the inhabitants of this mansion. The Archamong bishop himself very rarely quits its precincts from the apprehension of insult. On the second day of our abode in his house, while sitting with him in his apartment, a Turk of surly and forbidding aspect, and evidently of the lower class, entered the room, seated himself unceremoniously on the sofa, filled his pipe, and took coffee from the attendants. The Archbishop was obviously embarrassed, but made no comment. After a short interval, he took a coin from his purse and put it silently into the hand of the Turk, who immediately disappeared.” (P. 270.) "The (Greek) habitation, which our Tartar selected as one of the best in the village, consisted of a single apartment with naked mud walls, and a flooring of naked earth; one end of the room occupied by horses, the other inhabited by two large families, with no other furniture than a few wooden and earthen vessels, and the straw mats and woollen coats which they used for their nightly covering. There was an aspect of meagre wretchedness and of absolute privation about them, which I have seldom seen equalled. Our arrival, and the ferocious manner in which our Turkish attendants broke into the house, produced at first much alarm. The eldest daughter of one of the families, who in another sphere of life might have been a beauty, was hurried away into a neighbouring hovel. In the faces and manner of those who remained, there was silently expressed an habitual expectation of ill-usage, which it was painful to contemplate." (P. 384.)

Concerning Sicily, the last country named in the comparison, we have a cloud of authors, who have left us nothing to desire as to the knowledge of

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her internal situation. From Mr. Leckie downwards, through the writings of Mr. Galt, the Abbate Balsamo, Mr. Blaquiere, Mr. Thomson, and a variety of others, one uniform language is held. Houses unroofed, bridges broken down, large towns abandoned, immea surable tracts of waste land without an inhabitant, are the usual objects which present themselves. "But to describe the sufferings of those, who are driven to mendicity without any resource whatever in their parishes, or the most distant prospect of obtaining employment, is far beyond the power of expression: and while the causes already mentioned must have contributed greatly to increase the number of the poor, agriculture has been gradually declining all over the Island. At no period of its history is Sicily recollected to have been so completely dependent upon strangers for support. It is said that, in the present year, near a million of dollars has been paid for imported corn. This is the testimony of one traveller. Another writes, "It will hardly be conceived, that although in this fertile soil it is only necessary to put the grain into the ground to ensure plentiful crops;-yet, still in most of the villages there are seldom or never to be found the necessaries of life;-meal never,—often not bread. Frequently I have not perceived any appearance of the country being inhabited or cultivated; and even where it is, the population and the habitations are so thinly scattered as sufficiently to prove the oppressed state of the inhabitants." "There is nothing that conveys so pointed a stigma upon the present order of things in Sicily, as a comparison of the ancient and modern population."

Such are the accounts rendered by travellers of

H

credit of the" Sicula arva," the granary of Rome, and one of the most fertile spots of the ancient world, Mr. Leckie, who long resided in the Island as a proprietor, has with sufficient clearness traced the evil to its cause, in the tyranny and oppression, not only of the government, but of every petty feudal Lord of a village. Great Britain herself has had a pretty sensible proof of the moral and political degradation of the people, inasmuch as when she had generously given to the country a free constitution, she was obliged to lend eighteen thousand disciplined troops to secure to the inhabitants its full use and enjoyment.

Such is the contrast afforded by the contemplation of different countries, which have all, in the course of their progress, far advanced beyond the agri+ cultural into the commercial and civilized states of society. In those where the people, under a reasonably free government and a fair attention to morals, have been suffered, in their habits, employment, and distribution, to follow the spontaneous impulses given to their minds by the natural events and circumstances of their progress; there they are found subsisting, even in very inferior climates and ungrateful soils, and notwithstanding their rapidly increasing numbers, in plenty, comfort, and happiness: and I think it may be said, that a greater injury could not be inflicted upon those societies, than to check that tendency to increase in their population, which is to urge them to a still further progress in the career of civilization. On the contrary, where the people, under a tyrannical government and a dissolute state of morals, have had their habits preverted,

their minds debased, and their employments and distribution violently interfered with, there, notwithstanding any superiority of climate and fertility of soil, the people, notwithstanding their rapidly de creasing numbers, have dwindled down to the ex treme verge of want and misery: and I think it may be said, that a more atrocious injustice could scarcely be practised against such societies, than to search for means of obviating that grinding pressuré of their population against the means of subsistence, by the inconveniences of which they could alone pro bably be roused to seek the efficient remedy. In the stages of society, therefore, treated of in this chapter, it does, I trust, appear manifest that, under whatever condition of government it may be, nothing but danger and deterioration can ensue from any attempt to tamper with the natural effects of the prin ciple of population, but that it should be left to its appointed and ordinary operation.

I do not mean to imply, by the facts and argu. ments of this chapter, that the adjustment of the due proportions between food and population by the free operation of the laws of nature, as well as the adjustment of every other social interest, is not a more complicated affair in the advanced stages of society than in the earlier and more simple states. Every arrangement must of course increase in complexity the more particulars it includes. And when we consider the responsible condition of man, and the constant struggle against the principle of evil which his lot and his duties involve, it is reasonable to sup pose that, in proportion to the advantages of knowledge and the facilities of intercourse which attend the progress of civilization, a corresponding difficulty

should be imposed in the due preservation of the system. If the increased temptations of the civilized state were not met by the augmented necessity for exertion and moral precaution, which this difficulty brings with it, but were fostered by the same facilities of indolent gratification which may safely exist in the more simple conditions of society, there would not only be great danger of a total relaxation of morals, but a fair impeachment might be made of that perfect moral equality, which the wisdom and goodness of God have established among the several states of society, as well as among the individuals of each community. The present condition of Ireland may perhaps be cited in support of this reasoning. By its close connexion with Great Britain it has been exposed to the increased temptations of high civilization which is prevalent among some ranks of its society, while the mass of the people is in a situation very far behind that of the sister island, indeed very much below what ought reasonably to be expected from the intelligence of the higher ranks, and the vicinity of Ireland to the most civilized country in Europe. Into the remote causes of this state of things it is not my present wish to enter. But the proximate cause is evidently to be found in the want of that increased exertion and moral precaution on the part of the leading members of the community, which are necessary to oppose the temptations, arising out of the partial progress of prosperity, and the facilities of intercourse attendant upon the general improvement of the British empire. From this cause the people of that interesting country have been suffered to vegetate in the same indulgence of indolent gratification, in which they were found by a respectable