remote islands. The population of Batavia, which in the different accounts has been very differently calculated, is by our author ftated much higher than by any of his predeceffors, namely, about 110,816 fouls, exclufive of women and children. According to him there are fettled here 468 citizens of European defcent, and 23,309 Chinese. The clove trees are cultivated in Ambonia, in four thousand gardens (Doeffons). Of thefe trees no one is allowed to poflefs more than 125. in good years this government produces 150,000 cwt. of cloves, whitt in fome years fcarcely any thing is collected. In 1778, the company depofed two of the most powerful kings of the Molaques, thofe of Tidor, and Balchian, who died in prifon, in Batavia and Ceylon. The principal factory of the company in Sumatra, is Palembang, on the eastern coaft of that ifland. It received from thence annually 20,000 hundred weight of tin, chiefly from the island of Banca, where the Chinese have ten of thefe mines. Notwithstanding all the reftrictions to which it is fubject, the trade with Japan is very profitable. By the imports from Batavia, which confifted of fugar, fpices, quick-filver, cotton, &c. the value of which amounts to half a million of gulden (florins) they ufually clear about 106,000 florins, whilft the expence of fubfifting the different officers at Dafima, as that of the annual embassy to Yedo, was in the year 1779, 96,356 florins; on the exports, particularly on tin from Japan, of which the companies fhips generally bring back 10,000 hundred weight, the profits are ftill more confiderable. They purchase the Picol of 125 pound on the fpot for thirty-one, and fell it again in and about Malabar for, at least, ninety florins. To Canton four Dutch fhips carry, according to our author, 1200,002 florins in ready money, which export, however, in the company's account, Is ftated at 1600,000; that this company has, in a great mea fure, given up its factories in Bengal, as alfo on the continent of India, and on the western court of Sumatra, having left the trade to private merchandize appears to have been unknown to Mr. H. That of opium in Bengal, which in the eastern iflands is reckoned to be very lucrative, is in the hands of a private company. A cheft of opium of 125lb. weight, which including all the accidental expences, cofts this company only 792 florins, is fold again in Batavia for 1383 florins. The company therefore intend to refume this trade, though the profits are in fome degree dimifhed by the English, who contrive to furnish the iflanders with opium at an inferior price. Since the Nabob of the Carnatic has reduced under his power, the fmall kingdom of Marawar, and the company has had disputes with him concerning the pearl-fithery at Tutocoryn, they have been forced to give up that fishery. Most of the company's Indian poffeffions, coft them more to fupport, than they return in taxes, profits of trade, and other advantages. To this clafs belong the pice-iflands, Ceylon, the Cape of Good Hope, and even Batavia itfelf. In the year 1779, the whole Indian revenue of the company amounted to 5,293,072 florins, whereas their difbursements were not less than 6,882,794 florins.

Of the fupplemental articles, which, indeed, conftitute the greatest part of this work, we fhall attend only to the two laft, No. VII.

and

and VIII. The first contains the depofition of a fellow-traveller of the well known Beniowski, who died in Batavia in 1772. His name is Hippolitus Stephanof, a native of Mofcow, who had acted as deputy of the Nobieffe for this province, on a public occafion; and was, in 1770, on account of a violent conteft with a refpectable perfonage, banished to Kamtfchatka. His flight from this country is here defcribed nearly in the fame manner as in the Travels of Beniowíki, except only in regard to the murder of the governor, which he does not mention. Their object was to reach Guam, one of the Ladrone islands; but after having encountered a number of difficulties, they arrived firft on the coaft of Japan, and afterwards at Formofa, from whence they proceeded finally to Macao. Here the writer quarrelled with Beniowski, whom he calls Benef, and represents him to have been a public impoftor; and, after a variety of misfortunes, went at laft to Batavia.

The other article ftates the number of civil and military perfons employed in the fervice of the Dutch Company in 1777. The whole amounted to 21,855, of whom 11,162 belonged to the army. In Ceylon the fervants of the company, of every defcription, were 5300, in Ternate 847, and in Japan 12. In the whole of their fettlements the number of ecclefialtics fupported by them, was 132, with 332 phyficians and furgeons. Algem. Vaderl. Letteroefn. ART. 78. Joannis Voet commentarii ad pandellas tomus tertius, ejufdem commentarii continens fupplementum, auctore Joh. van der Linden J. U. D. et coram utrâque Hollandic curiâ caufarum patrono. Se&is prima a Lib. I. XII. pandectarum. Utrecht. 178 pp. in Folio. We are informed by Mr. v. d. L. that he had proposed to himself three objects in the execution of this work; firft, to corroborate the opinions of Voet by the authority of later writers on the subject of jurifprudence; fecondly, to make fuch important additions, as the labours of fubfequent commentators on the Pandects might supply; and, thirdly, to refer, on every occafion that might offer, to thofe Dutch ordinances and flatutes, which have appeared fince the time of Voet. To the performance of the last part of this plan, Mr. v. d. L. feems to have been more peculiarly competent, at least, there is an evident want of unity and method in the former parts, which may indeed be charged in fome degree to the nature of the work itself, to which the author had undertaken to write a fupplement. Ibid.

GERMANY.

ART. 79. Hefiods Schild des Herakles, nebft den Schilden des Achilleus und Aneas, von Homer und Virgil. Metrisch verdeutscht, mit dem Original begleitet, und erlaütert von I. D. Hartmann, Doctor der Philofophie, &c. Hefiod's Shield of Hercules, with the Shields of Achilles and Aneas, by Homer and Virgil; tranflated into German Verfe, with the original, and illuftrated by I. D. Hartmann, &c. Lemgo, 1794, 8vo.

Of the poetry of this version we cannot fpeak very favourably. The notes, however, fhow the author to poffefs no common fhare of ingenuity, and philological erudition. Gott, Anz.

ART.

ART: 80. Briefe des Herrn von Wurmb, und des Herrn Baron von Wolzogen auf ihren Reifen nach Afrika und Oftindien in der Jahren 1774 bis 1792.-Letters of Mr. de Wurmb, and the Baron de Wolzogen, on their Travels in Africa and the Eaft Indies, between the Years 1774-92. Gotha, 1794, 432 pp. in 8vo.

The letters of Mr. de Wurmb, who died in Batavia, 1781, extend to p. 276 of this volume. From the Bar. de Wolz. who still refides as an officer in Batavia, we may expect ftill further accounts of that country. When Mr. de Wurmb travelled, in the year 1774, through the islands of Cape Verde, no rain had fallen there for three years, and the mifery of the inhabitants furpaffed all defcription, p. 48. Ia Batavia the moft neceffary articles of life are uncommonly cheap, whilst every thing that is imported from Europe is proportionably dear. To a man of ordinary condition, the expence of a full meal will not ufually exceed four deuts, equal to about fo many pence. But a bottle of beer can feldom be purchafed under half a ducat; and an European officer, who pays the ftricteft attention to œconomy, can not expend less than eighteen florins daily, pp. 127, 420. The chief expence, as well as the chief inconvenience, in life arifes there from the number of flaves which Europeans find it neceffary to keep. In houfes of only moderate appearance from fifty to fixty flaves are ge nerally fupported, who, our author fays, on account of their natural ftupidity, are not equal in point of real ufe to five or fix of his coun trymen. We learn from an ancient tradition, that when the Portu. guefe were expelled by the Dutch from moft of their poffeffious in the Eaft-Indies, they purfued them with the following curfe" that God might give them flaves in abundance." Mr. v. Wurmb affures us repeatedly in his letters, that he enjoyed a better state of health in Batavia, where there reigns a perpetual fummer, than he had ever done in Germany. Both this fenfible traveller, however, and his companion, the Baron de Wollz. complain, that in a fhort time they had loft almost all their friends and acquaintance there. Two buffalos in Batavia will do more work than half a dozen German horfes, while, on the contrary, thirty or forty cows there will hardly produce fo much milk as one good German cow, p. 181. In Batavia, Mr. de Wurmb had an opportunity of making an experiment which had indeed often been made in China itself. There was a Chinese in Batavia who had a very ready hand in drawing, and who sketched any thing that was laid before him with the greatest accuracy. But though Mr. de W. took much pains to inftruct him, he could never be brought to obferve the proper diftinctions of light and fhade, nor indeed to form any adequate idea of thefe effential requifites in a picture, p. 272. lebes the Baron de Wollzogen faw a war-dance by feveral petty kings, in which the performers were fo entirely exhaufted with fatigue, that they were obliged to lie down, p. 361. By the fame traveller we are informed, that he obferveu feveral enchanting landfcapes on the road from Samarang to the refidence of the Emperor of Java, p. 381-2, and that in Batavia he met with many of the most modern German publications. Ibid.

BRIT. CRIT. VOL. VI. NOV. 1795.

At Ce

ART.

ART. SI. Kleinere Länder-und Reifebefchreibungen, von C. Meiner Zweytes Bändchen.-Small Voyages and Travels, by C. Meiners. Vol. II. 380 pp. in 8vo. Berlin, 1794.

In this fecond volume of a work, noticed in p. 330 of our laft number, are contained the following pieces; 1. Some Obfervations on the Harz; 2. Letter written on a Journey into Franconia; 3. Obfervations made on a Journey to Mentz, in the months of July and Auguft, 1793; 4. Obfervations on a Journey, during the time of Harveft, into Suabia. The author affures his readers, in the preface, that he has paid greater attention to accuracy in this volume, than he had ever be fore done in any work of a fimilar kind published by him, of which it must be left to the perfons who are acquainted with the places and objects here described to judge. Ibid.

ART. 82. Ueber die wahne Lage des alten Oftgrönlands, durch Heinrich Peter von Eggers.-On the true Situation of the ancient EaftGreenland, by H. P. v. Eggers. Kiel, 1794. 116 pp. in 8vo.

The author of this Effay, which is tranflated from the fourth volume of the Tranfactions of the Economical Society at Copenhagen, endeavours, with confiderable ingenuity, to prove, that the inacceffible eaftern coast of Greenland has been improperly represented on all maps hitherto published; that the ancient Eaft-Greenland was fituate not on the eastern coast, which, from the fame caufes that now produce that effect, was from the most remote ages covered with eternal ice, but on the western coaft, between Cape Farewell and Defolation, and that, laftly, the Normans, who had fo long inhabited Eaft-Greenland, were not driven from that country by the native Greenlanders, nor by the Efquimaux, or any other original American tribe, but by their enemies from Scotland, Ireland, and other neighbouring iflands, and that most probably by a famous warrior, named Zichmen, about the end of the 14th century. The arguments adduced by our author in confirmation of this opinion, are drawn from modern and ancient hiftoric accounts and documents, from monuments of the Normans ftill extant in Greenland, as well as from the natural appearance of the northern feas. The whole is still further illustrated by two charts anIbid.

nexed to the work.

ART. 83. Leben Auguft Gottlieb Spangenbergs, Bifchoffs der evan gelifchen Brüderkirche, befchrieben von Jeremias Rifler.-Life of A. Th. Spangenberg, Bishop of the Church of the United Brethren, by J. Rifler. Barby, 1794. 516 pp. in 8vo.

Spangenberg lived near fixty years in the midst of the above-mentioned fociety; at a very early period took an active part in the internal and external direction of it, and remained to the end of his life on of its most important members; perhaps, indeed, after the death of Count Zinzendorff, the most important of them. In the year 1733, he was formally admitted into the fociety at Herrnbut, having before been connected with, and fupported by them at Jena and Halle. In

this first year he was employed to accompany thofe of the Brethren who were deftined for the first miffion to Santa Cruz, as far as Copenhagen, in order to fettle, in conjunction with the Lord Great-Chamberlain von Pleifs, who wifhed the Brethren to have the fuperinten dance of the colony to be planted there, whatever refpected their removal thither, the mode of their future fubfiftence, their liberty of confcience, and their occupations among the negroes. His first voyage to America took place in the year 1735; in 1741 he was entrusted with the general government of the church of the Unitas Fratrum; nearly the whole of the time between the years 1744 and 1762 was fpent by him in America; and during the thirty laft years of his life he was in Europe one of the moft ufeful labourers in the direction of the fociety, over which he had been appointed to prefide.

In regard to the form of this hiftory we fhall only obferve, that the materials of which it is compofed are extracted chiefly from the letters, journals, and manufcripts of Spangenberg himself, which Mr. R. has arranged according to order of time.

Ibid.

ART. 84. Tafchenkabinet der Münzkunde aller Länder, für Banquiers Kaufleute, Reifende und andere, welche von der Münzverfassung aller Staaten Nachrichten haben wollen. Erften Bandes erfles Heft, van M. R. B. Gerhardt, Senior, Haupt-Banco-Buchalter.-Short Introduction to the Knowledge of the Coins of different Countries, for Bankers, Merchants, Travellers, and fuch other Perfons as wish to be acquainted with the State of Coinage in different Nations. First Part of Vol. I. by M. R. B. Gerhardt, &c. one Alphabet in fmall 4to. Berlin, 1794

The object of the author in this work is to give a clear and accurate account of the feveral Coins of different countries, together with reprefentations of all the current coins. To this livraison belong ten copper-plates, the three firft of which exhibit the coins of Portugal, Brafil, and Goa; and the remaining feven the modern and ancient Spanifh gold, filver, and copper coins. Each of thefe is accompanied with a fheet of text, in which are given the names, with an explanation of the different coins, as alfo an account of their weight, alloy, and value in Pruffian currency. The execution of this elegant and useful work is greatly facilitated by the valuable collection of foreign coins, in the poffeffion of Mr. Adler, of Berlin, to which the compiler has free accefs. Ibid.

ART. 85. Verfuch einer vollständigen Litteratur der deutfchen Ueberfet fungen der Römer, von Joh. Fr. Degen, Director, Professor, und InSpector der Königl. Preufs. Fürftenfchule zu Neustadt an der Aifen. Erfte Abtheilung. A. I.-Essay towards a complete Hiftory of German Tranflations of the Latin Claffics, by J. F. Degen, &c. First Divifion, A. I. Altenburg, 1794. 274 pp. in 8vo.

There is certainly in most of the polished languages of Europe a confiderable number of verfions of the ancient Greek and Roman claffics; but how many of these are well executed is a different question, as it is ftill another to determine in what degree they have contributed

to