mandant of the Missouris. What advantages could now be expected from the conversion of the great chief's daughter, and her marriage with a Frenchman? She received presents from all the ladies at court, and from the king himself; nor were her Indian companions forgotten-they all received fine blue coats, trimmed with gold, and laced hats. In fine, they set out very well satisfied, and repairing to L'Orient, embarked to return home. As for the commandant who had brought them, he remained in France, where he had just been made a knight of St. Louis, and afterwards married a very rich widow. The voyage of Mr. and Mme. Dubois and their suite to America was a very happy one. On their way they passed to the Natchez, then to the Arkansas, and at last arrived at the Missouris.

"What joy for those Indians, to see once more their countrymen, whom they had given up for lost, and see them return, rich, and loaded with presents! On their arrival there were dances and games in all the villages.

"Mme. Dubois remained at the fort, and went from time to time to visit her family. But either because she did not love her husband, or that her own people's way of living suited her better than the French, the boats which had brought them had scarcely left when the Indians massacred Sieur Dubois, and butchered the whole garrison. After which Madame Dubois renounced Christianity, and returned to her former mode of life, so that the post no longer exists."

After the year 1720, thorns and thistles began to spring in the pathway of the French trader, throughout the whole valley of the Mississippi. The failure of Law's project retarded emigration by the Gulf of Mexico, and the alliance of the fierce Dakotas of Minnesota, with the Outagamies (Foxes) of Wisconsin, cut off the passage of traders by Mackinaw, Green Bay, and the Fox and Wisconsin rivers, into the Mississippi. The inroads of the English were also beginning to be felt. Traders had made their appearance on the lower Mississippi, from Virginia and Carolina. As early as February 22, 1687, Gov. Dongan, of New York, in a communication to the London Board of Trade, remarks:

"Before my coming here, no man of our government ever went beyond the Seneca country, (Western New York.) Last

year some of our people went trading among the far Indians, called the Ottowas, inhabiting about three months' journey to the West and W. N. W. of Albany, from whence they brought in a good many beavers. They found the people more inclined to trade with them than the French, the French not being able to protect them from the arms of our Indians, with whom they have had a continual war."

These encroachments of the British did not cease till they completed the reduction of Canada. New Orleans had just began to have an existence, being chiefly settled by mendicants and other indifferent characters.*

We here bring our review of the commerce of the century, 1620-1720, to a close. From the examination we learn that traders, not ecclesiastics, were the pioneer explorers of the Mississippi valley. As we read Bancroft's beautiful chapter on the Jesuit Missions of North America, we imagine that ecclesiastics were the chief explorers of the West, and that they exercised a powerful influence on the tribes. But this is far from the reality. It is surprising how little has ever been accomplished by religious teachers among the nomadic tribes of the North West. The papal missions, in almost every instance, were mere attachments to trading establishments, and exceedingly fluctuating. On a map of the Jesuits, prepared in 1670 or '72, republished in the third volume of Bancroft, we find the "Mission of the Holy Ghost" near the head of Lake Superior, but it remained there for a brief period. Marquette was driven from his post, and it was not occupied again until visited by missionaries of the A. B. C. F. M., one hundred and twenty-five years after.

The same may be said of other stations. In 1722, the Jesuit Charlevoix descended the Mississippi, and he discovered but one cross between the Illinois river and New Orleans, and that was at a trading-post. The father says, "They have no priest, but it is not their fault. They had one, whom they were obliged to get rid of, because he was drunken."

The relations of the Jesuits, though interesting, have been altogether overrated. The journals of Tonty, Jontel, La Harpe and others, officers of France, surpass them in style and accuracy. While we would not wish to detract from the characters Champigny.

*

of Marquette and others of the "Society," we would not forget that their code of ethics allowed them to exaggerate, and even equivocate, in the service of the Church.

Jontel speaks of Marquette's pretended monster, which was drawn on the rocks of the Mississippi, and which he passed in September, 1688. He says, "That monster consists of two scurvy figures, drawn in red, on the flat side of a rock, about ten or twelve feet high, which wants very much of the extraordinary height that relation mentions."

Moreover, we have no faith in the reported conversions of the Indians. The Jesuit did not pretend to preach a Scriptural Christianity. Marquette says that he allowed the Indians to retain such sacrifices as he did not deem hurtful, as if it was possible for them to adore the Redeemer and a Manitou. When La Salle was petitioning the French government to take possession of Louisiana, he alluded to the success of the English in Boston, in civilizing the Indian; referring, no doubt, to the labors of Eliot and others, and recommended the adoption of similar measures. If the Jesuits in North America had been as successful as their relations and eulogists claim, why should the example of the Puritans be quoted at the court of Louis the Fourteenth?

At the present day there is but one band of Indians in the Northwest that is really civilized, and these received the rudiments of education, from Jonathan Edwards, at Stockbridge. Those who were accustomed to the teachings of the Jesuits, with few exceptions, remain as lustful, warlike, and indolent as their forefathers: As Father Marest described them in 1712, they continue. "They are lazy, treacherous, fickle, inconstant, deceitful, and naturally thievish, so as even to glory in their address in stealing; brutal, without honor, without truth, ready to promise anything for those who are liberal to them, but at the same time ungrateful, and without thankfulness."

NOTICES OF NEW BOOKS.

I. Looking unto Jesus: a View of the everlasting Gospel; or the Soul's eyeing of Jesus, as carrying on the great work of Man's Salvation, from first to last. By Isaac Ambrose, Minister of the Gospel. Philadelphia: Lippincott & Co. Shippensburg, Pa: J. C. Williams. 1856. pp. 694.

Whoever has not read Isaac Ambrose has suffered loss; the spirituality of this book is something wonderful; it is like that of the Saints' Rest. It has, of course, the faults of the time of the non-conformists, prolixity and repetition; but it goes into the inner heart of the matter, in a way that seems almost a lost power now. We shall never forget the time when we first read Ambrose; in our youth and in our first love in religion; it has intertwined itself with all that is most sacred, and we have ever cherished it reverentially. Take it up on Saturday evening, or on Sabbath afternoon, and its solemn and sweet tone will blend with the holy day on earth, and prepare for the still holier in heaven.

II. India ancient and modern. Geographical, historical, political, social and religious; with a particular account of the State and Prospects of Christianity. By David O. Allen, D. D., Member of the Bombay Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, and Corresponding Member of the American Oriental Society. Boston: J. P. Jewett & Co. Philadelphia: Lindsay & Blakiston. 1856. pp. 618. Dr. Allen was twenty-five years in India, in the service of the American Board. On his return, he found a general disposition to make inquiries in relation to India, but was not able to refer to any one book which would be generally satisfactory. This want he has endeavored to supply in the present volume.

It is a very extensive plan indeed, which Dr. Allen has undertaken to accomplish in a single volume. He begins with the geography, which is somewhat slightly discussed; he then presents the history of India in 270 pages, the government and English population in 73; the remainder of the work, upwards of 200 pages, being devoted to the native population and Christianity. There are appendices on the English language in India, Sanscrit Literature, Polygamy, and the "Pattwabodhini Sabha" in Calcutta. Dr. Allen was a careful observer, and appears to have written with much impartiality.

III. A Manual of Instruction for the South African College. Literature. Part I. The Principles of Grammar applied to the Eng

lish Language. Part II. The Principles of Grammar applied to the Latin Language. Capetown, (South Africa.)

A Manual of Instruction for the South African College. Science, Part I. Elementary Geometry, according to a natural System. Capetown (South Africa.)

These works are by the Rev. Dr. Adamson, who was formerly resident in Capetown, and who has more recently been engaged in efforts for founding an institution for the education of young colored persons in this country. The editors, not having leisure to examine these works with sufficient care, give no opinion of their own upon them, but present instead, the following carefully considered paper, which has been furnished to them, the part relating to the first work, consisting of extracts from the most suggestive parts of the book itself, and that relating to the latter, going into the principles of the Geometry of the Greeks.

"These works are fragmentary, being portions of an uncompleted design. What relates to the Latin tongue, goes no farther than an analysis of the derivation of words, which really constitutes or ought to constitute the division of Grammar called orthography. Grammar is throughout kept within the domain of inductive research, and no conclusion is considered as being established, which does not account for all instances bearing on them a common analogy. pp. 1, 40, 163, 263.

"The following conclusions announced in various parts of these works may be of interest to such as prosecute inquiries into the nature of language.

In affixing distinctive marks to terms, it is not necessary that such marks be as numerous as are the terms or ideas to be distinguished. The absence of a mark is a sufficient distinction for one of a series. For example, in the classical tongues, of the three genders found in them, the neuter bears no mark of its peculiar character as neuter. Inasmuch as the distinctions of the other genders imply in them the ideas of personality, or of subject and object, the want of any such mark is the reason why, in neuters, the nominative and the accusative cases are the same." pp. 38, 139, 142.

66

Real concords in all languages are instances of the repetitions of the signs of thought, and are explicable on the same principle as other repetitions. Hence, wherever there is any kind of relation expressed by an element of a word, that element may be repeated in any or in all of the words of a clause which have any mutual relations. Thus, the elements of words which express number, gender, personality, objectiveness, time, &c., may be incorporated with many other words in a clause besides those to which we find them attached in our common languages." pp. 6, 26, 50, 111, 162.

"Syntax ought to express the intention or purpose of the variations of terms with which it deals. Definitions of those ideas and illustrations of the modifications they may have undergone, ought to constitute its rules." p. 103.

"The ultimate roots in the Japetian or Indo-Germanic tongues, being biliteral, it follows that in the classical tongues, radical syllables are short. Hence, the occurrence of a vowel diphthong, of a consonant diphthong, or of a lengthened vowel, is an indication that such words are not primitive. Analysis of derivation, therefore, settles the quantity of syllables, and attention to quantity becomes a guide in analysis." pp. 2, 40, 148, 159, 167.