828.] 



Domestic and Foreign. 



641 



lie enters with the spirit and resolution of a 

 martyr ; though knowing he says, or im- 

 plies that he shall raise a nest of hornets 

 about his ears, his confidence in the purity 

 of his motives bids him set their stings at 

 defiance. His ultimate aim is utterly to 

 sweep away the " prejudices, which, though 

 fostered by the ignorant, or inflamed by the 

 artful, have instilled a fatal poison into the 

 generous and unsuspecting bosoms of the 

 British people." Bless the man ! Suppose 

 him successful in removing the prejudices 

 he talks of; slavery itself remains, and sla- 

 very it is even more than the actual treat- 

 ment of the victim which grates the ears 

 of his countrymen : and so long as slavery 

 exists, all talk of any modification of it must 

 be mere sophistry. The bulky volume before 

 us is but a first fasciculus ; and the history, 

 and, of course, the removal of prejudice, scarce- 

 ly begun ; for, before that history commences, 

 the reader must wade through a good 140 

 pages, upon matters some of them not at all 

 relevant, and others at least as well calculated 

 for the history of the world, or a discourse 

 on physical geography. First we have a 

 list of writers on the new world Spaniards, 

 Italians, French, English, and Scotch, with 

 the merits of four-and-twenty of them care- 

 fully balanced not quite unusefully. Then 

 comes a chapter on the formation of the 

 Caribbean Archipelago, in which the learned 

 author puts forth his newest geology, and by 

 which we learn, that " had the waters of the 

 deluge receded a few hundred yards or so, 

 more, what are now islands would have been 

 the tops of mountains in adjoining conti- 

 nents ; and had they receded less, we should 

 have had, if fewer mountains, more islands, 

 and our geographical dictionaries not a leaf 

 the thinner. Nay, had these waters sub- 

 sided only five-and-twenty fathoms, the crest 

 of the mountain that joins Dover to Calais 

 would have been bared, and a very little 

 more would have converted the Isle of 

 Wight into a hill, separated from Hamp- 

 shire, by a dry valley, only sixty fathoms ; 

 .and England itself would become one vast 

 mountain, separated by a deep vale from 

 Normandy, and connected with Flanders by 

 the crest between Dover and Calais ; while 

 the mouth of the British Channel, between 

 the Scilly Islands, and Ushant, would be- 

 come the barrier to the Atlantic." Prodi- 

 gious ! and all discovered at Jamaica too ! 



When the author has settled the present 

 and possible claims to distinction of the 

 Archipelago, as satisfactorily as if he had 

 been present at the birth, he proceeds very 

 .gravely to determine from what quarter came 

 the population ; and not a shade of doubt, 

 it seems, remains to darken Mr. Bridges's 

 convictions, that " Noah, himself, under- 

 took the re-establishment of America." He 

 lived, argues Mr. Bridges, 350 years after 

 the deluge, and it is not likely would waste 

 all those years without performing great ex- 

 ploits, and undertaking noble enterprises. 



M.M. New Series VOL. V. No. 30. 



Such a " shipwright and navigator," at onc e 

 ' inspired and experienced," as he was 

 " the maker of the largest ship, too, the 

 world ever saw," would he not build ano- 

 ther ship " his own remaining fast on the 

 Mount of Ararat to repair the desolation 

 of the world ?" To be sure he would. 

 Possessed as he was too of a knowledge of a 

 thousand things we are unacquainted with, 

 by the tradition of sciences with which our 

 first father was inspired, and whose children 

 he had conversed with could he be igno- 

 rant of these Western Isles ? Certainly not. 

 Besides, it is even possible he was himself a 

 native of them ; and navigating, as he had 

 boldly done, an illimitable ocean, what dif- 

 ficulty even if he did not himself go to 

 America could he have had in teaching 

 young Masters Noah, or the Misses Noah, 

 to cross a sea reduced within bounds, and 

 comparatively tranquil, safe, and narrow ? 

 Moses again tells us, that all the lands and 

 islands were peopled, and of course the chil- 

 dren of Noah could not have been ignorant 

 of half the world. No doubt they landed at 

 Mexico, and from thence radiated to all 

 points of the compass. Seriously, we are, for 

 the most part, quoting literally from Mr. 

 Bridges's book. Astronomy and navigation, 

 says he, still proceeding in the same strain, 

 were once completely understood, because 

 without them the world could not have been 

 peopled ; and these same 'arts,' having per- 

 formed their functions, peopled the world 

 that is, they disappeared being no longer 

 required for distant navigation. Why they 

 have re-appeared in these later days, Mr. B. 

 has forgotten to inform us or, perhaps, the 

 succeeding volume will tell us all about the 

 matter. Some idle application of Scripture 

 language follows, which would almost make 

 plain men, as we are, question the writer's 

 sanity. 



The chapters on the Indians and Carib- 

 beans are less filled with the conjectural, 

 though very far frgm being always intel- 

 ligible. Let the reader try " The natural 

 shape of the heads of the Indians was de- 

 stroyed by the universal custom of depressing 

 the sinciput in infancy, or, by manual force, 

 folding it beneath the occiput, where it was 

 retained by ligatures and thin metal plates, 

 until the forehead became totally depressed 

 and doubled in thickness" and Castilian 

 swords broke short upon their skulls. Speak- 

 ing of the Caribbees " All intuitive idea of 

 a deity, for whom, according to Rochfort, 

 they had not even a name, was extinguished 

 by the brutality of this people. They feared 

 an evil spirit which they called Maboia, 

 although they did not worship it," &c. 

 What can the writer mean ? It is evident 

 they had an idea, though it may not have 

 been an intuitive one, of a deity. Where 

 did Mr. B. get his own intuition ? 



At last commences the history ; and Co- 

 lumbus discovers Xaymaca on the 1st May 

 1494, where Mr. B. reluctantly abandons 



4 N 



