ces confifted of dancing, of tumbling, or of balancing, to the mufic*. It appears, indeed, that dancing and tumbling, in former times, differed but little, if at all, from each other; at leaft, they feem to be often confounded: a remarkable inftance occurs to my memory. In a fplendid manufcript, written and illuminated at the commencement of the thir D teenth century, which contains a fhort Bible hiftory, embellished with many curious paintings, there is one picture reprefenting the daughter of Herodias in the prefence of Herod; but, inftead of dancing, according to our acception of the word, fhe is literally tumbling, or making a fo. merfault, with her hands upon the ground. EXTRACTS FROM SONNINI'S TRAVELS IN UPPER AND LOWER EGYPT. Account of Baths at Siout. URING my tay at Siout I conftantly frequented the baths, to which I had taken a great liking, and which appeared to me to have a very falutary effect. These baths are nei ther fo handfome, nor kept in fuch good order as thofe at Cairo. Belides the different manners of kneading the flesh, of fuppling the limbs, and of rubbing the body, the Sybarites of this part of the country take great pleasure in having the foles of their feet rubbed, in their own houses, with pieces of pumice ftone. The fort that is the most esteemed for this ufe is of a blackish caft; it is fhaped like a fhuttle cut with a feather-edge on one fide, and a flat furface is left on the other. This fhape is the moft convenient for the hand of the perfon who applies the friction. The flat fide, or the bottom, is ftriped with deep denticulations, which give it the roughness of a large file, and which fcrape the foles of the feet in a fuperior manner. The pieces of pumice-ftone thus formed are called in Arabic el bakke The beft are faid to come from Palef tine. The operation of having the foles of the feet roughly rubbed is one of the chief pleafures of the Egyptians; but at firft it is infupportable to Europeans, and occafions involun-" tary motions and ftartings, which are excited by the fenfibility of the parts. After a certain time, these too delicate fenfations are no longer felt ; and at length this operation becomes agreeable, especially when it is performed by an experienced hand. Intoxicating quality of Hemp. Hemp is cultivated in the plains of these countries; but it is not fpun into thread as in Europe, although it might probably anfwer for that purpofe. It is, nevertheless, a plant very much in ufe. For want of intoxicating liquors, the Arabs and Egyptians compofe from it different preparations, which throw them into a fort of pleafing inebriety, a state of reverie that infpires gaiety, and occafions agreeable dreams. This kind of annihilation of the faculty of thinking,. this kind of flumber of the foul, bears no refemblance to the intoxication produced by wine or strong liquors, and Reprefentations of all these performances frequently occur in the illuminated MSS. whence feveral examples are given in the first and fecond volumes of the Manners and Cuftoms of the English. + In Bibl. Harl. infig. 1527. Another painting, reprefenting a girl tumbling upon her hand to the mufic, occurs in a MSS. in the Cotton Library, marked Domitian, A II.; which is nearly as ancient as that above mentioned. and the French language affords no terms by which it can be expreffed. The Arabs give the name of keif to this voluptuous vacuity of mind, this fort of fafcinating ftupor. The preparation molt in ufe from this hemp is made by pounding the fruits with their membranous capfules; the patte refulting therefrom is baked, with honey, pepper, and nutmeg, and this fweetmeat is then fwallowed in pieces of the fize of a nut. The poor, who footh their mifery by the ftupefaction produced by hemp, content themfelves with bruifing the capfules of the feeds in water, and eating the pafte. The Egyptians alfo eat the capfules without any preparation, and they likewife mix them with tobacco for smoking. At other times they reduce only the capfules and piftils to a fiue powder, and throw away the feeds. This powder they mix with an equal quantity of tobacco, and fmoke the mix. ture in a fort of pipe, a very fimple, but coarfe imitation of the Perfian pipe. It is nothing more than the fhell of a cocoa-nut hollowed and filled with water, through which a pungent and intoxicating fmoke is inhaled. This manner of smoking is one of the most ordinary paftimes of the women in the southern part of Egypt. All these preparations, as well as the parts of the plant that ferve to make them, are known under the Arabic name of hafchisch, which properly fignifies herb, as if this plant were the herb, or plant of plants. The hafchifch, the confumption of which is very confiderable, is to be met with in all the markets. When it is meant to defignate the plant it felf, unconnected with its virtues and its ufe, it is called bafté. Although the hemp of Egypt has much refemblance to ours, it, neverthelefs, differs from it in fome characters which appear to conftitute a particular fpecies. On an attentive comparison of this hemp with that of Europe, it may be remarked, that its talk is not near fo high; that it acquires in thickness what it wants in height; that the port or habit of the plant is rather that of a thrub, the ftem of which is frequently more than two inches in circumference, with numerous and alternate branches adorning it down to the very root. Its leaves are also not so narrow, and lefs dentated or toothed. The whole plant exhales a ftronger fmell, and its fructification is fmaller, and at the fame time more numerous than in the European fpecies. Miraculous Statue. In the mofque (at Tomieh) there is fhown a camel in ftone, which is feen to turn towards Mecca at the time when the caravan of pilgrims fets out from Cairo, and to turn back towards Cairo when it leaves Mecca. Such is the fable related by the inhabitants of Tomich; and this gives fome celebrity to their town. I had not an opportunity of examining this miraculous ftatue. Fertility of the Soil in Upper Egypt— Its Agriculture. There is certainly no country in the world where the foil is more productive than in Egypt. However, when, as fome ancient and modern authors have affirmed, its produce in wheat is carried to one hundred, two hundred, and even as far as three hundred, for one, it is extended far beyond the common average. On the other hand, thofe who have afferted that a measure of corn, sown in the ground, produced only tenfold, have ftopped far fhort of the truth. On this fubject. I collected and compared the most accurate information; the refult was, that, one year with another, a crop of corn yields from five and twenty to thirty for one. And it is important to ob F 2 ferve, ferve, that it is not here meant to count the number of grains contained in an ear, produced from a parti cular fingle feed, but that I am speak ing of the entire harvest, of the mafs of corn that it furnishes in a given diftrict; fo that each meafure fown, yields a crop of from five and twenty to thirty meafures. In extraordinary years, favoured by circumftances, the land laid down in corn gives a produce of fifty for one. At Néguadé I was even affured that, fix or seven years previous to my arrival, a cultivator had reaped a hundred and fifty times the feed fown; but this obfervation, fuppofing it to be correct, applying only to a folitary and particular fact, cannot be included in the general eftimate. For fome years the inhabitants had been complaining of the fcantiness of their crops; nevertheless, during these very years, which they confidered as times of dearth, the land had produced twenty for one.. Such a fertility, which had no need of exaggeration to appear aftonifh ing, is ftill fufceptible of increafe. Ignorant and lazy, the Egyptian cul. tivators knew not how to derive the greatest advantage from the most fruitful foil; and the process of watering, which vegetation requires in fo warm a climate, was neglected, or in a great measure forgotten. However, if it be confidered that vegetation has no where more ftrength and activity than in the foil of Upper Egypt; if it be remarked that no fpecies of culture long occupies the ground, and that feveral are feen, to fucceed each other, and thrive in the fame year, the inexhaustible mine of abundance which this ancient land contains in its bofom, cannot fail to be a fubject of astonishment. And this incomparable fertility is ftill more brilliant in the fouth than in the north of Egypt. The Thebais, which borders upon the torrid zone, would feem, from the heat of the fun by which it is warmed, from the maffes of rocks by which it is furrounded, and which reflect and concentrate the heat, and from its elevated fituation, more difficult to irrigate, to be deftitute of verdure and incapable of yielding rich crops: it is, nevertheless, infinitely more fer. tile than the moift foil of the Delta, Its produce of every kind is more fur. prifing. It is fhaded by a greater number of fruit trees, forming, in fome measure, forefts not very closely planted, which maintain a conftant coolness, and under the shade of which the traveller may either take repose, or proceed on his way. Befides the vegetative ftrength of a privileged foil, the manner in which the Egyptians fow corn is alfo one of the caufes of its great multiplication. It is obvious that the method of fowing thick, perhaps neceffary in cold and compact ground, would be prejudicial in a warm foil exuberant with vegetation. Accordingly, the feed is very fparingly fcattered in the fields of Egypt. The fower walks behind the plough, and ftrews in the fmall furrow it makes, a portion of grain barely neceffary, which the plough covers in tracing another fur row. In this manner there is no feed loft; there is none that, as in our country, feems to be thrown purpose ly to feed the birds. The stalks, arranged in drills, and at a proper diftance from each other, as well as the roots that fupport them, eafily receive the impreffions of the air and the fun; and the ears, being neither confined nor fmothered, are healthy and ftrong; the grains with which they are filed foon become plump and luxuriant, and none of them ever prove abortive or diseased. Neither are the fields overrun by a great number of plants which, under the generic name of weeds, are, in the greater part of our fields, a real fcourge to the harvests. The corn is fown pure as it is reaped; it is not mixed, in the fame field, with differ ent fpecies of grain, which, though of the fame genus, yet not ripening at the fame period, can yield nothing but a mixture, as unproductive to the cultivator, as it is unprofitable to the confumer. A LETTER FROM DR GUTHRIE OF ST PETERSBURGH TO THE RIGHT HON. THE EARL OF BUCHAN, ON THE ORIGIN OF THE NAME OF THE SCOTS. MY LORD, I been originally pronounced, (a very flight error in the perfon who first took it down in writing, or in the copyifts fince, would make the trifling difference,) you have immediately Scototes, which when pronounced fhort mult be Scots. I am your Lordship's very humble Servant, MATTHEW GUTHRIE Perceive that the firft Volume of the Tranfactions of the Antiqua ian Society of Scotland begins with an Inquiry into the name of the inhabitants; and beg permiffion to remark, that although the Greeks cal. led the nomade people, now known to us by the name of Tartars, by the appellation of Exulas, which the learned author of the paper alluded to above, supposes might have been St Petersburgh, Sept. 5th. 1794. the Grecian pronounciation of the Celtic word Scuits, or wanderers; yet this was by no means the name they gave themselves, as Heroditus, in his fourth Book Melpomene, exprefsly tells us, that the Scythians called themfelves Scolates. Now fuppofing they were a people from the Celtic ftock like ourselves, which I have little doubt of, their real name furnishes a very imple derivation of Seats, for by merely changing the into t, as it may have very poffibly P. S It is remarkable likewise that fome of the Scythian hords practifed the fame cuftom of painting their bodies, which we are affured by J. Cæfar, Pomp. Mela, Pliny, Tacitus, A. Marcellinus, and a number of other claffic authors, once obtained amongst the Celts in both South and North Britain. Thefe hords were the Daca and Sarmatians whom Pliny fays both painted their bodies like our forefathers. NOTICE OF THE CHARACTER AND WRITINGS OF PHILIP STANHOPE, EARL OF CHESTERFIELD. FE From the first volume of the works of Horace Walpole Earl of Orford. EW men have been born with a brighter fhow of parts: few men have bellowed more cultivation on their natural endowments; and the world has feldom been more juft in its admiration both of genuine and improved talents. A model yet more rarely beheld, was that of a prince of wits who employed more application on forming a fucceffor, than to perpetuate his own renown-yet, though the peer in queftion not only laboured by daily precepts to educate his heir, but drew up for his use a code of inftitution, in which no fecret of his doctrine was withheld, he was not only fo unfortunate as to behold a total mifcarriage of his lectures, but the fyftem itself appeared fo fuperficial, fo trifling, and fo illaudable, that mankind began to wonder at what they had admired in the preceptor, and to question whether the dictator of fuch tinfel injunctions had really poffeffed thofe brilliant qualifications which had fo long maintained him unrivalled on the throne of wit Even Lord Chefterfield's poetical and fashion. Still will the impartial examiner do juftice, and diftinguish between the legiflator of that little fantastic aristocracy which calls itfelf the great world, and the intrinfic genius of a nobleman who was an ornament to his order, an elegant orator, an useful statesman, a perfect but no fervile courtier, and an author whofe writings, when feparated from his impertinent inftitutes of education, deserve, for the delicacy of their wit and Horatian irony, to be ranged with the pureft claffics of the courts of Auguftus and Louis quatorze. His papers in Common Senfe and The World might have given jealoufy to the fenfitive Addison; and though they do not rival that original writer's fund of natural humour, they must be allowed to touch with confummate knowledge the affected manners of high life. They are fhort fcenes of genteel comedy, which, when perfect, is the most rare of all productions. His papers in recommendation of Johnfon's dictionary were models of that polished elegance which the pedagogue was pretending to afcertain, and which his own ftyle was always heaving to overload with tautology and the most barbarous confufion of tongues. The friendly patronage was returned with ungrateful rude. nefs by the proud pedant; and men fmiled, without being furprifed, at feeing a bear worry his dancing-maf ter. trifles, of which a few fpecimens remain in fome fongs and epigrams, were marked by his idolized graces, and with his acknowledged wit. His fpeeches courted the former, and the latter never forfook him to his latest hours. His entrance into the world was announced by his bon-mots, and his clofing lips dropped repartees that fparkled with his juvenile fire. Such native parts deserved higher application. Lord Chesterfield took no lefs pains to be the phoenix of fine gentlemen, than Tully did to qualify himself for fhining as the firft orator, magiftrate, and philofopher of Rome. Both fucceeded: Tully immortalized his name; Lord Chesterfield's reign lafted a little longer than that of a fashionable beauty. His fon, like Cromwell's, was content to return to the plough, without authority, and without fame. Befides his works collected and published by Doctor Maty, his Lordfhip had begun "Memoirs of his own "Time."-How far he proceeded on fuch a work I cannot fay; nor whether farther than a few characters of fome eminent perfons, which have fince been printed, and which are no fhining proof that Lord Chesterfield was an excellent hiftoric painter. From his private familiar letters one fhould expect much entertainment, if moft of thofe published by Maty did not damp fuch hopes. Some few at the end of his correfpondence with his fon justly deserve admiration. NOTICE OF ROBERT LORD CLIVE. From the fame. TH licy a heaven-born hero, and whom policy alone would canonize, would never have been an author, if he could have filenced oppofition as completely as he removed opponents in India. Yet was he qualified, like Cæfar, either to write or conquer. Still one, who neither reverences Roman ufurpations in Gaul, nor Spanish maffacres in Mexico, will never allow his pen to applaud the invasions and depredations of his countrymen. in India. Suffered to traffic as mer chants, |