faithful servants weltering in their blood. This horrible scene, acting upon a mind already disturbed by his bereavement of Esther, maddens M'Donnell to desperation; and his thirst of vengeance renders him thenceforth the deadly and unsparing foe of the protestants. At this point, the close of the second volume, Evelyn is separated from Edmund and Eva under circumstances which lead them to a dreadful suspicion of his honour. A young peasant girl, Moya Laherty, who is violently enamoured of him, and twice saves his life at the hazard of her own, endeavours, in the wildness of her passion and jealousy, to convert this separation into an irreparable breach between the friends and lovers; and her arts are for some time successful. The M'Donnells sedulously shun all intercourse with Evelyn; Eva is conveyed for safety to the continent, and M'Donnell, degraded from his commission for having suffered the escape of Evelyn as formerly related, disappears from his rank in society, and becomes the captain of a band of Rapparees or freebooters.

In the third volume, Evelyn goes through many adventures in endeavouring to seek an explanation of the M'Donnells, who, on their part, believe him a villain; and this delusion continues until the denouement, which is effected by Onagh. That insane sibyl recovers her reason, and obliges Moya to confess her perfidious practises; and Onagh herself repentently avows her own share of former guilt against the peace of Edmund M'Donnell and Esther. She proves to be a lady, whose honour an elder brother of Edmund had betrayed. Her brothers, after endeavouring to force the unfeeling seducer to marry her, had murdered him and her child before her face, with some horrid aggravation of cruelty; and the spectacle had deprived her of reason. In her insanity, she had imagined herself 'bid to cross the first-love of any brother of his blood whose hard heartedness had withered up her heart;' and hence her hostility to the loves of Edmund and Esther. The confession of Moya produces of course a complete reconciliation between the M'Donnells and Evelyn; but the tale does not end happily. Evelyn and Eva, already united, are indeed restored to each other; but Edmund, being excluded as a Rapparee captain from the benefits of the capitulation of Limerick, is, on the conclusion of the civil war, for ever banished from Ireland.

Such are the outlines of the plot of the novel. But it is manifest that the author has throughout made the mere business of the story quite subordinate to the plan of detailing the public events of the civil war; and his introduction of whole political manifestoes and historical passages, has often the effect of smothering the romantic interest of his piece. There is perhaps less to regret in this, as the incidents of his plot are often improbable and extravagant. His management of his fictitious characters, too, is altogether bad: it is unnatural that M'Donnell and Evelyn, with the conviction of the madness of the hostile parties full upon their

minds, should originally have contracted the political engagements which they did; or that, in the confidence of unreserved friendship, they should not have disclosed those engagements to each other. And it is even more improbable that subsequently, after many trials of each other's fidelity and character, they should so readily have been dupes to the artifices of Moya. The part of Onagh needs no comment: it is in the highest degree ridiculous; and the author here, with a depraved taste for the preternatural, violates all reason and probability, by the introduction of unreal visions of witchcraft, in the very midst of authenticated scenes of real life. Onagh has been driven to madness; but her incantations are obeyed by the powers of darkness, and her forebodings have the truth of prophecy, until she recovers her reason, and with it-for the denouement-her every day mortality. All this is very

absurd and inconsistent.

But the author's worst fault, is that palpable and servile imitation of Scott, which seems henceforth doomed to be the besetting sin of the "historical novel;" and it is remarkable that this imitation is almost always unskilful. We pass over the close resemblance of all the fictitious characters to the personages of the Scottish novels; although Eva M'Donnell must be at once identified with the Flora M'Ivors and the Diana Vernons; the inanimate Evelyn with Waverly, and all the doubles of that hero whom Sir Walter has painted; and above all, Onagh of the Cavern, with Norna of the Fitful Head, and all the wildest and most absurd among the northern novelist's creations of the same class. We may pass over all these identities of general character; but we shall find the imitation extend even to the scenes and the contrivances of the plot. To give only two for example: we have a single combat and a death struggle between the reverend champions, Walker and O'Haggerty, an evident copy of that between Bothwell and Burley; and notwithstanding an attempted and feeble disclaimer in the preface, an improbable error, upon which the whole interest of the third volume turns, is a mere repetition of that in the Abbot, where Roland Græme mistakes the brother of Catherine Seyton for herself in male attire. Here Evelyn encounters in disguise, in battle, in many perilous and unbecoming situations for a female, a younger brother of Eva, whom he had never before seen and scarcely heard of, so closely resembling her in countenance and stature, that he is convinced it is herself in the garb of a man.

Art. III.

Travels in Chile and La Plata, including accounts respecting the Geography, Geology, Statistics, Government, Finances, Agriculture, Manners and Customs, and the Mining Operations in Chile ; collected during a residence of several years in these countries. By John Miers. 2 Vols. 8vo. 21. London. Baldwin and Co. 1826.

To persons who may have occasion to proceed to Chile overland by Buenos Ayres, these volumes must prove peculiarly acceptable. They describe the whole of that route with great minuteness and accuracy, and while they state the real difficulties attending it, they dissipate all the imaginary dangers represented as belonging to it by travellers of the last century. Besides an excellent map of the mountainous country between Mendoza and Valparaiso, the work includes a great mass of information as to the seasons most favourable for the passage of the Andes, the most eligible mode of effecting it, the accommodations which the traveller has to expect, and the privations which he must undergo during the journey. Mr. Miers looks at matters generally with an eye to business; and if his descriptions be seldom picturesque they are at least topographical. In this respect his volumes form an "Itinerary;" for the length of the stages, and the expenses attending every practicable mode of performing them, are given, with many other points of useful advice which are not to be found elsewhere. Mr. Procter's narrative of his journey across the Cordillera of the Andes* contains also much information on this subject, but it is by no means so full as that which may be collected from the work before us.

Upon the present condition and the future prospects of the mines in Chile, the progress of our commercial connections with that country, and its capabilities in a financial and an agricultural point of view, Mr. Miers furnishes many details, which appear to us to be for the most part novel, and cannot fail to be interesting to all those who are in any manner concerned for the welfare of South America. Here again he manifestly endeavours to exhibit the facts in their own natural light, without any desire to exaggerate or to diminish their real attractions. It were much to be desired that his volumes had appeared before the public some twelve or eighteen months ago, as they might have contributed to check that wild spirit of adventure which has ingulphed so large a proportion of British wealth in South American speculations. But even at the present moment his details are extremely valuable, as they clearly show the results which a foreign capitalist or merchant has to expect who risks his money or his goods in Chile.

It is not however to be concealed, that the mere general reader who takes up this work as "a book of travels" will be disappointed

* See Vol. cvii. of the Monthly Review, p. 128, former series.

if he expect to meet in it amusing anecdotes of manners, charac teristic sketches of the country, or impartial discussions relating to the religious or political condition of the people of whom it treats. Mr. Miers seems not to have been at all aware of the extent of his own prejudices upon the two latter points particularly. With respect to the first of them he makes assertions which show that he is in a great measure unacquainted with the subject, and not unwilling to misrepresent it; as to the second, he writes as a partisan, and his statements must be taken with a liberal measure of allowance. He writes too as a disappointed speculator, and although his example must operate as a salutary warning to others, yet his personal misfortues, naturally enough perhaps, give, here and there, a gloomy and fretful character to his narrative.

It appears that Mr. Miers was induced, in the year 1818, to embark with a friend of his in an enterprise which, like most of those that have so strangely deluded the frequenters of the Stock Exchange, promised, on paper, prospects of a golden harvest. The plan was to erect in Chile an 'extensive train of machinery for refining, rolling, and manufacturing copper into sheathing.' A rapid and immense fortune was to be the result. The material was to be procured from the mines in Chile for half the price which was given for it in the English market: when manufactured it was to be shipped to the East Indies, where it was certain of a speedy sale, or to the coasts of the Pacific, where the demand for it was insatiable! Coal was to be had for nothing, and labour at a fourth of what it cost in England! This splendid dream was found to be but a moderate estimate of the reality on application to the South American deputies and the Chilean ambassadors, then in London; and, upon the strength of their sanction, Mr. Miers forwarded to the land of so much promise one hundred and seventy tons of machinery, together with a number of workmen, engineers, millwrights, and refiners! These were followed by himself and his wife,-a lady, we doubt not, of the greatest respectability and merit, who occupies a very conspicuous place in these pages. It was her happy fate, on leaving England, to be in that condition in which "ladies wish to be who love their lords ;" and if we are to judge of her husband's affection from the frequent allusions which he makes to that circumstance, and, indeed, to every other circumstance connected with her, we must set it down among the most extraordinary instances of conjugal devotion. There is not, we believe, a single chapter in his work in which my wife' is not introduced under some pretence or another.

The copper speculation failed of course. The author found, upon arriving in the country, that not one of his calculations could be realized; he compromised with his mechanics in the best manner he could, and in order to employ his leisure time he became a miller. He erected a water wheel at Concon, not far from Valparaiso; a piece of machinery, so perfect in all its parts was never seen in

Chile; the mill flourished, when, behold! one night there came an earthquake, and the building and water-works were tossed about like so much pasteboard. To crown his woes he was plunged into a lawsuit with a widow!-the most indomitable of all litigantsconcerning the title to the land on which he erected his mill, and, like some of our Chancery suits, it promises to be interminable. In the mean time he has turned coiner, having, as he informs us, obtained from the government of Buenos Ayres a contract for erecting in that city a national mint! The earthquake and the widow seem to have frightened him from the dominions of the Andes. His remarks, however, have the more value, as they are the result of several years residence in Chile, and of frequent journeys between Valparaiso and Buenos Ayres. He seems, on all occasions, to have entertained a proper abhorrence of Cape Horn.

The Pampa country lying between Buenos Ayres and Mendoza, at the foot of the Andes, has been so often described, that we need not follow our author through that part of his journey. It is worth remarking, that in the course of it deserts are to be encountered, similar to those which fatigue and often exhaust the traveller in Northern Africa. Still more remarkable it is, that in the South American, as well as in the African deserts, saline lakes abound, the margins of which are covered with incrustations of salt, containing portions of the sulphate and carbonate of soda. But although the provinces of Santa Fe, Cordova, and Mendoza, particularly the latter, are composed of a loose and sandy soil, strongly impregnated with saline matter, which in its natural condition is unfriendly to agriculture, yet these deserts afford some of the most striking triumphs of industry, and are made, by the assistance of irrigation, to become fertile. For, as Mr. Miers observes, the saline matter in a soil so light, by the assistance of constant moisture, appears the most active stimulant to vegetation, and serves as never-failing manure.'

Our author conspires with almost every traveller who has visited Mendoza in praise of its climate. It is said to be peculiarly salutary for patients afflicted with pulmonary complaints.

We spent the evening with Doctor Colesberry, a physician from the United States of North America, who had left his native country labouring under a severe pulmonary affection, from which he had entirely recovered in the genial climate of Mendoza. He follows his profession, is one of the most amiable and deserving men I ever met with, and is justly admired by all the inhabitants of Mendoza. To this deserving gentleman I shall ever feel under great obligations for the kind attentions he showed to my wife during her long subsequent sojournment in Mendoza, and for the friendly assistance he rendered us at the period of our great embarrassment at Villa Vicencio. Doctor Colesberry described the climate of Mendoza as exceedingly salubrious, especially in cases of pulmonary affection, instances of which had come under his observation, and which have since been confirmed by others. Dr. Gilles, a Scotch