poisoned arrows at them. Immediately after this, the Bushman conceals himself behind a tree or bush, and makes a great noise; on which the terrified animal runs off, but the poison soon beginning to operate, he falls down and becomes an easy prey to the hunter." The state of life in this part of the world is strikingly illustrated by the following facts: "A great disaster happened a few days before our arrival, indeed it might be numbered among the greatest which could take place in in a remote corner of the earth. When about the one-half of Berend's farm was ploughed, the plough-share broke; a loss irreparable, probably for years. They had no prospect of being able to replace it till the next Beaufort fair, which would not return for eight months; and as there were only two plough-shares for sale at the last market, there might be none at the next. Besides the risk of finding any for sale, it is necessary to undertake a journey of six hundred miles, and many poor Bushmen may thus perish for want, in consequence of the breaking of one plough-share. "The week before our arrival, Berend shot, at the Yellow river, three cameleopards, each about sixteen or seventeen feet high, and one buffalo; chiefly for the support of the Bushmen families, who are dependent on him. But all his kindness does not prevent their stealing an ox from him now and then. "Two young men, the one at Kars', the other at Berend's place, were afflicted with leprosy; and their fingers and toes were falling off. A boor, in the colony, assured Berend that he cured him The self of leprosy by rubbing his body with the fat of the sea-cow. lepers at the Mauritius are cured by being transported to the Island Diego Gaseia, and there employed in cocoa-nut-oil works; it would therefore seem that oil is a specific in this horrid disease. Two Bush girls, whom I wished to see in consequence of what I had heard of their history, where brought to the waggons. The eldest, whom they have named Flora, was about ten years of age; the youngest, Sabina, was only two years and a half old. When their mother died, their grandmother insisted that they should be thrown into the same grave with her, and buried alive; but this was prevented by the interference of Adam Kok. "We met several persons in the evening returning from the sale of a neighbouring farmer's effects, who reported that eight slaves had been sold for 16,000 rix dollars, about 1600 pounds sterling. A woman with her sucking child was sold for 5000 rix dollars, the prospect of her having more children increasing her value. A female sucking child fetched 1300 rixdollars, and a boy 3000. "Their infants cry or weep exactly as they do in England; but those who are above three or four years of age bawl out y-o-y^oy^o-y^o-y-o;-—y ̄o—yˆo—yˆo -yo-yo. "When a child recovers from a dangerous illness, a trench is dug in the ground, across the middle of which an arch is thrown, and an ox made to stand upon it; the child is then dragged under the arch. After this ceremony the animal is killed, and eaten by the married people who have children, none none else being permitted to participate of the feast. "When a person is ill, they bring an ox to the place where he is laid. Two cuts are then made in one of its legs, extending down the whole length of it. The skin in the middle of the leg being raised up, the operator thrusts in his hand, to make way for that of the sick person, whose whole body is afterwards rubbed over with the blood of the animal. The ox after enduring this torment is killed, and those who are married and have children, as in the other case, are the only partakers of the feast. "When a young man is attached to a female, and wishes to marry her, he and his companions take an ox and place it before her house. If she allow the ox to be killed, it is considered as giving her consent to the union, and the parties are immediately regarded as married persons. It occasionally happens that the ox is brought three or four times before her approval is obtained. Cupido, who resides at the Coranna town of Mobatee, has seen the young men and the ox pelted away with stones by the female herself; yet the next time probably she will give her consent to the union. "When a chief man dies he is buried in the cattle-kraal, or inclosure, with his head to the east; his grave being filled up, the cattle are brought and driven over it to tread it down, so that the place may not be discovered. Common people are buried in the fields, and stones are thrown over their graves. "Their usual method of killing cattle seems very cruel, they rip open the belly, and thrust in the hand to get hold of a particular entrail near the heart, which pulling out causes immediate death." CHAPTER CHAPTER III. BELLES LETTRES, ANTIQUITIES, AND MISCELLANEOUS. 1.-A Description of the Shetland Islands, comprising an Account of their Geology, Scenery, Antiquities, and Superstitions. By Samuel Hibbert, M. D. F. R. S. E. &c. ΤΗ HE publication of the Pirate, has given rather a new direction to this work, which was at first intended to be strictly geological. We shall quote a curious specimen of the superstitions of these regions, which were peopled by the Romans at an early period. "The dwarfs of Shetland, who dwell among the hills, are to be considered as the same malevolent beings who are to be found in the Scandinavian Edda; and as it is deemed dangerous to offend them by any terms of obloquy, however well merited, they are also named the guid folk, words of similar import being used at the present day for the self-same reason in the Feroe Islands, as well as in other places. "It does not appear that the popular belief in the personal appearance, habits, and influence of these land Trows has much varied, since, as objects of Pagan worship, they were enumerated by pious Catholics among the list of fallen angels for the Shetlander still sains or blesses himself, as he passes near their haunts, in order to get rid of his fearful visitants. Although, according to the theory of the early divines of Scotland, the light of the reformed religion ought to have long ago expelled from the land these agents of heathenism and popery, yet they are scarcely less seen than formerly, and cannot be considered as in the act of emigrating to climes where they will be more cherished. They are described at the present day, as a people of small stature, gaily dressed in habiliments of green. Brand, however, says, that in his days they were often seen in Orkney, clad in complete armour. They partake of the nature of men and spirits, yet have material bodies, with the means, however, of making themselves invisible. They have also the power of multiplying their species; thus a female of the island of Yell, who some years ago died at the advanced age of one hundred years, or more, once met some fairy children, accompanied by a little dog, playing, like other boys and girls, on the top of a hill. At another time, whilst in bed, she had occasion to stretch herself up, when seeing a little boy, with a white nightcap on his head, sitting at the fire, she asked him who he was. I am Trippa's son,' answered he. Upon hearing which, the good woman sained herself, that is, called on God to be about her, and Trippa's son immediately vanished. "Several Shetlanders, among whom whom are warlocks and witches, have enjoyed a communion with the guid folk, and, by a special indulgence, have been transported in the air, whenever occasion served, from one island to another. In their visits to Trolhouland, or any other knoll of a similar description, they have been allowed to enter the interior of a hill at one side, and to come out of it at the other; and in this subterraneous journey have been dazzled with the splendour exhibited within the recesses through which they have passed. They report that all the interior walls are adorned with gold and silver, and that the domestic utensils of the place, peculiar to Fairy-land, resemble the strange implements that are sometimes found lying abroad on the hills, which sceptical antiquaries ascribe to an early race of inhabitants who peopled Shetland. Thus there are innumerable stories told of Trows, who, in their rambles, have carelessly left behind them utensils of a shape unknown to human contrivance. Sometimes the dairy-maid observes a fairy woman in the act of clandestinely milking the cows in the byre, upon which she sains herself, when the evil spirit takes so precipitous a flight, as to leave behind her a copper pan, of a form never before seen. "The Trows of the hills have a relish for the same kind of food, that affords a sustenance to the human race, and when, for some festal occasion, they would regale themselves with good beef or mutton, they repair to the Shetlander's scatholds or town-mails, and employ elf-arrows to bring down their victims. "There ev'ry herd by sad experience knows "In Scotland, the guid folk are not the best of archers, since the triangular flints with which the shafts of their arrows are barbed do not always take effect, and are therefore found strewed on the hills; but the Shetland dwarfs are much more successful, none of their arrows having ever glanced aside, so as to afford a fertile theme of speculation for the northern antiquary, who, if they could have been found in the country, might have assigned their origin to some imaginary Pictish race that had fled from the pursuit of King Kenneth. "When the Trows are so successful as to shoot one of the best fatlings that is to be met with, they delude the eyes of its owner with the substitution of some vile substance possessing the same form as that of the animal which they have taken away, and with the semblance of its sudden death, as if it were produced either by natural or violent means. It is on this account that the bodies of animals which have perished by accident are condemned as unlawful food. A Shetlander at the present day affirms, that he was once taken into a hill by the Trows, when the first object that he saw was one of his own cows brought in for the purpose of furnishing a savoury supply for a banquet. So precarious at the same time was the man's individual preservation, that he considers himself as indebted for it to the gracious protection of a fairy lady, under whose special favour he had been admitted within the 1 the cave. On returning to his friends whom he had left on the earth's surface, he learned that at the very moment when, with his own organ of vision, he had observed the cow conveyed into the interior of the hill, other earthly had beheld the animal in the eyes act of falling over the rocks. this instance, then, the real cow had been abstracted, and an illusory image left in its place, lacerated and dead. In "As the Trows are not altogether secure from diseases, they possess among themselves medicines of as invaluable efficacy as those which, in the seventeenth century, immortalized the name of Jefferies, of Cornwall, who, with salves derived from fairies, performed many special miraculous There for example, a was, good man in the island of Unst, who had an earthen pot containing an unguent of infallible power, which he alleged was obtained by him from the hills, and like the widow's cruise, it was never exhausted of its contents. cures. These sprites are much addicted to music und dancing, and, when they make their excursions, it is generally with an imposing effect, being accompanied with the most exquisite harmony: "Like fairy elves Whose midnight revels, by a forest side, Intent, with jocund music charm his ear." "A Shetlander, while lying in bed, heard one morning before day-light the noise of a large company of Trows passing his door, accompanied by a piper. Having a musical ear, he readily learnt the air that was played, which he would afterwards repeat, calling it "Their nightly dancing ring I always dread, fair, They dance to some strange music in the air." "The Trows are addicted to the abstraction of the human species, in whose place they leave effigies of living beings named Changelings, the unholy origin of whom is known by their mental imbecility, or by some wasting disease. AIthough visits for such a purpose are to be particularly dreaded at midnight and at noon, yet to childbed women who may be designed for wet-nurses to some fairy infant of quality, the latter hour is, as in certain Asiatic countries, by far On this acthe most formidable. count, it is still a point of duty not to leave, in so fearful an hour, mothers who give suck, but, like pious St. Basil, to pray that the influence of the demon of noon may be averted. Children also are taken away to the hills, in order to be play-fellows to the infant offspring of the Trows; on which occasion all the lamentable effects have been produced that have been so well depicted by an elegant poet of Scotland, in his address to the muse of the Highlands "Then wake (for well thou canst,) that wondrous Soft o'er the floor the treacherous fairies creep, "When |