Several vessels were under the shore, | other rivers, the northernmost of which one brig, some sloops, and a kind of galliot of singular rig, beside some boats with large square sails. The day was very pleasant and cool, and the night which followed beautiful. Our breeze was good, and our progress would have been excellent, but for the unfortunate current. As it was, after another anxious night of unceasing sounding and exertion to Captain Manning and his officers, we were only advanced, at six in the morning of the 30th, about forty miles, or not quite to the parallel of False Cape; yet even this was considerable gain, and would have made us very happy, had not a dismal accident overclouded all such feelings. About ten o'clock, as I was writing these lines in the cuddy, a cry was heard, "Davy is overboard." At first I thought they said "the baby," and ran to the mizen-chains in a sort of confused agony, tugging at my coat buttons and my sleeves as I went, with the intention of leaping in after her; when there, however, I found that one of the poor boys apprenticed to Captain Manning by the Marine Society had fallen from the mizen-gaff, and that one of the midshipmen, Gower, not Davy, as at first supposed, was knocked over by him in his fall: the boy only rose for a few moments and sunk for ever, but the midshipman was picked up when almost exhausted. It was pleasing to see the deep interest and manly sorrow excited by this sad accident in all on board. For my own part, I was so much stunned by the shock of my first mistake, that I felt, and still feel, a sort of sick and indistinct horror, which has prevented me from being so deeply affected as I otherwise must have been by the melancholy end of the poor lad thus suddenly called away. The coast was so low that we could not discover any tokens of it, and were compelled to feel our way by soundings every half hour, keeping in from sixteen to twenty-nine fathom. All this part of Orixa, as I am assured by Major Sackville, who has himself surveyed the coast, is very ill laid down in most charts. It is a large delta, formed by the mouths of the Maha-Nuddee and insulates Cape Palmiras, and the remainder flow into what is called Cojan Bay, which is dry at low water; so that the real line of coast is nearly straight from Juggernaut to Palmiras. The night was fine and starlight, and we crept along, sounding every half-hour in from seventeen to twenty-three fathoms till after midnight, when we entered suddenly into a rapid stream of smooth water, which carried us considerably to the east. I happened to go on deck during this watch, and was much pleased and interested with the sight. It was exactly like a river, about half a mile broad, smooth, dimply, and whirling, bordered on each side by a harsh, dark, rippling sea, such as we had hitherto contended with, and which obviously still ran in a contrary direction. It was, I have no doubt, from Major Sackville's sketch, the fresh water of the Maha-Nuddee, which being lighter, specifically, than the ocean, floated on its surface, and which appeared to flow into the sea at right angles to the Ganges. I sometimes thought of Robinson Crusoe's eddy-sometimes of the wondrous passage described in Lord Erskine's Armata, but was not the less struck with the providential assistance which it afforded us. At five o'clock in the morning of October 1, we were said to be in lat. 20° 38'; and as the wind was getting light, anchored soon after. The fresh water of the Maha-Nuddee still remained flowing on the surface, and nearly in a N.E. direction, but too weak and too shallow to contend with the mighty Ganges, which ran like mill-stream at a fathom or two underneath, and against which nothing but a very powerful gale could contend. Our hope is, therefore, in the flood-tide, and in the smallness of the distance which we have yet to pass before we get into pilot water. At twelve, encouraged by a little increase of breeze, we weighed anchor again, the passengers (most or them) lending their aid, and thus successfully and speedily accomplished it. All sails that were applicable were set, and the vessel, to our great joy, answered her helm, and evidently made some little way. By degrees her motion vessel was really seen approaching, and, on being hailed, answered "the Cecilia pilot schooner." The cutter soon afterwards came to our side, with one of the accelerated, and by three o'clock we were going along merrily. Captain Manning burned blue lights, and hoisted a lamp at his mizen gaff, as a signal to any pilot who might be in our neigh-branch pilots on board. Sir H. Blosset, bourhood. The signal was answered by several vessels, obviously at no great distance, but the doubt remained whether any of these were pilots, or whether they were merely like ourselves, in search of one. Captain Manning, however, sent his cutter with one of the officers and ten men to that light which was most brilliant, and the bearing of which appeared to tally with the situation of a brig which he had observed. At length, about eleven o'clock. a I heard with much pain, died five weeks after he arrived in India, of an asthmatic complaint, to which he had been long subject. The pilot spoke much of the degree to which he was regretted, and of the influence which, even in that small time, he had acquired over the natives, who were delighted with the pains which he took to acquire their language. About seven in the evening of October the 3rd we were safely anchored in Saugor roads. NARRATIVE OF A JOURNEY, CHAPTER I. Saugor Tigers-Country Boats-Arab Ships-Village: Maldivian Vessels-Garden ReachApproach to Calcutta-Arrival: Old Government House: Native Household. AT daybreak of October the 4th we had a good view of the Island of Saugor, a perfectly flat and swampy shore, with scattered tall trees, dark-like firs, and jungle about the height of young coppice-wood, of a very fresh and vivid green. With a large glass I could distinguish something like deer grazing or lying down amid the swampy grass, and also some ruinous cottages and barn-like buildings. | idle seamen and young officers from venturing on shooting excursions so much as they otherwise would do, on a shore so dreadfully unwholesome as all these marshy islets are, under a sun which, even now intensely fierce, is standing over our heads "in a hot and copper sky." The stream of coffeecoloured water which surrounds us sufficiently indicates by its tint the inundations which have supplied it. These are the remains of a village One of the first specimens of the began by a joint company, who under- manners of the country which has fallen took to cut down the thickets and re- | under our notice has been a human claim the marshes of Saugor, a few I corpse. slowly floating past, according years ago. They found, however, that | to the well-known custom of the Hinas the woods were cut down on this doos. About twelve o'clock some boats side, the sea encroached, the sandy came on board with fish and fruit, beach not having sufficient tenacity of manned by Hindoos from the coast. itself to resist its invasions, and their operations are now transferred from the shore nearest us to the opposite side of the island. This coast was therefore abandoned to its wild deer and its tigers; for these last it has always been infamous, and the natives, I understand, regard it with such dread, that it is almost impossible to induce them to approach the wilder parts of its shore, even in boats, as instances are said to be by no means infrequent of tigers swimming off from the coast to a considerable distance. This danger is probably, like all others, overrated, but it is a fortunate circumstance that some such terror hangs over Saugor, to deter They were all small slender men, extremely black, but well made, with good countenances and fine featurescertainly a handsome race; the fruits were shaddocks, plantains, and coconuts, none good of their kind, as we were told. The shaddock resembles a melon externally, but it is in fact a vast orange, with a rind of two inches thick, the pulp much less juicy than a common orange, and with rather a bitter flavour, certainly a fruit which would be little valued in England, but which in this burning weather I thought rather pleasant and refreshing. The plantain grows in bunches, with its stalks arranged side by side; the fruit is shaped like a kidney potato, covered with a loose dusky skin which peels off easily with the fingers. The pulp is not unlike an over-ripe pear. While we were marketing with these poor people, several large boats from the Maldive Islands passed, which were pointed out to me by the pilot as objects of curiosity, not often coming to Calcutta: they have one mast, a very large square mainsail, and one topsail; are built, the more solid parts of cocowood, the lighter of bamboo, and sail very fast and near the wind; each carries from thirty to fifty men, who are all sharers in the vessel and her cargo, which consists of cowries, dried fish, coco-nut oil, and the coir or twine made from the fibres of the same useful tree; and each has a small cabin to himself. Several boats of a larger dimension soon after came alongside; one was decked, with two masts, a bowsprit, and rigged like a schooner without top-sails. The master and crew of this last were taller and finer men than those whom we had seen before; the former had a white turban wreathed round a red cap, a white short shirt without sleeves, and a silver armlet a little above the elbow; the crew were chiefly naked, except a cloth round the loins; the colour of all was the darkest shade of antique bronze, and together with the elegant forms and well-turned limbs of many among them, gave the spectator a perfect impression of Grecian statues of that metal; in stature and apparent strength they were certainly much inferior to the generality of our ship's company. tirely the idea of indelicacy, which would naturally belong to such naked figures as those now around us if they were white, is prevented by their being of a different colour from ourselves. So much are we children of association and habit, and so instinctively and immediately do our feelings adapt themselves to a total change of circumstances! it is the partial and inconsistent change only which affects us. The whole river, and the general character of this shore and muddy stream, remind me strongly at this moment of the Don, between Tcherkask and Asof,—and Kedgeree, a village on the opposite side of the river from Saugor, if it had but a church, would not be unlike Oxai, the residence of the Attaman Platoff. Several boats again came on board us; in one of which was a man dressed in muslin, who spoke good English, and said he was a "sircar," ""* come down in quest of employment, if any of the officers on board would entrust their investments to him, or if anybody chose to borrow money at 12 per cent. In appearance and manner he was no bad specimen of the low usurers who frequent almost all seaports. While we were conversing with him a fowl fell overboard, and his crew were desired to hand it up again; the naked rowers refused, as the Hindoos consider it impure to touch feathers, but the sircar was less scrupulous, and gave it up at the gangway. A "panchway," or passage-boat, succeeded, whose crew offered their services for fifteen rupees to carry any passengers to Calcutta, a Two observations struck me forcibly; distance of above one hundred miles. first, that the deep bronze tint is more This was a very characteristic and innaturally agreeable to the human eye teresting vessel, large and broad, shaped than the fair skins of Europe, since we like a snuffer-dish; a deck fore and aft, are not displeased with it even in the and the middle covered with a roof of first instance, while it is well known palm-branches, over which again was that to them a fair complexion gives lashed a coarse cloth, the whole formthe idea of ill-health, and of that sorting an excellent shade from the sun, of deformity which in our eyes belongs to an Albino. There is, indeed, something in a negro which requires long habit to reconcile the eye to him; but for this the features and the hair, far more than the colour, are answerable. The second observation was how en but, as I should apprehend, intolerably close. The "serang," or master, stood on the little after-deck, steering with a long oar; another man, a little before *A native agent, as well as a money-lender, -ED. As we him, had a similar oar on the starboard | rising from every part of it. drew nearer to the Sunderbunds their We were now approaching the side of the river opposite Kedgeree. Here all likeness to the Don disappeared, and nothing met the eye but a dismal and unbroken line of thick, black wood and thicket, apparently impenetrable and interminable, which one might easily imagine to be the habitation of everything monstrous, disgusting, and dangerous, from the tiger and the cobra de capello down to the scorpion and mosquito,-from the thunderstorm to the fever. We had seen, the night before, the lightnings flash incessantly and most majestically from this quarter; and what we now saw was not ill-fitted for a nursery of such storms as Southey describes as prevailing in his Padalon. The seamen and officers spoke of this shore with horror, as the grave of all who were so unfortunate as to remain many days in its neighbourhood; and, even under our present brilliant sun, it required no great stretch of fancy to picture feverish exhalations | We anchored a few miles short of Diamond Harbour. The current and ebb-tide together ran at a rate really tremendous, amounting, as our pilot said, to ten and eleven knots an hour. We were surrounded soon after our anchoring by several passage vessels; among these was a beautiful ship of about two hundred and fifty tons, with the Company's Jack and a long pendant, which we were told was the Government yacht sent down for our accommodation. During this day and the next I made several fresh observations on the persons and manners of the natives by whom we were surrounded. I record them, though I may hereafter see reason to distrust, in some slight degree, their accuracy. I had observed a thread hung round the necks of the fishermen who came first on board, and now found that it was an ornament worn in honour of some idol. The caste of fishermen does not rank high, though fish is considered as one of the purest and most |