Messrs. Callow and Wilson, Prince's Street, Soho; or, Messrs. Burgess and Hill, Great Windmill Street, Piccadilly. And it is further most earnestly requested, that they take an early opportunity of making the Members of Parliament, Magistrates, and other influential persons in their respective neighbourhoods, acquainted with the real bearings of the important questions at issue, which have recently undergone such full and able discussion in the Medical and other Journals of the Metropolis, as to have been rendered perspicuous to all who have had an opportunity of attending sufficiently to the subject. For the convenience of those who may wish to suggest improvements, the paragraphs of the proposed petition are numbered.'

Owing to the very great importance of the subject, we shall consider it our duty to watch and to record the progress of the pending reform in the organization of the medical profession, which, we are happy to think, cannot now be arrested by the utmost efforts of malevolence, corruption, or intrigue. Nothing, we think, can materially injure the cause, but crude or precipitate legislation.

DESPOTISM.

A HORRID Vision walk'd the earth,
A monstrous and unseemly sight;-
Men knew not whence he had his birth,
But from his eye Hell's lurid light
With wild, portentous lustre gleam'd ;—
Where'er he strode, the hearts of all
At his unearthly presence seem'd

'Neath slavish Fear's strong power to fall.
Though the fair climes through which he went
Rejoiced beneath a beaming sky,

The beauty of their hues was blent,

'Neath that stern vision's withering eye,
With the foul features, black as night,
That mark'd his own polluted form ;-
As scenes most beautiful and bright
Are sadden'd by the passing storm.
The hearts of men within them sunk,

A craven's tremor shook the brave,-
As from his blasting glance they shrunk,
Each lofty impulse found its grave,—
For in his fierce and threatening brow
They saw the prowess of a god;
So did they in their blindness bow
And crouch beneath his iron rod.

He knew their weakness was his strength,-
Then death and thraldom track'd his path;
And in his train appear'd at length

His ghastly ministers of wrath :

The murmurs of the crowd were hush'd-
They fear'd his dark, blood-loving lust;
Their feelings and their frames were crush'd-
Alike they grovell'd in the dust.

The vision, waxing hugely great,
Was overgorged and overgrown ;
With the unholy spoils of state

Was deck'd his dark, polluted throne ;-
The sorrowing nations' blood and tears
Had swoln his gorgeous pomp and pride;
While scoff'd he at their idle fears,

Yet deem'd his power should aye

abide.

Yet men at length began to scan,
With steadfast and untroubled gaze,
His shadowy features, wild and wan,
Which erst with horrible amaze
Had sear'd their senses and their sight;-
They felt 'twas not their treacherous dread,

And not the phantasm's airy might

That had their sires to bondage led.

The strong subduing glance of man
Resolved to burst the festering chain,
Divinely awful-could not scan
The evil shape, and still retain
Their spirits in his slavish sway;

'Twas moral darkness gave him dread— The dawn of intellectual day

Abash'd him quite—he shriek'd, and fled.

They hunted him from shore to shore :
He wandered like a thing accurst;

The terrors of his reign were o'er,

Yet were not quite the fetters burst
With which his guile the nations scourged;
His waning form shows grimly still-
Till Truth triumphant shall have purged
The seeds of error and of ill.

L.

LETTERS FROM THE EAST.

[The following Account of Penang, contained in a Letter from a Visitor to that Settlement, has been placed in our hands for publication, by the Gentleman to whom it was addressed, and contains much that will be no doubt new to many of our Indian readers.]

Pulo Penang, July 30.

You will, perhaps, be surprised at finding me here; but you must know that Prince of Wales' Island is the Eastern Montpelier, to which all unfortunate Bengalees are regularly sent by Dr. Calomel, unless his remedies should render a much shorter journey necessary; I am not here, however, on account of any serious bodily ailment. I have resolutely set the doctor and his imps at defiance, and shall continue to do so as long as I preserve my senses. However, having been almost idle at Calcutta, enjoying a fine dry temperature of about 98° to 107° for two months, and finding the rain coming in good earnest with their usual train of fevers, &c., I thought it would be wise to take the opportunity of escaping from the paradise of frogs and alligators, and gratify my curiosity in seeing the Eastern Islands.

To enable you to travel with me over this far-famed island, you must borrow Daniel's Engravings, after Views by Smith,' and, deducting for the perspective and colouring, (no painter's colouring can do any thing like justice to the vivid hues of tropical scenery,) you will have a very fair delineation of some of the most remarkable views in the island. Ascend the Government Hill, and look towards the Malay shore, you will see a country which, to my eyes, resembles Italy, full of the most beautiful mountain scenery, and covered with the most magnificent forests, but which has never been trod by any European, perhaps by any human foot. Strange, that a country known to abound with the richest mineral treasures, which even now are scratched up by the savage inhabitants, should not have tempted European cupidity, or have been explored by the ardent votaries of science, who abound in our regions in this 19th century. It is to be accounted for by a word which is a clue to a great many Indian phenomena-Monopoly ! the millstone about the neck of the vast population of this immense and beautiful country. But I have no time for such a subject at present,-I must return from the Queda shore to my island. Penang is certainly the head-quarters of Flora: I am perfectly delighted with the variety of beautiful plants I have seen. Oh, for the opportunities I have neglected! What would I now give for a knowledge of botany! On this subject I can get no information from the inhabitants. I have now before me the most lovely fern I ever saw; I wish I could send it, but its colours are already gone; before it was gathered they changed like an opal; and there

are many others almost as elegant. The pine-apple is here a weed; the roads are full of them; and they are bought in the market at a dollar per hundred, each four or five pounds weight. The celebrated mango tree is also abundant here; it is a fruit in which I have been much disappointed, as one generally is with every thing which has been puffed. The doorian is another remarkable highly prized fruit, which has so peculiar an odour, that it is at first hardly approachable by strangers. Its rind exhales a perfume analogous to some compound of putrid meat and asafoetida. Amateurs, however, who have conquered their prejudices, extol it highly. Even his Burmese Majesty sends annually to Siam for it, as it does not grow in his dominious.

In spite of the doctors, who denounce death against all who penetrate the jungles, I have spent a whole week in rambling about the island and opposite shore,-penetrating them in various directions, and have seen a waterfall, which is yet unknown to fame. I have been hunting the leaf insect and the flying wizard, and examining the many curious trees; amongst which are the gamboge, the bread-fruit, the palm which produces the horse-hair-like ropes, well known for their strength, the Indian-rubber, creeper, &c. &c. But I shall not trouble you with a mere catalogue; and if I were to describe a hundredth part of the objects of nature, I should not soon finish, and must, therefore, stop at the great tree, of which Smith's drawing gives but a poor idea. It is a most magnificent object. The chestnut on Mount Etna is much more bulky, but the height of this is quite unrivalled; the lowest branch sent off from the trunk is 120 feet from the base, and from it hangs a gigantic creeper,—a good sized tree itself; but what is most remarkable, it is of modern growth, and represented by some of the Natives to have been of a moderate size in their own memory. This may give you some notion of the rapidity of vegetation in these climates. This remarkable tree stands a little way up one of the hills, and though most of the trees in its immediate neighbourhood are by no means of small dimensions, it appears to stand like a tremendous giant amongst dwarfs. The figure of it, regarded in any direction, is extremely picturesque and beautiful. It has a straight perpendicular stem rising boldly from the ground, and its branches, at a tremendous height, are distributed with great splendour. This gigantic but beautiful form is relieved by the dense foliage beneath it, and by the opposite mountain, which stands to the left of some exceedingly variegated scenery, composed of sea, islands, distant valleys, and blue hills, that, by the light of four o'clock in a July morning, were perfectly enchanting. On steps, which are made up the hill from a short distance below the base of this tree, from a spot horizontal with about two-thirds of its height, whence it is seen to the best advantage, is the rich landscape I allude to. Inquirers would naturally wish to know something of the species to which this tree

belongs. I can only answer, that the great Dr. Wallich, the celebrated botanist, did not ascertain this point. The leaf is small and ovate, and of a light green tint. I measured the tree round its base with a tape, and found its circumference to be thirty-four feet. Upon being wounded through the bark, which is rather rough at the base, a white milky fluid exudes, which, upon exposure to the air, concocts to a white resinous substance, resembling ammoniacum. The fluid tasted rather sweet, and afterwards left a bitterish flavour in the mouth; it formed a milky solution in rain water.

Smith has a view of Suffolk House, the Governor's residence, which gives you an idea of a mansion far more splendid than the place is found to be ; but does no justice to the splendour of the hill and dale scenery about the grounds of this fairy land. So easy is it to improve the appearance of a work of art; so very difficult to attain to a distant resemblance of nature.

1

The view of Gluga House is sufficiently correct. This was the residence of the late excellent Mr. Brown, the original proprietor of ̧· the spice plantations on this island, which are now remarkable as the only things of the kind in British possession, since Bencoolen has been given up to the Dutch. The groves of nutmeg-trees are uncommonly beautiful, and it is certainly interesting to walk through them. The cloves appear to thrive best on the mountains, where the thermometer seldom exceeds 74°. Equal temperature and constant moisture are, it would seem, what they require. Coffee is likewise cultivated, and, it is said, with much success on the hills of this lovely island; and on the estate of Gluga it seems to be an object of experiment. It is a matter of doubt, however, how far the cultivation of coffee and of spices may be found to answer here, as a matter of commercial speculation; one of the most clear-headed and intelligent of the merchants here said, that speculations in plantations were wild and unprofitable.' They have hitherto never succeeded, notwithstanding all the flowery predictions of Mr. Canning as to the value of our possessions in these Straits, as sources of wealth from the cultivation of spices. The truth is, that to thrive well, these articles require certain peculiar circumstances of soil and climate; besides which, labour is too expensive here. Besides the high price of labour, another cause for the ill success of spice cultivation is, the insecurity of property on this island: there are about two thousand professed thieves, independent of the Hindoo and other convicts here, and the cloves and nutmegs are not very safe in their neighbourhood. Pepper, which requires less attention, succeeds better: the pepper vine is a pretty creeper, and if the plant were not supported by living trees, a plantation of it would resemble a hopgarden; but even this article is produced at a far cheaper rate on the west coast of Sumatra. Property is in a very depreciated state in this island; houses and lands may be estimated at two-thirds less than their value ten or twelve years ago. Several estates have been

Oriental Herald, Vol. 16.

U