man with delight-this is not the place. We anticipate a fitter opportunity for the performance of the delightful task of endeavouring to point out some of De Foe's claims to our admiration. The popularity of Robinson Crusoe was immediate, steady, and immense in the same year he published a second volume with equal success, though it is perceptibly inferior in interest to the first part; forming no exception to the general rule of Continuations.-Though De Foe, in this second part is inferior to himself, he is yet immeasurably superior to all beside: if the second part possess less interest than the first, it would be as vain to compare it with any other of the innumerable fictions which the success of this romance naturally suggested, as to look for a Poem which should equal the Paradise Regained-excepting the Paradise Lost.

Reluctant, and naturally so, to leave unworked so rich a mine of fame and profit, De Foe shortly afterwards published Serious Reflections during the life of Robinson Crusoe, with his Vision of the Angelic World. This work, consisting of a number of religious meditations having nothing necessarily connecting them with the history of Crusoe, though much admired at the time, is by no means easy to be found at present nor is it we are compelled to say — worth the trouble of the search.

In 1720 appeared The Life and Piracies of Captain Singleton, the first of a series of narratives in what the Spaniards call the Gusto Picaresco: describing the adventures by sea and land of robbers and buccaneers; a style in which, from the vigour of his imagination and his unequalled power of personating the character of a rude but sensible narrator, De Foe was admirably calculated to excel.

Of his remaining publications—of various merit, though none ever possessed or are likely to obtain the popularity of Robinson Crusoe it will be sufficient for us to enumerate the titles; The Dumb Philosopher, History of Duncan Campbell, Remarkable Life of Colonel Jack, Spy on the Conjuror, Memoirs of a Cavalier, Fortunate Mistress, New Voyage round the World.

This great genius died in London April 24th 1730, at the

age of 70, leaving a widow and a large family in tolerable circumstances, though we regret to add that his declining years were embittered by distressing family feuds.

NOTE. The Russian public, we believe, possesses one, if not more, soi-disant versions of the Robinson Crusoe; from which however, as they were made from, the imperfect abridgement of Campe, or the still more faulty French translation, the spirit of De Foe's peculiar and admirable style has evaporated. We look forward, therefore, with anxiety to the approaching appearance of the promised translation of Mr. Korsakoff, made directly from the original a work likely, in its form and decoration, to be worthy of the skill with which the literary portion will be executed by the able translator.

We anticipate the agreeable task of noticing more at length Mr. Korsakoff's work.

TRAVELS AND RESEARCHES

IN ASIA MINOR, MESOPOTAMIA, CHALDEA, AND ARMENIA.

BY W. F. AINSWORTH, F.G.S. &c.

Much interest was excited in the religious world by the accounts of the Chaldean Christians, incidentally collected during the Euphrates Expedition; and it was stimulated rather than gratified by the information subsequently derived from the gentlemen whom the Board of American Missions sent into the interior of Asia. The Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge united with the Geographical Society to defray the expenses of an expedition to these interesting tribes, supposed on reasonable grounds to have preserved more of the simple forms of primitive Christianity than any of the European nations. As the country between the frontiers of Europe and the districts inhabited by the Chaldeans had been very imperfectly explored, instructions were given to the members of the expedition to examine and survey the less known parts of Anatolia, and determine the position of the principal cities, the height of as many mountains as possible, and the courses of the most remarkable rivers. The results of these investigations present a mass of geographical and geological details, which, however valuable in themselves, must necessarily appear dry and tedious to general readers; we shall, therefore,

pass them over, halting only for a moment to take a survey of one of the cave-villages of Cappadocia.

"Our route lay over plains and uplands, till we approached the Sevri Hisar hills, when we turned to the right, and entered deep and rocky ravines, at the foot of an outlying spur of the Hasan Tagh. The first we entered contained a few grottoes and caves, which kept increasing in number as we progressed, till we came to what had evidently been a very populous site, and where, superadded to the caves, were ruins of dwelling-houses, arches of stonework, &c., still standing in the valley. This place is called by the Greeks of the present day, Belistermeh. Ravines of the same character, almost without interruption to the succession of grottoes, many of which were rudely ornamented in front, led us to Gelvedery, where we were equally surprised and delighted to find a large colony of Greeks living in these caves, mostly built up in front, and occupying not only the acclivities of the hills, but also the face of the precipice to its very top, and stretching up a narrow ravine, which, towards its upper part, became choked with these semi-subterranean dwellings. We had now the pleasure of contemplating what one of these cave-villages or towns was when inhabited; and were all anxiety to get into one of the houses, but this anxiety on our part was not at all met by the natives, who were disinclined to receive us, or to hold communication with us. At length we got into a house, where was a caverned odah, but it was full of khawasses; so Mr. Rassam repaired to the house of a priest, who acted kindly, and allowed us a room for the night. These Greeks, although thus secluded from the world, were not poor, and had a goodly stone church in the vale. From what conversation we had with the priests, it appears that they claim a high antiquity to the site of Gelvedery, which there is every reason to believe corresponds with Garsabora. What interested us greatly, was to endeavour to trace the origin of Greek colonies, in such remote and sequestered spots, but upon this subject they could offer us no information; their fathers had lived in the same spot, but why it was chosen by them, and what advantages it had ever offered to them, appeared scarcely ever to have been a subject of a moment's thought. It is not many years since the Osmanli government, by a rather enlightened policy, dragged the Christians from the caves of Osiana, Tatlar, &c., and made them reside in the New City, and the troglodites of Gelvedery appear to have much horror of the same fate hanging over them; and thus our questions excited their suspicions, and awakened fears which all our expressions of kindly and brotherly feeling towards them scarcely sufficed to allay.»

It is probable that the Christian Greeks of Cappadocia sought shelter in these caverned fastnesses from the successive

invasions of Persians, Syrians, and Ottomans, though perhaps the first of these dwellings were excayated by the ascetics, who introduced their corruptions into Oriental Christianity during the third and fourth centuries. The existing race of Cappadocians displays none of the moroseness which isusually supposed to be connected with a troglodyte life.

«The present condition of the Cappadocian Greeks shows itself under a very favourable aspect. We have seen, that while in Gelvedery and Sowanli, they have in other places issued from these, and congregated in now flourishing and cheerful towns, as Nev Shehr and Injeh Su. In these places there is an aspect of ease, freedom, and prosperity, which never belongs to Mohammedan towns. Children are playing about, flowers are trained up the house walls, females sit at their verandahs, and trade is bustling in the market; add to this, that the Cappadocian Greeks are, generally speaking, pleasing and unreserved in their manners, and their conversation indicated a very high degree of intelligence and civilization, where there are so few books, and so little education, and consequently, little learning. In the villages, the men, marrying early, repair to Constantinople and Smyrna to trade, while to the women is left the care of the house, the flock, and the vineyard; an evil follows from this, that the females become masculine and full of violent passions, and when the men return to their homes, they are often very far from finding an echo to the subdued tones and more polished man. ners which they had learned to appreciate in the civilized world. The priests who remain at home might be supposed to have some counteracting influence, but they are often old, have rarely above moderate capacities, and are frequently disregarded and disrespected. But apart from these minor considerations, these Cappadocian Greeks certainly constitute a tribe themselves, distinguished by their manners, their habits, and their independent prosperity and civilization, and not so much surpassing other Greeks in Asia Minor by their progressive civilization, as excelling them in having become less changed, and less humbled and prostrated, than other Greek communities are by four centuries of Osmanli tyranny. »

The Kurds in the vicinity of Mount Taurus are a far less interesting race than their Greek neighbours, but they are still worthy of our notice. if it were only from the similarity which all travellers describe as existing between them and the Highlanders of Scotland.

"

We were now rendered aware that we were in a district of Kurds who were in the vassal, but not the subject state. The ragged garb

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