But it is not to the spirit of party we appeal. If we call on our church to patronise the republication of their own theological literature, it is because such literature is for its intrinsic excellence eminently_worthy to be prized as our own. For rich exhibitions of evangelical truth, these works have ever held a foremost place, adapting them both to the household

and the study. And few things, we are persuaded, would, under the blessing of God, tend more to the edification of our churches than the thorough diffusion among our pulpits and families, of the spirit and unction and practical influence with which the writings of our fathers are imbued.

Belfast: John Mullen.

SUCH is the title of a pamphlet which has been published by the Eastern Reformed Synod of Ireland,--a body, respecting whose position and principles a word of explanation may be offered. Were we to estimate the importance of any body with exclusive reference to its numbers, the body which is represented by the Eastern Reformed Synod, might be regarded as of comparatively little note among the churches of Christ; but if estimated according to the talent, learning, and usefulness of its ministers, and the piety and intelligence of its members, we must be conducted to a very different conclusion. Several of the ministers of this Synod are extensively and favourably known throughout this country, and various districts of America. One of them, for example, has done essential service to the cause of evangelical christianity in the north of Ireland, being the author of a work of great value on the Arian and Socinian controversy.

About 1830-seventeen years ago-a controversy, respecting the magistrate's power circa sacra, commenced in the Synod of the Reformed Presbyterian Church in Ireland. One party maintained the principle of magistratical interference in all its length and breadth; and, in a periodical called the Covenanter, advocated this position-that the civil magistrate, in a country in which the true reformed religion is established, is the supreme ruler in all causes, civil and ecclesiastical, and that, in such a country as we have supposed, heretics should not be tolerated. To this doctrine a minority earnestly opposed themselves; asserting that men should not, in any circumstances,

be exposed to civil pains, penalties, and disabilities, on account of their religious opinions; and that the church of Christ should be independent of state support, and free from state control. For the maintenance of their position in this respect, that minority, with their congregations, were exposed to a course of systematic annoyance and injustice, which cannot be here indicated, but which is well known in Ulster, and by several sections of the church in Scotland and America.

The result was, that in 1840 the minority were compelled to submit their declinature. The ministers composing it now form the Eastern Reformed Synod, consisting of two presbyteries; and, in their present circumstances, are engaged, with their people, in various efforts for the extension of religion, and the diffusion of the great principles of nonconformity. The pamphlet bearing the title quoted at the head of this notice, is one of many publications on collateral subjects issued by this Synod. The present publication has excited very considerable interest, and called forth some controversy in the north of Ireland; and, as the deliverance of a body respected by all parties of evangelical Christians, it is to be hoped that it will be eminently useful at the present crisis.

The great object of the pamphlet, as the title imports, is to expose the gross injustice of one class of men being compelled to support the religion of another class of men; and the work is an expansion and justification of the title. We are not acquainted with any work of similar dimensions, in which that subject is more faithfully and conclusively settled. It is evident that the writer possesses a comprehensiveness of mind which falls to the lot of few; and that the production before us is the result of patient research into the merits of the question, and an attentive observation of the signs of the times.

The work not only advocates the freedom

of the church from state control and support, on general principles, but refers specially to the grant to the General Assembly in Ireland, called Regium Donum, exposing at once its essential wrongfulness, and its deadening and destructive influence on the Presbyterian Church in Ireland. The disease is indicated, and the true means of remedying the monstrous evils which it entails, fully and earnestly enforced. Eleven distinct arguments against all civil establishments of religion are specified and illustrated with equal point and power.

On two accounts we cordially recommend this publication to the notice of all of our readers who can obtain it; first, on account of its own excellence as an admirable exposure of existing evils which necessarily arise from erroneous principles and practices-an exposure, too, so linked with the events of the day as to be exceedingly interesting; and, secondly, on account of the body from whom it emanates-the members of the Eastern Reformed Synod, whom we hail as brethren. We pray that God may establish the work of their hands; and that in these days of politico-religious manœuvre and intrigue, they and we may continue, as hitherto, the fearless and consistent friends of the purity and freedom of the church.

MEMOIR OF HELEN SILVIE, a Deaf Mute. By ROBERT KINNIBURGH. With an Appendix containing Notices of other Deaf Mutes. Pp. 70.

THIS memoir first appeared in an abridged form in the Edinburgh Messenger, a periodical devoted to the cause of the deaf and dumb. It is now enlarged, and presented to the public in a separate form. We congratulate the pious and intelligent author on this measure. It is an interest.. ing little work, and calculated to be useful in advancing the Redeemer's cause.

The work consists of three parts; first, the narrative of Helen Silvie's Life, written in a pleasing style, suited to the amiable character which it portrays. As might be expected in the life of one moving in a humble sphere, and, by physical defects, restricted in her intercourse with society, and in the situations she was fitted to occupy, the leading incidents are few and simple. She was born in Dunblane-was by a fever deprived of hearing about the age of five-lost, from timidity in the use of it, that portion of vocal language which she had previously acquired-was placed in the Deaf and Dumb Institution, Edinburgh -at first, from the want of healthful employment to the mind, was discontented and peevish; but when light dawned on the understanding, became cheerful and happywas dull and slow in acquiring the elements

of language; but, that difficulty being surmounted, became, by her diligence and attainments, a model to the whole school. From a pupil she became an assistant teacher, and conducted one of the junior classes; but in this department, principally from want of animation, she did not excel. She next taught the girls sewing; a situation in which she was more successful, and in that continued several years. In May 1845, she went to keep house for her brother at Bannockburn, where she continued eight months. Longing for the Institution, in which she had spent many happy years, she requested to be replaced in her former situation. Owing to the illness of Mr Kinniburgh, the letter was not speedily answered, and, losing patience, she set off to make personal inquiries. Embarking at Stirling, December 31st, 1845, she was landed at Granton in the dark. Both she and the young gentleman who was her guide, being near-sighted, they walked across the pier, instead of turning up towards the town, "and in an instant plunged into the sea.' The gentleman escaped all serious consequences; and it was at first thought that Helen was free from danger; but inflammation of the lungs commencing, she expired within eighteen days from the accident.

The second and largest part of the publication, consists principally of selections from her correspondence, and contains a

number of letters written at various times to her friends and acquaintance. From the practice of largely explaining every subject, the mode of tuition then followed in the Deaf and Dumb Institution, and which, with advantage, might be more extensively employed in seminaries whose pupils have the full possession of all their sensesthe letters assume the form of short essays or disquisitions. The subjects of them are various to a missionary who had brought home a native of Madagascar; description of a visit to Pennycuik Mills; on reading the life of the Rev. John Newton; on reading Blunt's Life of Christ; to E. B., on the death of a deaf and dumb brother, while a child; on the snow-drop; on the approach of winter, &c. All these essays display a correct taste, a cultivated understanding, and a pious heart.

An appendix contains notices of three deaf mutes which are well worthy of preservation. We would advise Mr Kinniburgh, in next edition, to give the names and birthplaces; and one or two of those little circumstances which serve to individualize the persons. Interesting though the notices are, this would render them somewhat more interesting.

There is no christian mind that may not peruse this book with pleasure and profit.

It is peculiarly fitted for occupying a place in a juvenile library. It will, by the divine blessing, communicate important information to the minds, and breathe pious feeling into the hearts of the young-awaken gratitude to God for the possession of the entire faculties of human nature-produce humiliation in seeing themselves so far surpassed by persons who labour under peculiar physical disadvantages-inspire admiration of the divine goodness, which has directed the resources of human art to the opening up of the stores of sacred and secular knowledge, to minds from which light seemed, from physical defect, to have been effectually excluded.

For these reasons, and because the profits are devoted to the support of an interesting charity, we wish the book an extensive sale.

SCHEME of MUTUAL ASSISTANCE in the SUPPORT of MINISTERS. (From the Original Secession Magazine.) With a Prefatory Note by the Rev. Dr BAIRD, Paisley; together with an Address on the Necessity of a more Liberal Provision for the Support of Ministers. By the late Rev. Dr PEDDIE.

Edinburgh: W. P. Kennedy.

As the subject of this tract is one of great and increasing importance, we recommend our readers to procure it. Our church is becoming alive to the necessity of attending to the proper maintenance of the ministry throughout its length and breadth, and this small but pithy publication will help to advance the good work. It is encouraging to observe, that other dissenting bodies are engaged in promoting the same cause, and that the Free Church, at present working out an extensive experiment, is rejoicing in their

efforts. Speaking of the above" Scheme," the "Monthly Statement" of that church says, "The necessity for some Scheme" of the kind in the Original Secession Church, and, we believe, in every other unendowed body, is brought out with painful distinctness and irresistible force. The revelations which it makes should serve as a warning to the friends of the Free Church of what must happen, if she falter or fail in her present attempt to make some suitable provision for the support of ordinances in all her congregations-they should encourage her to go on vigorously in that attempt, seeing that the cause of the gospel is bound up with it; and, painful though the revelations be, we hail them with pleasure as the forerunners of a successful effort to place in a position of comfort the whole body of nonestablished ministers, and promote the prosperity and efficiency of the churches to which they belong."

ROBERTSON'S SCOTTISH CHURCH BOok, for training Youthful Hearers to Habits of Attention.

Glasgow: D. Robertson, WITH his invention ever on the stretch for improvements in "church stationery," Mr Robertson has here produced what, to juvenile hearers of the word, and to parents interested in their religious instruction, should prove a highly useful and acceptable book. It consists of blank forms, each covering two pages, to be filled up by notes of the discourses and other services which the youthful writer may hear or engage in at church. While the words inserted by the printer will help to diminish the labour of writing, they will serve also to guide the eye of the inexperienced notographer, and suggest to him an orderly mode of recording the leading ideas of a discourse.

NOTES OF THE CAFFRE WAR OF 1846-7. THE late war in Caffreland was the result of misunderstanding and complaints which had been accumulating for years before. When the Caffre war of 1835 was denounced in Downing Street, and Sir B. D'Urban's measures of subjugation and annexation were annulled, Caffreland reverted to the government of its chiefs and counsellors, and the neutral territory between the Keiskamma and Fish rivers was restored in perpetuity, on condition of good

faith being kept with the colony. This was Sir A. Stockenstroom's first act as lieutenant-governor of the frontier districts and Caffreland. He required the contracting chiefs to hold themselves responsible for all horses, cattle, and sheep proved by the footmarks or "spoor" to have crossed the border into Caffreland, whether stolen or strayed. The chiefs yielded the point with great reluctance at the close of a three days' debate, and argued justly, that the government of a country should not be

held responsible for the private offences committed by any of its subjects in a neighbouring country. Is the Queen of England, we ask, made accountable to the French monarch for the misdemeanour of any of the London swell mob in Paris? However, the chiefs undertook this serious obligation, provided the herds of colonist stock were armed in the field, and that the chiefs were not to be called on to make restitution for cattle, &c., strayed or carelessly left out over night. These conditions being conceded by Sir A., his measure became law, wrought well in the peculiar circumstances, and ought to have given satisfaction to all parties, not excepting stock-keepers who did not take proper care of their cattle. These, however, when their cattle went amissing or were stolen (perhaps by their own servants or by vagrants), blamed the Caffres, denounced the treaties and their enlightened author, and clamoured for change.

Sir Geo. Napier, to pacify complainers, gave liberty to persons to go into Caffreland in search of stock, whenever they suspected it might have been carried off by Caffres, and entitled them to claim compensation if the spoor was lost near the border, and in the direction of the Caffre country, though not traced into it, and whether their cattle had been properly herded or not when found amissing. At the same time he opened an "irreclaimable list" of losses, reported by the owners to be taken by Caffres, though the spoor might not be traceable beyond the homestead. In this way he hung up over the heads of the contracting chiefs a constantly increasing catalogue of delinquencies, the odium of which they had to bear. If not called on to make restitution, they were constantly reminded of this alleged debt; and thus the national character, which was not invulnerable, was further deteriorated in public estimation. On one occasion, in 1842, Col. Hare, who succeeded Sir A. Stockenstroom in 1838, taunted the chiefs on the amount of their debt. Annoyed with the subject, they asked him how many head of cattle he wanted to square accounts? Unable to answer, and overlooking the three agents present who could, he referred to the magistrate at Fort Beaufort, who was wholly unconnected with the Caffre department. The latter retired, and soon came back with an unauthenticated list in pencil of 500 head of cattle and 200 horses, which the gallant colonel presented, and part of which the chiefs afterwards paid.

It excited the surprise of an officer of the Indian government, who was present on the occasion of reading Sir P. M.'s own treaty, at Victoria, when he saw the dragoons afterwards ordered to

Such temporising policy, crowned by this last measure of the local government, seems to have swept away all the remaining confidence the Caffre authorities might have had in the integrity and honour of our executive; and all the subsequent intercourse of government showed that the chiefs would henceforth drive as hard a bargain as they could with the colony; and would punish and pay for thefts of colonial stock only when they could not help it. They took no interest in the measures adopted by the lieutenant-governor repress thieving on the border, and barely made compensation for what the strict letter of the treaties provided. Even that, latterly, it sometimes required menaces to

exact.

to

Sir P. Maitland, who succeeded Sir Geo. Napier in 1844, betrayed an equal love of innovation, with more unreflecting temerity. He was soon on the frontier, and with one dash of the pen annulled the existing treaties on his own responsibility, without consent or cognisance of the chiefs who had signed them. He substituted in their stead a measure of his own, which he singularly called a treaty, and which he got the chiefs to sign only after he had expunged several obnoxious articles, and enforced their assent by an array of naked swords surrounding the reluctant chiefs. One of them, notwithstanding, declared, on taking the pen, "I sign for the old treaties."

*

The chiefs now felt they were no longer independent representatives of a free nation, but the vassals of a British officer, who had given them an example of his disregard of solemn mutual contracts, by his summary disposal of the "old treaties." Dreading further change, they now began to act for themselves. Victoria, where they were called to hear Sir P. M.'s instrument read, and which they afterwards signed at the Block Drift Residency, was a new post in the neutral territory, to reward Sandili for permitting a military party to enter Caffreland for the apprehension of the murderers of De Lange. Sandili felt he could no longer govern the nation, and begged of his Excellency to free him of all responsibility, by ruling the Caffres himself. The Caffre war of 1846 properly begun now. From this time resistance to encroachment was resolved on; and the means of maintaining it was steadily pursued. When, therefore, the government had ordered a party of engineers to survey Block Drift, in Caffreland Proper, for a new post, without the knowledge even of the lieutenantgovernor, and on the verbal acquiescence

clear the parade of their sable auditors, which they did, enforcing the expulsion with the back of their swords.

of Sandili, who, it was known, had no constitutional authority to concede such a right without the consent of his government, the unexpected arrival of several thousand armed Caffres at the back of their chief, to demand the withdrawal of the surveying party from their country, showed that the train was already laid, and required but a spark on either side of the border to ignite the whole.

A Caffre, who had stolen an ox in Fort Beaufort, being rescued by his friends when on the way to Grahamstown for trial, in custody of a Hottentot constable, whom they killed to effect their purpose,-nothing more was needed to effect the explosion. Sandili, trifling with a feeble executive, which he had ceased to respect, refused to give satisfaction, and yielded only when the lieutenant-governor, feeling chafed by the governor at the Cape, and annoyed by local clamour and excitement, had proclaimed war, a proclamation which excited the astonishment and regret of both these parties. But they, he said, had made him the scapegoat, and he was determined to strike a blow.

Missionaries and traders were now ordered out. April the 11th the troops entered-marched to Burnshill, the neighbourhood of Sandili's kraal, and there encamped. Not a Caffre moved either toward them or into the colony till the chief's combustible establishment of straw huts and bush enclosures was set on fire. This was the concerted signal for commencing on the defensive, as the Caffres all along regarded it; and their inroad on the colony was a part of the measure in which they might have done treble the amount of mischief they did to life and fixed property. Cattle, they sought, and obtained. In their own country their arms were successful; and the drought destroying horses and oxen, the troops were little able to move for want of the means of transport and commissariat supplies. Many ships laden with supplies having been driven on shore, and other serious obstacles arising, drew the remarks equally from the reflecting and the inconsiderate-"God is fighting against us." "Providence is favouring our foes." Can we wonder, then, that the natives were so slow to submit, even when want began to press upon them? The devout mind will only thank God, who has so far restrained the spirit of barbarian retaliation, that in a war of eighteen months' duration, there has been less waste of life on either side, that was ever known before in a war of the same continuance between two hostile armies, each nearly 10,000 strong.

Glenthorn, S. Africa, 15th Nov. 1847.

R. N.

WESTERN AFRICA.

THE evangelical missions already planted, and at present in operation on the western coast of Africa, under the auspices of various societies, American, British, and Continental, extend along the coast for upwards of 2400 miles; and, although not so contiguous as to fill up the whole space, yet they are situated at such distances from each other, that their influence must speedily meet, and cover the whole intervening spaces. The stations are chiefly upon the coast; only in one or two instances do they reach about 100 miles into the interior. But from the constant communication betwixt the inland tribes and those upon the coast, the missionaries have frequent opportunity of sending communications respecting the gospel, to places which they are not themselves able to visit. With one or two exceptions, these missions are but recently established; and have had from the beginning peculiar difficulties to contend with, from the deadliness of the climate, the hostile influences of the slave trade, and the murderous superstitions of the tribes among whom they are placed. These tribes are, neither in circumstances nor character, at all so favourable for the reception of pure Christianity as the Caffres and other tribes of South Africa; and therefore, with the missionaries on the western coast, it is yet but the day of small things, excepting in the British dependencies, where they have had in their favour both the influence of

English character, and the general use of the English language. We shall give a condensed view of the present state of these missions, according to the latest intelligence received from them respectively.

Gambia. Here the present efforts of Christianity, on behalf of Western Africa, make their commencement on the north, leaving an extent of 22 degrees of coast still further north, lying under the gross darkness of Mohammedan or heathen delusions. In this small British colony the Wesleyans have three stations, but with only one English missionary; their other agents being native assistants. It is felt that further reinforcement is necessary, before the mission can be placed in a state of efficiency. Their members number 373, and their scholars 405. The education of the youth is their main hope; "for the adult population are so closely wedded to their superstitions, and so awfully debased, that there seems, humanly speaking, little hope of any very extensive success among them."

Sierra Leone.-This colony, established for the reception of liberated Negroes, has a population of about 40,000. The Wesleyans have within it five stations, with 3473 members, and 2272 scholars. The health of their