinion was put to the test when, at the close of the war, we were informed by the Burman chieftain that they had lost 1500 pieces of artillery and swivels, of from one to sixty pounds calibre, a fact which we were able to corroborate. I may also observe, that I did not see a single matchlock during the whole of the war. My regiment remained several days at Calcutta previous to its embarkation, and we employed this time in organizing our camp equipage; but we were speedily informed that few preparations were requisite, for that the Government would only sanction the embarkation of one servant with each officer. Now, although this may not appear a harsh measure to English ears, yet a person who understands the customs of the East will easily imagine what a blow it was to our comforts. The division of the Indian population into castes, renders it necessary for an officer to retain a number of servants on his establishment, as the man who waits at table will not clean his boots, and the person who brings him water will not sweep his room, the slightest deviation from the rules of their caste being sufficient to degrade them in the eyes of their brethren. Thus, my establishment in quarters at B, although on the lowest scale, consisted of a kitmutghar, whose office it was to prepare my breakfast and wait upon me at dinner,-this man and his assistant the mussauljee were Mussulmans; a sindar-bearer, who made my bed and took care of my clothes; a dhobie, or washerman; a bheestie, or water-carrier; a meter, or scavenger; a syce, or groom, and his companion the grass-cutter-eight servants, without whom it was impossible to live even in the quiet of a cantonment; and now that we required an additional number, as bullock-drivers, tent chuprassies, &c. we were limited to one, an arrangement until then unheard of in the annals of Indian campaigning. The great difficulty was to find men who would unite all the qualifications above enumerated in their persons; and the utter impracticability of inducing any respectable native servants to unbend from their caste, obliged us to employ a class of men whom we should not otherwise have deemed trustworthy. We indeed had not time to enquire into characters, and provided that the applicant for a situation was a Mohammedan of liberal principles, or a Portuguese Christian, it was all we cared about. It is true that we thus came in contact with the sweepings of the gaols, but this was a trifling consideration. "Master's caste" was a qualification of more importance in our opinion than any other. I had nearly despaired of providing myself with a servant of all work, and looked forward with dismay to the day when my smart kitmutghar, Jemaillot, would "take leave" of me, when, one morning, he ushered into my presence a thin, sallow-looking lad, about eighteen years of age, in European attire, and who expressed a wish to attach himself to my fortunes. He stated that he was English, and a soldier's son by a native woman: as such he interested me; and although I told him that his emaciated frame seemed ill calculated to sustain the fatigues of a campaign, yet he expressed himself so confident of his ability to rough it, that we made our agreement, and James, as he styled himself, became my factotum. There are many situations in which a man is placed, that render him so very dependent on his servant for care and consolation, that I may be pardoned for being thus diffuse on the subject of my attendant. In after days, he was often my sole companion, when I have been stretched on a bed of sickness; and although he proved eventually to be a worthless vagabond, yet the custom of finding him with me daily, induced me to feel much interest in him ; but he requited my goodwill with the greatest ingratitude. Having provided myself with a servant, my next care was to compress my baggage into two small trunks, calculated to be carried on a bullock; these, with a roll of bedding, completed my equipment. I likewise followed the example of my brother officers, and provided myself with a brace of pistols, a purchase which I had no cause to regret, for they did me good service two or three times during our subsequent campaigns. On the 5th April, with merry heart and buoyant spirits, I embarked at the Coolie Bazar, on board of the E, and with the next tide, we weighed anchor and dropped down the stream. (To be continued.) FIRST MERIDIAN. "It is very desirable that all the nations of Europe, instead of referring their calculations of the longitude to the meridian of their principal observatory, should have some common meridian, which nature seems to have pointed out for that purpose. That agreement would introduce into the geography of the world, the same uniformity that exists in its almanacks and in its arithmetic; a uniformity which, extending to the numerous objects of their mutual relations, forms various countries into an immense family."—Suggestions of M. de la Place. M. DE LA PLACE recommends the Peak of Teneriffe, or Mont Blanc, as the point through which this common meridian should pass. There appears but three maritime nations whose jealousies it would be necessary to appease in an alteration of this sort; these are, Spain, France, and England. The Americans use the meridian of Greenwich, and I believe the Russians, Swedes, and Danes do also; as well as generally using the charts of the English hydrographers; and this, undoubtedly, for the best possible reason, that these are, on the whole, by far the most correct, and are ever likely to be so, from the simple fact, that no expense is spared by the Government to render them so, by surveys and re-surveys. This being admitted, we do not see that it would be in any way humiliating or derogatory from the dignity of France and Spain, were they to take Greenwich as a first meridian-a spot situated on the most commercial river in the world, and adjacent to the metropolis of the greatest maritime country existing, or that ever did exist; and which has done more for the improvement of navigation and hydrography, than all the other nations taken collectively. In thus giving the palm to England, we must not forget to do justice to Spain, which has produced some excellent mathematical writers, and very skilful marine surveyors. Capt. Mendoza Rios, and other naval officers, are entitled to the gratitude of all navigators. The Spanish charts of the West Indies in particular, are accurate and beautifully engraved in fact, it must be allowed, that, in the art of chart-engraving, the Spaniards are unrivalled; but the jealousy of that people prevented, in great measure, the rest of the world from benefiting by the store of hydrographical and geographical knowledge gained by their skilful officers. A. B. EXTRACTS FROM THE MS. JOURNAL OF A NAVAL OFFICER SERVING ON THE JAMAICA STATION DURING THE LATE WAR. "She walks the waters like a thing of life, And seems to dare the elements to strife. Who would not brave the battle fire, the wreck, To move the monarch of her peopled deck?"-BYRON. It has often been remarked, that a sailor is an original being, possessing habits and manners essentially different from those of the other classes of society. No doubt this marked character is occasioned by that peculiar mode of life he is obliged to conform to-a life, under all circumstances, so widely varying from that of the landsman, under any of its modifications-yet his feelings still bear the stamp of Nature's kindliest mould. Among the varying scenes and events which occur in the naval service, there are few more unpleasant, at least for a time, than that of changing ship, or of receiving a new captain and officers: like the local attachment, which almost every person imbibes for the place of his nativity, or the home of his childhood, and the regard felt for those with whom he has been accustomed to associate; the sailor, whether officer or fore-mast man, in like manner becomes attached to the "barky," which has borne him in safety, far and near, over the bosom of the trackless deep; and warmly so to his companions in arms, with whom he has for any length of time been connected by the ties of mutual service. In December 1803, we received a new Captain, who brought with him the character of a strict disciplinarian, and, indeed, his very tout ensemble bespoke the active stirring mind, the ardent enthusiastic spirit. Some changes also took place among the commissioned and warrant officers, and we lost some of our old messmates from the Mids' berth: one in particular was regretted, W- H-S-, a young officer, in whom were combined the accomplishments of the perfect gentleman, the qualities of a good seaman, and a spirit for enterprise not to be surpassed. He had endeared himself not only to his messmates, but to all on board, by his kindness of heart, suavity of manners, and his brave and daring spirit. "He was one who, in youth, on the stormy seas, Who, borne on the billow, and blown by the breeze, * Yet in this rude school had his heart still kept Not in woman's warm eye hath a tear ever slept Had Providence spared this worthy young man, he long ere this, no doubt, would have risen by his merit, unaided by family interest, to high rank in his profession, and have added another name to the bright list of Fame, and been an honour to it, as he assuredly was to his country and to his friends. But it was otherwise ordained: this U. S. JOURN. No. 39. FEB. 1832. N |