22 THE MODERN AMAZONS. 



the great eft part, are in no connection with each other, 

 and yet agree together in the main particulars, are not 

 to be utterly rejected ; and the whole affair muft re- 

 main undecided, till fome traveller fhall vifit himfelf 

 the place where the Amazons are faid to refide. 



POPULAR POETRY OF THE ESTHONIANS. 

 [in a letter from a friend.] 



Und ER this article you are not to expect an 

 Iliad of a Homer, or the Songs of an Offian. How 

 can fuch poetry be thought of among the poor Scla- 

 vonian races ? What I intend to -.give; are effiiiions of 

 a tender, and often an aching hearty limple natural 

 poetry ; a fmall contribution to the collections of the 

 popular ballads of the European nations, from a people 

 inhabiting the upper regions of the Gulf of Finnland, 

 whom no man would fufpecl: of pofTefjung a poetic 

 vein. 



More tfian once have I been in doubt, at one and 

 the other ballad, whether I fhould commit it to paper 

 or not. But, if we place ourfelves in the fphere of ideas 

 of fuch a limple people ; and confider that to them 

 with whom a plated button, a piece of linen, an old 

 dollar, defcends from the great great grandfather as an 



inhe- 



