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with his hands, or a low bow; he must make his obeisance in a respectful manner to a superior, not bow in a hurried manner, nor in a fluttered manner avoid him. If asked a question by a passenger, he must answer in a composed and easy manner; he must let him walk before, by no means presuming to walk first.

A boy must bow leisurely, orderly, deeply, and roundly.

In conversation, a boy is required to speak in a low voice, and meek tone; not jabber high and dispute wide, nor brag of great things, nor crack laughing jokes. A boy's clothes must be plain and simple, yet neat, as those of a literary man. No finery is to be admitted.

When a visitor comes into the school, the scholars must immediately come down from their seats, and, placing themselves in the order they hold in the school, make a bow : -no whispering, no laughing, no noise and clamour (heuen-hwa) are allowed.

Boys are prohibited from learning any useless pursuits, as the following: cardplaying, throwing dice, kicking the shuttle-cock, foot-ball, chess, flying kites, breeding birds, beasts, fishes, or insects, playing on musical instruments. These amusements not only are a hindrance to their regular occupations, but enervate the mind: they ought to be guarded against with the greatest attention.

The following are also prohibited as injurious to young persons:-gaming of all kinds; the reading of light and licentious books; poetry; intercourse with friends, chattering, talking, going backwards and forwards, &c.

Let eating and drinking be a matter of indifference: a good man occupies his mind about moral science, not about eating.

A lad when eating and drinking must chew small and swallow leisurely; he must not gobble up his food, nor reach far over to the other side of the dish to take a morsel, nor take meat that he has broken with his mouth and put it back again into the dish.

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When scholars receive instruction, obey the rules of the school, get their lessons perfectly, and write their copies well, the master may commend them, confer upon them pencils and ink, and encourage them, and thereby entice others.

Boys who do not learn, &c. must first be admonished and persuaded two or three times; if they do not reform, then first punish them by causing them to kneel at their own seat, to disgrace them; if that does not succeed, make them kneel at the door, and greatly disgrace them; the time is measured by a stick of incense burning. If these means do not make them alter their conduct, then flog them: but take care not to do it after meals, lest you make them ill; nor yet beat them violently on the back, lest you hurt them seriously..

The author concludes his rules by admonitions to parents and teachers. In the former he observes, how seldom is it seen, that men who clearly understand right reason, and can read, do what is wrong and vicious! Even farmers (husbandmen) whose occupations are pressing, ought every year, about the tenth moon, to send their sons to school, and let them return home in the spring, about the third moon: thus, in three or five years, they would become men. The advice to the teachers is in these words :-Those who are teachers of others ought to be completely venerable, and should respect themselves; since they are teachers, they should be singly devoted to the duty of explaining to the scholars; they must not be lazy nor intermit their duties: thus a master will accumulate virtuous and good deeds, and the children's parents will respect him; but of late, there has arisen a class of school-masters, who with their own duties connect the practice of medicine, or sell divinations and calculate fates, or write impeachments for people, or act as middlemen in bargains, or become sureties, &c., whereby their attention is divided. Such conduct must impede and injure the scholar so that he will never become a man all his life. Not only will such a teacher be viewed with contempt by his employers, but his moral character will be injured. Ye masters! change your tune and respect yourselves!

THE SANDWICH ISLANDS.*

THE Sandwich Islands are ten in number, and bear the following names, written according to the orthography adopted by the Missionaries, who have given to the people of those islands a written language, viz. Hawaii, Maúi, Tahurawa, Ranai, Morokai, Oáhu, Taúai, Niihaú, Taúra, and Morokini. They are situated in the Pacific Ocean, between 18° 50′ and 22° 20′ north latitude, and 154° 55′ and 160° 15′ west longitude from Greenwich. They are extended in a direction W.N. W. and E.S.E., Hawaii being the southcastern island. The estimated length, breadth, and superficial contents of each island, is as follows:

Hawaii...

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Most of the islands are mountainous, and the mountains rise sometimes to a great height. The summits of Mounakea and Mounaroa, on Hawaii, are not less than 15,000 feet high, thus ascending into the region of perpetual congelation. That these lofty piles had a volcanic origin there can be no doubt. The marks of ancient craters are numerous upon them; and on the side of Mounaroa, midway between the ocean and the summit, is one of the most remarkable volcanoes in the world. Hawaii exhibits much to the beholder that is grand and sublime. Most of the other islands, particularly Oahu, Tauai, and Maui, are picturesque and romantic. Some portions of the islands are remarkably fertile; other portions have but a scanty vegetation; and others are nothing but barren lava. Oahu is probably the most luxuriant island in the whole group..

The lands most susceptible of cultivation lie generally within from two to seven miles of the sea. The interior is broken into steep ridges and deep ravines. The chief productions are sweet potatoes, taro, and, in some of the islands, yams; bananas, sugar-cane, water-melons, musk-melons, cucumbers, cabbages, beans, and the cloth plant, together with a few oranges and pineapples. The population of the islands is estimated at 130,000. Of this number Hawaii contains 85,000, and Oahu 20,000.

The islands are now subject to one government, consisting of a king, and a considerable body of chiefs. The government, in all its branches, is hereditary. The king is regarded as owning all the lands, and possesses unlimited power. The lands are divided among the chiefs, who hold them from the king, on condition of paying tribute. The people again hold the lands from the chiefs, to whom they pay a certain portion of the produce. Within their own territorial limits, the power of the chiefs is absolute. The operation of this system upon the people is said to be very oppressive.

The character of the inhabitants, so far as they are unaffected by the instructions

From a memoir of the American missionaries, published in the United States. Vide "Transactions of the Missionary Society," April 1826, p. 163.

structions of the missionaries, is lamentably debased. Theft, treachery, drunkenness, impurity, and infanticide, are awfully prevalent. The social and domestic virtues are little known. Polygamy is common, and murder by poison is believed by the natives to be very frequent.

The system of idolatry, so far as it was connected with the government, was abolished by Rhio-rhio (the individual who visited England), sometimes called Tamehameha II. the son and successor of Tamehameha I. This was done in 1819, before Christian missionaries came into his dominions, and was owing to three causes :-first, a desire to improve the condition of his wives, who, in common with all the other females of the islands, were subject to many painful inconveniences from the operation of the tabu; secondly, the advice of foreigners, and of some of the more intelligent chiefs; thirdly, and princi pally, the reports of what had been done by Pomare, in the Georgian Islands. A few of Rhio-rhio's subjects revolted in consequence of this measure; but Karai-moku, his general, defeated them, in a decisive battle, at a place called Tuamoo, and peace was soon restored.

The American missionaries, on their arrival in April 1820, found the lan guage altogether unwritten; and the great prevalence of liquid sounds rendered it exceedingly difficult to settle the orthography. They however applied themselves diligently to the work, and made continual and very encouraging progress. An alphabet was agreed upon, in which every sound had its appropriate sign. Every word is spelt exactly as it is pronounced, and thus the art of reading and writing the language is rendered simple and easy.

In the beginning of 1822, so much progress had been made, that the printing-press, which the missionaries had carried from America, and which is doubtless to become a mighty means of promoting knowledge in the Islands, was put in operation, and the first sheet of a Hawaiian spelling-book was printed. This work was soon in great demand among the natives.

There are now six missionary stations:-on Hawaii, three; on Oahu, one; on Maui, one; on Tauai; one.

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At each of these places a church has been erected by the chiefs, and the public worship of God is regularly attended on the Sabbath. Schools are established at the several stations, embracing, in the whole, more than a thousand scholars. In many instances, the more forward pupils have been sent into other districts as teachers, and the ability to read and write is daily extending among the people. Epistolary correspondence among the chiefs has become common. Scarcely a vessel passes from one island to another without carrying many letters, composed by natives in their own language; though, until convinced of the contrary by the missionaries, they regarded the speaking letter" as a magical operation, quite beyond their powers of attain

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It is believed that every considerable chief on the islands favours the missionaries, the meliorating tendency of whose influence is already to be perceived in an edict prohibiting infanticide, and in the mildness-altogether unprecedented in those islands-with which the late war on Tauai was conducted. Many of the warriors on the side of the king were from the schools of Honoruru; and the vanquished were not slain, but were sent by Karaimoku to their lands, with injunctions to attend to the "palapala,” as the system of instruction is denominated. In some instances, the observance of the Sabbath has been enjoined by authority. Marriage has been introduced in a few cases, and also the Christian mode of burial.

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BUDHUIS M.

Or this system, which is spread over such a vast portion of the Asiatic continent, little is yet known to the inhabitants of Europe, or even to those who have passed a considerable part of their lives in our Indian empire. The sacred books in which that system is contained, are not easily accessible, and they are written in two languages, which have, during at least twenty-five centuries, ceased to be oral, and with which few of our most learned orientalists have any acquaintance.

Budhuism is believed in the East to have originated in Ceylon; thence it spread over the eastern coast of Hindoostan, the Burman, and a great portion of the Chinese empire, and all the south-eastern countries of Asia. In that island, then, we may expect to find it in its greatest purity; and, accordingly, the following brief outline of the system has been extracted from the sacred books preserved from time immemorial in the Singhalese temples.

The Sakwalla, or universe, has existed from eternity. It is a circular plain, of immense extent: in the centre rises a high rock, called Mahamera, which is divided by the sea into two equal parts. The figure of the upper part (that above the water) resembles an upright pyramid; and that of the lower part, which is continually under the water, an inverted one; so that what we may term the natural bases meet each other at the surface of the sea. The central circumference of this rock is ten thousand yudoons, and the height of each part twenty-one thousand. As the yudoon is about 13 English miles, some idea may be formed of the astonishing dimensions of this rock: its whole height, 42,000 yudoons, considerably exceeds half a million of miles! The inverted apex of the part under water, rests on another rock with three peaks, or points, which are so placed as to form the circumference of a circle. Thus, at the depth of more than a quarter of a million of miles is formed a cavity so capacious as to constitute a large kingdom-the abode of evil demons.

Far above Mahamera are eighteen large kingdoms, rising one above another. These are the Devi-lokayas, or kingdoms of the gods; and, as we shall hereafter perceive, the abodes, not of the gods only, but also of the good, after passing through their various stages of probation. Higher still are six other kingdoms, or heavens, rising in a similar manner one above another, and called Brachmalokayas, or the high heavens. There is yet another region placed at the highest part of the universe, and called Nerawāna; and here is the abode of supreme happiness.

Mahamera has four sides, each of which faces one of the four cardinal points. The sea, which surrounds and divides it into equal parts, is bounded by a circular ridge of rocks. Beyond this is another sea, bounded by another ridge of rocks, and so on to seven seas, bounded by seven ridges on these revolve the sun, moon, and planets. The sun and moon occupy the ridge nearest to Mahamera; and so also do two planets, whose existence is unknown to Europeans. Of these, the one called Rahoo, which has the body of a man, and the head of a serpent, is the determined enemy of the sun and moon. He is continually on the watch for them, and he is sure to assail either the one or the other whenever an opportunity occurs: this explains the doctrine of eclipses. When Rahoo holds the sun or the moon in his round mouth only, the eclipse is partial; when he swallows either (which he always does if not seasonably prevented) the eclipse is total. But, happily for the universe, the other planet, Kayatoo, which has the body of a serpent and the head of a man, is as much the friend as the former is the enemy of the two great luminaries.

luminaries. No sooner does he perceive, by the diminishing splendour, that either is in danger, than he hastens to the relief of the sufferer. On his arrival, he seizes Rahoo by the back, and shakes the latter with so much violence, that the prey is soon released or disgorged, and thereby enabled to proceed in its accustomed orbit.* When the sun, moon, and planets pass behind that part of Mahamera which is opposite to the earth, they are said, in our language, to set.

Beyond the seven seas, with their respective barriers or ridges, is a vast ocean, which surrounds them all, and which stretches towards the utmost limits of the Chakra-wata, or visible horizon. At the extremities of this ocean, and to the four cardinal points diverging from Mahamera, are four great continents, each of which has five hundred islands dependent on it. Each of these four groups of islands has been peopled from the neighbouring continent. The continent to the south is called Jambud-dweepa, and it is that which we term the earth. Its greatest extent is ten thousand yudoons. The portion nearest the ocean, comprehending a space of three thousand yudoons, is the only inhabited part. The same space beyond it is jungle, or thick forest. The remaining four thousand yudoons is nothing but mud. This continent and its islands are inhabited by persons with round faces. The continent to the west of the great ocean is called Apara-godhana, and is seven thousand yudoons in extent. This, and the neighbouring five hundred islands, are inhabited by persons with half faces. The continent to the north is eight thousand yudoons in extent, and is called Ooturokuro-dewana, which, with its five hundred islands, is inhabited by persons with square faces. The last of these continents, with its equal number of islands, is inhabited by persons with triangular faces. It is situated to the east of the great ocean, and is called 'Poorwewe-deha. The other continents are inaccessible to the inhabitants of Jambud-dweepa.

Such is the universe, according to the Budhuists: but there are also one hundred and thirty-six hells, or Narakadayas, which are supposed to be placed far below Mahamera, and the sea which surrounds it. Of these, more will be said hereafter. The whole of the Sakwalla, or universe, rests on the back of a huge elephant; the elephant is supported by a crocodile; the crocodile by a tortoise; the tortoise rests on mud, the mud on water, and the water on air!

Most, if not all nations, have some notion of the great flood, which, as we learn from Holy Writ, once covered the earth. By some this flood is said to have been total, by others partial. If the accounts, however, of this great historical fact are found to vary in some slight particulars, among various nations, the fact itself is established by the concurrent and unanimous testimony of all ages and countries. Thus, even in the remote island of Ceylon, evident traces of the deluge are discernible in the traditions of the natives. They inform us that all the inhabited part of Jambud-dweepa was once overflowed with water, and that, in consequence, all the people perished with the exception of a very few who escaped into the jungle, and who, when the waters had subsided, returned to cultivate the waste, and to perpetuate the generations of men.

Deplorably ignorant as the Budhuists are of the true system of the universe,

and

* Some time ago an intimate friend of the writer's, then resident in Ceylon, was observing, with great numbers of the natives, an eclipse of the sun. As the darkness spread over the disk of that luminary, cries of apprehension and even of horror arose: "Alas! Rahoo will devour the sun! What shall we do if Kayatoo be sick?" In a short time, however, the sun emerged from obscurity, and every countenance brightened: "Huzza! Kayatoo is victorious!"

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