not near the eastern coast, but about 700 or 800 miles from it, nearly in the parallel of 15° south lat. They are a warlike people, much superior to the African nations around them in regular industry and the organization of society, and do not pay, but receive tribute from their neighbours. But the mulatto who visited the Mulooa in 1807, reported (as we learn from Bowdich) that the latter people received tribute in salt from their neighbours on the south-east. M. Douville, obtaining the same piece of intelligence, has thought fit to improve it by giving the names of the tributary nations, and he could not have made a more infelicitous selection. But in reality we have no reason to believe that there is a nation called the Cazembé. This word has the form of a diminutive, and should probably be Ca-zymboe, the minor court, or royal residence. The name of the place becomes the appendant title of the chief, and from inattention, or want of another name, is applied by writers to the people also.

The history of the prince called Cazembé seems to illustrate and confirm our conjecture, for his territory and city were conquered for him by his father the king of the Moropooa, a powerful nation of the interior. The name Cazembe, therefore, as explained above, might well apply to the city and prince, but by no means to its inhabitants, who are a colony of Moropooa. There can be no doubt, therefore, that the nations called Quilimane and Cazembé, which M. Douville affirms he met with at Yanvo, have really no existence.

But as we have broken the chain of M. Douville's ill connected itineraries, we shall now complete the dispersion of the links. We declare, therefore, our confident persuasion that the nation who call themselves Mulooa, and who are known by that name in the Portuguese colonies of Angola, are the identical nation called on the eastern coast by the descriptive name of Moropooa, and who are known to be situated at no great distance from the head waters of the Coanza, not farther north than lat. 12° south. Every particular of manners and character which we can learn respecting these nations tends to confirm this conclusion. The Mulooa carry on a constant trade with the Cassanji, to whom they send all their slaves, which must prove to all who are acquainted with Africa, that there is no nation (though there may be a long tract of uninhabited country) intervening between them. Traders could not burn towns, carry off hostages, and fight their way through interposed nations in the manner of M. Douville. Now it is only towards the south-east, along the course of the Coanza, and to the south, that we are ignorant of the nations which border on the Cassanji, and that we can place the Mulooa with probability. The mulatto despatched to the Mulooa, under the direction of M. da Costa, who was well acquainted with the

country, was sent from the southernmost fair in Cassanji, and reached his destination in two months, hunting, no doubt, and loitering on the road, for geographers ought not to estimate the regularity of a mulatto's rate of travelling by that of a stage coach. From this it is evident that the Mulooa are situated to the southwest, and not to the north of Cassanji: nor did the mulatto cross the Coango to reach them, for he is silent upon that head, and the chief rivers crossed are among the particulars which we find always reported in these itineraries. The Mulooa were found to possess abundance of European clothing procured from Mozambique. They manufactured a great deal of copper, received tribute in salt from their neighbours on the south-east, and described a country dependent on them, to which a Portuguese officer (Colonel Lacerda) had penetrated from the sea coast, and where he died.

On the other side, the country of the Moropooa abounds in copper. They procure European merchandize from Mozambique, through their colony of the Cazembé, and probably, like these too, receive tribute in salt from the Maravis on the southeast. They send their slaves to Angola through Cassanji. The country to which Colonel Lacerda directed his course was that of the Cazembé. Finally, the ambassador of the Cazembé, who visited the Portuguese settlement at Tete on the Zambese, and who was a native of Moropooa, stated that he had himself visited Angola, which was distant a three months' journey from his country; and it appears that his country had likewise been reached by white men (under which designation the negroes include mulattos,) from the western coast. The Moropooa and Mulooa are respectively described as being much superior in arms, arts, and civili. zation to the surrounding African nations. Now since the Moropooa are not known by this name in Angola, it is clear that they must be known by some other name. Or are we to believe with the constructors of our maps, that while the Portuguese of the western coast send emissaries more than half way across the African continent to the Mulooa, they remain in total ignorance of the Moropooa, a nation equally remarkable, only three months' journey distant from them, with whom they carry on a constant trade, and well known by the fame of their power and industry to the Portuguese at Mozambique.

These arguments, we doubt not, will be found on consideration to prove irresistibly, that the Moropooa, known to be situated. near the head waters of the Coanza, are the same nation as the Mulooa. But as it would be disingenuous in us, when offering a new opinion, to conceal the full extent of our reasonings, we will offer a single observation on the former name. We have always believed that the prefix moro or mura, occurring fre

quently in the names of this portion of the African continent, is identical (the r being a surd guttural) with the word written Mochi or Mucha, in the Congo dialect, and which signifies original or indigenous. Thus, the name Moropooa (or Muran'vua,) may be fairly conjectured to signify the old or original n'vua, a name naturally given to that people by their colony at Cazembe. So that the Moropooa, situated from six to seven hundred miles from the coast of Benguela, and in about lat, 12 south, are the very people whose great capital Yanvo was found by M. Douville, above 800 miles farther north, and more than 1000 miles from the sea.

It thus appears that M. Douville has strung together the separate and unconnected itineraries of the slave dealers and native merchants, who being prevented by the policy of barbarous nations from passing through the territories with which they traffic, cannot possibly make a circuitous tour like that described by our author. Their routes always diverge from the Portuguese possessions. He has forced, we say, the nation of the Anziko, (or Ngeco,) whom he has removed about ten or twelve degrees to the east of its true position, into contact with that of the Mulooa, whom he has transported an equal distance to the north, where they occupy the place of the tribe called Amulaca in Bowdich's map. He has joined together nations which are in reality 1000 miles asunder, and for all this tissue of palpable and blundering fraud, he has received the approbation of distinguished men, and had distinguished honours showered upon him by the Geogra phical Societies of Paris and of London.

We blush for those learned societies, (or coteries, we should rather say, for if they were as public as they ought to be, they could not be thus imposed upon,) which have been thus made the dupes of a flagrant imposture. The Royal Geographical Society of London, indeed, may be easily excused; for how can it be expected that honourable men, who habitually converse with none but persons of character, should be always upon their guard against such unparalleled effrontery? Can it be supposed that a gentleman will easily harbour suspicions of downright falsehood? But the Societé de Geographie appears in some measure implicated in the fraud, for it examined, or professed to examine, by a committee, the merit of M, Douville's pretensions, and has sanctioned his fabrications by a laudatory report prefixed to the volumes which contain them. The Societé owes to itself and the public some explanation of the means by which it was deceived. As to M. Douville himself, we doubt not that he will ere long see all his splendid discoveries reduced to one,-namely, that the literary world cannot be long deluded.

ART. IX-Den Danske Billedhugger BERTEL THORVALDSEN, og hans Værker. Ved J. M. Thiele, Professor, Secretair ved det Kongelige Akademie for de skiönne Kunster. Förste Deel, med 81 Kobbertavle. Kiöbenhavn. (The Danish Sculptor Thorvaldsen, and his Works. By J. M. Thiele, Professor, Secretary to the Royal Academy of the Fine Arts. Vol. I. with 81 Engravings. Copenhagen.) 8vo. 1832,

It does not often fall to our lot to derive from a work sent for our notice, so much gratification as, under various points of view, we have received from this of Professor Thiele. In the first place we greet with pleasure every biographical notice of remarkable men; and in that chapter of the book of Fame which is dedicated to the fine arts, what living name can compete with Thorvaldsen's? Perhaps, we might exchange the epithet "living" for that of "modern"; for we believe none but Italians now even question the Danish artist's superiority to Canova himself: but we wish to waive for the moment all comparison of those two worthy successors of the great Hellenic masters, inasmuch as such discussion will find a more appropriate place when we shall have gone through the volume before us. To return to the cause of our gratification from the said volume, (or rather volumes, for there is one of letter-press and one of engravings,)-we are highly pleased with the talent displayed by Danish artists in the engravings, which present us with outlines of some of Thorvaldsen's best statues and bas-reliefs; we are delighted with such a proof, as the undertaking itself, and the list of subscribers to it, exhibit, of Danish enthusiasm for compatriot genius; and we rejoice that those lovers of the arts who are not free to roam over Europe in search of the widely dispersed productions of Thorvaldsen, should be afforded some means of estimating his merits and the character of those productions.

Our anticipations of biographical enjoyment, however, we must confess Professor Thiele has not fully realized. With the exception of the artist's genealogy and a few anecdotes of his boyish days, the life consists of little more than an account of his works, and the order in which they were undertaken and executed. We learn nothing of his manners, of his domestic and daily habits, and almost the only trait of character occurs in the preface, when the author explains how he came to write his book. We will not however waste our pages with complaints of what we think wanting in the Professor's volume,-a deficiency which, by the way, the second volume may perhaps supply, but proceed to give our readers a brief abstract of what it does contain.

The Germans and French write Thorwaldsen; we prefer to follow the Danish orthography.

Professor Thiele, as he tells us in his preface, was a constant frequenter of Thorvaldsen's studio during a visit to Rome. At length he was about to return home, and says:—

"One of my last days at Rome I passed in the little garden which is surrounded by Thorvaldsen's three lesser studios, in order to enrich my book of recollections with the image of a place so dear to me. Unexpectedly the artist stood behind me, and of his own accord led the conversation to the object then nearest my heart. 'I regret,' said Thorvaldsen, that no one has yet thought of my biography.' And at these words I was seized with the idea, which, for the six following years, pursued me amidst my dearest labours. I declared that I would gladly devote the requisite time, and such abilities as were given me, to the fulfilling in some measure of his and my own wish, upon condition, however, of his frank communication and assistance to my work. But here difficulties already met me. He averred that he knew but little, the occupations of his later life having year by year drawn the veil closer over the unimportant occurrences of his quiet youth; neither could his now engaged thoughts busy themselves with such matters; but I might apply to the friends of his youth."

From that source, the archives of the Copenhagen Academy, and what could be in any way extorted from Thorvaldsen himself, Professor Thiele has concocted the short account, of which we are about to extract the pith and marrow.

From an annexed genealogical table, it appears that Thorvaldsen descends by females from the royal blood of Scandinavia. His family had long been settled in Iceland, and in that Ultima Thule his ancestors had gradually sunk lower and lower in circumstances, until his father, Gotskalk Thorvaldsen, emigrated or immigrated to Copenhagen, where he earned his livelihood by carving in wood, and that not in the highest style. He appears to have been chiefly employed by shipwrights, and not to have ventured to attempt the figures that usually ornament a vessel's head, until his son was able to assist him by correcting his blunders. But despite this his lowly condition, Gotskalk married the daughter of a clergyman, who, on the 19th of November, 1770, bore him a son christened Bertel, the Scandinavian form of Albert.

The boy early discovered a turn for sketching and modelling, in consequence of which he was admitted as a student into the Copenhagen Royal Academy of Fine Arts. His progress through the different schools was rapid. His father, as we have said, rose in his occupation by his son's aid; and in the year 1787 Bertel won the lowest prize of the academy, the small silver medal. At this period he was preparing for the church ceremony of confirmation, and, engrossed by his professional pursuits, had perhaps not devoted much time or thought to religious duties.