individual on account of himself or his ancestors, and the necessary results of the present imperfect order of the world. Those afflicted, consequently, experience, generally speaking, little compassion or sympathy.

The slaves of the temples are another class of men, who are reduced hereditarily and for ever-to the same degraded rank in society, as the chandalas. They cannot intermarry with the rest of the people, nor, indeed, in almost any manner associate with them; and few persons will even condescend to sit down and eat with them. When the late king conquered Aracan, in 1783, he built a magnificent temple in commemoration of the event, and condemned for ever one hundred and twenty families of Aracanese, the stoutest and most obstinate defenders of their country, to the degrading servitude of slaves to the pagoda: such are the effects of despotism and superstition.Gaolers, executioners, and professional prostitutes are nearly in the same degraded condition.

Mr. Crawfurd speaks of the Burman territory as comprehending not fewer than eighteen distinct nations or tribes-differing in language, manners, customs, and religion, but all having the same physical type-that which is, in fact, common to all the tribes lying between Hindostan and China. We should say they were originally of the Mongul Tartar race, mixed with Hindoos, Chinese, and Malays. Like these last, they are generally short, stout, well-proportioned, and active; of a dark brown complexion; their hair black, coarse, lank, and abundant. Tattooing the skin is a common practice among the men. The figures imprinted consist of animals, such as lions, tigers, monkeys, and occasionally cabalistic letters and figures, intended as charms against wounds. Not to be thus tattooed is considered as a mark of effeminacy and degradation. Boring the lobe of the ear is another practice common to both sexes, as also stuffing into the aperture a gold or silver ornament, or, in lieu of them, a bit of wood, or a roll of paper, gilt or plain. The betel mixture of areca nut, pepper-leaf, and chunam, is in universal use, as is also the smoking of tobacco, among all ranks of both sexes, and from three years old upwards. Both sexes wear sandals, but neither shoes, boot, nor stockings, under any circumstances. The Burmese are the only people of the East who suffer their women to appear in public, which they do from the highest to the lowest ranks; but Mr. Crawfurd thinks they gain nothing from this indulgence, not being treated with the same consideration and delicacy which the secluded females of Hindostan receive from the other sex.

The Burmese peasantry are stated to be in more comfortable and easy circumstances than the mass of the labouring poor in any

of

of our Indian provinces; and, says Mr. Crawfurd, making allowance for climate, manners, and habits, might bear a comparison with the peasantry of most European countries.'

A day-labourer in Bengal will hardly earn three pounds a year; and the cost of rice is nearly the same as in the lower provinces of the Burman empire; salt, fish, and house-rent, being much higher. An instructive example of the beneficial effect of high wages is afforded by comparing wages at Calcutta and Rangoon. A carpenter, of the best description, at Calcutta, earns only twenty shillings a month, while one at Rangoon will earn thirty. The wages of the native of Bengal will purchase about eight hundred pounds of rice; that of the Burman, about eleven hundred and twenty. Beggary, as may be readily inferred from these statements, is very unfrequent among the Burmese; and, with the exception of the voluntary mendicity of the priesthood, is confined to a few unfortunate persons, driven to it more by superstition than necessity.'-p. 468.

In the useful arts, the Burmese have made but little progressless than the Hindoos, and much less than the Chinese. In the different processes of cleaning, spinning, weaving, and dyeing cotton wool and cloth, women mostly are engaged. The patterns are stripes or checks, a decided mark of rudeness,' according to Mr. Crawfurd; the art of printing cottons is unknown to them. Yet, rude as this domestic manufacture is, the prices are so high, that British piece goods can be sold cheaper, even in the interior of the country, than their own fabrics. Their silks are coarse, high priced, but durable; part of the raw material is imported from China. Their common coarse earthenware is superior to any that is made in India, and their jars to contain the petroleum are made so large as to contain nearly two hundred gallons. Their workmanship in metals is rude and clumsy, much inferior to that of almost every part of India.

In the higher branches of literature, the attainments of the Burmese scarcely deserve mention. For their astronomy, such as it is, they are not only indebted to India, but are obliged to employ a certain number of Brahmins of Bengal at the court, who have the exclusive direction of the kalendar. Like the rest of the eastern nations, they have a week of seven days. They observe the new and full moons as religious festivals, and also the quarters, which four days are set apart for public worship, when the people repair to pay their devotions at the temples. They keep time by means of a clepsydra, or water-clock, which is merely a perforated cup admitting the water, while floating in a basin, and as it rises to particular marks, notice is given by striking the proper number of times on a great bell.

Mr.

Mr. Crawfurd says that most of the Burmese can read and write their literature, like that of most rude nations, is chiefly metrical, consisting of songs, religious romances, and chronological histories. The written character is exceedingly simple, consisting, for the most part, of circles and segments of circles. The language appears to be a mixture of the Pali and the Chinese. The religion of is that of Boudh, mixed up, however, with a great deal of Hindoo mythology. A brief extract, furnished from Mr. Judson's account of it, as given in Burmese writings, will convey a tolerable notion of their ideas of the soul of man after this life.

The universe is replete with an infinity of souls, which have been transmigrating in different bodies from all eternity; ascent or descent in the scale of existence being at every change of state ascertained by the "immutably mysterious laws of fate," according to the merit or demerit of the individual. No being is exempt from sickness, old age, and death. Instability, pain, and change are the three grand characteristics of all existence. 66 However highly exalted in the celestial regions, and whatever number of ages of happiness may roll on," say the Burmans," the fatal symptom of a moisture under the arm-pits will at length display itself." The mortal being, when this presents itself, must he prepared to exchange the blandishments and dalliance of celestial beauties, for the gridirons, pitchforks, mallets, and other instruments of torture of the infernal regions. The chief end of man, according to the Burmese, is to terminate the fatiguing course of transmigratory existence. This attainment the Lord Gautama made in the eightieth year of his life, and all his immediate disciples have participated in the same happy fate. What remains to the present race of beings is to aim at passing their time in the regions of men and gods, until they shall come in contact with the next Budd'ha, the Lord Arimiteya, whom they may hope to accompany to the Golden World of Nib-ban, or annihilation.' -p. 391.

The word Nib-ban' (Nirváná, in Sanscrit), which Mr. Judson and all the missionaries translate into annihilation,' is explained by Mr. Colebrooke to mean calm, unruffled; implying a condition of unmixed tranquil happiness or ecstacy. It approaches very nearly, however, to annihilation, by what Mr. Colebrooke further observes: Perpetual, uninterrupted apathy can hardly be said to differ from eternal sleep. The notion of it, as of a happy condition, seems to have been derived from the experience of ecstacies, or from that of profound sleep, from which a person awakes refreshed. The pleasant feeling is referred back to the period of actual repose.' We apprehend there is very little difference between this doctrine of the Bud'hists, and the eternal sleep' of the French revolutionary atheists.

Mr. Crawfurd is disposed to think that the strongest internal marks

marks of the authenticity of the public records of Ava are to be found in the average shortness of the reigns of their sovereigns. It appears, from a regular chronological series, that, from the year 301 before Christ to the accession of the present king in 1819, a period of two thousand one hundred and twenty years, the number of sovereigns is one hundred and twenty-three, making the average length of each reign only between sixteen and seventeen years. The table appears in many instances to be corroborated by inscriptions found on stones, which are very numerous in and about the capital. It is to be hoped, however, that their historical records are kept in general with more fidelity than that of the late contest with the English.

I learnt last night, from good authority, that the court historiographer had recorded in the national chronicle his account of the war with the English. It was to the following purport:-In the years 1186 and 87, the Kula-pyu, or white strangers of the west, fastened a quarrel upon the Lord of the Golden Palace. They landed at Rangoon, took that place and Prome, and were permitted to advance as far as Yandabo; for the king, from motives of piety and regard to life, made no effort whatever to oppose them. The strangers had spent vast sums of money in their enterprise; and by the time they reached Yandabo, their resources were exhausted, and they were in great distress. They petitioned the king, who, in his clemency and generosity, sent them large sums of money to pay their expenses back, and ordered them out of the country.'-p. 176.

We have now got the Burmese interposed between our settlements in Aracan and the territory which we compelled them to cede to us in the gulf of Martaban, and which gives us the whole line of coast round the Bay of Bengal to the entrance of the Strait of Singapore, while it places us immediately between the Burmese and the Siamese. As forming a connecting link between Bengal and the settlements of Pulo Penang, Malacca, and Singapore, the acquisition of a commodious and safe harbour in Martaban, independent of the value of the territorial possession in other respects, appears to be of great importance. It is not improbable that the China trade may ultimately be wholly carried on in these quarters. The rush of adventurers which would flock to Canton on the present restriction being removed, (and there is some reason to fear that the shortsighted eagerness of a commercial party may be able to carry this measure) would in all probability be the cause of excluding us entirely from the Chinese ports. In that case, the China trade would be conducted by Chinese junks, as a part of it now is in the Strait of Singapore and Malacca, to which they proceed without fear or difficulty. The importance of these possessions

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possessions is already felt; and the more so, since the Dutch have so egregiously mismanaged their affairs in Java and Sumatra, as to have annihilated nearly all trade with the ports of these two islands.

sions.

The harbour of Martaban is stated to be sufficiently capacious to hold the whole navy of England. Three rivers, the Saluen, the Gain, and the Ataram, join at the town of Martaban, and are then divided into two branches by the large island of Balú. Before this bifurcation, the three rivers above-mentioned form a sheet of water, interspersed with many green islets, five or six miles broad, having all the appearance of a noble lake. The Saluen, descending from the north, forms the new boundaryline. The Ataram, flowing from the south-west, is the smallest of the three, but the deepest. For fifty miles the navigation is safe and easy. The banks are so steep that a vessel may range from side to side touching the boughs of the trees alternately on both sides. It is on the banks of this river that the teak forests lie, of great extent, and abounding with timber trees of the largest dimenThe soil, according to Mr. Crawfurd, is fertile and well adapted for the growth of sugar, cotton, indigo, and tobacco, but nearly destitute of any cultivation, for want of inhabitants. The moment, however, that the cession was made known, emigrants from the Burmese territory began to pour in across the Saluen. Scarcely had the commissioner left Rangoon, and before a formal possession had been taken of the ceded country, when no less than twelve hundred families, with three thousand head of cattle, arrived on the banks of the Saluen, with the intention of crossing over into the British territory, there to establish themselves. The new town is named Amherst, and occupies part of an elevated peninsular promontory, overlooking the harbour, and admirably adapted to become a great emporium. are glad to find that Mr. Crawfurd, as commissioner, in founding this new colony, has followed the same wise policy which Sir Stamford Raffles adopted when he established the flourishing settlement of Singapore. In announcing the event of the cession, the proclamation, addressed to the inhabitants in the Burmese language, says :

The inhabitants of the towns and villages who wish to come to the new place, may come and settle; those who come shall be free from molestation, extortion, and oppression. They shall be free to worship as usual, temples, monasteries, priests, and holy men. There shall be no interruption of free trade, but people shall go and come, buy and sell, do and live as they please, conforming to the laws. In regard to employing the labouring people, they shall be employed on the pay

ment