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course no mind either to write or to be drowned, and begged him for God's sake, not to forsake him. Very well," said the Greenlander," if you die, I can die likewise," and he staid with him and saved him. In the sequel, he often joked on this adventure, saying, "You would not write; you were afraid; that was droll.”

SAVAGE FEROCITY OF THE TIGER.

William Morley, in his Journal of his Travels in Buenos Ayres, gives us a dreadful instance of the blood-thirsty nature of these animals.

"During my stay in the woods in Buenos Ayres, in the year 1815, I have seen the tigers frequently swim across the creeks from one side to the other, close by the hut we were then dwelling in: but as we always made it a rule to keep large fires, they have again retired into the thickets, without molesting us.

"One evening a man from our hut, just before sun-set, went out with an intention to shoot wild turkeys in the hedges bordering on the spot where we were then stopping. For this purpose he armed himself with a gun and the necessary ammunition. We heard him fire the first time; but, as we did not hear any sound afterwards, we began to be considerably alarmed for his safety. By this time the sun had gone down, and it being about the time that these ravenous beasts emerge from their dens to seek for prey, we endeavoured by every means in our power to rescue him from the danger he was in. For this purpose we shouted and hallooed loudly, blew our horns, and made large blazing fires, but all to no purpose. It would have been the height of madness for us to have ventured out from our huts into the woods after dark, as these animals lay in ambush, silently waiting until their prey approaches near to the spot, and then they dart forward with a hideous roar, much in the manner that a cat does upon a mouse.

We passed the night in the most dreadful suspense, and with the first dawn of morning we sallied forth into the woods to seek for our ill-fated companion. But we had not to seek far, for at about 150 yards from the hut, our souls were harrowed at the dreadful spectacle that met our horror-stricken sight. There lay his mangled remains-bones of his legs, arms, and thighs-with the flesh eaten off them. His skull was partially eaten; and the ground was bedewed with his blood! The butt-end of the musket had a considerable bruise, and was plastered over with some of the blood and hair of the tiger— from which we concluded, that after he had fired his first charge he came in contact with the animal before he had time to re-load his piece, and so had fought with the gun, as well as he was able, until overpowered bythe superior strength of the savage beast, who had dragged him down, and so devoured him.

THE SADDLER OF BAWTRY.

It was formerly the custom to present a bowl of ale to malefactors on their way to execution. The county of York, which strongly adheres to its ancient usages, was the last place where this custom continued. A saddler at Bawtry lost his life in consequence of declining the refreshment; as, had he stopped as usual, his reprieve, which was actually on the road, would have arrived time enough to have saved him. Hence arose the saying, that the saddler of Bawtry was hanged for leaving his ale.

DREADFUL EARTHQUAKE AT MESSINA, IN THE YEAR 1783.

AT page 645, vol. I, we have given an extract from Mrs. Piozzi's Travels, relative to those awful convulsions of nature which ravaged the whole country of Calabria for more than two months. The circumstances attending those earthquakes were of so remarkable a nature, and the dreadful effects resulting from them were so truly horrible, that we consider them entitled to a particular record in our Register.-The following account is principally derived from the observations of persons who were residing in Messina at that awful period, and who providentially escaped the fate which befel nearly the whole of the inhabitants of that city; and from the journals of several wellinformed travellers, who visited the spot immediately after the frightful

visitation.

Messina, being situated between Mount Etna and the Gulf of Charybdis, and being likewise at no great distance from the volcanoes of Lipari and Stromboli, must have been in all ages liable to suffer by earthquakes. Such terrible events, however, appear to have been more unfrequent in ancient than in modern times, and have alarmed the present age oftener than any other. In the year 1693 a fourth part of the cities of Sicily was destroyed by an earthquake. Messina merely felt the shock; all its buildings, however, suffered. In the year 1742 it suffered another equally violent. The plague which followed in 1743 retarded the repairs necessary after the earthquake. In the year 1780, this city continued, for more than six months, to suffer from new earthquakes.

The autumn of the year 1782 was unusually cold and rainy. Fahrenheit's thermometer was often as low as 56 degrees. The succeeding winter was dry; and the mercury never fell under 55 degrees: and, what is uncommon in that season, storms were now and then observed to rise from the west. The pilots in the channel observed that the tides no longer rose at the usual periods, and the Gulf of Charybdis raged with extraordinary fury. On the

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over the whole street, and attacked the pedestals of the statues which had been spared by the earthquake, and still stood firm among the ruins. The same furious wind which swelled the sea in so extraordinary a manner, ravaged the whole coast from Messina all the way to Syracuse.

LUCKY THIEF.

About twenty yards above the Cora-Linn, where the water of the Clyde is precipitated over perpendicular rocks eighty feet in height, there is a chasm of not more than seven or eight feet in width, through which the whole collected stream pours impetuously along. A boy had stolen some apples from the garden at Cora-house, and being detected by the gardener, he ran towards the river, and attempted to leap over the terrific current. He missed his footing, and fell headlong into it. The gardener stood horror-struck, and expected to see the mangled corpse of the boy emerge only to be dashed down the fearful cataract below. Imagine his sensation of joy when he saw the lad thrown safely on the ledge of the opposite rock, and heard him, as he scampered off with the bag of apples in his hand, exclaim, "Aha, lad! ye have na' catch't me yet!"

DRIVING OUT THE DEVIL.

Among the various complaints which in Abyssinia are said to be caused by the devil, there is one of a very curious description, called the Tegretier, and of which the following account is given by Pearse, an English sailor, who had resided in that country many years.

"A complaint, called the tegretier, both in Tegri and Ammerrer, which is not so frequent among men as women, is for a certainty very surprising; and I think the devil must have some hand in it. It is very common among them; and when I have been told in what manner they acted, I would never believe it until it came to my own wife's chance, who had lived with me five years. At the first appearance of this complaint, she was five or six days very ill, and her speech so much altered, that I could scarcely understand her. Her friends and relations who came to visit her, told me that her complaint was the tegretier, which, from what I had heard, frightened me, and I would at the instant have turned her away, only for fear they might think me a brute for turning away my wife when afflicted with sickness. Her parents, however, persuaded me to bear it with patience, and say nothing, for if I were to be angry it would cause her death, and that they would cure her as all others were cured in this country. After the first five or six days' sickness, she began to be continually hungery, and would eat five or six times in the night, never slept, and in the day time she would go about, followed by some one of her parents, to all her neighbours, borrowing rings and other ornaments for the neck, arms, and legs. I did not like the thing at all; but for the sake of seeing the curiosity, I endeavoured to hold my tongue and be patient. Her speech I could scarcely understand; and she, like all others troubled with this complaint, called a man she, and a woman he. One day she called unto me in the presence of her friends after the manner of calling a woman, which vexed me so much, that I said she should not stop in the house. But

the moment she saw me in a passion, she fell as if in a fit, and I can assure you that I saw the blood run from her eyes as if they had been pricked with a lance."

Pearce, though not a very doating husband, did not wish to lose his wife, when means could be used to save her; he therefore determined to say nothing more until the day appointed for her cure, or "the devil to be drove out of her;" which was done in the following manner :

"Her friends had hired as many trumpeters and drummers who go about the country for the purpose, as they thought sufficient; and early in the morning of the day appointed, they loaded her neck, arms, and legs, with silver ornaments, and dressed her with a dress which the great men wear at reviews after battle, which the owners readily lend on such an occasion. After she was sufficiently dressed, she was taken to a plain appointed by herself, about a mile from the town, where hundred of boys, girls, and men and women of low class, follow. Her friends and relations take a great many large jars of maize and swoir for them to drink; I had often seen people go out of the town for the same purpose, but would not for shame follow to see them. However, for the sake of curiosity, I was determined to see the last of this, and I therefore went to the place appointed before daylight, and waited until they came; a cradle was placed in the middle of the spot, covered with a large carpet, and a great many large jars of maize were placed round it. As soon as she came near, she began to dance, and the trumpeters all began to play in two parties; when one party was tired, the other relieved them, so that the noise might constantly be heard; the drink being continually served out by her friends to all, kept them singing and shouting; she still dancing and jumping, sometimes four or five feet from the ground, and every now and then she would take off an ornament and throw it down. Some one being appointed to take care they might not be lost, picked them up, and put them into a basket. She kept on jumping and dancing in this manner without the least appearance of being tired, until nearly sun-set, when she dropped the last ornament, and as soon as the sun disappeared, she started; and I am perfectly sure, that for as good as four hundred yards, when she dropped as if dead, the fastest running man in the world could not have come up with her. The fastest running young man that can be found, is employed by her friends to run after her with a matchlock well loaded, so as to make a good report; at the moment she starts, he starts with her, but before she has run the distance where she drops as if dead, he is left half way behind; as soon as he comes up to her, he fires right over her body, and asks her name, which she then pronounces, although, during the time of her complaint, she denies her Christian name, and detests all priests or churches. Her friends afterwards take her to church, where she is washed with holy water, and is thus cured." Thus ends the ceremony of " "Driving out the Devil."

FIGHTING WITH KNIVES IN SOUTH AMERICA. William Morley, an intelligent man, who has lately travelled over a considerable part of Buenos Ayres, gives the following account of the abore

custom.

"The barbarous custom of fighting with knives, which the people of South America practise, is truly dreadful to one unaccustomed to behold those death-dealing combats. I saw two young men sparring with each other in

apparently a jocular way, when one of them, during the contest, making a false step, slipped, and fell backwards. His antagonist threw himself on his fallen foe with the knife in his grasp, and drove the murderous weapon through his body. The unfortunate man died upon the spot. Even the very children practise this horrible warfare-for in a large family, in which I remained for a considerable time, two little girls took up long knives to fight with, when suddenly the youngest stabbed the knife into her opponent's right eye, by which she was blinded for ever.

"On another occasion I saw two men combating with each other-and at the moment the one attempted to ward off a blow aimed at him-the other drew the knife, with such force across the back of his hand, as to cut through all the sinews, by which he entirely lost the use of his arm, and his life was for a considerable length of time despaired of."

THE SAIL ROCK.

Near the island of Porto Rico, in the West Indies, is the small island of St. Thomas, from which place is seen a rock in the sea, at the distance of about ten miles from the island, which bears a very strong resemblance to a ship. At that distance it is impossible to discover the difference with the naked eye, and when much nearer the resemblance still holds good, The seamen call it "The Sail Rock;" but the inhabitants of St. Thomas's call it "The Frenchman's Rock," and they tell a very curious adventure that occurred respecting it.

In the American War, a French frigate, cruising in these seas, fell in with it in the night, and, taking it for a ship, hailed; the hail was repeated from the rock by a loud echo, and the French captain, after hailing it several times fired a broadside into it. The rock reverberated the sound of the guns, and at the same time some of the shot were thrown back on board the frigate. This convinced the Frenchmen that they had fallen in with an English man-ofwar, and they forthwith commenced a heavy cannonading, which lasted without intermission till daylight, when they had the mortification to find that the enemy was formed of such materials as they could make no impression upon : they were then forced to haul off, re infecta!

MISERABLE DEATHS OF THE CREW OF THE ADVENTURE.

The following account of the miserable fate of ten men, belonging to the Adventure, who were surprised by the savages of New Zealand, put to death and eaten, is extracted from the Journal of one of the crew, that was ordered to make search for the unhappy sufferers.

"On the 30th of November, 1773, we came to an anchor in Charlotta Sound, on the coast of New Zealand, where the ship being moored, and the boat sent ashore, a letter was found, which informed us that the Resolution had been there, and had sailed six days before we arrived.

On the first of December we sent the tents and empty casks on shore to the watering place. The Indians came and visited us, and brought us fish and other refreshments, which we purchased with pieces of cloth and old nails; and they continued this traffic for ten or twelve days, seemingly very well pleased.