452 REVIEWS THE SANDWICH ISLANDS MONTHLY MAGAZINE. 



odicals we have named at the head of this article are highly character- 

 istic indices of recent advances. " The love of religious conquest," 

 says a recent American writer, in treating of The prospects of the Eng- 

 lish language — " The love alike of literary, commercial, and military 

 conquest, which the Anglo-Saxon race have shown, and are now show- 

 ing, all over the globe, will each diffuse the language. The British 

 empire, extending over one hundred and fifty-six millions, listens to 

 that language as to a voice of power. The population of the United 

 States, doubling every twenty-five years, already amounts to more than 

 twenty millions. The French population of Canada, the Spanish 

 population of Mexico, will give place to the Anglo-Saxon race, or 

 rather, as in past time, be absorbed in it. We may believe that, fixed 

 in the standards of the national literature [of the United States,] the 

 language of the Constitution will be familiar to the hundreds of millions 

 in North America as their vernacular tongue ; and that Shakspeare 

 and Milton will be read ages hence on the banks of the Connecticut 

 and the Potomac, on the shores of the Columbia and the Francisco." 

 That such anticipations of the future destiny of the English language 

 are not extravagant, seems to find corroboration even in such ephem- 

 eral yet significant literature as that now under review. 



The printing-press, that great engine of modern social reformation 

 and revolution, no longer waits for the consolidation of settled commu- 

 nities and the luxurious leisure of accumulated wealth, to invite its 

 presence. It marches with the van-guard of the Anglo-Saxon no- 

 mades, and materially contributes to the rapidity with which they 

 hew a home out of the wild forest, and change the wilderness into a 

 centre of civilization. 



The Victoria Gazette, the most recent of the above named periodi- 

 cals, is the first paper published on Vancouver's Island, the fruit of 

 that sudden migration which the recent gold discoveries have attracted 

 to the North-western regions around Fraser's River. This paper is 

 issued twice a-week ; and from its second number, dated June 30th of 

 the present year, we extract the following amusing editorial sketch of 

 the " Printing House Square " of this, the newest world of civiliza- 

 tion : — 



" The present number of the Victoria Gazette is prepared for publication in a 

 room more remarkable for its extent than convenience. Its walls abound in 

 crevices, through which the wind bears with an impartial equality the seeds of 

 catarrh and bronchial afflictions to the editors, proprietors, and typographers. Its 



