578 



Monthly Review of Literature, 



[MAY, 



corners together, and your boat is made. For use, 

 place it upon the water bottom downwards; then, 

 to prevent its natural tendency to turn bottom up- 

 wards, put one foot immediately in the centre, and 

 let the other follow with the most delicate caution : 

 thus, standing breathless in the middle, you are 

 now to shrink downwards, contracting your body 

 precisely in the manner in which, probably in your 

 childhood, you have pressed a friar into a snuff- 

 box. This position, however inconvenient, serves 

 to conceal a considerable share of timidity from 

 your companions, though not from the spectators, 

 who line the banks of the river, indulging in loud 

 wild laughter. When crouched down in the bottom, 

 sundry articles are handed in, and ingeniously de- 

 posited round you, until the balsa sinks to about an 

 inch or perhaps an inch and a half from the water's 

 edge; it is then considered sufficiently laden. A 

 naked peone now plunges into the stream. " Mercy 

 on us !" is the natural exclamation ; for the first 

 impression from the shock is, that yourself and all 

 your property are going to the bottom ; but you are 

 instantly relieved from this very probable conjec- 

 ture by the peone's taking hold of one of the cor- 

 ners of the balsa (which projects like that of a cocked 

 hat), and asking you " Estd V. blent" "Are 

 you comfortable?" To this question you reply by 

 a nod of the head, for the use of the tongue is lost ; 

 but even if words were at command, you may not 

 wish to commit yourself by expressions diametri- 

 cally opposed to feelings and symptoms ; or you 

 may wish it to be imagined, as is sometimes prac- 

 tised in perilous situations, that your profound si- 

 lence indicates indifference of danger, or may pass 

 for coolness and presence of mind. Silence also 

 conveys an idea of gravity, and of resignation to 

 your fate, which, indeed, is no more than becom- 

 ing, when you feel persuaded that nothing short of 

 a miracle can prolong your existence beyond a quar- 

 ter of an hour. The nod being given, a peone on 

 the shore imparts a gentle impulse to your tottering 

 bark, while the peone in the water, keeping hold of 

 the corner with one hand, strikes out with the other, 

 and swims away with you to the opposite bank. 

 The moment you touch it, so great is your joyful 

 surprise at arriving perfectly safe that all the perils 

 of your voyage are forgotten, and you soon find out 

 (as is often the case in life) that your imagination 

 had represented dangers and difficulties, where, 

 with a little caution, there existed neither the one 

 nor the other. 



The shape of the poncho is conveyed in 

 much fewer words: An oblong square gar- 

 ment, having a hole in the centre, through 

 which the head passes. It is worn constantly 

 by men, and may be called the cloak of the 

 country. Ladies use it only on horseback. 



Capt. Temple has some information about 

 the height of the Andes from Mr. Pentland, 

 a gentleman attached to the Peruvian Em- 

 bassy. 



Chimborazo has long passed for the highest of 

 the Cordilleras, and, until the discovery of the Hi- 

 malaya, was supposed to be the highest mountain 

 in the world M. Humboldt,as he himself observes, 

 ' ' had the pleasure of seeing a greater extent of 

 mountains than any other geognost ;" but he did not 

 pursue his travels to this part of the Andes, where 

 subsequent travellers have ascertained the height of 

 the Ylimani to be 21,800 feet above the level of the 

 sea, exceeding that of Chimborazo by 350 feet no 

 very great difference, it may perhaps be said, in 

 subjects of such vast dimensions; but still quite 



sufficient to take from the latter the palm of super- 

 lative magnitude and grandeur in the great chain of 

 the Andes. 



Mr. Pentland, who measured the Ylimani in 1826, 

 gave me his calculations with the remark, that 

 '.' they required revision ;" consequently they were 

 not intended to go forth as accurate. At a subse- 

 quent period, I was informed by our chief commis- 

 sioner, who took a warm interest in these subjects, 

 that the height of Ylimani had been given to him 

 as 21,800 feet, which agrees with that given to me 

 by Mr. Pentland, and this appears to be corrobo- 

 rated by the observations of Dr. Redhead. 



This account, however, does not at all 

 agree with Humboldt's recent Memoire sur 

 les Travaux Geographiques et Geognos- 

 tiques de M. Pentland. Instead of 2 1,800 

 ieet, Ylimani is there stated to be 24,350, 

 and Sorate 25,400. Is this addition of more 

 than 3,000 feet the result of M. Hum- 

 boldt's "revision" of Mr. Pen tland's calcula- 

 tions ? We are afraid mighty little reliance 

 is to be placed upon either calculations or 

 revision." 



The Game of Life, ty. Leitch Ritchie, 

 2vols. I2mo. 1830. A volume of magazine 

 sketches by this gentleman, some time ago, 

 we considered as the production of no com- 

 mon person ; and the tale before us confirms 

 our estimate and anticipations. The writer's 

 object is here plainly to delineate certain 

 scenes of London misery which do not fall 

 within the purview of everybody, and he has 

 done so with spirit, and possibly with truth : 

 the rest is mere machinery. An elderly 

 gentleman, retired from business on a slender 

 pittance, and subsequently enriched by the 

 death of a brother, finds himself a lonely 

 being, without a relation or a friend, and 

 almost without an acquaintance, save the 

 curate who plays backgammon with him. 

 Wearying of the solitude and monotony of 

 his condition, and panting for some object 

 on which to pour his unoccupied affections, 

 he takes a sudden resolution to abandon, for 

 a time, the curate and his game of counters, 

 to go and play a " game of life." He recol- 

 lects a lady whom he had once admired, but 

 who had jilted him in favour of a poor lieu- 

 tenant; he resolves to go and see her, and 

 sets off for her residence at Llangollen by the 

 mail. He finds her a widow, with a son, a 

 fine, frank youth, on the point of starting for 

 London to seek his fortune, with ten pounds 

 in his pocket. With her also he finds a 

 young and beautiful girl of a vigorous and 

 intelligent character, an orphan, the child 

 of nobody knew whom, and keeping a little 

 school in the town. In his longings for 

 objects on whom to lavish his overflowing 

 tenderness, these two young and interesting 

 persons seem the very beings he wants ; and 

 he accordingly resolves to patronize them, 

 but to set about the matter prudently. He 

 will put them to their probation ; he lays his 

 little plan ; he foresees all the incidents of 

 the drama, and fondly hopes to wind it up at 

 his pleasure. In vain the curate reminds 



