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there appears the slightest evidence to prove that he received. It would have been inconsistent with his ar dent feelings, to remain a calm spectator of his country's wrongs; and, however anxiously he might seek to redress them, a solemn act of the legislature has long since rescued his memory from the imputation of all legal, and all moral guilt. He fell, indeed, a martyr to his principles, and a victim to the vengeance of a tyrant, whose life he had generously preserved.

the history of nations, as it tended to unfold the evils of despotism, and the advantages of popular control. And his expedients for the preservation or establishment of civil liberty, are few, simple, and practical, wherever public virtue, its only effectual safeguard, can be found.....

But the approbation bestowed on Sydney, by the historian or the patriot, has been by no means confined to the speculations of his retirement: it has accompanied him amid the tumults and dissensions of his active life. Above all, the injustice of his sentence has been almost universally condemned; and

Regarding religion solely as a divine philosophy, Sydney placed no reliance on the efficacy of external forms. He was a firm believer in the wisdom and benevo-"the production of papers, conlence of the Deity; in the truth and obligations of the christian scheme: but he was averse to public worship, and to every description of ecclesiastical influence in the state. He was devoid of all intolerance and bigotry, where religion alone was concerned, and his aversion to popery was chiefly grounded on its supposed connection with arbitrary power.

As a writer on government, Sydney was eminently qualified to excel, no less from his cultivated taste and genius, than from his intimate acquaintance with the theory and practice of political institutions, and his ardour in defending the common rights and freedom of mankind. A master at once of reason and of expression, he wrote from his judgment and his heart; and conveyed the result of his principles and knowledge, in a clear, flowing and nervous style. Conversant with the best writers of antiquity, and the purest models of more recent times, he had studied

taining speculative opinions upon government and liberty, as a substitute for a second witness, deprecated, as a system of wickedness and nonsense, hardly to be paralleled in the history of juridical tyranny." He has been regarded as innocent even of political crimes ; as a victim to the sanguinary vengeance of his profligate and perfidious king.

Such was Algernon Sydney: such, by the liberal and enlightened, has he ever been esteemed. His little errors are lost in the blaze of transcendant genius, of virtues such as fall not to the commnon lot of man. Let those, who calumniate his character and revile his principles, remember, that to the practical assertion of those very principles at the revolution, England has owed her best superiority over the nations of Europe. If he formed too favourable an opinion of the dignity of human nature, and recommended a freedom too pure and too lofty for the passions

and prejudices of the mass of man kind; it was the error of a mind sublime and generous: the great-" est benefactors of their species have invariably cherished an equal enthusiasm. And whilst the censures of the venal and the base are heard but for a moment, the name of Sydney will live in the memory of the just, and his conduct will excite the emulation of the honourable; while his character and his principles will be applauded by every friend to the liberties of Britain.

And if, in the revolving annals of her history, that day shall ever arise, when the despotic prince, and the profligate minister, shall again prompt the patriot of noble birth to do or die for his country; then may the image of Algernon Sydney rise up to his admiring eye and against the darkness of fate, whether its smile or its frown awaits his "well considered enterprize," let him fortify his spirit by an example of magnanimity so choice and so complete.

EPITAPH

On the late

SIR WADSWORTH BUSK,

BURIED IN THE

dischargeof his official duties, and by an unremitting attention to the true interests of the Island, which was the scene of his professional engagements, he merited and ob tained the rewards of his Sovereign, and conciliated the esteem, gratitude, and veneration of the inhabitants.

Qualified to shine in any station of public trust, he preferred, in philosophical retirement, the path of virtue and piety, which led to a more enviable and lasting preeminence.

In private life his virtues were conspicuous-not ostentatious; his conduct exemplary-not austere; his deportment dignified-not assuming; his benevolence warm

and comprehensive, but not indiscriminate; his manners invariably gentle, unaffected, and sincere.

In conversation he was instructive, animating, and impressive; in composition nervous, perspicuous, and elegant; his acquirements were solid, classical, useful, and extensive, and his knowledge of the human mind penetrating and profound. Zealous for the promotion of civil and religious freedom, (the foundation of all human excellence), he accounted it a singular blessing to have ranked among

Church of the Middle Temple, his steadiest friends some of the

LONDON.

Hoc Tumulo requiescunt Cineres WADSWORTH BUSK Equitis, Jurisconsulti, præclaræ hujus Societatis Consessoris et multis annis Regiarum Causarum Procuratoris in Mona Insula; Obiit Die xv. Decembris, Anno Salutis

MDCCCXI. ÆTAT. LXXXII.

By the faithful and assiduous

ablest advocates of Liberty and Christianity. A firm believer in the truths of revealed Religion, he unceasingly endeavoured to promote its genuine doctrines and practical influence by prayer, by precept, and by example; for his life was passed in the exercise of every social duty, of every moral obligation, of every christian charity! his end was marked by calm content,

placid resignation, and pious hope, the fruit of intellectual exertion, the meed of tried integrity, the theme of disinterested praise, the promise of a blessed immortality! Brevis a natura nobis vita data

est at memoria bene redditæ vitæ sempiterna.

Filii quinque uxoris prioris et conjux carissima superstes, suis madidum lachrimis, hoc marmor posuerunt.

MANNERS

MANNERS, CUSTOMS, &c.

OF

NATIONS AND CLASSES OF PEOPLE.

KALMUCK PRAYING MACHINES.

this cylinder is large, another twice as small, and filled with writing, is fixed for ornament at the top of

(From Travels in the Caucasus and it. The inscriptions on such prayer

Georgia.)

AMONG the most remarkable of the sacred utensils of the temples is the Kürdü, a cylindrical vessel of wood or metal, either very small or of immense size. In its centre is fixed an iron axle, but the interior of the cylinder, which is quite hollow, is filled with sacred writings, the leaves of which are all stuck one to another at the edge, throughout the whole length. This paper is rolled tightly round the axis of the cylinder till the whole space is filled up. A close cover is fixed on at each end, and the whole Kürda is very neatly finish ed, painted on the outside with allegorical representations, or Indian prayers, and varnished. This cylinder is fastened upright in a frame by the axis; so that the latter, by meaus of a wheel attached to it below, may be set a-going with a string, and with a slight pull kept in a constant rotatory motion. When

wheels commonly consist of masses for souls, psalms, and the six great

general litanies, in which the most moving petitions are preferred for the welfare of all creatures. The text they sometimes repeat a hundred or even a thousand times, attributing from superstition a proportionably augmented effect to this repetition, and believing that by these frequent copies, combined with their thousands of revolutions, they will prove so much the more efficacions. You frequently see, as well on the habitations of the priests as on the whole roof of the temple, small Kürdä placed close to each other, in rows, by way of ornament; and not only over the gates, but likewise in the fields, frames set up expressly for these praying-machines, which, instead of being moved by a string, are turned by means of four sails, shaped and hollowed out like spoons, by the wind.

Other similar Kürdä are fasten

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ed to sticks of moderate thickness; a leaden weight is then fastened to the cylinder by a string which, when it is once set a-going, keeps it with the help of the stick in constant motion. Such-like prayerwheels, neatly wrought, are fastened upon short sticks to a small wooden pedestal, and stand upon the altars for the use of pious persons. While the prayer-wheel is thus turned round with one hand the devotee takes the rosary in the other, and at the same time repeats penitential psalms.

A fourth kind of these Kürdä is constructed on the same principle as those which are turned by wind; only it is somewhat smaller, and the frame is adapted to be hung up by a cord in the chimneys of the habitations or huts of the Mongols. When there is a good fire, they are likewise set in motion by the smoke and the current of air, and continue to turn round as long as the fire is kept up.

A fifth kind of Kürdä is erected on a small stream of water, upon a foundation like that of a mill, ever which a small house is built to protect it from the weather.

By means of the wheel attached to it, and the current, the cylinder is in like manner kept in a constant circular motion. These waterKürdä are commonly constructed on a large scale, and maintained at the joint expense of the inhabitants of a whole district.

They

have a reference to all aquatic animals, whether alive or dead, whose temporal and eternal happiness is the aim of the writings contained in them: in like manner as the object of the fire-Kurda is the salvation of the souls of all animals suffering by fire.

From the Same.

THE CKARATSCHAI.

The Ckaratschai, (that is, Black Rivulet,) not Karautzi, are called by the Tscherkessians Karschaga Kusch'ha, but by the Mingrelians and Imerethians Karatschioli. By the Tartars they are denominated Ckara-Tscherkess, or Black Tscherkessians, because they are subject to that people. Thus also they were named by the Georgians, in the middle ages, Quara Dshiki, and their country Qaradschachethi, for Dshiki and Zychi are synonymous, and signify Tscherkessians.

They assert that they removed from Madshar to the district which they at present inhabit before the Tscherkessians came to the Kabardah, and derive their name of Charatschai from the chieftain under whose conduct they settled on the Ckuban. Pallas assigns to them a considerable extension to the west; for he represents them as bordering upon the Beschilbai on the Urup. The truth is, that they dwell dispersed at the north foot of the Elbrus, which is called by them Mingi-taw, on the rivers Chursuk, Ckuban, and Teberde. To the east they are separated by the mountains of Kandshal, Tshalpak, and Urdi; and to the north by the mountains of Auarsetsch, Ketschergan, Baramut, and Mara, from the Tsckherkessians and Abasses. To the west they have the Abassian tribes of Tramkt, Lo'u, and Klitsch. Their two principal villages are Ckaratschai, at the influx of the Chursuk into the right of the Ckuban, which contains about 250 houses, and another of about fifty houses, situated to the west of the Upper Ckuban, on the little river

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