Soon after his arrival at Black River, it was determined to ascend that and the Polyer River to visit the Polyer Indians in the upper country. The voyage led to a knowledge of various fertile and beautiful tracts of land, here and there covered with many fine trees, useful for building purposes. On arriving at the Embarcadero, we met with new scenery; high rocks on the banks, on which grew mahogany and other trees of a large size, while the bed of the stream was studded with rocks just under water, so that caution was required to prevent our frail pitpans from striking against them, as we poled or paddled along. Proceeding some distance, we came to a small creek leading to the pass over the mountains to the Indian town; the water being very shallow, our pitpans, or rude boats, were hauled up the meandering stream, till we came to a high stony bank, where we encamped for the night, perfectly free from annoying insects of every kind, all that appeared of the insect tribe being small ants, and the indefatigable little stingless bee. Our situation was replete with interest, encamped as we were on a high rock, with the gushing stream leaping under us, and the broad face of the moon shining upon us. We sat up late that evening; started for the Indian town at daylight; and after three hours' hard travelling through a narrow pass, over high hills, crossing brooks up to our loins, we arrived there. The Indian town, to my astonishment, was comprised in one large house of an oval form, about eighty-five feet in length, and thirty-five feet in breadth, in which all the natives resided truly in the patriarchal style. Crickeries were erected all around close to each other, separated by two or three cabbage boards, each family having one of these compartments. At one side of the house a place was divided off, about sixteen feet by ten feet, and hidden from view by green leaves, which were replenished as fast as they faded.

'On our entrance, the women were busily occupiedsome pounding cassada and Indian corn together, boiling it, and making it into a beverage called oulung; some preparing cassada for bread in the morning; others

rubbing cacao and squeezing sugar-cane; the whole under the management of the chief's wife-the chief, who is called by the English name of officer, being absent. Having partaken of a couple of fowls, some cassada and plantains, cacao and boiled cane-juice, prepared for us by these kind people, we betook ourselves to repose. Early in the morning, whilst in my hammock, an Indian woman timidly touched me, saying: "Englis," at the same time presenting me with a hot roll of bread, nicely done up in fresh leaves; another soon came to me with a bundle of oulung; and so it continued until I had three or four bundles of oulung, and nine large rolls of bread. In return, I presented them with a little tobacco, some needles, and salt, and gave a clasp-knife to the officer's wife. Soon after, I was agreeably surprised by several of the men arriving from the plantations loaded with sugar-cane, plantains, cacao, &c. which we very willingly received in exchange for a few hooks, needles,' &c.

After staying a short time with the Indians, the party returned down the river to Fort Wellington, much entertained with watching the great flights of green and yellow-tailed parrots, the numbers of which are incredible. Other two species of birds were observed with much interest: of these birds, called the cricum and sumpeke, the following remarkable manœuvres were noticed :-'In walking by the side of a lagoon, a small white bird, the cricum, is seen skimming along the surface of the water, now ascending, and anon darting downwards with its body half under water, for its fishy prey; at length its unwearied efforts are successful, and it flies rapidly away with some struggling fish in its mouth. In a short time, a speck appears in the clear blue sky; nearer and nearer it approaches; till the cricum's mortal enemy, the sumpeke, appears plainly in view in chase. At this period, the scene becomes highly interesting; the cricum using all its art to escape, sometimes ascending higher and higher, at other times darting to and fro with great velocity, then flying in rapid circles, but all in vain; the sumpeke gains the ascendancy, poises itself for a moment, and "with one

fell swoop" seizes the screaming cricum, which in its terror drops the fish; downward darts the sumpeke, and before the fish regains its native element, it is caught and speedily devoured: thus the plunderer is plundered. Away flies the poor cricum, glad to escape from its tormentor; again it skims the surface of the water; again it seizes its fishy prey, and is again compelled to give it up to superior strength and power. The sumpeke is called by us the man-of-war bird; I know not the English name of the other.'

We need not follow the writer of the narrative further, but come at once to the winding-up of the expedition in which he was concerned. By a concurrence of bad management, and unforeseen misfortunes, the initiatory colony fell into disorder; and when, in 1841, the brig Rose arrived with a cargo of emigrants, 'instead of Fort Wellington being a settlement and a hostlery of newcomers, it was completely disorganised, and with barely the necessaries of life.' The long-expected vessel was filled with provisions, goods, sheep, hogs, goats, dogs, turkeys, ducks, fowls, &c.; it had also thirty-seven English and Spanish passengers: but disease and death had fastened on the unfortunate brig, and the very elements joined in the work of destruction. When approaching the land, a storm rose and dashed the vessel on the beach, a mass of useless lumber. Goods and stores were saved, while those passengers who escaped became the prey of typhus and other disorders. Mr Houghton, the new superintendent, a fine young man, died within five weeks, his death being occasioned by over-anxiety, exertion, and exposure to the sun with deep anguish did we witness his premature end, and read the beautiful funeral service over this promising young gentleman. Another followed -another-and another, until eight had gone to their final rest. The others fled, panic-stricken, some via Truxillo to England, some to Roatan,' &c. So ended this scheme of settlement on the Mosquito Shore, which we trust no company of speculators will again attempt to colonise; and the result may well serve to shew how

useless it is for persons without discrimination, judgment, perseverance, and sufficient means, to leave their homes for this ill-fated country.

JUDICIAL TORTURE IN ENGLAND AND SCOTLAND. IN the opinion of Sir Edward Coke, torture for confession was held to be forbidden by that part of the Magna Charta which asserts that no freeman can be injured in his person in any way except by the legal judgment of his equals (a jury) or by the law of the land. Whether it was so or not, torture continued to be used in England for many centuries after the celebrated convention of Runnymede. During the reigns of the Tudors, in particular, it was often employed on very slight occasions. Bacon relates of Queen Elizabeth, that, when she could not be persuaded that a book was really written by the person whose name it bore, 'she said with great indignation, that she would have him racked to produce his author. I replied: "Nay, madam, he is a doctor; never rack his person; rack his style: let him have pen, ink, and paper, and help of books, and be enjoined to continue his story, and I will undertake, by collating the styles, to judge whether he were the author." We are told by King James himself, in his account of the Gunpowder Conspiracy, that the rack was shewn to Guy Fawkes on his examination; and that it was employed at a later period of his reign, is shewn by a warrant of the privycouncil, dated in February 1619, and addressed to the Lieutenant of the Tower, commanding that officer to examine Samuel Peacock, suspected of high treason,' and to put him, as there shall be cause, for the better manifestation of the truth, to the torture, either of the manacles or the rack.'* But in 1628, when a proposal was made

*Archæologia, x.

to cause Felton, the assassin of the Duke of Buckingham, to discover his accomplices, the judges declared that, consistent with law, torture could not be used for that purpose; and it was never afterwards employed in England.

In Scotland, the extortion of confession by this abominable means was a regular portion of the judicial powers. In his work on the Criminal Law of Scotland, Sir George Mackenzie has a whole chapter' Of Torture,' shewing that the privy-council, or the supreme judges, could only use the rack; how those were punished who inflicted torture unjustly; and who were the persons that the law exempted; and he insists that all lawyers were of opinion that, even after sentence, criminals might be tortured for the discovery of their accomplices. The same view is taken by Lord Stair, a lawyer of liberal politics. The most conspicuous instrument of torture used in Scotland was one called the boots, or, as it is usually spelled in old law-books and warrants, the buits; which consisted of an oblong square box, firmly hooped with iron, and open at both ends, having loose plates in the inside, and which could be put upon the leg of the criminal or witness proposed to be examined. When the leg was insinuated into this instrument, wedges were put between the loose plates and the solid frame of the box, and while the executioner stood ready with a mallet in his hand, the judge repeated his hitherto unavailing question. At every refusal of the prisoner to confess, the mallet descended with force upon one of the wedges, so as to squeeze the limb; and this was sometimes done so frequently, that not only the blood would flow, but the very marrow be pressed from the bone. We read that, in 1596, the son and daughter of a woman accused of witchcraft were put to the torture to make her confess: the former suffered fifty-seven strokes of the hammer in the boots, the mother remaining obdurate all that time. The torture of the daughter, who was only seven years old, was by pilniewinks; an instrument of which the exact nature is not now understood, though it may be safely supposed to have referred to the little fingers, as the word is still used in Scotland to describe that diminutive mem