July 17. 
COUNTRY GENTLEMAN’S COMPANION. 
281 
fact in liis description of the South Sea rookeries, and his 
far-seeing eye would not have failed lo discover in mountains 
of this substance, monuments of production which, if not of 
a very pure nature, yet are of more real importance to 
mankind than what is so often recorded in the annals of 
other biped republics of higher intelligence, but of much 
less antiquity. It is obvious, therefore, that peculiar 
causes exist for the accumulation and preservation of the 
dung of those birds, in such enormous beds as cover some 
islands on the coast of Peru, Bolivia, and Africa; and we are 
not to look for these causes alone in the mere temperature 
of their climate. Many rocky islands and precipitous shores 
within the tropics, in full possession of the feathered tribes 
of the ocean, may have thus at least one physical cause 
existing without any such accumulation, and this could 
scarcely occur without being noted by the prying eye of 
man. In such climates, the heavy periodical rains, un¬ 
counteracted by other agency, must dissolve everything 
which is soluble of whatever is deposited on the surface of 
the earth, and what is not so dissolved would be otherwise, 
in all likelihood, washed away; the same must occur in 
temperate and colder climates, where the constant alteration 
of wetness and dryness, and of heat and cold, must rapidly 
effect a thorough decomposition, and facilitate greatly the 
disappearance of all such matters. 
It we take a survey of the localities in which guano has 
hitherto been found in large quantities, we shall find causes 
in operation which will account for its accumulation. 
The seaboard of Peru and Bolivia, from 2 deg. to 22 deg. I 
south latitude, a space of about 1,480 miles in a direct line, 
is generally of a light, sandy soil, never refreshed by a drop I 
of rain, and although the dews are heavy, they seem of little j 
consequence to vegetation. On this coast are the numerous 
islands upon which take place large deposits of guano—on 
the islands of Chincha and Paequica, according to good au¬ 
thority, the beds are of great depth, and the quality exceed- | 
ingly good ; but on the coast of Chili, where rain frequently 
i falls, the guano is inferior. Morrell, who seems to have I 
visited most of those islands on the coast of Peru, makes j 
mention of two islands named Lobos Afuero and Lobos de 1 
Terra: the latter is in latitude G deg. 24 min. S. and longi¬ 
tude 80 deg. 45 min. W. and lias a safe and convenient har¬ 
bour on the north side ; “ they are covered,” says he, “ with 
the dung of aquatic birds, sufficient to load thousands of 
ships, having been accumulating for untold ages. It is 
called gvanar by the Spaniards, and is probably the richest 
manure in the world." 
If we now turn to the coast of Africa, we shall find from 
the same author, that Ichaboe Island is covered to the 
depth of 25 feet with guano, and is within 1^ miles from the 
main, and 41 miles to the northward of Possession Island, 
which is in latitude 2G deg. 57 min. S. longitude, 15 deg. 8 
min. E. The south and west coast, from about latitude 1G j 
deg. to 27 deg. south, is a dreary, sandy waste, generally 
destitute of water. The desert in the neighbourhood of 
Angra Pequina extends into the interior about forty miles, 
which, being traversed, a country is reached inhabited by an 
inoffensive and civil race of Hottentots, possessing, as you 
advance farther, innumerable flocks of cattle, where the land 
becomes fine and fertile. 
About 800 miles of the sea-coast, Morrell says, running 
| north-west and south-east, almost every mile of which was 
; examined by him, presents a range of sandy deserts, upon 
an average nearly forty miles in breadth, 
During ten months of the year here there is scarcely a 
drop of rain, and for the other two months very little falls, 
i The atmosphere is pure, warm, and dry, to such a degree, 
i that a quarter of fresh beef, weighing two hundred weight, 
hanging in the rigging, will become perfectly dry, without 
| being tainted in the slightest degree, even to the bone. 
Thus, to all appearances, there are identical agencies 
existing on the coasts of Peru and Africa, where guano is 
: found of such superior quality and in such wonderful 
abundance. 
For the deposition and accumulation, then, of guano, in 
any particular locality, it is essential that there should be 
a sea-coast on which there are numerous isolated rocky 
situations, where sea-fowl may collect unmolested to hatch 
their young, and seas in the vicinity supplying abundance of 
food; warmth of climate, little or no I’aiu, and a perpetually 
dry atmosphere. Under a terrestrial and atmospherical 
combination of this sort, Dr. M. Hamilton calculates that a 
million of birds will produce fifteen tons of guano daily, 
from their droppings, subject to no further loss from evapo¬ 
ration. No mean quantity would thus, in a very few years, 
be accumulated in favourable situations, and many such, 
it is reasonable to suppose, are to be found in both hemi¬ 
spheres. 
We can foresee that the stimulus given by the success 
which has already attended the voyages for African guano, 
and the Idea that the supply will soon be exhausted, both 
on the coast of Peru and Africa, must naturally lead to the 
exploration of new regions, for an article apparently every 
year growing more and more in request. It will, however, 
only be by looking to those topographical bearings referred 
to, that any one can expect to make fresh discoveries of 
deposits of this substance to an extent which will make them 
an object of commercial enterprise, or of a quality which will 
realize the hopes of the farmer.— Dr. Jackson, in Fanner’s 
Cabinet, U. S'. 
[As we promised, we publish another sketch by the 
authoress of “ Uncle Tom’s Cabin.”] 
SPRING BREATHINGS. 
“ How fresh, O Lord ! how sweet and clean 
Are thy returns ! as flowers in spring, 
To which, besides their own demean, 
The late past frosts tributes of pleasure bring. 
Grief melts away, 
Like flowers in May, 
As if there were no such cold thing. 
“ Who could have thought my shriveled heart 
Could have recovered greenness ? It was gone 
Quite under eround, as flowers depart, 
To see their mother root, where they have blown ; 
Where they together, 
All the havd weather, 
Dead to the world, keep house alone.”—H erbert. 
Not far from our stone cabin is a pile of rude gray rocks, 
carelessly thrown together, and lioary with mosses. Here 
and there in the clefts the crimson columbine hangs its 
tassels, and wild rose, saxifrage, and ferns combine to make 
a garland round and over them. The graceful white birch, 
with silvery stem and glancing leaves, keeps sentinel here 
arm in arm with the stunted and scraggy pitch pine. This 
white birch Lowell calls the “ Dryad ” of our woods, and it 
is in shape and feature the very personification of woodland 
elegance and grace. Its arrowy leaves are of a vivid and 
glossy yellowish green, and constantly glitter and shimmer 
on their long stems, as if pervaded by a tender and tremulous 
ecstacy of life, forming a singular contrast to the sullen and 
craggy immobility of the pitch pine, with which they are so 
frequently associated. The fair, polished white trunk, grace¬ 
ful and shapely, seems like a marble shaft in the greenness, 
and is a peculiarity wherever the tree appears in the land¬ 
scape. One or two young elms, and a growth of young oaks 
also lend their shade to encompass these rocks, which have 
a history connected with them. Tradition whispers that this 
spot was, in former days, the trysting place where Samuel 
J. Mills and his companions met, while members of the 
Theological Seminary of Auburn, to nourish, by prayer and 
communion, that lovely vision of human brotherhood which 
has since carried the American mission ary into every country 
of the earth. A generation has grown up since then, and 
w r e whose cradles were rocked by mothers in whose hearts 
the missionary spirit had become an absorbing enthusiasm, 
who were taught to pray and feel for every nation and tribe 
of earth as brethren, can scarce realize what was the labour 
to introduce that spirit into America, when missionary 
enterprises were deemed visionary and chimerical. Sad is 
it indeed that America, while doing this great work in foreign 
lands, has stood so indifferent to the sufferings of three 
millions of heathen in her own land ; sad that the luke¬ 
warmness and inconsistency of the religious world on this 
subject has brought suspicion of the sincerity with which 
she seeks to convert the heathen of other shores. But 
while the lovers of foreign missions should not forget the 
American slave, neither should the abolitionist forget the 
heathen abroad, for both alike are brethren, and each is 
inconsistent who neglects either. 
