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Leader (1850-1860), 12th May 1860, Edition 2 of 2, Page 12

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      ? Saturday Analj/Tt, No. 2, Pngo 41.

      and this , let us remember , was proved " against the absolute power of imprisonment , without even a hearing , for time unlimited in any gaol in the kingdom , without the use of pen , ink , and paper , and without any communication with any soul but the keeper . " Against such a power pen and pencil'strove and was victoriousj pen with its parody , pencil with its caricature . ; / After " The House that Jack Built , " * the tide of these little brochures greatly increased . The safety which the boldness of the juries had given the originators prepared the way for , and greediness of gain , acting as usual upon publishers , created hosts of imitators . George the Fourth was everywhere exposed , and good Queen Caroline vindicated . It says much for the healthiness inherent in these pictures , that we always find them on the side of the poor or the oppressed . In the frontispiece of the " Queen that Jack found , " we see Britannia and Wisdom shielding Innocence . In grand allegory , and certainly in reality , we always find caricature ready to " draw" and defend what it believes to be innocent . It is iisftipss hern to raise the Question of that injudicious Woman ' s

      innocence or guilt j it is enough to know that her defenders amongst the people believed her good . Curious , too , it is that Shakspeare and Cowper do service under these cuts in magnanimous quotations , and justify or damnify , as the case may be—. — " disloyal ? No : She ' s punished for her truth ; yet bears it all , More goddess-like than wife-like . " So speaks " immortal William" from his grave , shielding a woman ; and , — " I could endure Chains nowhere patiently ; and chains at home , Where I am free by birthright , not at all , * cries but the placid Cowper . This is all very pleasant ; it is well when Freedom appeals , to her old prophets ; it is well when the men of action call up their deeds by appealing to the men of thought . ( To he continued . )

      44g Theleaderandsaturday Analyst* L May ...

      44 g TheLeaderandSaturday Analyst * L 1 ^ 186 ( X

      Eastern Africa.-F-At The Present Moment,...

      EASTERN AFRICA .-f-AT the present moment , there is no part of the globe which has not been brought under the subjection of the Japhetic races by the arts of peace and civilization , that excites more interest in the breast of the philanthropist and the philosopher than the benighted continent of Africa , whose nations are indeed " meted out and trodden down . " With the revolt of the Sepoys in India still fresh in . bur memories , and the vapid threats of the French colonels scarcely drowned by the chorus of rifle-bugles sounding-the rouse from the Land ' s-end to t < he Land-b ' -Cakes , Englishmen may well look ^ upon the paragraph which we extract Irom a contemporary with something like suspicion , if not with alarm , and seek to make themselves acquainted with the ^ more covert reasons of France for sending at such a moment a mission into the interior of Africa . . _

      On Monday last a correspondent of W \ Q Times , writing from Aden , under date of the 18 th of April , saj's : — " By advices just received , I understand that a French steamboat , laden with the requisites for forming a new settlement , had reached iEarReTnTioiTraTid- ^ days . The destination of these two vessels is avowed to be Adulis , on the coast of Ahessinia , though there can be little doubt that the island of Dissee will be the first point in the Red Sea occupied by our allies . It will be interesting to note the reasons which will be advanced for this new move on the part of France in this region . As a counterpart of what is going forward on the other side of the water , the tableau will in all probability represent Dissee and Adulis ao the slopes of the Alps ; the rebel Dejai Nagoosi will stand in the place of Victor Emmanuel , and the acquiescence of forty families of poor fishermen , who at present occupy the island of Dissee , will answer well enough for the votes of Nice and Savoy . "

      Another paragraph , some few days older , gave the first alarm , and we add it accordingly : — . „ " The persevering efforts of the French to establish their influence in the Red Sea , " says the writer , " is a subject of anxiety to the most forecasting minds in India . Egypt swarms with Frenchmen ; every branch of the Administration is full of them ; and the Pacha , it is said , has yielded himself up wholly to French influence . A French squadron is talked of for Jeddah or Sonakin . A line of transport steamers for the Red Sea has long been building , and will be supported by heavy Government contributions . France has obtained a pretended * cession' of territory , embracing Annesley Bayotherwise called the Bay of Adulis ; and the Bombay Gazette

      , reports , obviously on sufficient authority , that a French mission is on its way to Gondar to demand the independence of the defeated rebel , Who bestowed on France that whioh was never his own . The mission , which is Jed b y the Comte de Rous , is already in the Tigre country , and the slightest outrage would be sufficient excuse for active measures to secure the predominance of French influence . " " It was the opinion of the ancients , " says Dr . Krapf , " that the coast of Africa was connected with that of India . Erroneous as this was , there is certainly a great political truth involved in the supposition , inasmuoh as the possessors of East Africa will have gained a first step towards the dominion of India .., Any further know * ledge , therefore , obtained respecting East Africa , cannot fail to

      interest Englishmen , as it may be that the fate of India itself will some day have to be decided in the burning solitudes of Africa , noless than in the rich plains of Asia . No true Englishman canJienceforth be an indifferent spectator of what is passing upon the Eastern coast of Africa , from the Isthmus of Suez to the Cape of Orood "It would be quite preposterous to urge that there is no real political danger to be apprehended from the possession of theseregions , because East Africa presents for the most part nothing but a barren , harbourless , and savage coast , not to be invaded with prudence by any Government of Europe . It is true that Africa wears nnlallhfir coasts a forbidding : asDect . IProvidence having furnished '

      her weak nations with this repulsive feature as the only weapon of strength which they can oppose to the dominant Japhetic and Semitic races . But we may be sure that no coast-barrier will prevent the former from possessing the inland regions , in many places not inferior in fertility , beauty , and healthiness , to any country on the face of the globe . " ' ¦ ' Missionaries , ever since the days of Paul and Barnabas , have been the pioneers of civilization . England herself probably owes the introduction of Christianity to the disciples of one of these Apostle ? himselfand

      to the Gentiles , if not to St . Paul or St . Barnabas ; Christianity is civilization . Standing by the ruined Roman Pharos of Dover Castle , the most venerable of British Churches carries us back to the days of the first Christian king ; for Lucius , king of Britain , built the churqh now undergoing restoration , of which that Pharos is the tower , somewhere about the middle of the second century , before any other of the potentates of the earth had embraced Christianity . That Pharos , one of the most interesting monuments in the land , is older than the Church , for the very

      materials of which it is built point to the wise administration 01 Julius Agricola as the date of its erection , as the large stalactical incrustations must have been brought from more northern parts of the coast ; and it was not till his circumnavigation of the island , about the year 90 , that these parts were explored by the Romans . The Pharos is the monument of Roman and Pagan civilization , which passed away with the advent of Hengist and Horsa ; the Church is the record of Christian civilization , which , though driven into the mountain fastnesses of the west , and to the seaboard of the south , still survived , only to return after the conversion of its truculent adversaries by St . Augustine , andto burst forth-again in : fuller vigonr at the date of the Reformation . hical

      A missionary in our day is moreover the pioneer of geograp science and-of ethnology . He makes us acquainted with the land in which he labours , no less than with the heathen races which he claims as the ' heritage of his Master . He notes down the courses of rivers , the altitudes of mountains , the natural productions of the soil , no less than the distinctions of race and language , and the manners and customs of the people . Like Pausanias of old , hetells us what he saw and what he heard , turns a sod where sod has never been turned before , finds coal and iron , or the more precious metals , and notes down snow upon mountains where theorists say it cannot exist , and lakes and boundless waters where maps have hitherto figured endless ranges of mountains and impassable

      bar-. The east coast of Africa , however repulsive in itself , opens the way into a land overfl ' and brings forth coffee , sugar , grapes , and tropical fruits for the gathering . If not over rich in the more precious metals , it has still the Ophir of the Bible , and Dr . Krapf seeks to prove most satisfactorily , " That the Opliir of the Bible is to be sought for on the eastern coast of Africa , as is evident from Felix

      two circumstances , Qne is , that right opposite to Arabia there is a people who call themselves Afer , and culled by others Adals and Danakil from their chief tribe Ad Alii , but whose designation in their own language is Afer . In the second place , it musfi be considered that Ophir beyond a doubt means gold-dust ; for , in Job xxviii . 6 , the words dust of gold in Hebrew are ' Ophirot Sahab . * Hence , by easy transition , tho word Ophir was made to comprise two things , the name of a people and of a substance ; and the Land of the Afer was simply the land where Afer Sahab , gold-dust , was found . "

      Thus , too , Mr . M'Leod ' , in his Travels in Eastern Africa , identifies , upon no leas probable grounds , the Sofala district with the Ophir of Scripture . On both banks of the Sofala , and northwards towards the Zambesi , gold and silver and copper are found , and gold is so plentiful that the natives prefer copper for their personal ornaments ; whilst , towards Tete , iron and coal are found inabundance . Bars of copper and suit are conveyed from the territories of the Cuzembe , midway between the eastern and western coasts ; and the native iron , as Dr . Krapf informs . us , is esteemed at Moinbaz equal to that of Sweden imported by way of Suez . Coal , the use of which is still unknown to most of the natives , is found

      in many places , and wood suited for every purpose , from ebony and teak to acacia and the copal . tr . ee , . abounds . ; far the deserts „ of the maps , says Mr . Rebmann , are , properly speaking , wildernesses—land , productive and fitt « d for culture , given up to beasts of prey , full of luxuriant timber and undergrowth , but producing at present for the wants of the natives little beyond the ivory and peltry which they convey to the coast , and copal , oil , and gum . Mr . Erhardt devotes a paper to the resources ana products of Wanika-land , the present seat of the Church mission , opposite to the island of Mombaz , and the list , beyond what we have already mentioned , includes bamba , cotton , and Bufu , all growing wild ; ana he adds , " Wool and cotton are two articles whioh are in constant demand in England , and which , if culti-

      • William Hone. + Travels, Researches, A...

      • William Hone . + Travels , Researches , and Missionary labours during an Eighteen Tea r * * Residence in Eastern Africa , By the Rev . Dr . J . Lewis KnAPjr . Triibner and Co .

  • Citation
    • Leader (1850-1860), May 12, 1860, page 12, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_12051860/page/12/