so that I might say, I had more than four times the value of my first cargo, and was now infinitely beyond my poor neighbour, I mean in the advancement of my plantation; for the first thing I did, I bought me a negro slave, and an european servant also; I mean another besides that which the captain brought me from Lisbon.

But, as abused prosperity is oftentimes made the very means of our greatest adversity, so was it with me. I went on the next year with great success in my plantation; I raised fifty great rolls of tobacco on my own ground more than I had disposed of for necessaries among my neighbours; and these fifty rolls, being each of above 100lb. were well cured, and laid by against the return of the fleet from Lisbon: and now encreasing in business and in wealth, my head began to be full of projects and undertakings beyond my reach; such as are, indeed, often the ruin of the best heads in business. Had I continued in the station I was now in, I had room for all the happy things to have yet befallen me, for which my father so earnestly recommended a quiet, retired, life, and which he had so sensibly described the middle station of life to be full of; but other things attended me, and I was still to be the wilful agent of all my own miseries; and, particularly, to encrease my fault, and double the reflections upon myself, which, in my future sorrows, I should have leisure to make, all these miscarriages were procured by my obstinate adhering to my foolish inclination to wandering abroad, and pursuing that inclination, in contradiction to the clearest views of doing myself good in a fair and plain pursuit of those prospects, and those measures of life, which nature and providence concurred to present me with, and to make my duty.

As I had once done thus, in breaking away from my parents, so I could not be content now, but I must go and leave the happy view I had of being a rich and thriving man in my new plantation, only to pursue a rash and immoderate desire of rising faster than the nature of the thing admitted; and thus I cast myself down again into the deepest gulph of human misery that ever man fell into.

To come, then, by just degrees, to the particulars of this part of my story; you may suppose, that, having now lived almost four years in Brazil, and beginning to thrive and prosper very well upon my plantation, I had not only learned the language, but had contracted an acquaintance and friendship among my fellow planters, as well as among the merchants at San Salvador, which was our port; and that, in my discourses among them, I bad frequently given them an account of my two voyages to the coast of Guinea, the manner of trading with the negros there, and how easy it was to purchase on the coast, for trifles (such as beads, toys, knives, scissars, hatchets, bits of glass, and the like), not only gold-dust, guinea grains,* elephant's-teeth,† &c. but negros, for the service of the brazilian

GUINEA-GRAINS :—it is apprehended here mean the greater cardamum of the druggists; which, besides forming an article of african trade, are produced on Ceylon, Java, and in some other parts of the East. The pods are large and long, triangular, thick-skinned, and dark coloured; some approach nearly to black, the smell is less acrid, and the taste more disagreea le than the smaller cardamums. The quantity of cardamums of all sorts imported and sold at the east india sales in the year 1808, was 16355/b. amounting in value to 36021. averaging 4s. 5d. per lb. 12 cut, of cardamums are allowed to a ton: the permanent import duty in England is 1s. 5d. per lb. These grains are sometimes called by the traders on the coast, " grains of paradise :" but, among the natives, bear the name Melegeta.

* ELEPHANT'S TEETH :-or rather tusks, of which each animal has two pointing forwards, and bending a little upwards, are of a yellowish, and, sometimes, brownish colour on the outside, internally white, hollow towards the root, and so far as was inserted in the jaw, of a dark brown colour: they are procured from both the western and eastern coasts of the continent of Afric, from various parts of India, &c, and should be chosen large, strait, and white, without flaws, not very hollow in the stump, but solid and thick. The largest teeth are said to come from the african "ivory coast and are more esteemed as being of a closer texture, and less liable to turn yellow, than

colonies, in great numbers. They listened always very attentively to my dis courses on these heads, but especially to that part which related to the buying negros; which was a trade at that time, not only not far entered into, but, as far as it was, had been carried on by the assientos of the kings of Spain and of Portugal, and engrossed from the public; so that few negros were bought, and those excessive dear.

It happened, being in company with some merchants and planters of my

those which reach England through the east indian medium. The traders in London divide elephants' teeth into 6 sorts; of which the first weighing 70lb. and upwards, fetch from 25%, to 30l. per cwt, and the sixth, otherwise called scrivellos, weighing under 18lb. sell for 10 to 12 per cwt. the intermediate classes bearing a proportionate value. The permanent duty thereon in England is 2l. 10s, per cwt. The importation for 12 years 1788 to 1799 inclusive was 18914 cwt. equal to 1576 annually. In purchasing teeth, those that are very crooked, hollow, and fractured, or cracked and decayed inside, should be rejected; and care be taken, that lead, or any other ponderous substance, has not been introduced into the cavity. At the East India company's public sale, in the year 1808, there were sold 169 cwt. for 37221, averaging 221. Os. 6d. per cwt. The elephant is a distinct genus of animals, belonging to the order of brutae in the class of mammalia; the distinguishing characters of which are these; that it has no cutting teeth; the canine teeth of the upper jaw, are exceeding long; it has a long flexible snout, and the body almost naked. The elephant is the most bulky of all animals now known; its utmost dimensions may be judged from the following admeasurement of one of the very largest: from the front to the origin of the tail, sixteen feet; the proboscis or trunk, nine feet; height, fourteen feet; circumference of the neck, seventeen feet; that of the carcase at the thickest part, twenty-five feet and a half; circumference of the leg, six feet; that of the tail at its origin, two feet and a half; length of the tail, six feet. In many climates, however, its full growth does not exceed seven feet in height. The eyes are very small in proportion to the size of the creature. The muzzle is very different from that of any other quadruped, being formed by that long trunk, for which the animal is so remarkable; and which hangs down between the two tusks: this trunk is, therefore, the nose so prolonged, and terminated by a couple of nostrils and a sort of finger. The average length of this instrument is about eight feet, five inches and a half in circumference near the mouth; and eighteen inches near the extremity. In a domestic state the elephant's power of labor is equal to six horses.

ASSIENTO, or Assientą:-in matters of commerce, a contract or convention between the king of Spain and other powers for furnishing the spanish dominions in America with negro slaves. The term is originally Spanish, and signifies a bargain; accordingly the first assiento was a treaty or contract made with the french Guinea company, whereby they were put in possession of this privilege, in consideration of a certain duty which they were to pay to the king of Spain's farms, for every negro thus furnished. The Spaniards having almost destroyed the natural inhabitants of spanish America, have been many years, and still are, obliged to perform the work of their mines, and other laborious business, by negros, of whom they could scarce ever obtain the number they have wanted; and it is certain, if they were fully supplied, they would get yearly about twice the silver perhaps they now do, or have done for many years past. It must be confessed, they have used variety of measures to obtain them. The Genoese undertook to supply them at a concerted price between them; for which end they formed a company called the assiento, who had their factors at Jamaica, Curazao, and Brazil; but, by their ill management, made nothing of this contract; nor did their successors the Portuguese. After them it fell into the hands of the French, who made so much of it, that they were enabled, by a computation made from the registers of Spain, to import into the french dominions no less than 204 millions of pieces of eight, Yet they, at length, overglutted the market, and became sufferers towards the conclusion.

By the treaty of Utrecht, Philip V. being declared king of Spain by the allies; it was one of the articles of the peace between England and France, that the ussiento contract should be transferred to the English, Accordingly, a new instrument was signed in May, 1715, to last thirty years; and the furnishing of negros to the spanish America was committed to the South-sea Company, just then erected; though the first conveytion for this purpose was made in or about the year 1689. In virtue whereof they were yearly to furnish 4800 negros; for which they were to pay at the same rate as the

acquaintance, and talking of those things very earnestly, three of them came to me the next morning, and told me, they had been musing very much upon what I had discoursed with them of the last night, and they came to make a secret proposal to me; and after enjoining me to secresy, they told me that they had

French, with this condition, that, during the first twenty-five years, only half the duty shall be paid for such as they shall import beyond the stated number.

The last article gives them a farther privilege not enjoyed by the French; which is, that the english assientists shall be allowed, every year, to send to the spanish America a ship of five hundred tons, loaden with the same commodities as the Spaniards usually carry thither; with a license to sell the same, concurrently with them, at the fairs of Porto-Bello, Carthagena, and Vera-Cruz. This additional article was supposed as advantageous to the company, as the whole contract besides; being granted contrary to the usul spanish policy, which has ever solicitously preserved the commerce of their America to themselves.

Some new articles have been since added to the ancient assiento; as that the English shall send their register ship yearly, even though the spanish fiota and galleons do not go; and that, for the first ten years, the said ship may be of 650 tons. Finally, as the South-sea Company had, on the whole, been losers by their trade, and as at the time of the treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle, in 1748, they had only four years more of their assiento term remaining (the war between Spain and England having commenced in 1739, and interrupted the continuance of it), which Spain was determined not to renew, at least not on any pron sing terms; for these, and other reasons, it was concluded, by the british court, to instruct her minister at Madrid, to obtain the best equivalent that could be procured for the remaining short time of the company's assiento contract.

But all these particulars are become mere matter of history; the abolition of the slave trade here, coupled with the change introduced more or less into the foreign relations of all maritime states of Europe, by the war of the french revolution just now happily terminated, leaving this branch of commercial navigation to be permanently regulated by common consent in the definitive treaty of peace and amity, about to be concluded between all the belligerent powers.

The subject has recently been submitted to the re-consideration of parliament, with such effect as to obtain the unanimous concurrence of both houses in recommending to the executive government, that the present aera should be marked by our strenuous endeavours to procure the practical adoption of our example, by the few remaining powers in Europe, who still countenance that trade in their colonies. Some idea may be formed of the aggregate of human misery that has been thereby caused in Brazil alone, since the days of Robinson Crusoe, from the simple fact, that the importation of negros into that colony, during the last year, has not fallen much short of 80000. The prospect of its cessation may be judged of from the following vote in the house of Lords, 5th May, 1814:

Resolved, nemine dissentiente, that the following address be presented to H.R.H. the Prince-Regent :

"WE humbly represent to your Royal Highness, that we have seen, with unspeakable satisfaction, the beneficial and happy consequences of the law, by which the african slave trade has been, throughout all his Majesty's dominions, for ever prohi bited and abolished; and that we rely, with the fullest confidence, on the gracious assurances, which both his Majesty and your Royal Highness have condescended to give to us, of your endeavours to obtain, from other powers, that co-operation which is still necessary for the completion of this great work. It well became Great Britain, having partaken so largely in the guilt of this inhuman and unchristian traffic, to stand forward among the nations of Europe, and openly to proclaim its renunciation. This duty we have discharged; but our obligations do not cease here. The crimes countenanced by our example, and the calamities created or extended by our misconduct, continue to afflict an unoffending people. Other european nations still carry on this commerce, if commerce it can be called, in the lives and liberties of our fellow creatures. By their intervention, its clandestine continuance is encouraged and facilitated in our own dependencies. By the same cause, the desolation and barbarism of a whole continent are prolonged; and, unless some timely prevention be applied, the returning tran quillity of Europe, the source of joy and exultation to ourselves, will be the aera only of renewed and aggravated miseries to the wretched victims of an unprincipled and relentless avarice: With all humility, therefore, but with the utmost earnestness, wo

a mind to fit out a ship to go to Guinea; that they had all plantations as well as I, and were straitened for nothing so much as servants; that as it was a trade that could not be carried on, because they could not publicly sell the negros when they came home, so they desired to make but one voyage, to bring the negros on shore privately, and divide them among their own plantations; and, in a word, the question was, whether I would go their supercargo* in the ship, to manage the trading part upon the coast of Guinea? and they offered me that I should have an equal share of the slaves, without providing any part of the investment, This was a fair proposal, it must be confessed, had it been made to any one that had not a plantation of his own to look after, which was in a fair way of coming to be very considerable, and with a good stock upon it. But for me, that was thus settled, and had nothing to do but go on as I had begun, for three or four years more, and to have sent for the other hundred pounds from England; and who, in that time, and with that little addi tion, could scarce have failed of being worth three or four thousand pounds sterling, and that encreasing too; for me to think of such a voyage, was the most preposterous thing that ever man, in such circumstances could be guilty of.

But I, who was born to be my own destroyer, could no more resist the offer, than I could restrain my first rambling designs. In a word, I told them I would go with all my heart, if they would undertake to look after my plantation in my absence, and would dispose of it to such as I should direct, if I miscarried. This they all engaged to do, and entered into written covenants to do so: and I made a formal will and testament, disposing of my plantation and effects, in case of my death; making the captain of the ship that had saved my life, as before, my universal heir; but obliging him to dispose of my effects as I had directed in my will; one half of the produce being to himself, and the other to be shipped to England. In short, I took all possible caution to preserve my effects, and to keep up my plantation: had I used half as much prudence to have looked into my individual interest, and have made a judgment of what I ought to have done and not to have done, I had certainly never gone away from so prosperous an undertaking, leaving all the probable views of a thriving circumstance, and gone upon a voyage to sea, attended with all its common hazards, to say nothing of the reasons I had to apprehend particular misfortunes to myself.

supplicate your Royal Highness, that the whole weight and influence of the british crown may be excited in the approaching negociations to avert this dreadful evil. In the name of our country, and on the behalf of the interests of humanity, we entreat that the immediate and total abolition of the slave trade may be solicited from all the sovereigns of Europe. No moment, we think, was ever yet so favourable, for stipu lating a joint and irrevocable renunciation of those barbarous practices, and for promul gating, by the assembled authority of the whole civilized world, a solemn declaration, that, to carry away into slavery the inhabitants of unoffending countries is, to violate the universal law of nations, founded, as that law must ever be, on the immutable principles of justice and religion. It is on those sacred principles, the safeguards of all lawful government, the bulwarks of all national independence, that we wish our proposal to be rested; on them we rely for its success: recommended, as it will be, not by the exhortations only, but by the example of Great Britain, and addressed to the rulers of those states, which have themselves so signally been rescued by Providence from danger and destruction; from internal desolation, and from subjection to a foreign yoke. On all it must, we think, impress itself with equal force; whether they be ranked among the deliverers or the delivered; among those whom a merciless oppres sion had already overwhelmed, or among those whose moderation and justice in success have added lustre even to the firmness of their resistance, and to the glory of their victories. No worthier thanks, we confidently believe, can be offered to Providence for past protection; on no better grounds can future blessings be solicited, than by the recognition and discharge of the great duties which we all owe alike, to the rights, the liberty, and the happiness of our fellow-creatures."

✦ SUPERCARGO:-an officer charged with the accounts of the cargo, and all other commercial affairs in a ship. (Spanish.) One employed by the freighters of a ship to go a voyage to oversee the lading, and to dispose of it to their best advantage.

But I was hurried on, and obeyed blindly the dictates of my fancy, rather than my reason: and, accordingly, the ship being fitted out, and the cargo furnished, and all things done as by agreement, by my partners in the voyage, I went on board in an evil hour again, the first of September, 1659, being the same day eight years that I went from my parents at Hull.

The very same day that I went on board, we set sail, standing away to the northward on the coast of Brazil, with design to stretch over for the african shore, when we should come into the latitude of about ten or twelve degrees north; (which, it seems was the manner of their course in those days:) we had very good weather, only excessively hot all the way upon our own coast, until we came to the height of Cape St. Augustino ;* from whence, keeping farther off at sea, we lost sight of land, and steered as if we were bound for the isle Fernando de Noronha,† holding our course N.E.b. E. and leaving that island on the east. On this course, in about twelve days time, we passed the Line, and were by our last observation in latitude 7° 22′ N. when a violent tornado took took us quite out of our knowledge: it began from the south-east, came about north-west, and then settled north-east; from whence it blew in such a terrible manner, that, for twelve days together, we could do nothing but drive, and

* CAPE ST. AUGUSTINO:-in latitude about 8° 28′ S. longitude 34° 30′ W. or, by the best accounts, nearly on the same meridian as Phernambouco (otherwise Fernambuco, or Phernambocca) and Olinda; this port is in latitude about 8° 12′ S. is a place of great trade, and a safe harbour; but the entrance is an intricate navigation to persons unacquainted.

FERNANDO NORONHA:-(the english pronunciation of the latter word being Noronea) an island situated near the coast of Brazil in latitude 3° 55′ 15′′ S. longitude 32° 25' 20" W. The island is, according to some accounts 7, to others, 10, miles in length, and between 2 and 3 broad, and is remarkable by a high rocky peak called the Pyramid, very barren and rugged, and appearing to lean or overhang eastward, when seen from N.N.E. it is also known by its S.W. point, which sailors have named the "hole in the wall," from its being pierced through, and giving a free passage to the sea; off which is a dangerous sunken rock at a considerable distance. The S. point is distinguishable by a little rocky islot, that appears like a statue. There are two harbours, or rather roads, capable of receiving ships of any burthen; one is on the N. side, the other on the N.W. The former is, in every respect, the principal for shelter, capacity, and good bottom; but both are exposed to northerly, or north-westerly winds. Three forts defend the anchorage, built of stone, spacious and well armed. Fernando Noronha is a dependency on the government of Phernambuco, and is peopled with exiles from Brazil and from Portugal: but, according to the assertion of the commander of an english post-office packet, who visited the place in 1815, "a female was never known to have set foot on this devoted spot"! (See Raval Chronicle, for 1813; vol. xxix. p. 451.) Cattle, sheep, poultry, vegetables, and water, are to be procured here; the latter is rather a scarce article in the dry season, and watering is often rendered an inconveuicnt operation by the surf. The wood is cut on a small island near the north point of the principal one, and from thence called by mariners, Wood (or Wooding) isle; but the getting it off is also attended with difficulty, from the surf produced by the N.W. winds, which are said to prevail from December to April. The best anchorage is in 13 fathoms off shore, about a mile with fort Antonio, E.b.S. S. fort Remedios, S.b.W. fort Conception, S.S.W. W. Pyramid, S. 42° W. The tide is said to rise about six feet on the springs, high water at 4 h. In 1807, there was very little magnetic variation at this island. In the vicinity of Fernando-Noronha, is a dangerous shoal called "Roccas;" which is particularly described in the Naval Chronicle; xxiii, 481. See page 14, last note.

TORNADO a violent gust of wind rising suddenly from the shore, and afterwards veering around all points of the compass like a hurricane, very frequent between the tropics. The force of wind is as the square of its velocity, according to Mr. FERGUSON'S experiments. The following is a table of the different velocities and forces of the winds, constructed by Mr. Rous, from a considerable number of facts and experiments, and communicated to Mr. SMEATON; upon which considerable dependance may be placed :