FOUNDLING HOSPITALS.-EVILS OF STRIFE.

In the years 1834-5 twenty-four departments of France decreased very greatly the number of their foundling hospitals, as an economical and experimental measure. The result showed that infanti-rise to distrust and estrangement, and the people cide decreased in thirteen departments, was stationary in one, and increased in ten; in the remaining fifty-four departments a diminution of 18.5 per cent. had taken place in twenty-five, but in twentynine had increased by 40.5 per cent., showing a great advantage in those departments which had partially abandoned the foundling system.

MOFFAT AND THE BECHUANAS.

NO. I.

NORTH of the limits of the Cape of Good Hope colony lies the country of the Bechuanas; a land of mountains and plains; of rivers whose narrow banks nourish rich vegetation; of wide, waterless deserts, stretching over an untrodden expanse, arresting the traveller's steps and concealing a mysterious land which has cost many European lives to penetrate, and which still remains unexplored.

From the apex of the African continent, (formed by a line of coast extending between the Cape of Good Hope and Algoa Bay,) three parallel ridges of mountains intersect the country, distant from each other from thirty to three hundred miles; each intervening space occupied by terraces; the whole subsiding in arid sand-hills near the high banks of the Gariep or Orange river. Here the southern limits of the Cape Colony terminates, and the country of the Bechuanas begins; separated on the west from that of the Namaguas and the Damara Caffres by a broad desert, and from the Caffre land of the east coast by a mountain range running at an angle with those above mentioned. The northern boundaries of the Bechuana territory have never been defined.

The natural features of such a country impose habits and manners upon its people which presented them to their first European discoverers, in that first stage beyond barbarism which is shown in the partial cultivation of land. Drawing, however, but a small portion of subsistence from that source, the rest is derived from hunting, and their chief property consists of cattle. With these they sometimes reside in towns; sometimes driving them from pasture to pasture, according to the season, as vegetation fails in one place or another; but they are always subject to privation and long periods of drought. The rivers of the Bechuana country are either dried up in the hot season, or overflow their banks and cause great destruction during the period of rain. Thus there are few towns, there being few favourable spots for establishing them.

The exigencies of the climate and the small extent of available land frequently drive one tribe to make war upon their more fortunate neighbours. For this purpose they form themselves into marauding parties, or commandos, to get possession of cattle; hence these incursions are less stained with human sacrifices than those of other semi-barbarians. Dreading reprisal, in case of success they immediately kill the beasts, each devouring his large share at one sitting; their powers of enduring hunger, which are great, hardly equalling their ability to eat scarcely credible quantities of food in satisfying it.

The country of the Bechuanas is deficient in a main ingredient for the support of life-moisture. Hence the only belief the Bechuanas possess of a supernatural power to do good is in certain sorcerers, who they imagine can produce rain by the performance of prescribed rites. These rain-makers are, it appears, no impostors, but sincerely believe they really possess the power of causing the wishedfor showers to fall; although, of course, their ceremonies end in disappointment more frequently than otherwise. All the evil which befalls them, this misguided race attribute to a spirit of whom only a confused and irrational account has been collected. The name, and the only name, which these tribes have for a Supreme Being is Isuiknass, which in its etymological derivation signifies neither more nor less than a sore or wounded knee; of whom nothing more is known than that he was a great sorcerer, or, more probably, a chief of ancient renown. Thus, in a spiritual sense, the Bechuanas lived in the uttermost darkness. "No temples," exclaimed the subject of this notice in the Sermon he preached before the directors of the London Missionary Society,-" No temples, no altar, no sacred groves there; no shasters, no koran, no holy relics there; not one solitary idol there; neither the likeness of any thing in the heavens above, or in the earth beneath,' to represent a Sacred Being; no idea in the minds of the multitude that there is any thing greater or more powerful than mortal man. Their thoughts never scaled the skies, nor sought to pry into the wonders infinite with which they are surrounded. Among the thousands and tens of thousands inhabiting those regions, there is not the shadow of an idolgod, nor the slightest belief remaining that there is a Creator, Preserver, or Governor of all things! As the last rays of tradition have sunk beneath their intellectual horizon, the invisible things of God from the creation are no more seen and understood by the things which are made."

Here then was a people whose moral and spiritual condition called loudly for civilization and Christianity, and the call was promptly answered. In the year 1813, the Reverend John Campbell, whose name, together with that of Dr. Philip, will always be identified with South Africa, visited old Lattakoo*, the residence of the Bechuana Chief Mateebe; and, having been favourably received, was followed, three years afterwards, by Mr. Read. The natives, however, removed to a new site, thirty-five miles distant from the old town, on the Kuruman river, which joins the Gariep or Orange stream. Here a regular missionary settlement was established, to which the Rev. M. Hamilton was appointed.

Meantime Moffat was preparing to enter upon the field of missionary enterprise. On the 30th day of September, 1816, he received, at the hands

* The geographical position of old Lattakoo is 24° 40′ E. long, and 27° 10' S. lat.

MOFFAT AND THE BECHUANAS.

of the late venerable Dr. Waugh, his commission for the missionary enterprise. Beside him stood the Rev. John Williams, whose after destiny was the South Seas, and, alas! martyrdom among the heathen. Both were young, perhaps the youngest the society ever sent out, but full of physical strength and mental activity. How well each was fitted for his high calling, after events have abundantly proved.

Robert Moffat, accompanied by his wife, arrived at Cape Town on the 13th of January, 1817, and, under the direction of the Cape branch of the Missionary Society, went immediately into the interior. After several excursions among the Namaguas, Griquas, &c., he was finally appointed to the Kuruman or New Lattakoo station, to labour in company with Mr. Hamilton among the Bechuanas. In what state did he find these people? What ignorance had he to enlighten-what dangers to encounter? Even the imperfect sketch that we are enabled to give, of the condition in which he found the objects of his mission, will supply answers to these questions.

We have already seen what darkness had to be dispelled, in a moral and spiritual sense, from the minds of the Bechuanas; but their political and social state offered equally formidable difficulties. They were an independent nation, who considered all their neighbours infinitely beneath them in power, industry, and civilization. National pride induced them to treat every manner and custom, which did not accord with their own barbarous views, with sovereign contempt. "Often did they tell us," says Moffat, "to go to the Griquas, the Corannas, and the Bushmen, and teach them, and ask us with a sneer if we were really such fools as to suppose that the Bechuanas would ever adopt our customs, or yield obedience to the government of that Jesus we so often talked about."

Looking at their social institutions, they appeared as barbarous as they were ancient-persevered in for ages. The condition of women is always a good index to show the amount of civilization possessed by a nation: among the Bechuanas they were found in the most degraded state; performing the rudest offices of labour, their personal appearance betokening the most disgusting habits. Fat and grease of all kinds formed their delight; their bodies and skin-cloaks being plentifully anointed with sibilo, a grey sparkling iron ore. Their naturally woolly hair, twisted into small cords, was matted with this substance into apparently metallic pendules. Among the more wealthy women cumbrous strings of beads, ivory toothpicks, and gourd snuffboxes were coiled round the waist and neck. An apron of leather cut into thin strips, and clotted with an accumulation of grease and filth, reached to the ancles, and,

* Lattakoo is derived from the native term tako, a wall, with the plural prefix li or lee.

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with a rude skin-cloak, completed their costume+! The dress of the men was equally revolting. They lived in huts, which, though neatly constructed of plastered wicker-work, were devoid of cleanliness or comfort. Such were the people whom Moffat went among, early in 1818, to humanise, to Christianise !

How did they receive him? "I stand here as a living witness to testify," continues the preacher, "that my ears have been hundreds of times stunned with roars of laughter, when, with my veteran and faithful brother Hamilton, I have been labouring to inform their darkened minds, and convince them that there was one mightier than man, even the mighty God, the creator of the ends of the earth; and my eyes have often beheld their derision and scorn when reasoning with them on creation, providence, and redemption."

Against this tide of discouragement our missionary struggled manfully. Both himself and his wife studied hard to acquire an oral mastery over the Sichuana or Bechuana tongue: they then reduced the sounds to writing, and formed a spelling-book. Their demeanour gradually acquired the admiration of the savage people; their earnestness in pursuing the only end and aim of their mission, the patience they showed under the most trying difficulties, and their courage when assailed by danger, at length made them friends. In this respect Mr. Moffat seems to have been singularly happy, which proves him to have been above others peculiarly fitted for his undertaking. A short time after going into the interior, he returned to Cape Town with some natives-incorrigible marauders; whose fellows parted from their new teacher with tears, and every token of reluctance, lest he might not return. Arrived at the Cape, the savage visitors were jealous of Moffat's absence from them for an instant for fear of losing him. "They keep," says Campbell, in a letter dated Cape Town, 16th April, 1819, "a sharp look-out after Mr. Moffat; if he moves only from one room to another, they follow him instantly."

The same results soon showed themselves among the Bechuanas. Having by the year 1822 mastered their language, Moffat translated a catechism which was printed at Cape Town, several of his Bechuana pupils having learnt to read (by the help of his spelling-book previously circulated among them) sufficiently well to require further instruction. Who can estimate aright the toils of such efforts? Nor was success denied. Improvement and friendship were gradually developed, and the jeers and surly looks which up to that time had met his labours at every turn, began to diminish. We must resume this striking and most instructive tale.-W.

+ Captain Harris's Narrative of an Expedition to South Africa.

"FREE AND EASIES."

AMONG the many causes of demoralization, and its concomitant, misery, in this metropolis, by no means the least prominent are the clubs bearing | the title prefixed to this article. We should as little consult our own tastes as subserve the cause we desire to promote, were we to dwell on the disgusting details of these "convivial" meetings, as they are called ; and although we may hereafter give their statistics to our readers, we shall now hold it sufficient for our purpose to state that these clubs abound in every district of London, and are of various grades, being frequented by the mechanic, the small tradesman, and, we regret to add, by many whose superior position should open to them better taste, if not better feeling. Most of these societies, in burlesque imitation of Freemasonry, have their dignitaries—their "noble grands," "most noble grands," and other officers; and it is no trifling | aggravation of the evils of the system, that it is the endeavour of each of these functionaries, during their tenure of office, to enlist as many as possible into the club, as his best recommendation to the favour of his compeers, and to consequent promotion in the society. Their meetings are held at public-houses and low taverns, for the most part de nocte in noctem ; songs, speeches, mock treats, &c., &c., being among the appliances to prolong the debauch. The liquor consumed at these meetings varies according to the tastes or the fancy of the members-from the pint of porter to spirits and water, and punch.

watchmaker in Clerkenwell, who can earn his two guineas a week. It is not many years since that he married the daughter of a tradesman in a small way of business. The girl had been well brought up-was pretty, mild-tempered, and lively. For a time he was an attentive and affectionate husband, returning regularly home when his work was done, and acquitting himself kindly in his domestic duties. In an evil hour he was induced by the solicitations of a companion to be present at a Free and Easy club, and, finally, he became a member of it. And mark the change! when his day's work is done, he exchanges in the workshop the every-day jacket for the blue coat with the yellow buttons, and instead of returning to his home, proceeds to his club. His wife the while is keeping a weary vigil by her melancholy hearth, and although accustomed thus to spend hours without the society of him who had won her from the humble but happy home of her childhood, and neglected her ere the wing of time had swept off the bloom of her beauty, she still indulges the hope of his coming. It may be that though her own attentions be powerless, the smile of his last-born may win him back to his home before his wonted hour of midnight. And in that hope she has set her little room in order—alas! it hath been swept and furnished only that an evil spirit may enter it. And it is long past midnight before he arrives, and then in a state which, instead of rewarding her for her long vigil, strikes a pang to her heart. He enters with an unsteady step, a flustered brow, a snatch of a low song, or, it may be, an oath upon his tongue.

And in what can all this issue, but in misery and death? His wages are squandered in the dissipation that destroys body and soul together, and his wife and little ones, whom he ought to have maintained in comfort and plenty, are left to pine in neglect,

mature widowhood and orphanage to the cold charity of the world.—H.

FALSEHOOD IN PERSIA.

Were the mischiefs resulting from these clubs restricted to those who frequent them, we should be spared much of our sympathy and regret on the occasion. It is, however, on domestic life that the evil most frequently falls, and although habits of dissipa-want-worn and squalid, and are finally left in pretion, by their influence on the constitution, have anticipated the orphanage of many a helpless child of wretchedness, it is woman who is the chief and most constant sufferer-woman, that fair flower, which whether it bend beneath the dew of the humble valley, or court the sun on the mountain peak, it is the province and the privilege of man to touch with tenderness, and, if he pluck it from its native soil, to wear it in his bosom until it dies! Marriage has been termed a lottery; and, looking to the short acquaintance on which it is often constructed, it is, in truth, little else. If a man, however, has made an imprudent, or, as in many cases it may be called, an unlucky choice, he has a resource, a miserable one though it be, in the dissipation of the world, or, if he be of a better mould of mind, in its business; but a woman stakes her whole wealth of happiness in the purchase of the ticket, and if it arises a blank she is ruined.

We will by way of illustration take a case, which at this moment occurs to us, of a journeyman

THE REV. H. Southgate remarks in his Travels, recently published, that he received such discrepant statements on one occasion, that he told his informants he knew not which to believe; and adds,-" John interposed to remind me that I should find everybody in Persia a liar. Yes,' said an old man, whose tottering steps proved that he had nearly completed the allotted career of three-score and ten,- Yes, we always lie when we can. I looked at him in utter amazement; but I could not discover from his expression that he had not intended to speak for once a grave truth. I began to imbibe some first impressions of Persian character."