6

at the present day, numerous proofs are seen of the terrible cruelties permitted, and even commanded, by Ibrahim, the great Egyptian Generals.' Many admirers of the despotism of the present Pacha of Egypt, delight to harp upon his reforms, his civilization, and his humanity. Such persons lower the standard of humanity below the brutes. The best reforms of the Pacha of Egypt are sanguinary reforms, and are opposed alike to justice and benevolence. The conduct of Ibrahim and his troops, at the crisis just mentioned, was unparalleled in atrocity. After murdering and torturing all those within their reach, they vented their spite against nature itself. They tore up trees by the roots, and sacked the very ground ! Such a violation of the image of nature, might well be expected to occasion a frown upon the brow of the Supreme Being.

While the Egyptians were calling the Europeans 'cowards,' on account of their humanity, the Europeans were preparing to force Ibrahim to keep his promise. Ibrahim's fleet desisted from its purpose of weighing anchor, on the approach of the allied squadrons, and prepared for action. His adversaries advanced, with the intention of peaceably compelling him to pauze in his career of devastation and bloodshed, carried on against innocent and defenceless beings. Their philanthropic plans were thwarted; and nothing remained but the issue of a conflict, to determine the question.

The English, French, and Russian forces were nearly equal. The allied fleet comprised ten ships of the line, twelve frigates, and six sloops, in all, twenty-eight vessels of war. On the other side, were four Turkish line-of-battle-ships, four Egyptian double-banked frigates, fifteen Turkish frigates, twenty-two Turkish corvettes, and sixteen Egyptian corvettes, together with five Egyptian brulots, or fire-ships; in all, sixty-one vessels of war, beside the brulots. Bompard, a French officer, asserts, that the number of Turkish vessels was eighty-one.

In the harbor of Navarino,' says Admiral Codrington, 'lay the Turkish ships, moored in the form of a crescent, with springs on their cables, the larger ones presenting their broadsides toward the centre, the smaller ones in succession within them filling up the intervals. The combined fleet was formed in the order of sailing, in two columns, the British and French forming the starboard-line, and the Russian the lee-line. The Asia led in, followed by the Genoa and Albion, and anchored close alongside a ship of the line, bearing the flag of the Capitana Bey, another ship of the line, and a large double-banked frigate; each thus having their proper opponent in the front line of the Turkish fleet. The four ships to the windward of the Egyptian squadron, were allotted to the squadron of Rear Admiral De Rigny; and those to the leeward, in the bight of the crescent, were to mark the sections of the whole Russian squadron ; the ships of their line closing those of the English line, and being followed up by their own frigates. The French frigate Armide was directed to place berself alongside the outermost frigate on the left hand, entering the harbor; and the Cambrian, Glasgow, and Talbot, next to her, and abreast of the Asia, Genoa, and Albion, the Dartmouth, the Musquito, the Rose, the Brisk, and the Philomel, were to look after the six fire-vessels at the entrance of the harbor.' Cod

rington gave orders that no guns should be fired, unless they were first fired by the Turks; and these orders were strictly observed.

A letter was despatched to Ibrahim, on the eighteenth of October, but he disdained to make any reply to the proposals of the allied forces. Fifteen thousand infantry, and eight hundred cavalry, scoured the country, crying Down with the Infidels !' Ibrahim himself was on shore, laying waste all the sea-coast, from Navarino to Patras. On the twentieth of October, 1827, the allied squadrons entered the harbor of Navarino. At twenty-five minutes past two P. M., an English boat was fired upon by a brulot, and its commander killed. The nearest ship, the Syren, discharged only fire-arms against the hostile fire-boat, in order to save the men in the English boat. At the same time, a boat bearing a flag of truce from Admiral Codringtou, was fired into, and the pilot and several others were killed. No cannon had yet been discharged on either side. Admiral de Rigy, hailing the Turks through a speaking trumpet, said he would not fire at all, until they commenced.

At this moment, a Turkish vessel, astern of the Syren, fired two cannon-shot into the latter, and killed one man. The battle soon became general. The Russian vessels had to support the fire of the forts, which only began to fire upon the fifth vessel, the Trident. At five o'clock, P. M., the first line of the Turks was destroyed, the ships of the line and cut-down frigates sunk, or burned; the remainder ran upon the coast, where the enemy themselves set fire to them. The French brig Armide, and the English frigate Talbot, were exposed to the fire of five Turkish frigates, until the arrival of the Russian frigates. The Scipio, whose bowsprit was entangled with a burning fire-ship, had to extinguish fire on board four times, without ceasing to fight; firing, at the same moment, to the right and the left, on the enemy's line and on the forts. When the first frigate, yard arm to yard-arm with the French vessels, took fire and blew up, the Syren was so near astern, that her main and mizzen-masts fell on her deck. At the first broadside, the French shouted spontaneously,' Vive le Roi!' All opposition to the allied vessels was speedily overcome, notwithstanding the desperate bravery shown by some Turkish ships. The battle-scene was terrific. Imagine fifty ships of war, of all grades, firing into a narrow basin, in a triple line, amid the crackling of conflagrations, and the roar of continual explosions!

The allied squadrons strove to rival each other in doing their duty. The ship of Moharem fired into the English ship Asia, but was ef fectually destroyed by the returning fire, sharing the same fate as his brother admirals, and becoming a mere wreck. These ships being out of the way, the Asia was exposed to a raking fire from vessels in the second and third line, which carried away her mizzen-mast by the board, disabled some of her guns, and killed and wounded several of the crew. In a short time, the batteries on shore were entirely silenced.

This bloody and destructive battle was continued with unabated fury, for four hours, and the scene of wreck and devastation was such as is seldom beheld. As each of the Turkish vessels was disabled, such of the crew as could escape, set her on fire; and it is

wonderful, that the allied squadrons were not injured by the frequent explosions.

Of the formidable Turko-Egyptian armament, only twenty corvettes and brigs remained afloat; and even these were abandoned by their crews.

The Turks lost about five thousand men. The loss on the other side was trifling. The French had but an hundred and fifty-seven killed and wounded. The allied ships were considerably damaged, but not disabled.

The announcement of this victory electrified the Greeks. Tears of gratitude flowed copiously, for the first assistance on the part of the Allied Powers. Then were the Greeks sure that their bravery and their sufferings were worthy of the alliance of the greatest monarchs of the globe. Hereafter, let it be recorded in the Grecian history, that England, France, and Russia, listened to the cry of oppressed Greece, and rescued her children from utter extirpation.

After this battle, the contest against the Turks and Egyptians was renewed with the greatest vigor by the Greeks. The mountaineers kept up a continued rejoicing. On every hill were seen the bold Pallicars, dancing the Pyrrhic dance, while their war-song echoed through the valleys, terrifing the wild Arabs. At Napoli, the writer well remembers the enthusiasm with which the immense population, the flower of Hellas, then concentrated there for safety, came out, filling the streets and lining the battlements, singing those popular odles, which praised the friendly efforts of the Christian powers. The sky, the land, and the sea, ihe mountains and the islands, resounded with gratitude, and with prayers for the prosperity of the friends of the Greek nation.

Shortly after, the French troops landed; they were joined by the Greeks, and in a few months Greece was free, and Capo d'Istrias Was appointed President.

'WHAT matter is it that we shall sleep in the dust, if our work is done and well done; if we have helped to raise up in those that come after us, a mighty host of the intelligent, the virtuous, the happy and the free?' ORVILLE DEWEY.

OUR country boasts no proud ancestral halls,
Her sons, no broad entailed inheritance,

Save that for which their fathers watched and toiled,
And with the stout heart and the true sword won;

The boundless freehold of her ancient hills,

A birthright for her sons, unalienable.

O, there were patriot hearts with them of old,
Beating beneath the 'kerchief and the coif,
As e'er 'neath corselet beat, and morion:
And hands the homely distaff skilled to twirl,
Strong need had nerved to wield the battle brand,
To smite the invader there, of home and hearth:
That for a beacon to arouse the land,

Had to their roof tree laid the kindling torch;
On their own household altars lit the pile,
And to their country burnt the holocaust!

I stood upon the ancient battle-ground,
By the proud waters of the Lake Champlain,
Where first our nation's glorious banner waved
Triumphant o'er the conquered battlements,
And gazing there, on broken arch and wall,
I marked how man had helped the work of time.
Gay friends were round me, and their tones of glee,
Voices anon shouting my 'household name,'
Came, wind-borne, to mine ear: unheeding all,
And, bending down, from 'mong the ruins gray,
I plucked an herb; such, famed for healing power,
As nurse doth sometimes feed the puling babe:
A healing herb, sprung from the soil of death!
Emblem it seemed of that fair heritage,

Blood-bought, in trust bequeathed us by our sires.

Shall we not keep untrod by stranger feet

The heirdom thus in suffering redeemed?

O then, bethink ye of that golden time,

Greece in her age of glory; seven-hilled Rome;
Turn to the ancient scroll of history:

Is it not writ on the enduring page,

Which, in all time, each age hath chronicled,

How men of might, by ease made enervate,

Bowed to the tyrant's scourge, the conqueror's yoke;

How, folding luxury round them as a shroud,

There, on the Forum and the Acropolis,

Those children of a race of demigods,

Clasping their chains, lay down and ceased to be
For ever more among the nations numbered!

Breathe to the lisping boy, that climbs your knee,
Proud tales of all our storied battle-plains:
Tell him of Concord's field, of Bunker's height;
How, from each blood-drop sown at Lexington,
As from the fabled dragon's teeth of old,
An armed avenger to the conflict sprang!
Then, while he listens, tell of WASHINGTON.
Bind thou the sandals to his willing feet,
And point his way the path of freedom on:
So shall he bless thee, when, in after years,
He sits, an aged man, beneath the tree
His fathers planted, telling to his sons
Tales of our nation's glory- and of thee!

TO THE EDITOR OF THE KNICKERBOCKER.

SIR: I have read, with great satisfaction, the valuable paper of your correspondent, Mr. HERMANUS VANDERDONK, (who, I take it, is a descendant of the learned Adrian Vanderdonk, one of the early historians of the Nieuw-Nederlands,) giving sundry particulars, legendary and statistical, touching the venerable village of Communipaw, and its fate-bound citadel, the House of the Four Chimnies. It goes to prove, what I have repeatedly maintained, that we live in the midst of history, and mystery, and romance; and that there is no spot in the world more rich in themes for the writer of historic novels, heroic melo-dramas, and rough-shod epics, than this same business-looking city of the Manhattoes and its environs. He who would find these elements, however, must not seek them among the modern improvements and modern people of this monied metropolis, but must dig for them, as for Kidd the pirate's treasures, in out-of-the-way places, and among the ruins of the past.

Poetry and romance received a fatal blow at the overthrow of the ancient Dutch dynasty, and have ever since been gradually withering under the growing domination of the Yankees. They abandoned our hearths, when the old Dutch tiles were superseded by marble chimney-pieces; when brass andirons made way for polished grates, and the crackling and blazing fire of nut-wood gave place to the smoke and stench of Liverpool coal; and on the downfall of the last gable-end house, their requiem was tolled from the tower of the Dutch church in Nassau-street, by the old bell that came from Holland. But poetry and romance still live unseen among us, or seen only by the enlightened few, who are able to contemplate this city and its environs through the medium of tradition, and clothed with the associations of foregone ages.

Would you seek these elements in the country, Mr. Editor, avoid all turnpikes, rail-roads, and steam-boats, those abominable inventions, by which the usurping Yankees are strengthening themselves in the land, and subduing every thing to utility and common-place. Avoid all towns and cities of white clap-board palaces, and Grecian temples, studded with Academies,' Seminaries,' and Institutes,' which glis