can words, we begin to imagine that the name may, after all, be the very same. We find the Niger indifferently called, or spelt, Quolla, Quorra, Kowara, Quarra, Quarrie, all manifestly the same word; but the last requires only to have the initial consonant softened, to be identical with Shary or Sharee. The consonants, indeed, are somewhat less mutable than the vowels, yet the transmutation of Quolla into Quorra in one place, and into Jolla or Joli in another, shows it to be a process which sometimes takes place.

It is with deep regret that we must close with the mention of another victim, fallen in the same cause, and by a fate still more tragical. Major Laing, having conducted with skill and success an expedition to the sources of the Niger, was afterwards employed in an attempt to penetrate to Tombuctoo itself, the grand central emporium, so long celebrated, and so long hidden from the view of Europeans. He attained his object, reached Tombuctoo by a route across the Desert, and spent two months in that city. Of his observations there, the only memorial is contained in a short letter to one of his relations. He there states Tombuctoo as having every way answered his expectations, except as to its size, which did not exceed four miles in circumference. He represents himself as busily employed, during his stay, 'in searching the records of the town, which are abundant.' This mention of records suggests a source of information never heard of before in central Africa, and redoubles our regret, that the result of these researches should be destined never to reach Europe. The bigotry and rapacity of the Moors, who border the Desert, have been disastrous to every traveller whose evil star has placed him within their influence. Laing was first surprised in the Desert by a party of Tuaricks, who plundered and left him for dead, having inflicted twenty-four sabre wounds, from which he almost miraculously recovered. At Tombuctoo, he found a reception altogether kind and friendly, so long as the Sheik, Seid Ali Boubokar, had the power to protect him; but the fortune of war had thrown this opulent city under the supremacy of the Foulahs of Masina, to whom the Sheik was compelled to act as Viceroy. He received from his liege lord a mandate, that a Christian, who it was believed intended coming to Tombuctoo, should in that event be expelled from the country in such a manner as to prevent any chance of his ever returning. The good old chief was therefore obliged to send off Major Laing, under the charge of Barbooshi, an Arab chief, who undertook to conduct him in safety as far as Arawan; but that traitor, on finding Major Laing completely in his power, murdered him, and took possession of all his property,

Meantime, from the opposite side of the channel, tidings have come that this grand expedition has at length been performed with safety and success. M. Lacaille, inspired by the premium proposed by the French Society of Geography, has penetrated from the coast across the Kong mountains, by way of Jenne and the Lake Dibbie, to Tombuctoo, and has returned by Arawan, through the Great Desert, to Morocco. His safety, it appears, was ensured by following the example of Hornemann and Burckhardt, in assuming the character of a Mahometan. The extent and value of the information thus collected we are not yet permitted to appreciate. The Society have made this a complete secret of state; and even in publishing a somewhat lengthened report on the journey, in reference to its authenticity, have contrived to draw it up, without allowing a single particle of information to escape. We find even the Parisians making it a complaint, that the scanty fragments of intelligence which they can collect, are obtained by the circuitous medium of the London prints, which they have reached by private and contraband channels. The policy seems doubtful, of shrouding these discoveries under so deep a veil of secrecy. A slight avant-gout might only have heightened the relish of the public for the feast to be spread before them. The analysis, though somewhat copious, of the discoveries of Park and Parry, which were early communicated to British readers, only deepened their curiosity for the more full details which were in due time produced. Such a circle of discovery has now been drawn round Tombuctoo, that its actual position, and its relation to the rest of Africa, are very closely approximated. The chief desideratum was, that Tombuctoo should be described by an able and intelligent observer, which we somewhat fear that M. Lacaille is not. We shall be quite happy to be found too hasty in this anticipation; but the admission of the Society, that there is nothing very brilliant in the intellectual qualities of M. Lacaille, and the care with which every specimen of his composition is withheld, must plead our excuse for having ventured on such a conjecture. Some rectification, however, of the maps of Africa, and some views of the state of society in this celebrated African emporium, may doubtless be expected from the publication of M. Lacaille's narrative,

ART. VI.-The Library of Entertaining Knowledge. Vol. I. Part I. The Menageries-Quadrupeds described and drawn from Living Subjects. Published under the Superintendence of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge. Pp. 216. London, C. Knight, and Longman and Co.; Edinburgh, Oliver and Boyd; Glasgow, Robertson and Atkinson; Dublin, Wakeman; Liverpool, Willmer; New-York, Carroll, 1829.

THE

HE work before us is the first of the series which we have already more than once mentioned that the Society had announced its resolution to publish, while it continued the Library of Useful Knowledge, and confined that series to its proper objects. The latter may be considered as addressed to those who, having the habit of reading formed, are in want of proper works for their instruction; the former is designed to make men become readers. The one library is calculated to supply an exist ing demand; the other, to create that demand where it exists not, or greatly to extend it, where it is to be found in a very li mited degree.

The manner in which this design may be best carried into execution, suggests itself almost as soon as the object is stated. Entertainment must first of all be regarded; and as much useful knowledge conveyed as can well be given in an amusing form All knowledge, indeed, is fitted to attract; for the mere gratification of curiosity is in itself a pleasure: But some kinds of information are so much more easily apprehended than others, bear so much more immediately upon the ordinary concerns of life, or excite wonder with so little demand upon the reasoning faculties, or even upon the attention, that they may be rendered interesting to a class of readers, far more sluggish or volatile than ever think of opening books of instruction-the class which only looks at works of mere amusement. It is to this class, principally, that the Library of Entertaining Knowledge is addressed; although the professed student will find much to please and instruct him in its pages, if its subjects in future are as well selected, and its execution as able, as in the volume now before us.

It is entitled the Menageries; and, as the name implies, the purpose is to teach zoology analytically, by proceeding from particular instances to general laws. Every thing that is most curious, and entertaining, and useful respecting animals, whether as regards their structure and their habits, or the uses to which they are subservient, both in the economy of nature and in their

domestic state, may thus be given in the way best suited to excite attention, and to imprint itself upon the memory, without any painful or tiresome effort of the mind.

The work begins with two chapters of a general nature; the onę an introduction to the whole, and containing a number of judicious reflections upon the study of natural history, with a sketch of the science of zoology, and the principles of classification; the other describing the uses of menageries, in a singularly lively and agreeable manner. We shall select a passage from each of these chapters, both because of the important matter conveyed, and that we may give a sample of the execution of the work; and show how far, even in the more didactic, and therefore dryer portions, the main object of combining amusement with instruction is kept in view.

• To enable an observer to make any valuable additions to this store of zoological knowledge, it is not necessary that he should be a profound anatomist, or skilful in languages, or acquainted with all the va rious systems of classification which have entered, perhaps too largely, into the science of zoology in all ages. Some of the most valuable materials for our knowledge of animals have been contributed by unscientific travellers, who have been content accurately to describe what they saw, and to collect the minutest particulars of the structure, and more especially of the habits, of the rare species of quadrupeds, or birds, or reptiles, or fishes, which they had opportunities of seeing in their na tural state. But it is not even necessary that a lover of nature should be a traveller, or detail the peculiarities of those creatures only with which we are not familiar, to make very important additions to Zoology. One of the most instructive and amusing books in our language, "The Natural History of Selborne," was written by the Rev. Gilbert White, who for forty years scarcely stirred from the seclusion of his native village, employing his time, most innocently and happily for himself, and most instructively for the world, in the observation and description of the domestic animals, the birds, and the insects by which he was surrounded. He does not raise our wonder by stories of the crafty tiger or the sagacious elephant; but he notes down the movements of " the old family tortoise;" is not indifferent to the reason" why wagtails run round cows when feeding in moist pastures;" and watches the congregating and disappearance of swallows with an industry which could alone determine the long disputed question of their migration. Mr White derived great pleasure from these pur. suits, because they opened to his mind new fields of enquiry, and led him to perceive that what appears accidental in the habits of the animal world, is the result of some unerring instinct, or some singular exercise of the perceptive powers, affording the most striking objects of contemplation to a philosophic mind. It is in this way that every man may become a naturalist; and the great object which we propose to ourselves in the collection of the most interesting facts relating to animals in general, and in this volume of those which appertain to

quadrupeds in particular, will be to excite such a habit of observation in our readers, that they may accustom themselves to watch the commonest appearances of animal life; and thus derive from every enquiry to which their observations may lead them, a more intimate conviction of the perfection of that Wisdom, by which the functions of the humblest being in the scale of existence are prescribed by an undeviating law.'

All associations between animals of opposite natures are exceedingly interesting; and those who train animals for public exhibition know how attractive are such displays of the power of discipline over the strength of instinct. These extraordinary arrangements are sometimes the effect of accident, and sometimes of the greater force of one instinct over the lesser force of another. A rat-catcher having caught a brood of young rats alive, gave them to his cat, who had just had her kittens taken from her to be drowned. A few days afterwards, he was surprised to find the rats in the place of the drowned kittens, being suckled by their natural enemy. The cat had a hatred to rats, but she spared these young rats to afford her the relief which she required as a mother. The rat-catcher exhibited the cat and her nurslings to considerable advantage. A somewhat similar exhibition exists at present. There is a little Menagerie in London, where such odd associations may be witnessed upon a more extensive scale, and more systematically conducted, than in any other collection of animals with which we are acquainted. Upon the Surrey side of Waterloo Bridge, or sometimes, though not so often, on the same side of Southwark Bridge, may be daily seen a cage about five feet square, containing the quadrupeds and birds which are represented in the annexed cut. The keeper of this collection, John Austin, states that he has employed seventeen years in this business of training creatures of opposite natures to live together in content and affection. And those years have not been unprofitably employed! It is not too much to believe, that many a person who has given his halfpenny to look upon this show, may have had his mind awakened to the extraordinary effects of habit and of gentle discipline, when he has thus seen the cat, the rat, the mouse, the hawk, the rabbit, the guinea-pig, the owl, the pigeon, the starling, and the sparrow, each enjoying, as far as can be enjoyed in confinement, its respective modes of life, in the company of the others, -the weak without fear, and the strong without the desire to injure. It is impossible to imagine any prettier exhibition of kindness than is here shown. The rabbit and the pigeon playfully contending for a lock of hay to make up their nests; the sparrow sometimes perched on the head of the cat, and sometimes on that of the owl,-each its natural enemy; and the mice playing about with perfect indifference to the presence either of cat, or hawk, or owl. The modes by which this man has effected this, are, first, by keeping all the creatures well fed; and, secondly, by accustoming one species to the society of the other at a very early period of their lives. The ferocious instincts of those who prey on the weaker are never called into action; their nature is subdued to a systematic gentleness; the circumstances by which