destined for publication, it is worthy of the pen of In ancient time, when Homer sung, 'Tis by Love's chain the world is hung— To kneel at Love's most sacred shrine ! Yet love is a most dangerous thing, Love charms the heart, but blinds the eyes; Love causes bliss, or causes fears- That love alone is safe from fears- From Eliza Cook's Journal. FRAGMENT. SAY on, that I'm over romantic, The billows, so madly uprearing Their heads on the blast-ridden main, The mountain, right heavenward bearing, The eagle is high in its dwelling, It heeds not the storm-spirits' yelling, Tell me not of a soft-sighing lover; And polish the rifle he bore. The storm with its thunder affrighting; Say on, that I'm over romantic, In loving the wild and the free; From Chambers' Journal. AUSTRALIA. By a letter received from a correspondent in New South Wales, it appears that a great impetus has been given to the prosperity of that colony by the mining of coal and its export to California. Coal seams of great thickness are found on the Hunter River, and there mining has been commenced on a large scale. The following is our correspondent's account, dated October, 1850: "A new trade has sprung up in this river (the Hunter) within the last few months, in the great demand for coal by ships from California. As many as eighteen or twenty sail, of from 400 to 800 tons each, are now waiting to be loaded at Newcastle, (such being the name given to the harbor at the mouth of the river,) and a number have sailed within these three or four days. Many others are daily expected to arrive. Besides all this, the export of coal to neighboring colonies by means of small vessels is exceedingly brisk. "You can form no proper idea of the vastness of our coal fields. The whole basin of the Hunter is one coal field, extending from the sea at Newcastle to the dividing range of mountains a hundred miles inland. At the present moment there are about twelve mines at work. The coal is generally procured with very little trouble, near, and at the surface. A joint-stock coal company have, in conse quence of this increased demand, lately extended their operations. They have just completed a railway of two miles from the harbor to a pit where the working of a seam of superior coal, eleven feet thick, is begun. This seam lies at the depth of only from twenty to twenty-five fathoms from the surface. A powerful steam-engine draws up the coal. The same company have two other pits and engines at work. Another coal field has lately been carefully examined, about forty miles to the north of this, and about twenty miles inland from the navigable harbor of Port Stephen. I am informed by a gentleman who visited it, that there is one seam of solid coal cropping out, thirty-four feet thick, and of very superior quality. What an immense amount of dormant wealth in this mass of fuel! Yet all our prodigious resources, mineral and agricultural, are of comparatively little avail, in consequence of a want of labor. We want an almost unlimited accession to our population by continued immigration. "Nothing has lately been heard of Dr. Leichhardt and his party, who went off on the perilous expedition of exploring the interior, across from New South Wales to Swan River. Fears are entertained that this enterprising traveller has fallen a sacrifice to the savages of the central unexplored region. Here, in an old-settled part of the country, It swoops through the lightning-fraught cloud. I we know little of the hardships encountered by ex plorers. There is one class of men to whom jus- | day lately, on calling on him, I found him prostrated tice has never been done. I allude to the assistant- by rheumatism; but he was as cheerful as ever, surveyors employed by government to explore and and expected soon to be busy with fresh engagebring home correct accounts of unknown regions, ments. It is by such men that England opens up for it is those occupying the position of assistants new fields for her emigrants. What should we do in the survey department on whom the hard work without a dauntless corps of surveyors ?-—and of principally falls. I lately became acquainted with this useful class of persons Scotland contributes her an assistant-surveyor, and gathered from him many share. Should Leichardt, the great explorer, cast curious details respecting his operations. His sto- up, the surveyor-general will doubtless be let loose ry may amuse your readers. on his track; and we may hope that at least a portion of the blank which disfigures the map of Australia may be filled up with names, and made geographically known." "James Burnett, who was born in Edinburgh, emigrated with his father, (a son of the late Mr. Burnett, of Barns, in Peeblesshire,) in 1829, to New South Wales, where he received an appointment in the surveyor-general's office, under the auspices of Sir Thomas Livingston Mitchell. In 1836 Mr. Burnett was appointed an assistant-surveyor, and has ever since been employed in various parts of the colony. An assistant-surveyor leads the life of a pioneer amidst deserts, forests, and swamps; crosses rivers, scales mountains, and makes his bivouac in the neighborhood of savages, snakes, and swarms of mischief-loving insects. Young Burnett had his fair share of these experiences in the bush. For some years he was stationed in Illawarra, and was there much employed in surveying tracts of low swampy land. For whole days his lower extremities were constantly wet, with a fierce sun scorching overhead. On one occasion, when engaged in surveying on the Richmond River, he found it necessary to proceed on a journey when the whole country was flooded. He rode one horse and led another, swimming them at every creek, and, as there were no houses or huts by the way, he had to sleep every night in his wet clothes in the open air. His encampment was finally reached without accident. THE whole of the postmasters in the kingdom are now allowed an immense stock of postage-stamps of all descriptions on credit, and they are compelled to ascertain daily that every letter-receiver in their official districts has a sufficient supply on hand for the accommodation of the public. The value of the whole of these stamps now furnished on credit to the various officials in the country is not less than a quarter of a million of money. This plan has been adopted preparatory to a general measure being put in operation for the compulsory prepayment, by stamps, of all prepaid letters posted in the United Kingdom. The accounts to be kept with the country postmasters in consequence of these regulations will cause a considerable increase of business to the stamp department, but they will ultimately cause a material diminution of post-office labor.-Daily News. CURIOUS PRESENT.-Among the presents offered to the King of Hanover on his birthday was one of a modest, but nevertheless interesting kind. It consisted of nothing more than a white cotton pockethandkerchief, on which was printed in red colors a family portrait of George III. and Queen Charlotte, with nine of their royal children, with the names and ages of each. The King of Hanover is represented as a boy of four years old, playing at the feet of his royal mother, who holds Prince Adolphus, the late lamented Duke of Cambridge, a baby, in her arms. ous old relic, printed seventy-six years past, had from that period to the present day. The handkerbeen preserved in the family of the anonymous donor chief was post addressed to the princess royal, who presented it to the king, by whom it was received with thankful emotion. This curi "About the end of 1846, when in charge of the Moreton Bay district, and suffering from the effect of previous exposure, this active young man was despatched to accompany Captain Perry in his exploration of a river called the Boyne, from its headwaters down to the point where it became navigable. The party, disabled by bad weather, was compelled to retrace its steps, and Burnett was some time afterwards employed to complete the survey himself. This undertaking he effected by incalcuJable toil, amidst thick scrubs and swamps. Some important parts of the river towards its mouth remained yet to be examined, and he solicited permission to go on a new expedition along the coast NEVER SATISFIED.-Some people are never content by water. This being granted, he left Moreton with their lot, let what will happen. Clouds and darkBay on the 5th of July, 1847. Everybody con- ness are over their heads, alike whether it rain or shine. sidered this a hazardous enterprise. Burnett, with To them every incident is an accident, and every acciseven attendants, arms, and provisions, set out in an dent a calamity. Even when they have their own way, open whale-boat, to perform a voyage of 240 miles of they like it no better than your way, and, indeed, conocean on a dangerous coast. The party was success- sider their most voluntary acts as matters of comful. It reached the mouth of the Boyne, and proceeded pulsion. We saw a striking illustration the other up the river considerably beyond the point formerly day of the infirmity we speak of, in the conduct of a He was crying because reached by land. On his way back, Mr. Burnett child about three years old. Poor thing," made a survey of a fine river which he discovered his mother had shut the parlor door. disemboguing into Wide Bay, which the governor the child out." "It's all the same to him," said said a neighbor, compassionately, "you have shut afterwards named the Mary. The country adjacent the mother; "he would cry if I called him in and to the Boyne has since this period been settled; it then shut the door. It's a peculiarity of that boy, is called the Burnett District, in compliment to its that if he is left rather suddenly on either side of a first explorer. Although still a young man, Bur-door, he considers himself shut out, and rebels accordnett is much shattered in constitution by the priva- ingly." There are older children who take the same tions to which his duties have exposed him. One view of things. The LIVING AGE is published every Saturday, by E. LITTELL & Co., at the corner of Tremont and Bromfield Streets, Boston. Price 12 cents a number, or six dollars a year in advance. Remittances for any period will be thankfully received and promptly attended to. LITTELL'S LIVING AGE.-No. 377.-9 AUGUST, 1851. From Chambers' Papers for the People. SIBERIA AND THE RUSSIAN PENAL SETTLEMENTS. DRIVEN by that love of adventure and of a roving life, which is characteristic of their race, a considerable tribe of the Cossacks of the Don, in the middle of the sixteenth century, left the abode of their people on the banks of the river from whence their name is derived, and moved eastward in quest of booty and of new possessions. Their depredatory inroads on the Russian territories on the banks of the Wolga, and their daring piracies on the Sea of Azov, soon rendered them formidable enemies in the eyes of the surrounding nations, and particularly of the Russian tzar, Ivan II., the first among the predecessors of Peter the Great who attempted, though by the most cruel and despotic means, to assimilate his empire to the civilized states of Western Europe. Ivan, bent upon introducing order and security in the provinces which he had but recently conquered from the Tatars, and upon establishing regular commercial intercourse with the neighboring Asiatic nations, saw that these wandering Cossack hordes threatened his plans with destruction, and in consequence determined to take the most stringent measures for putting an end to their proceedings. The army and fleet which he assembled in 1577 for this purpose were, however, not brought into action; for the Cossacks, inspired with fear, dispersed in all directions. One horde, consisting of from 6000 to 7000 men, headed by their attaman, (chief,) Jermak Timofejen, moved along the banks of the rivers Kama and Tschnssowaja, towards the present government of Perm, and thence penetrated into the Ural Mountains. From the summit of these mountains Jermak beheld spread out before him the immeasurable plains, to which the name of Siberia was afterwards given, but which was an unknown land to the European nations of that period. Nothing daunted by the wild and desolate character of the country, or by fear of its unknown inhabitants, the Cossack chief conceived the bold project of founding a new empire in the regions thus opened up to his view. Upheld by that love of conquest which has achieved so many marvels, he descended the Asiatic declivities of the Ural with his handful of followers, overthrew and expelled the Tatar Khan Kutchum, penetrated beyond the rivers Tobol, Irtysh, and Ob, and subjugated, during his campaign through these wide-spread regions, the various populations who inhabited them. But though Jermak's and his companions' invincible bravery and perseverance sufficed to win an empire, the small number of these enterprising men, still further diminished by war and dreadful hardships, was inadequate for maintaining in subjection a territory extending over nany thousand square miles, and inhabited by various populations, distinct as to origin and mode of life, and unconnected by any political ties. But, rather than that his newly-acquired empire should die, as it were, at its birth, and the tale of his heroic achievements find no place in history, Jermak determined to cede it to a hand strong enough to retain it, and, in 1581, he, in consequence, made a formal cession of the conquered territory to the very prince whose hostile preparations on the banks of the Wolga had transformed him from a robber chief into the founder of an empire. In consideration of the great service thus rendered to the Russian empire, Ivan not only absolved Jermak from the consequences of his former misdeeds, but even rewarded him for the genius and valor he had evinced in the plains of Northern Asia. However, if tradition speaks the truth, the monarch's favor brought Jermak evil fortune; for the death of the latter, which ensued in 1584, is attributed to a fall into the river Irtysh, where he was drowned, from the weight of the golden armor which the tzar had bestowed on him as a mark of distinction, rendering him unable to save himself by swimming. The possession of the country which Jermak, in so great a measure, contributed to bring under the dominion of the Russian crown, opened up for Russia a commercial route, through her own dominions, to China, and laid the foundation of Russian navigation in the Pacific, and eventually led to the acquisition of territories on the continent of America. Its metallic riches constitute a great item in the revenues of the state, and its products in general form the basis of an extensive and important branch of Russian commerce. This remarkable country had become partially known to the Russians in the beginning of the fifteenth century, during the military expeditions of Tzar Ivan I. against the barbarous inhabitants of the northern districts of the Ural Mountains. But the dangers which, during the reigns of Ivan and his immediate successor, beset the state on various points, soon obliterated from the mind of the tzar and his followers the remembrance of countries which possessed no attractive features to recommend them. It was the curiosity and enterprise of a private individual which, during the reign of Ivan II., led to the rediscovery, and eventually to the subjugation, of Siberia. A Russian, by name Stroganow, who possessed lands situated on the river Wutschegda, on which he had established a salt-work, was often visited by a people belonging to a nation which, as to feature, language, and costume, was quite unknown to him, and who brought with them the produce of their own country, among which were costly furs, to offer in exchange for the salt which they sought from him. Being curious to obtain fur ther knowledge of the origin and dwelling-place of his unknown customers, Stroganow induced some of his people to accompany the strangers to their homes, and thus learned that they dwelt in the vicinity of the river Ob; he thenceforward entered into a regular commercial connection with the whole tribe, which he did not, however, divulge until, by the monopoly thus secured to himself, he had amassed a large fortune, when he informed the tzar of his discovery. Ivan II., fully alive to the advantages which might accrue to his country from this connection, acted upon the information given, and in 1556 the Siberian Khan Jediger became a tributary of the Russian empire. But subsequently Jediger was subjugated by the Tatar Khan Kutchum; and, as Ivan preferred entertaining friendly rela Jermak's sacrifice of his sovereignty, with a view to securing the conquered territories, threatened at first to be of no avail, for Ivan sent him a reinforcement of five hundred men only; and this was neither sufficient to keep the subjugated populations in submission, nor to follow up the course of conquest; and the Russians having neglected to build fortresses, in which they might seek safety in case of need, they were, after Jermak's death, gradually but so effectually thrown back again towards the Ural, that to make Siberia a dependence of the Russian crown a second conquest became necessary. This was undertaken during the reign of Ivan's successor; and though the forces then despatched were numerically very weak, their undertakings were crowned with success, because their leader was wise enough not to penetrate far into the country before he had secured himself in the rear by the foundation of the town of Tiumen (1586.) From that moment their dominion over the neighboring territories was secured, and thenceforward the progress of Russian power in Siberia may be traced in the dates of the foundation of the various towns in that country.* tions with the latter, with whose subjects the the military ardor of the Cossacks quailed. If a Russians carried on a very profitable trade, to making detachment of Cossacks found itself too weak for war upon him for the sake of territories which were the subjugation of a newly-explored territory, it as yet but very imperfectly known, all idea of Si- called to its aid a number of these adventurers; berian acquisitions was again abandoned, until and with their assistance the object was soon acJermak nade his peace with the offended monarch complished. The Siberian populations, who were by placing a conquered empire at his feet. far from comprehending the ultimate views of the strangers who thus introduced themselves among them in the character of traders, rarely objected to acknowledge the supremacy of the sovereign of a people who proved themselves such excellent caterers for their necessities; but if resistance were attempted, violent means were resorted to, and the defenceless natives were obliged to submit. When a territory was at too great a distance from one of the existing towns to be held in subjugation by the latter, new fortifications, or ostrogs, as they are termed in the Russian language, were erected, and were garrisoned with Cossacks; and thus the whole territory, from the Ural to the Pacific, and from the Arctic Ocean to the confines of China, was brought into dependence on the Russian crown before the expiration of the seventeenth century. The Cossacks that accompanied Jermak into Siberia, as well as those that were subsequently despatched thither, remained in the country; and at first, as has been seen, formed a kind of militia, whose duty it was to keep the subjugated population to their allegiance. Many of them intermarried with the latter; others brought their families with them; and from these original conquerors of the land descends the race of Siberian Cossacks, the number of which now amounts to between 100,000 and 200,000. The great majority have abandoned their original warlike organization, and have devoted themselves to industry and agriculture, while the smaller number still perform military duties. Though we have used the word conquest in speaking of the extension of the Russian dominion in Siberia, this term is not quite appropriate, for the natural love and capacity of the Russian Slavonians for commerce, which has played so important a part even in the history of European Russia, contributed as much to the subjugation of the native tribes as the military prowess of the Cossacks. Among the Russian Siberians of the present day there is a word current which in a great measure comprises the history of the establishment of their forefathers in the land. This word is Promuisl, which, in the Siberian language, denotes every kind of industrial activity and enterprise, but particularly such undertakings as necessitate distant expeditions; and it was as Promuischleneki-that is, inventors or suggesters, a name which they themselves adopted-that the Russian subjugators of Siberia gradually won their way amongst the hostile populations, whom their pacific arts, more than their warlike enterprises, finally brought under their dominion. The Promuischleneki were, in the first instance, troops of adventurers from all parts of Russia, who, attracted by the fame of the costly furs which were said to abound among the natives, followed in the wake of the Cossacks, in the hope of gaining riches by commerce, where the latter gained lands by conquest; for the abundance of those wild animals in Siberia, whose skins were most highly valued among other nations, is said to have awakened the same avidity among the Russians as the gold of Mexico and Peru excited among the Spaniards. Dangers and difficulties of the most appalling character were braved in the search for riches, and the avarice of the people would make them rush to encounter hazards before which even * Tobolsk was founded 1587; Pelym, Berezow, and Surgut, 1592; Tara, 1594; Narym, 1596; Werchoturie, 1598; Tarinsk and Mangasea, 1600; Tomsk, 1604; Turnchansk, 1609; Kusneyk, 1618; Jeneseisk, 1619; Krasnojarsk, 1627; Jakutsk, 1632; Irbit, 1633; Ochotsk, 1639; Nertschinsk, 1658; Irkutsk, 1669. The extensive regions, now comprised under the name of Siberia, and embracing an eighth part of the known world, which was conquered for the Russian crown in less than eighty years-not in wisely-planned campaigns by eminent military leaders, but by the perseverance and skill of an untutored race-was, at the period of the conquest as in the present day, inhabited by populations as different in their origin as in their modes of life. Of the Finnish race there are the Surjanes and the Woguls in the government of Tobolsk, the latter still in a nomade state, and both living chiefly by the produce of the chase; the Tschuwasches, who, though an agricultural population, never dwell in towns, and who live chiefly upon horse-flesh; and the Ostjacks of the Ob, living in the vicinity of the river of that name and of the Irtysh, and forming one of the most numerous populations of Siberia. The name Ostjack or Oschtjack is of Tatar origin, and denotes a stranger-one who knows nothingand was at first applied indiscriminately to all the natives of Siberia. But since the difference of race and other distinctions between these populations have become better known, the name Ostjack, has been retained only by the people just mentioned, and two other tribes dwelling on the rivers Narym and Jenissei, who differ, however, from each other as well as from the Ostjacks of the Ob as to origin and language. Of the Tatar race, there are in Siberia the Yakuts, who dwell in the government of Irkutsk, on both sides of the river Lena, up to its very efflux into the Arctic Ocean; the Bokharians in the governments of Tomsk and Tobolsk, who live chiefly by trade; and the Teleutes, who are also called White Kalmuks, because of their having dwelt a long while among that people. I destructive an influence on vegetation. Large Besides these, there are twelve other Tatar tribes forests in some localities cover the face of the in Siberia, some dwelling in settled villages, but country, various shrubs bear berries which are the greater number leading a nomade life, and much prized by the inhabitants, and garden vegetasubsisting by cattle-breeding and hunting. In bles are cultivated with success in the more southaddition to these there are tribes of Mongol race in ern parts; but corn, which in Europe yields a not the government of Irkutsk, who, in the seventeenth unprofitable harvest in 65° north latitude, cannot in century, voluntarily transferred their allegiance from Siberia be cultivated with profit further north than the emperor of China to the tzar of Russia, and who 55°, and in Kamtchatka, than 51°. In the region dwell in tents, and lead a nomade life; Tunguses, here described, the hot sun of summer precipitates Lamuts, and Olenians, belonging to the Mandschu vegetation; but the transition from heat to cold and race the former roving through the vast territories from cold to heat is so abrupt, that the temperate that extend from the river Jenissei, across the seasons, spring and autumn, cannot be said to exist. Lena, to the shores of the Pacific, the Lamuts In the temperate region, between 57° and 50° north dwelling on the shores of the sea of Okhotsk, which latitude, the climate in a great measure resembles in their language is called Lama, and the Olenians that of Denmark and Northern Russia, though the in the government of Irkutsk, on the river Oleneka, winter is longer and much more severe. Here corn which falls into the Arctic Ocean. Several yields an abundant harvest; but the country is too Samoyedi tribes, also in a nomade and very bar- thinly populated, and agriculture, as a science, too barous state, live in the same localities as the little developed, to allow of any great production. above-mentioned races, and on friendly terms with The intensity of the cold is not, however, by any them; and North-Eastern Siberia is inhabited by means equal in the same latitudes throughout the various tribes equally low in the scale of civiliza- whole continent, the severity of the climate increastion. But however imposing this long enumeration ing considerably with the extension of the territoof distinct populations, the sum-total of the in- ries eastward. Sufficient observations have been habitants of Siberia, in comparison to the extent made to establish this phenomenon as an incontestof territory, is very small even in the present day, able fact; but as yet the causes of it have not been when Russian colonization has added such con- demonstrated, nor is it ascertained whether it be siderable numbers to the original population. In ascribable to a general law or to local circum1834, the territorial extent and the population of stances. Eastern Siberia, where the cold in the Siberia was computed as follows:same parallels is so much greater, and where the cold region extends so much further south than in Western Siberia, is indeed intersected by mountains which exclude the sea-breezes, and prevent them from exercising their usual tempering influences on the air; but this circumstance alone is not sufficient to account for the existing differences of temperature; and the other features of this division of the country-such as the immense uncultivated and snow-covered plains, barren of all vegetation, and presenting none of those variations of surface which might impede the circulation of the cold currents of air-it has in common with West Siberia; and therefore, though this may, in a certain measure, account for the great severity of the climate of Siberia compared with that of European countries in the same latitudes,* it cannot explain the increase of cold in the eastern regions of this tunts. Area in Ger- Inhabi Am't. of Pop. Government of Tobolsk, Jakutsk, Okhotsk, and 123,300 300,000... 24 the peninsula of Kamtchatka,. The whole of Siberia, 260,600.. 800,000... 35* continent. As familiar illustrations of the different effects 66 The climate of a country extending between 45° 30′, and 77° 40' north latitude, and 60° and 190° cast longitude, cannot of course be uniform; but excessive cold is predominant. The country may, however, be divided into three regions-namely, the arctic, the cold, and the temperate. In the first of these, which embraces all the lands further north than 67° north latitude, the winter never lasts less than eight months of the year, and is so cold of cold at the various degrees which it attains in that quicksilver freezes, and the sea is generally Siberia, we may quote a passage from Mr. Cotcovered with ice from the beginning of September trell's work, Recollections of Siberia," giving till the end of June. In the northern parts of this the experience of a gentleman who had resided region, vegetation, with the exception of some few mosses, entirely ceases, while in the most southern many years in the country, and had devoted his time to meteorological observations :-" At 39° parts, dwarfy bushes begin to make their appearance; but the earth produces no vegetables fit for (of Réaumur, a not unusual degree of cold even at Yet even here man maintains his Irkutsk) the breath is heard to issue from the sway, his chief nourishment being the fish in which mouth with a sound like the crackling of very dry the rivers abound, and his only property flocks of hay when crumpled in the hand, and the traineau reindeer and dogs. The cold region embraces the (sledge) ceases to glide smoothly over the snow. territories between 67° and 57 north latitude. At 45°, (below which the thermometer not unfreHere the winter is of shorter duration, being gen- freezes before it reaches the ground, and you see it quently falls in Yakutsk,) in spitting, the saliva erally reckoned at six months of the year; and form a round solid ball on the snow." At Holy though the cold is still very great, Réaumur's thermometer marking frequently 36°, it has not so of the mountains, when the thermometer stood at Cape, in the Icy Sea, in passing through a gorge * Schubert; Handbuch der Allgemoinen Staats-only 30°, he felt a current of air which burned and kunde von Europa. Mr. Cottrell, in his "Recollec- pricked the skin like a needle. This wind the tions of Siberia, in 1840 and 1841," page 81, mentions 2,000,000 or 1,500,000 as the relative census of Western and Eastern Siberia. Mr. Cottrell does not name the source whence he has derived his information, but we cannot but doubt its correctness. the food of man. *Irkutsk, the capital of East Siberia, and London, are within half a degree of latitude of each other, and the difference in their mean annual temperature is nearly 20°. |