Old Authors, selections from, recom- Organs of Voice in Man and Animals. Origin and progress of written cha- Papyrus Manuscript of the Psalms, 3 231 Pfaltz, or Castle of the Palatinate, 98 Planetary System, grandeur of, 120 its lawfulness or unlawful- Plumage of Birds, 116 Popular Errors and Superstitions, 220 Pottery and Porcelain 31, 135 how to appreciate, 239 115 Proper modes of taking Exercise, 102 Raikes, Robert, anecdote of, 167 Robert Hall on the neces- Retrospection, advantages of, 93 Rhine, No. II., The Hochkreuz, or Rich and great men not always happy, Ripon Minster, 234 Rogers, remark by, on Travelling, 108 Rural Funerals, 204 Russia, I., Winter Travelling in, 49 Satire and Ridicule, dangerous, 243 Secret Writing, the Art of, 224 Scenery of the Blue Mountains, Snowdon, 247 Solar System, the, lines on, 8 Soul, the, 35 South American Slave-market, 69 lines by, on his Library, 142 Stormy Petrels, immense stream of, 157 Swamp in the Southern States of Swan River, natives of, 29 Switzerland, Hermit of, 141 Tale of the Indian Wars, 155 Testimony, remark on its weight, 54 Thorn-Apple, common, 149 Tillotson, extract from, 31 dissipation of, 199 Trade, beneficial effects of, 142 Travelling, enjoyment of, 50 Turkey, Rites of Burial and Cemete- ries in, 36 Turks, Manners and Customs of the, Turner, Sharon, extract from, 157 Ultramarine and Cobalt, how pre- Useful Arts; The Sheep, the Hog, 14 Sumner, Bishop J. B., extract from, 35 28 INDEX TO THE ENGRAVINGS. Egyptian Hieroglyphics, 52, 53 Etruscan Vases, 32 Fairhead, view of, 209 Fowl, varieties of the common, 24 Godesberg on the Rhine, Cross at, 113 Grass-tree, and Natives of New South Grose River, from Govatt's Leap, 177 Havre, entrance to the harbour of, 176 Hellebore, white, fetid, and black, 96 Innspruck, the capital of the Tyrol, 137 Karnak, Ruins of the Temple of, 48 Lasso, mode of throwing the, in South 25 Londonderry Cathedral, Mandrake, forked roots of the, 228 Whately, Archbishop, on the admis- the stay and solace of Man in Wreck at Sea, 37 Young Chemist, the, 8, 167, 183 Russian Serf, Cottage of the, 89 Scio, Fountain in the Island of, 225 Seal, common, 198 Sedge, Great Panicled, 4 Skating Soldiers of Norway, 9 168 Sleep of Plants, illustrations of the Southwark Bridge, 128 Turkish Funeral, Procession to a, 36 Venice, Ducal Palace at, 249 Colounade and Library in the Whale, common Greenland, 156 Wild Bird Catching, 164 UNDER THE DIRECTION OF THE COMMITTEE OF GENERAL LITERATURE AND EDUCATION, APPOINTED BY THE SOCIETY FOR PROMOTING CHRISTIAN KNOWLEDGE. man. A RHINOCEROS ATTACKED BY ELEPHANTS. THE Rhinoceros * is the least intelligent of the larger quadrupeds. Fierce and intractable, it is at all times very formidable, as well to animals as to Being protected by nature with a skin like a coat of armour, it commits the greatest devastations with impunity. It is a native both of Asia and of Africa, though the species found in the two countries greatly differ; the Rhinoceros of Africa having two horns on the snout, while that of Asia has only one. Of the former, Mr. Bruce says, "When pursued, and in fear, the Rhinoceros possesses an astonishing degree of swiftness, considering his size, the apparent unwieldiness of his body, his great weight before, and the shortness of his legs. He is long, and has a kind of trot, which, after a few minutes, increases, in a great proportion, and takes in a great distance. It is not true that on a plain he beats the horse in swiftness. I have passed him with ease, and seen many more mounted do the same; and though it is certainly true that a horse can very seldom come up with him, this is owing to his cunning, not to his swiftness. He passes constantly from wood to wood, and forces himself into the thickest parts of them. The dry trees are broken down as with a cannon-shot, and fall about him in all directions. Others that are more pliable, greener, and fuller of sap, are bent back by his weight and the velocity of his motion; and, after he has passed, restoring themselves like a green branch to their natural position, they sweep the incautious pursuer and his horse from the ground, and dash them in pieces against the surrounding trees." Of the two species of this animal, one is called the bicornis, or two-horned, and the other the unicornis, or one-horned: the latter has been supposed to be the unicorn of Scripture. The former is, I believe, peculiar to Africa: it is never known in India, where the onehorned Rhinoceros alone is found. Its size is only inferior to that of the elephant, although it is considerably smaller. Its bulk, however, is greater in proportion to its height; and, from its superior courage and activity, it is a much more formidable creature. Its head resembles that of a pig; and it has two small, dull eyes, which give it an appearance at once stupid and intractable. Its length, not including the tail, is from eleven to twelve feet, and the circumference of its body about the same; though it is said sometimes to exceed this standard. It occasionally, though rarely, attains to the height of seven feet, and is amazingly strong; while its skin is so hard and thick, as to be generally impervious to a musket-ball. The hide is curiously divided into sections, and the different divisions are adapted with such exquisite precision, as to have the appearance, at a short distance, of a beautiful coat of mail. It is extremely rough, and offers so complete a resistance to the touch, as not to yield in the slightest degree to the strongest pressure. The only vulnerable parts are the belly, the eyes, and near the ears. bone, but when the Rhinoceros is in its ordinary state, stands loose between the nostrils; the moment, however, the animal is excited to resistance by the approach or attack of a foe, the muscular tension is so great that the horn instantly becomes immoveably fixed, and he is able to dart it into the trunk of a tree to the depth of several inches. The upper lip of the Rhinoceros is of great length, and remarkably pliant, acting like a sort of proboscis, by which he grasps the roots of trees, and other esculent substances, and it is capable of contraction or expansion, as circumstances may require. "With this lip," says Bruce, "and the assistance of his tongue, he pulls down the upper branches which have most leaves, and these he devours first. Having stripped the tree of its branches, he does not directly abandon it; but, placing his snout as low in the trunk as he finds his horn will enter, he rips up the body of the tree, and reduces it to thin pieces, like so many laths; and when he has thus prepared it, he embraces as much as he can of it in his monstrous jaws, and twists it round with as much ease as an ox would do a root of celery." The female generally produces only a single young one at a birth, which attains to a full state of maturity in about fifteen years. The Rhinoceros is so stupid, and of so savage a disposition, that it seems to exist merely to gratify a voracious appetite. It is the terror of its native woods, and if it had been a gregarious animal, would have been a terrible scourge to the countries in which it is found. When excited, it displays paroxysms of fury which render it highly dangerous for any one to approach. As it is of a temper much less mild than the elephant, it is far more formidable when exasperated, on account of its greater activity and more desperate ferocity. The voraciousness of this creature is extraordinary; it will consume as much as an elephant, and is always very fierce if intruded upon whilst feeding. A young Rhinoceros, only two years old, sent from Bengal in 1739, cost a thousand pounds sterling for food, including the expenses of its passage. When the Rhinoceros and Elephant meet, which is not very often the case, the conflict is terrific. The former will stand his ground, even though surrounded by a herd of elephants, by which indeed he is generally destroyed, though not without making a desperate resistance. He will frequently inflict a mortal wound upon one or two before he is subdued. The Elephant, therefore, always approaches him with extreme reluctance: if the Rhinoceros succeeds in making good his stroke at his huge adversary, it generally proves fatal; his horn, ploughing through the side, exposes the intestines, and the gigantic creature falls dead. If, however, the Elephant is successful in preventing the rush of his enemy, he receives him upon his tusks, which inflict too severe a wound to enable the Rhinoceros to renew the encounter. The timidity of the Elephant generally causes it to have the worst in conflicts with this mailed foe, so that the latter is seldom molested, and consequently roams at large as the monarch of the jungle; even the tiger and the lion shun him, as an enemy not to be provoked without peril. This animal is of very sequestered habits: it traverses the most impenetrable jungles alone, and is the terror of every creature with which it comes in contact, although it seldom attacks unless provoked by aggression. The horn upon its nose, which is thick and pointed, curves upwards towards the forehead, forming an acute angle with the bone of the snout, and projecting from it about thirty inches. It is a most fearful weapon; so much so, that even the colossal elephant has been frequently laid prostrate" by a well-directed stroke from the armed head of this terrible adversary. The horn does not adhere to the * See Saturday Magazine, Vol. I., p. 224.. The following account of the Rhinoceros is extremely curious, being by the celebrated Baher, Emperor of the Moguls, and is to be found in his autobiography, translated by Dr. Leyden and Mr. Erskine. "The Rhinoceros," writes this remarkable man, is a huge animal; its bulk is equal to that of three buffaloes. The opinion prevalent in our countries, that a Rhinoceros can lift an Elephant on its horn, is probably a mistake. It has a single horn over its NATURE, USES, AND MANUFACTURE OF THE various processes by means of which natural productions become available to the arts of life, deserve inquiry on the part of all persons who desire an insight into the general adaptation of matter to man. The changes undergone by almost all substances, as they pass through the hands of industry to their destined uses, as, for instance, the progressive transition of the ore of lead, from the dark recesses of the mine, through the fire of the furnace, to the brilliant pigment ready to the painter's brush; such changes, so variously and craftily wrought, are found to be not unworthy of notice, even when the subject is one of such familiar and universal occurrence as white paint. Trusting, therefore, to that interest which usually attends the detail of operations carried on remotely from the sphere in which we daily move, it is our intention to collect a few particulars respecting the manufacture of a more equable substance than the above, namely, that which is at the head of our present article. nose, upwards of a span in length, but I never saw one of two spans. Out of one of the largest of these horns I had a drinking-vessel* made, and a dice-box, and about three or four fingers' bulk of it might be left. Its hide is very thick: if it be shot at with a powerful bow, drawn up to the arm-pit with much force, and if the arrow pierces at all, it enters only three or four fingers' breadth. They say, however, that there are parts of his skin that may be pierced, and the arrows enter deep. On the sides of its two shoulder-blades and of its two thighs, are folds which hang loose, and appear at a distance like cloth housings dangling over it. It bears more resemblance to the horse than to any other animalt. As the horse has a large stomach, so has this ;- -as the pastern of the horse is composed of a single bone, so also is that of the Rhinoceros ;- -as there is a gumek‡ in the horse's fore-leg, so is there in that of the Rhinoceros. It is more ferocious than the elephant, and cannot be rendered so tame or obedient. There are numbers of them in the jungles of Pershâwer and Hashnaghar, as well as between the rivers Sind and Behreh, in the jungles. In Hindostan too they abound, on the But our readers will not perhaps object to accombanks of the river Sirwu§. In the course of my pany us to the rural scene, with which we would assoexpedition into Hindostan, in the jungles of Per-ciate our recollections of the Charcoal-burner and his shawer and Hashnaghar, I frequently killed the Rhinoceros. It strikes powerfully with its horn, with which, in the course of these hunts, many men and horses were gored. J. H. C. The Rhinoceros' horn was supposed to sweat on the approach of poison, a quality which fitted it, in a peculiar manner, for being made into a drinking-cup for an eastern king. It has more the appearance of a huge over-grown hog. A marginal note on the Tûrki copy, translates gumek, marrow. PAPYRUS MANUSCRIPT OF THE PSALMS. A PORTION of the Book of Psalms, written on papyrus, probably the earliest fragment of Sacred Writ known to exist, has recently been brought into this country, from Egypt, by Dr. Hogg, who gives the following account of it. "Among the various objects of antiquity which were purchased from the Arabs, at Thebes, were two papyri, the one in Coptic, the other in Greek; both in the form of books. The subject of the Coptic papyrus, now in the possession of Sir William Gell, at Naples, has not yet been ascertained; but since my return to England, the Greek papyrus has been discovered to contain a portion of the Psalms. The leaves, of about ten inches in length, by seven in width, are arranged, and have been sown together like those of an ordinary book. They are formed of strips of the papyrus plant, crossing each other at right angles. The writing, continued on both sides, is perfectly legible, the letters partaking both of the uncial and cursive forms, sometimes standing quite apart, unconnected by cursive strokes, with accents, occasionally, but not regularly, inserted. "The beginning of the manuscript is imperfect, and it concludes with the second verse of the thirtyfourth Psalm. The text, as far as it has been collated, has been found to be a good one, and to possess some interesting variations not found in other ancient versions. These papyri were both discovered among the rubbish of an ancient convent at Thebes, remarkable as still presenting some fragments of an inscription, purporting to be a pastoral letter from Athanasius, Patriarch of Alexandria, who died A.D. 371, which has been conjectured to be the age of the manuscript." [DR. HOGG's Visit to Alexandria, Damascus, and Jerusalem.] fiery craft. Indeed, if it be possible for language to describe faithfully such a spot as that to which we allude, the charm imparted to our detail by the contemplation of its beauties, will not fail to draw on the attention of any reader whose mind is capable of appreciating the graces of a woodland scene. Newington Moor opened unexpectedly upon our view, during a ramble over the picturesque country about the coast of South Kent. We had already explored more than one of those valleys, or perhaps salt-water inlets, which agreeably diversify the walks in the neighbourhood of Hythe and Saltwood; but we had met with nothing which could compare with the peculiar features of the moor. Leaving the road from Newington to Beachborough village, by a narrow footway, which presents itself opposite the sandy banks to the left, we were at once struck with the lively characters of a marshy tract, overshadowed by alders and lofty ashes, which appeared to extend far into the bosom of some low hills, partly occupied by hop-gardens, and partly by variably productive crops of mangel-wurzel, lucerne, and wheat. Immediately before us was a flour-mill, turned by the water of a stream which takes its rise a mile to the north, at the base of the chalk-downs, and enters the moor beneath a brick arch, broadly stretched above where the road intersects its course. At this moment, the scene, circumscribed by a few yards, was our principal inducement to deviate from the road; the stroke of a water-mill, indeed, seldom fails to arrest one's step for a moment: the simple ingenuity of the machine, the lively sound, and agreeable sense of falling waters, especially in summer-time, conspiring to recommend it to the respect of a moment's regard. Upon advancing farther into the valley, a rude plankbridge offered us safe conduct towards the mill and the rustic cottage at its side; but we preferred entering the vale, for its wildness had already attracted our attention through the trees which overshadowed the path. The vegetation of this moor (which, by means of obstruction offered to the streamlet in its bosom, has become, in the greater part, a poachy morass,) is unusually luxuriant. The gladwyn (Iris pseudacorus) bar-reed, (Sparganium rainasum,) the rush and sedge-tribes, rise around in giant proportions; but there was one species of sedge (Carex paniculata,) which we had not observed elsewhere, but which on this spot presented a novel and very interest ing appearance. Its roots, continually decaying from below, and advancing from above, form, in the course of years, solid cones of vegetable earth, from the summit of which spring forth plenteous crowns of slender leaves and flowers; the whole group of a single plant, or rather family of plants, frequently mea20 24 ilmene bot quarters in which the burner and his family were lodged. A spacious caravan occupied the ground in front of the burning; a little to the left was a green cone of turf, about eight feet in height, which, upon our walking round it, proved to be a chamber so constructed for temporary use. These dwellings, with the familiar appendages of a line of drying clothes, a water-tub, a rough-haired and much-besooted dog, tied up to a beech, groups of black bags of the coal, and various "lots" of cleft billets, together with the decent presence of the matron and newly-married wife of the burner and his son, constituted a picture which would have tempted the pencil of a far more able draughtsman than either of the observers, whose rude sketches, however, may convey some notion of the scene. The hut, indeed, took our attention very much, being such a bride-chamber as could have wowong wadi gratified the ambition of the most romantic lovers. Its turfy sides were verdantly clad with grass; a rough piece of canvas, suspended over the entrance, sufficed as a door, at the same time that it admitted air and light ad libitum, performing, in fact, the threefold duty of ventilator, window, and door. Averse as my lady of the hut might have been to such a comparison, her simple chamber at once recalled to our memories the almost as simple huts of the natives of New Caledonia, and of the Esquimaux, the most readily available materials being employed upon the construction of each of the three dwellings. The hut of the New Caledonian is finished upon a frame-work of strong reeds, the interlacing of which within the conical roof, would seem likely at once to suggest a style of art having much resemblance to our gothic architecture: the exterior is thatched with the foliage of grasses, &c., and attention is carefully directed to the did. suring eight feet from the base of the cone to the summit of the foliage. These cones, accumulating fast and contiguously upon the impracticable face of a barren morass, and gradually approximating through the farther access of vegetable matter upon their sides, as well as upon their heads, eventually prove, in many cases, the means of converting the most unproductive tracts into land capable of tillage, and offering singular advantage to the judicious hand of the agriculturist. Pursuing the course of the stream by the most practicable path which we could find, and having crossed it at length by a plank lying upon the oozing moor-soil, beneath a group of young alders, we at last reached the spot with which we associate our recollections of the Charcoal-burner. Upon first descrying the gloomy and mysterious cloud of dusky smoke, which arose from the burning heap and obscured the hill side, beneath the shelter of which the manufacture was carried on, our contemplations were immediately exchanged for all the variety of recollections of handicraft and household economy, revived in us by the very thought of charcoal. On approaching the heap, which, indeed, except by that dense, gray column of smoke, did not at once meet observation, being three parts surrounded by a rude hurdle-fence, and open only in that direction towards which the current of the valley seldom bure the wind, we were struck with the substantial preservation, and probably the defensibility, of the structure, by means of a strong fence, also of reeds, which, encircling the hut, is open only where a narrow passage is found opposite to the door-way. See Cut in page 8. icebound storms of heaven, the faithful witness of The hut of the Esquimaux*, the offspring of the dence, is constructed of squared masses of snow, the unfailing resources of reason guided by Provirudely arranged in the form of a dome; the interior being ventilated by means of an aperture from above; and being approached from below by a long and narrow passage composed of the self-same material. : Charcoal, as must be familiar to most of our readers, proves of various and very important use in the arts and manufactures, as well as in domestic economy. Two of the most conspicuous advantages, See Saturday Magazine, Vol. III., p. 209. |