of this necessity; but a list of nearly five hundred native subscribers, and the importance which geographers and the collectors of historical materials must everywhere attach to these papers, many of them being new not only in Europe but in South America itself, it is to be hoped, will enable the editor to proceed with his labours. The work to meet the exigencies of publication has been brought out in numbers, the editor from time to time receiving many contributions, which unavoidably has broken in upon systematic arrangement. This, however, is not in a work of the present description of vital concern. We copy the titles of some of the documents, as given in the volum ebefore us.

La Argentina, or History of the Provinces of the Rio de la Plata from the discovery of that river by Solis. Written in the year 1622. By Don Rui Diaz de Guzman.

Account of the Journey of Don Luis de la Crux from the fort of Bellenar, on the frontier of the Province of Conception, in Chile, through unknown lands, inhabited by Indians, to the city of Buenos Ayres, performed in the year 1806.

Collection of the documents relating to the City of the Caesars (de los Cæsares), supposed to exist in the Andes, South of Valdeira. Account of a Voyage from Buenos Ayres, to explore the Coast of Patagonia, as far as the Straits of Magellan, in 1745. By the Jesuit Fathers Quiroga and Cardiel; by order of his Catholic Majesty.

Memoir on the Spanish Settlements on the Coast of Patagonia, drawn up for the information of the Marquis of Loreto, Viceroy of Buenos Ayres. By Don Francisco de Viedma, Superintendent of the said Settlements, 1784.

Description of Potosi and its Dependencies, in 1787. By the Governor, Don Juan del Pino Manrique. This account, we are told, goes back to the first discovery of the mineral treasures of Potosi in the year 1546, and the following particulars which we pick out are remarkable. The population of the city in 1611, the editor says, was estimated at 150,000. It is also stated that from the discovery of the mines to 1783, the quantity of silver, on which the king's duties were paid there, amounted to the enormous sum of 820,513,893 dollars; and yet it was supposed that nearly as much more had been taken out of the mines which had not been brought to account. The mines of such wealth begot the most wanton extravagance on the part of the people. The celebration of the coronation of Charles the Fifth is said to have cost them eight millions of dollars; nay, on the funeral ceremonies at the death of Philip the Third, six millions were expended. Then as to private fortunes, some idea may be formed when it is stated that the marriage portion of one young lady, more than two hundred years ago, amounted to 2,300,000 dollars. But the waste of human life, in bringing these treasures from the mines was terrible; for, at length, sixteen exten

sive provinces were depopulated of their natives, all of whom in their turn were obliged to take part in the unhealthful and poisoning labour.

There is a "Historical, Geographical, and Political Account of the ci-devant Jesuit Missions in Paraguay, by the Governor Don Gonzales de Doblas, 1785," which is described as being a paper of especial value and interest. But, not to continue copying any more of these titles, excepting to mention that of a strictly historical character, the "Original Records, showing-1st. The foundation of the City of Buenos Ayres in 1580. By Don Juan de Garay, and his allotment of the lands and Indians to his followers; 2nd. The foundation of Monte Video in 1724; 3rd. The Actas Capitulares, or Proceedings of the Cabildo and People of Buenos Ayres, upon the receipt of the news of the successes of the French in Spain, and the overthrow of the legitimate government of the mother country, which led them to establish their own first Junta in 1810," must all be documents of first-rate value.

We shall close the present article with a slight account of the paper we have first mentioned as appearing in Angelis's work, viz. "La Argentina," which is one of the early chronicles of the Conquistadores; we also copy a specimen of the narrative as translated in the Journal before us.

The author of this paper, we are informed, was allied to the noble #family of the Duke of Medina Sidonia, and is represented to have been one of those brave and chivalrous adventurers who not only sought for dangers in the New World with a romantic knight-errantry, and encountered as many as might well have sufficed the appetite of a whole family of gallants, but to have been actuated by a laudable desire to transmit to posterity a narrative of the events in which he took a part, or of which he was a witness, some of his nearest relatives also coming in for a share of the glory. He says in his dedication to the grandee above named, that his principal object has been to record "the valiant deeds of those brave Spaniards who undertook the discovery, and the conquest, and the peopling of the parts, in the course of which (he adds) there happened many things worthy to be remembered." It is stated, that though the document was never before published, several manuscript copies had got into circulation, one of which was lent to Dr. Southey, who made use of it in his history of Brazil. That it was highly worthy of the most extensive circulation which typography can facilitate, may be safely affirmed after knowing that Azara has spoken of it as being better authority for the early history of the dominion of the Spaniards in the parts of which the work treats than any other he had met with. It now appears with the additional value which numerous notes confer, furnished by the learned editor.

Unlike the inhabitants of Mexico and Peru, those of the provinces of the Rio de la Plata were a warlike, fierce, and obstinate race,

that gave ample scope for the exercise of the most enthusiastic and persevering exploits of the Spaniards. The following are some of the striking features of these Indians as pictured by Senor de Angelis. The passage may very suitably close a paper in which a rapid glance has been taken of many subjects and questions inseparably connected with the discovery, the colonization, and the subsequent annals of the New World.

The Indians referred to, says the editor

"Were all sprung from the same stock-that of the Guaranis-a nation whose origin, customs, language, and numerous offsets, would alone furnish copious materials for a work greatly wanted in the history of America. They reached from the southern Atlantic to the frontiers of the empire of the Incas, following the courses of the many great rivers and of their numerous ramifications which intersect all that vast portion of the globe. The Timbus, the Agaces, the Caracaras, the Payaguas, were all from this same stock, whose language was spoken alike by the Carios and Arachanes in Brazil, and by the Chiquitos and Chiriguanos in Peru. Every grade of barbarism, from the savage state to the first dawnings of civilization, were (was) to be traced among the various tribes of this large family, which wandered to and fro, subject to no general law or direction. Anthropophagi in some places, and husbandmen in others, they submitted voluntarily to the authority of their caciques, and to the dictation of their Diviners or Jugglers. The extent of their religion was comprised in the two names of a good and evil spirit, Tupa, the translation of which is, Ah, who art thou? and Anang, the Persecutor of souls. Of these Anang, the bad spirit, was by far the object of most veneration, and in propitiating him it was that the influence of the Diviners was principally exercised.

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They had a confused tradition of a great deluge which destroyed all their nation, except two individuals, who saved themselves by climbing a lofty palm tree, on the fruit of which they subsisted till the waters subsided.

"Their government was vested in an hereditary Cacique in time of peace, and in an elective dictatorship in war: in both cases they yielded a blind obedience to their chiefs, however despotic. The authority of the parent over his children was as absolute as that of the Cacique: marriages were as easily broken as made! Their diversions consisted entirely in dancing and drunkenness: they began with shouts, and ended with blood: their chosen beverage was a fermented liquor, made from maize or honey, and of this they drank till they fell down in a state of madness: at such times they seized their darts, and aimed deadly blows at their best friends and companions. They can hardly be described as a no nadic people; but yet they had, if traditions are to be credited, undertaken distant conquests; embarking on the rivers in their canoes, and without other arms than their bows and clubs. They boasted of having never submitted to a foreign yoke; and when they bowed their necks to that of the Spaniards, it was under the delusion that they were treating with allies, not perceiving that they were to be made slaves of.

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497

ART. III.-Religio Medici, &c. By Sir T. BROWNE, M. D. With a
Preliminary Discourse and Notes, by J. A. St. JOHN, Esq. London.
Rickerby. 1838.

Or the series of choice reprints, for which the public has lately be-
come so deeply indebted to the parties who have put forth the
above compact and handsome duodecimo, there is not one more
welcome to us than Sir Thomas Browne's tract on Urn Burial-
one of the most quaint yet noble effusions to be met with in any
language. Religio Medici, or the religion of a physician, is a work
also that attracted much notice during the lifetime of its author;
and its excellence is still appreciated by all those who dip into the
well of English literature. To use the words of Dr. Johnson, "The
Religio Medici was no sooner published than it excited the atten-
tion of the public, by the novelty of paradoxes, the dignity of sen-
timent, the quick succession of images, the multitude of abstruse
allusions, the subtlety of disquisition, and the strength of language."
Owing to these circumstances, as well as to the nature of the sub-
ject handled, this performance does not suit our immediate purpose
so well as the other production already mentioned and forming the
running title to this paper. Mr. St. John's Introduction, however,
will be found an excellent key to both; and therefore we may in-
dulge our partiality by choosing the smaller and more convenient
work, in order to show some of our readers, who may be unac-
quainted with the piece, how rich are the gems and treasures that
may be gathered out of the old and venerable literature of England;
and how worthy it is of the publisher and editor of the present
volume to dig in the hallowed field.

But before proceeding to notice the peculiarities and beauties of the Discourse on Sepulchral Urns or Urn Burial, we wish to dwell for an instant upon the venerable, but to the multitude the bygone, literature above alluded to.

It was that literature which made us what we are; we are a reading people. But of what does our reading generally consist? New works, which for the most part, wherever the uncompromising vigour of intellect and the unshrinking adherence to great principles are concerned happen to be the chief concerns, are a mere diluted, attenuated, or compounded mass, unsavoury and doomed to be short-lived. Not that the age is to be blamed for what it cannot help; or that we are to be forbidden the use and the aids which a noble ancestry has bequeathed us. But why not make the works and achievements of our fathers our immediate study?-Why not at once repair to the fountain-head? Surely this should sometimes be done; and that sort of mere pretension laid aside, which consists in naming and being ashamed not to know the name of apotheosized authors. To talk of and not to read, to worship and not VOL. 111. (1838.) No. IV.

LL

to be acquainted with, the attributes of the thing worshipped, is a despicable but a common idolatry.

We are perfectly aware that the literary works of our fathers are often ponderous, and that they very frequently abound in matter which is perfectly superfluous in regard to the current age. At the same time it must be admitted, that a general knowledge of all that has been written, of different modes of talent, of particular individuals and schools whose influence has been so great as to stamp eras and nations, and leave permanent shapes, is highly gratifying to a liberal curiosity, and necessary to the accomplished scholar. The history of literature is a delightful as well as a useful study, for in fact it is the study of the human mind. But how few have time or take the proper guidance to form an acquaintance with the choicest spirits of all those of whom records exist! How few comparatively speaking can of themselves directly repair to the gems of English literature, the richest, most varied, and comprehensive of any in the world! What then is to be done? We answer, take such miners, pioneers, and caterers as the parties before us, who pleasantly introduce inquirers to the patriarchs and the priestesses in our commonwealth; and we predict, without the fear of error, that in a few volumes of philosophy, poetry, and general reading there will be found and tasted, by the earnest, susceptible, and capable mind, as much that is original in design, profound in thought, beautiful in imagination, mellow in regard to sympathy, and delicate as well as golden in expression, as will serve for an every-day, and a lifetime's recreation and instruction.

The work of Sir Thomas Brown, of which we are now to speak, is in a variety of respects now referred to extraordinary. Its subject has not been very often adopted, that subject being the Grave; but his manner of treating it, never, so far as we know.

The grave, to be sure, has been a ceaseless theme, to the divine, moralist, and poet; but each of these has regarded it as but a breach in existence, or the form of existence. What has gone before, and what is to follow after, are still regarded as being surely and indissolubly though mysteriously connected. Life has been known and been felt by all to be short, fleeting, and uncertain, yet every one attaches himself to objects in that life, just as though he believed he was never to die. If a worldling and a disbeliever in immortality, he clings the closer to perishable objects the more he perceives his possession to be brief; if nobler sentiments, better principles, higher hopes, influence a man, he attaches himself to beings of kindred destinies, he loves, for example, and believes that this love will be reciprocated and allowed the most ample scope throughout eternity, where all shall be love, peace, and spiritual enjoyment. The grave, therefore, to such a being, is synonymous with death, and death he regards as a shadow, an unsubstantial, or, at least, an ending separa