fooner, are

any of their demands refufed, than they turn their arms against the very persons who have furnished them, committing every fpecies of ravage and cruelty, until they have extorted coftly bribes and gratifications for the renewal of their friendship, which, after all, is equally precarious as ever. The higheft offerer always obtains their fervices for the time. Gratitude for paft favours is a principle to which they are total ftrangers, fo that those who would avail themfelves of their alliance, must be perpetually on the watch to give them no grounds of complaint, or to expiate with the utmost speed, and, at any expence, every fuppofed injury of which they complain.

The Indians pafs the greatest part of the night in general without fleep. Their amufements, of which drinking to excess is the chief, occupy the night as much as the day. When wearinefs overtakes them, they lay themselves down on the ground and fleep. No fooner do they awake than they have again recourfe to the intoxicating liquor, fhould any remain; if not, they wander about without any fteady purpofe, regardless of the fatigue it may involve, until total laffitude again compel them to repofe.

From this detail, it appears how little their manner of life is raifed above that of brutes, having no determined object of action, no restraint of their paffions, and little or no fenfe of morality in their conduct. The fphere of their ideas is not lefs contracted, than their manners are grofs and brutal. It has already been mentioned that they do not compute the fucceffion of days nor of weeks. The different afpects of the moon alone engage their attention as a measure of time. Of the year, they have no other conception than what is fuggefted to them by the alternate heat of Summer and cold of Winter, nor have they the leaft idea of applying to this period the obvious computation of the

When it

months which it contains. is afked of any old man iu Peru, even the most civilized, what age he is of, the only anfwer he can give is the number of Caciques he has feen. It often happens too that they only recol lect the most distant of thefe Princes in whofe time certain circumstances had happened peculiarly memorable, while of thofe that lived in a more recent period they have loft all remembrance.

The fame grofs ftupidity is obferveable in those Indians who have retained their original liberty. They are never known to fix the dates of any events in their minds, or to trace the fucceffion of circumftances that have arifen from fuch events. Their imagination takes in only the prefent, and in that only what intimately concerns themselves.

Nor can difcipline or inftruction overcome this natural defect of apprehenfion. In fact, the fubjected Indians in Peru, who have a continual intercourfe with the Spaniards, who are furnished with curates perpetually occupied in giving them leffons of religion and morality, and who mix with all ranks of the civilized fociety established among them, are almost as ftu pid and barbarous as their countrymen who have had no fuch advantages.

This fact becomes the more ftriking when we compare these people with the Negroes from Africa. Thefe last, after paffing a few years in America, acquire with much lefs inftruction, and even of their own accord, the faculty of computing the periods of time, as well as ideas in every refpect infinitely furpaffing those of the natives. Slaves, as they are, the Negroes confider themselves as greatly fuperior to the Indians, on whom they look down with fovereign contempt, as a people incapable of any intellectual improvement.

The Peruvians, while they lived under the government of their Incas, preferved the records of certain re

markable

kind of regular government, defcribed by the hiftorians of the Conquest of Peru. This government originated entirely from the attention and abilities of their princes, and from the regulations enacted by them for directing the conduct of their fubjects. This ancient degree of civilization among them gives ground to prefume that their legiflators fpruug from fome race more enlightened than the other tribes of Indians, a race of which no individual feems to remain in the prefent times.

In general, the Indians live to a great age, although it is not poffible to know from themselves the exact number of their years. Two circumstances, however, commonly diftinguish those who are far advanced in life: Thefe are, grey hairs and a beard. Their hair feldom becomes grey before seventy, and their beard does not appear till fixty, and even then but in Imall quantity. Thus, it is prefumed, that they are upwards of a hundred when both their hair and beard have been entirely grey. It was afked of an Indian, who appeared to be extremely old, what age he was of: I am above twenty, was his reply. Upon putting the question in a different form, by reminding him of certain circumstances in former times. My machu, faid he, spoke to me when I was young, of the Incas, and he had feen these princes. According to this reply, there must have elapfed, from the date of his machu's (his grandfather's) remembrance to that time, a period of at least two hundred and thirty-two years. The man who made this reply appeared to be a hundred and twenty years of age; for, befides the whiteness of his hair and beard, his body was almost bent to the ground, without, however, fhewing any other marks of debility or suffering. This happened in 1764.

This longevity, attended in general with uninterrupted health, is pro

vacancy from all ferious thought and employment, joined alfo with the robuft texture and conformation of their bodily organs. If the Indians did not destroy one another in their almost perpetual wars, and if their habits of intoxication were not fo univerfal and incurable, they would be, of all the races of men who inhabit the globe,, the most likely to prolong, not only the bounds, but the enjoyments of amal life to their utmost duration.

Several of the Indian tribes in Peru are accustomed to pierce their ears thro' the whole circumference of the outward part, with a view of enlarging their fize, which, according to their notions, is an ornament. This custom extends itself to the river Maragnon, the inhabitants of whose banks are called Orejones, or Great Ears, on this account. Others of them make holes through the cartilaginous parts: of their nofe, also through their lips and chin, in order to pafs through them a thin tranfverfe bit of wood, refembling the briftle, of a hedgehog. The fame cuftom is obferved among the northern nations. This refemblance of customs and dress among all the inhabitants of the New World, though feparated by the greatest dif tances, is a very remarkable fact, efpecially when it is confidered that the other nations of the globe difplay fuch varieties in these refpects. Hence it feems evident that these habits are as old as the firft peopling of the American continent, and that they haẹv been preferved without any change from that æra.

The northern Indians provide themfelves with a fecond wife when the former has grown old. The old one, however, does not leave the hut, but continues in it to fuperintend the little agriculture that is practised among them; to bruize the maize, and to prepare the food and drink of the family. Thus fhe becomes in a manner a fervant to her fucceffor. The younger

Spouse

ALREADY a change was apparent in the Seafon, and fymptoms of mutability became evident in the conftitution of the times. The mighty king of the Stars, forfaking the fcale of Juftice, laid violent hands on the Sheaf; which injuftice curtailed the career of day, and lengthened the broad veil of darkness. The troops of Harveft, who had long waited for this event in the ambufcade of Expectation, now leaped from their concealment, with a defign of pillaging the four inhabited quarters of the Globe; and advancing on the plain of the univerfe, began to extend the hand of Rapacity; the coldnefs of their charity froze Juftice; whilft they began their attack, by laying fiege to orchards and gardens, divefting them compleatly of their leaves and mufical notes. The earth and its inhabitants, from a dread of their fwift and warlike courfers, began to fhiver like the trembling af pin; whilst others, like foxes, becoming enamoured of furs, fhut themselves up in their fecluded apartments, and obferved the external defolation from the roots of their fecurity. The clufters of grapes which have efcaped the perfecution of the jackalls, now offer thanksgiving in the cell of Humility; whilft that vagrant fluid, which formerly afpired to circumnavigate the

globe, now banishing the fantaftic idea of travelling, remains contentedly in its place and that wind, which used to fport in the fimooth expanfe of the ocean, being feized with a violent раnic, in its fight overfet huge rocks. The trees, as naked as if just come to refurrection, and ftripped of their leaves and buds, extend their imploring arms to heaven. The nightingales fly from the garden, to complain of the fun's elopement, leaving the ravens in poffeffion of the orchards; and the sheet of the earth, in expectation of being imprinted with vernal productions, becomes whiter than the cheek of the jeffamine. The lowly inhabitants of the field, chid by the raging blaft, have fled on the road of Annihilation; the rofe and the tulip, leaving their deferted habitations to the owl, fall victims to the gloomy Di†, and the furious Behmen, their beautiful ornaments torn in ten thoufand pieces; the stately cyprefs, which had long reigned in the metropolis of Vegetation, is pulled from the throne of Dominion; the lily, rifing on its unbending ftalk, was divefted of its foliage, by thefe worfe than Tartarian invaders, and thrown proftrate in the cell of Deftruction. Neither did the fragrant locks of the hyacinth, nor the plaited treffes of the honey-fuckle, preferve them from the ruthlefs foe; whilft the rofe-buds, just opening to the day, expired with terror at the difmal fhricks of Di's oppreflive fquadrops, and their crimson remnants were fcattered on every side.

M.

PLEIFFER has difcovered and carried into execution a method of charring or diftilling Pit

coal, upon the fame principle as has been done in this country for a conflderable time by the Earl of Dundo

nald.

hald. If we understand rightly the conftruction of the furnaces ufed by his Lordfhip, the procefs in them is what the chymifts call diftillatio per afcenfum; that is, the volatile matters feparated from the coal are carried upwards, and by a proper apparatus condenfed and collected. The method defcribed by our author is a diftillatio per defcenfum; the coals are inclofed in a kind of oven, the heat is applied to this externally, and the fluids by it expelled from the coals run off by a gutter in the bottom of the furnace, and being conveyed by pipes to a proper place, are there collected for ufe. The firft of thefe that makes its appearance, and indeed continues to come off till the very end of the process, is what our author calls his Styptic Water, at first with very little tafte or fmell, but gradually more and more ftrongly impregnated with what gives it the ufeful quality for which it is here recommended. It is received into barrels as it comes off; thefe are numbered as they fill, and fet by. No 1. therefore, contains the weakeft water; No 2. is ftronger, No 3. ftill more fo, &c. The oils, and part of the vola tile fpirit that comes over along with this water, as the procefs advances, are understood to be feparated from it before it is applied to the purpose of tanning.

This discovery, fays M. Pleiffer, I Communicated to a great court feven years ago, and to one of the worthieft minifters known, with fpecimens of the leather thus prepared.

would be injured, fhould this method be introduced: Another, in a dictatorial tone, declared, that lime was a thing indifpenfably neceffary to give a grain to leather.

Arguments like thefe, adds our author, need no refutation; they only fhew with what fuperficial knowledge fome men, favoured by fortune, venture to oppofe reafon and truth.

Lime is the material which has been longeft in ufe for removing the hair of skins, and giving them a grain; but, being a very corrofive fubftance, and at the fame time a powerful attracter of humidity, it hurts the leather too much, and renders it foft and spongy.

Bark is the other substance which has been much used: it is free, in a great measure, from the imperfections of the lime; but 300 lb. of it, and fix months time nearly, are neceffary for the tanning of a single strong hide: the conftant confumption too of this material renders it daily dearer. It is therefore certainly a defirable object, to curtail the time, the labour, and the expence attending this method of tanning; which, it is hoped, might be accomplished by the ufe of the flyptic water.

The procefs recommended by the ingenious author, for this purpose, is as follows:

Two large tubs, each fix feet wide, and four feet high, with lids exactly fitted to them, are to be made of a wood that will not communicate bad taste or colour to the fluid, tout and perfectly water-tight. Thefe are to be placed on brick-work, or other mafonry, in fuch a manner as to be raised a little, and acceffible on all fides for conveniency, with a fire-place and flue under each for warming their contents.