Part 1
THE PENNY MAGAZINE
OF THE
Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge.
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2.] PUBLISHED EVERY SATURDAY. [April 7, 1832
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POMPEII.
[Illustration: Restored View of Pompeii.]
⁂ The volume on ‘Pompeii,’ lately published in the Library of Entertaining Knowledge, contains every authentic detail of the destruction of that city by an eruption of Mount Vesuvius, A.D. 79; and the second volume, which will be shortly published, will complete the description of the remains of public and private buildings, and of articles of domestic use, which have been discovered in the ruins. The following observations on this interesting subject are from an intelligent correspondent, who has had the advantage of visiting the spot.
It is certainly surprising, that this most interesting city should have remained undiscovered until so late a period, and that antiquaries and learned men should have so long and materially erred about its situation. In many places masses of ruins, portions of the buried theatres, temples, and houses were not two feet below the surface of the soil; the country people were continually digging up pieces of worked marble, and other antique objects; in several spots they had even laid open the outer walls of the town; and yet men did not find out _what it was_, that peculiar, isolated mound of cinders and ashes, earth and pumice-stone, covered. There is another circumstance which increases the wonder of Pompeii remaining so long concealed. A subterranean canal, cut from the river Sarno, traverses the city, and is seen darkly and silently gliding on under the temple of Isis. This is said to have been cut towards the middle of the fifteenth century, to supply the contiguous town of the Torre dell’ Annunziata with fresh water; it probably ran anciently in the same channel. But, cutting it, or clearing it, workmen must have crossed under Pompeii from one side to the other.
As you walk round the walls of the city, and see how the volcanic matter is piled upon it in one heap, it looks as though the hand of man had purposely buried it, by carrying and throwing over it the volcanic matter. This matter does not spread in any direction beyond the town, over the fine plain which gently declines towards the bay of Naples. The volcanic eruption was so confined in its course or its fall, as to bury Pompeii, and only Pompeii: for the shower of ashes and pumice-stone which descended in the immediate neighbourhood certainly made but a slight difference in the elevation of the plain.
Where a town has been buried by lava, like Herculaneum, the process is easily traced. You can follow the black, hardened lava from the cone of the mountain to the sea, whose waters it invaded for “many a rood,” and those who have seen the lava in its liquid state, when it flows on like a river of molten iron, can conceive at once how it would bury every thing it found in its way. There is often a confusion of ideas, among those who have not had the advantages of visiting these interesting places, as to the matter which covers Pompeii and Herculaneum: they fancy they were both buried by lava. Herculaneum was so, and the work of excavating there, was like digging in a quarry of very hard stone. The descent into the places cleared is like the descent into a quarry or mine, and you are always under ground, lighted by torches.
But Pompeii was covered by loose mud, pumice-stone, and ashes, over which, in the course of centuries, there collected vegetable soil. Beneath this shallow soil, the whole is very crumbly and easy to dig, in few spots more difficult than one of our common gravel-pits. The matter excavated is carried off in carts, and thrown outside of the town; and in times when the labour is carried on with activity, as cart after cart withdraws with the earth that covered them, you see houses entire, except their roofs, which have nearly always fallen in, make their appearance, and, by degrees, a whole street opens to the sun-shine or the shower, just like the streets of any inhabited neighbouring town. It is curious to observe, as the volcanic matter is removed, that the houses are principally built of lava, the more ancient product of the same Vesuvius, whose later results buried and concealed Pompeii for so many ages.
[Illustration: Implements of building found at Pompeii.]
In the autumn of 1822 I saw Pompeii under very interesting circumstances. It was a few days after an eruption of Vesuvius, which I had witnessed, and which was considered by far the grandest eruption of recent times. From Portici, our road was coated with lapilla or pumice-stone, and a fine impalpable powder, of a palish grey hue, that had been discharged from the mountain, round whose base we were winding. In many places this coating was more than a foot deep, but it was pretty equally spread, not accumulating in any particular spot. As we drove into Pompeii our carriage wheels crushed this matter, which contained the principal components of what had buried the city: it was lodged on the edges of the houses’ walls, and on their roofs, (where the Neapolitan government had furnished them with any); it lay inches thick on the tops of the pillars and truncated columns of the ancient temples; it covered all the floors or the houses that had no roofs, and concealed the mosaics. In the amphitheatre, where we sat down to refresh ourselves, we were obliged to make the guides clear it away with shovels--it was everywhere. Looking from the upper walls of the amphitheatre, we saw the whole country covered with it--trees and all were coated with the pale-grey plaster, nor did it disappear for many months after.
Some ignorant fellows at Naples pretended the fine ashes, or powder, contained gold! Neapolitans began to collect it. They found no gold, but it turned out to be an excellent thing for cleaning and polishing plate.
This dust continued to be blown from the mountain many days after the eruption had ceased. It once made a pretty figure of me! I was riding up the Posilippo road when it came on to rain; the rain brought down and gave consistency to the dust, which adhered to my black coat and pantaloons, until I looked as if I had been rolled in plaster of Paris.
But it travelled farther than Posilippo, for a friend of mine, an officer in the navy, assured me it had fallen with rain on the deck of his ship, when between three and four hundred miles from Naples and Mount Vesuvius. There is an old story, that during one of the great eruptions of this mountain, or Etna, cinders were thrown as far as Constantinople: by substituting the fine powder I have alluded to, for cinders, the story becomes not improbable.
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VAN DIEMEN’S LAND.
[Concluded from our last.]
The island of Van Diemen’s Land lies immediately to the south of the vast continent of New Holland, from which it is separated by the narrow channel called Bass’s Strait. If New Holland be regarded as a great full bag or sack, Bass’s Strait will represent the neck, where it is drawn together and tied close, and Van Diemen’s Land the small bunch or gathering made beyond the string by the mere lip of the sack. While New Holland is rather more than half as large as all Europe, the extent of Van Diemen’s Land is only about twenty-three thousand square miles, which is not much more than two-thirds of the size of Ireland, or a fourth part of that of the island of Great Britain. The one, in fact, is about eighty times as large as the other.
One of the papers in the Van Diemen’s Land Almanac presents us with a very full geographical description of the island. It was divided soon after its settlement into two great counties, Buckinghamshire, embracing the southern, and Cornwall, the northern portion of it. But the division which is now chiefly recognised, is that made in 1827 into eight Police districts, each under the charge of a paid magistrate. In the first of these, occupying the south-west corner of the island, stands Hobart Town, the capital, on the river Derwent, and about twenty miles from its mouth. The river, however, is, even at this distance from the sea, of considerable width, and the water is quite salt. The town stands upon a gently rising ground, and covers rather more than a square mile. Its streets are wide, and intersect each other at right angles. It contains several government buildings, a parish church, and other places of worship; a government school for the poor, and several Sunday schools; two public banks; and several libraries. Among its manufactories Hobart Town possesses a distillery, several breweries and tanneries, two timber mills, several flour mills worked by steam and water, and two or three soap and candle works. The population of the town and suburbs, including the convicts and the military, is above seven thousand. This, we believe, is about half the amount of the whole population of the island.
The other towns already founded in Van Diemen’s Land, are, Launceston, on the river Tamar, about a hundred and twenty miles north from the capital, containing about a thousand inhabitants; New Norfolk, or Elizabeth Town, a place of considerable traffic, and also the centre of a rich agricultural district, standing on the Derwent, about twenty-two miles higher up than Hobart Town; Richmond, fourteen miles from the capital; Sorell Town, or Pitt Water, and Brighton, two other townships in the same vicinity; Bothwell, Oatlands, Campbell Town, Ross, Perth, and George Town, all considerably advanced settlements. Many other stations, however, have been marked out for towns, although scarcely yet begun to be built upon. Numerous farm-houses, also, and other detached residences, many of them standing in the midst of enclosed fields, gardens, and orchards, have been built in all directions. A single agricultural association, called the Van Diemen’s Land Company, possess a continuous tract of above three hundred thousand acres, in the north-west part of the island. About four hundred and fifty persons reside on this property. There are two government settlements for persons convicted of crimes in the colony, Macquarie Harbour on the west coast, and Maria Island on the east.
The face of the country, though extremely diversified, is mountainous on the whole, and, especially as seen from the south, presents a prospect of singular sublimity; hills covered to the ridge with trees, occasionally intermingled with a bare rocky eminence, appearing to rise behind each other in endless succession. Some of the mountains on the south coast are five thousand feet in height, and during a great part of the year are covered with snow. Mount Wellington, or the Table Mountain, a few miles to the west of Hobart Town, rises to the height of four thousand feet above the level of the sea. The interior, however, contains many extensive plains quite unencumbered with wood. Even the western coast, where the scenery in general is bold and desolate, presents many protected and fertile spots. The bays and harbours around the coast are numerous and excellent. In this respect Hobart Town especially is most favourably situated. The principal rivers are the Derwent, the Huon, and the Tamar, all navigable. The Derwent, even at New Norfolk, above forty miles from the sea, is as wide as the Thames at Battersea. The scenery on both sides of this noble stream is described as being of the richest beauty. The second-rate and inferior rivers are numerous, fertilizing every part of the country, and falling into the sea along the whole extent of the coast. In the heart of the island are several lakes, from which many of the rivers take their rise.
Much of the native timber of Van Diemen’s Land is excellent for all building purposes; and others of the woods are esteemed for ornamental cabinet-work. All the trees are evergreens. The shrubs are of great variety and beauty; but present as yet an almost unexamined field to the botanist. As to fruits, none of any value have been found native to this island; but on the other hand, every sort of fruit, herb, or vegetable, that grows in England, grows still better here.
In respect of climate, Van Diemen’s Land enjoys the happiest medium between the extremes of heat and cold, the thermometer rarely falling below 40 degrees in winter, or rising above 70 degrees in summer. During the winter months of June, July, and August, the frosts are sometimes severe, and occasionally a good deal of snow falls; but it is seldom that snow lies on the ground a whole day.
Coal has been found in various places; iron-stone is believed to be abundant; lime-stone also exists in great plenty; and it is highly probable that the earth is enriched with various other mineral treasures. Of the native animals, the most formidable is the hyena, by which many of the sheep are destroyed. Wild dogs and cats of different species are also found in the woods. The kangaroo is now fast disappearing, having, although a perfectly harmless animal, been much hunted by the settlers for sport, or for the sake of its flesh and skin. There are numerous species of birds, many of them of beautiful plumage. Various descriptions of fish also abound in the bays and creeks; but, except eels, the lakes and rivers supply very few that are valuable as food. Of the reptiles found in the island, the principal are snakes, some of which are extremely venomous.
Such is an abstract of what is most important in the paper before us, which is followed by a more minute description of the parts of the island that have been brought into cultivation, in the form of an itinerary. We will now add a very few facts, selected from another paper, on the agriculture and horticulture of the colony.
The first cattle were brought to Van Diemen’s Land in 1807. They were “a coarse buffalo sort of animal:” but, about nine or ten years ago, superior breeds began to be imported from England, and the colony now possesses pure Devons, Herefords, Durhams, Holdernesses, Fifeshires, &c. Horses were at first brought from New Holland; but, “in the same manner as with neat cattle,” says this account, “they have since had the benefit of very superior crosses of English importations, and the colony can now boast as fine horses as even England itself. It has every sort, perhaps, that is known in the mother-country, from the heavy dray-horse to the diminutive pony, and including, what should by no means be passed in silence, blood and bone upon which thousands have been depending at Newmarket and other English race-courses.” Sheep, for which both the climate and natural herbage of the country are well adapted, are now numerous and rapidly improving in quality. Pigs and poultry, of every description, thrive admirably. Most sorts of grain that are common in England, grow at least as well here. The wheat is of excellent quality, seldom weighing less than from sixty-two to sixty-four pounds per bushel. Barley and oats produce well upon good land; but will not answer on inferior soils. The average return yielded by the potato is not equal to what it yields in England; but the cultivation of this root is yet in its infancy. Turnips and mangel-wurzel are both found to do extremely well. The same may be said of English grasses and pulses of all sorts.
The export trade from this colony has, as yet, been confined to the more useful articles. Corn is sent to New South Wales, and to Swan River. Wool is already exported in considerable quantities, and is likely to become every year more and more the staple production of the island. Whale-fishing and the manufacture of oil are rapidly becoming trades of considerable importance. A good deal of mimosa bark, for tanning, is also sent to England; and salt meats, hides, and dairy produce will probably soon be added to the list of exported commodities.
The regulations at present in force for the disposal of land, by grant or sale, were issued in 1828. The main principle upon which they are grounded is, that “settlers should not receive a greater extent of land than they are capable of improving, and that grants should not be made to persons who are desirous only of disposing of them.” Lands are accordingly granted in square miles, in the proportion of one square mile, or 640 acres, for every £500 sterling of capital which the applicant can immediately command. Of this capital, however, a portion may consist of live stock and instruments of husbandry. Upon the land thus granted a quit-rent is imposed at the rate of £5 per cent. on the estimated value of the land, the payment to commence at the expiration of seven years from the date of the grant, when the settler will also receive his title-deeds. The smallest quantity of land granted in this way to an individual is 320 acres, and the largest, 2560 acres, or four square miles. Lands may also be obtained by purchase, being advertised for that purpose, and sold to the person making the highest tender.
We will, in conclusion, mention a few of the more interesting particulars, supplied by the various lists in the little volume before us; these are indicative of the rapid progress of civilization. In addition to the three banks in Hobart Town we find a fourth, called the Cornwall bank, established at Launceston. There is at Hobart Town a Mechanics’ Institute, of which the Governor is patron, and the Chief Justice, president. Among the religious and philanthropic institutions of this capital are, a Bible Society, of which the Governor is president; a Presbyterian Missionary Society; a Wesleyan Missionary Society; a Benevolent and Strangers’ Friend Society; and a Sunday School Union, having four schools in its connexion, containing in all about 250 children. Besides the Government Gazette, there are three other weekly newspapers published in Hobart Town, and a fourth at Launceston. The Almanac closes with a Directory for Hobart Town; in which, besides merchants, general dealers, official, clerical, and other professional characters, we find the names of civil engineers, livery-stable keepers, watchmakers, midwives, shoemakers, bricklayers, milliners, portrait painters, and engravers, chemists and druggists, pastry-cooks, confectioners, glaziers, plumbers, house and sign painters, hatters, upholsterers, cabinet-makers and undertakers, coopers, boat-builders, auctioneers, goldsmiths, and working-jewellers, music teachers, tailors, butchers, brewers, hosiers and glovers, ironmongers, brass and iron founders, tinmen and blacksmiths, printers, saddlers, bakers, hair-dressers. It would be curious to compare this list with the population of an English town of seven thousand people three centuries ago!
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LOST CAMEL.
A dervise was journeying alone in the desert, when two merchants suddenly met him: “You have lost a camel,” said he to the merchants. “Indeed we have,” they replied. “Was he not blind in his right eye, and lame in his left leg?” said the dervise. “He was,” replied the merchants. “Had he lost a front tooth?” said the dervise. “He had,” rejoined the merchants. “And was he not loaded with honey on one side, and wheat on the other?” “Most certainly he was,” they replied; “and as you have seen him so lately, and marked him so particularly, you can, in all probability, conduct us unto him.” “My friends,” said the dervise, “I have never seen your camel, nor ever heard of him, but from you.” “A pretty story, truly!” said the merchants, “but where are the jewels, which formed a part of his cargo?” “I have neither seen your camel nor your jewels,” repeated the dervise. On this, they seized his person, and forthwith hurried him before the Cadi, where, on the strictest search, nothing could be found upon him, nor could any evidence whatever be adduced to convict him, either of falsehood or of theft. They were then about to proceed against him as a sorcerer, when the dervise, with great calmness, thus addressed the Court: “I have been much amused with your surprise, and own that there has been some ground for your suspicions; but I have lived long, and alone; and I can find ample scope for observation, even in a desert. I knew that I had crossed the track of a camel that had strayed from its owner, because I saw no mark of any human footstep on the same route; I knew that the animal was blind in one eye, because it had cropped the herbage only on one side of its path; and I perceived that it was lame in one leg, from the faint impression which that particular foot had produced upon the sand; I concluded that the animal had lost one tooth, because wherever it had grazed, a small tuft of herbage was left uninjured in the centre of its bite. As to that which formed the burden of the beast, the busy ants informed me that it was corn on the one side, and the clustering flies that it was honey on the other.”
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_Science preceding Art._--When the principles of any science are become common to all the world, these principles lead to inventions, nearly, if not altogether similar, by different persons having no communication with each other. A remarkable instance of this is given by Judge Story, in his address to the Boston Mechanics’ Institute:--
“A beautiful improvement had been made in the double-speeder of the cotton-spinning machine by one of our ingenious countrymen. The originality of the invention was established by the most satisfactory evidence. The defendant, however, called an Englishman as a witness, who had been but a short time in the country, and who testified most explicitly to the existence of a like invention in the improved machinery in England. Against such positive proof there was much difficulty in proceeding. The testimony, though doubted, could not be discredited; and the trial was postponed to another term, for the purpose of procuring evidence to rebut it. An agent was despatched to England for this and other objects; and, upon his return, the plaintiff was content to become nonsuited. There was no doubt that the invention here was without any suspicion of its existence elsewhere; but the genius of each country, almost at the same moment, accomplished, independently, the same achievement.”
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BRITISH ANIMALS.
[Illustration: A dormouse sitting on a tree stump.]
THE DORMOUSE
The little dormouse has now awakened from his fitful sleep. When the winds of March sweep away the lingering fogs of winter,--when the tender buds are first seen on the trees, and the primrose first shows its head in the green banks--before the swallow comes to our shores, or the rook has finished her nest--the dormouse rouses up from the bed where he has slept for several months. His sleep, however, is not constant through the cold season, like that of some other animals; for he wakes, at times, to eat of the store of nuts and beech-mast which he has provided for his sustenance in the autumn. The marmot, a quadruped inhabiting some mountainous parts of Europe, makes no provision of this kind in his subterranean galleries. He sleeps completely.