to co IX. The Travels of John Schildtberger, of Munich in Bavaria, in 1394, with the army of king Sigismund against the Turks; with that of Bajazet, after he was taken prisoner; and with that of Timur-beck, after he was a second time taken prifoner by that prince; with whom he remained till his death, which happened in 1405. He continued with different chiefs, and among different tribes of the Tarrar nations for many years after this; traversing, with them, most parts of Ruffia, Tartary, and Siberia; and he returned to Munich about the year 1426. This man's travels furnish us with many particulars relating to the situation of Tartary, and the towns which belonged to the Tartars at that time; the history of that people, and the succeffion of their Khans. X. The Journey of the Ambassadors from Schah Rokh, a son of the emperor Timur, to the emperor of China, in 1420, extracted from a work of Nicholas Witson, Burgomaster of Amsterdam, entitled Nord en Oost Tartarye. Among other curious hints which these travels furnish, it is remarkable that a pot of tea was one of the liquors set before these ambassadors, on their arrival in China; a potation which the Jefuit Trigauld imagined had come into use of late years only in China. XI. The Travels of Jofaphat Barbaro, a Venetian, who was sent ambaffador in 1436, to Tana, now called Azof; and afterward in 1471, into Perfia. He was 16 years among the Tartars; but Dr. Forster gives only some extracts from his voyage to Azof, taken from Ramufio. XII. The Voyage of Nicolo and Antonio Zeno, brothers, of a noble family in Venice, to Friesland, Porland, and Sorany. Porland is faid to be " certain small, but fertile and populous islands, which lay fouth of Friefland;" and " Sorany was a place which lay over against Scotland." The two latter countries belonged originally to a prince of the name of Zichmni, who conquered the former, together with several other countries which are not now known, while the Zenos were with him, and they visited more, whose names have never been heard of fince. The account of this voyage is taken from Ramusio's Collection of Voyages, and has, in our opinion, much of the air of the marvellous in it. Dr. Forster observes, in a long note, that Friesland, Porland, and Sorany, seem to be countries which have been swallowed up by the sea, in confequence of earthquakes, or other great convulfions of nature. He, however, conjectures that Friesland may be the fame with Fara land, i. e. the Faro Isles; in which cafe Sorany must have been the Western Isles; and he thinks fome of the fouthermost of the Faro Isles may have been called Porland. But the text contradicts this; for it is there expressly faid that Friesland was much greater than Iceland: and notwithstanding all the pains which our author has taken, and the ingenuity which he has exerted, and and he can exert a great deal when a favourite hypothefis is to be defended, we still think the whole a fable, invented by Mar. colini, and swallowed by Ramufio. XIII. The Voyage of Pietro Quirini, a Venetian noblemar, a merchant, and the master of a ship; who failed from the ifland of Candia, in 1431, for Flanders, and was driven by a violent gale of wind, which blew from the fouth-west, down St. George's Channel, and cross the German Ocean, and shipwrecked him on one of the numerous iflands bounding the western coast of Norway. The distress which they fuffered would almost have been incredible if we had not, in our own times, seen human nature fupport itself under similar hardines in the perfons of Captain Cheap, the late Admiral Byron, and their companions, on the west coast of South America, after they had been shipwrecked in the Wager, one of Lord Anfon's squz dron, in 1741. Our blood ran cold while we were reading the history of the accumulated distresses of these poor unhappy Wretches. Out of 68 people, which composed the crew of this veffel, only in returned to Venice, though all of them were landed alive on the island on which the ship was wrecked. This chapter concludes with a general view of the state of affairs in Europe at the period when the voyages, treated of in it, were undertaken; and some strictures, and remarks, I. Ot the Andanicum, or steel, mentioned by Macco Polo, in his account of the province of Chinchintalas. Il. On the country where the rhubarb is found; and the methods of cultivating and preserving it. III. On fome remains of the Gothic people and language, faid to be yet exifting in the Crimea. Having already extended this article to a confiderable length; and it appearing to us that we shall have much to fay on the a third book, which contains materials as ample as those of the two first; we shall defer the confideration of it to a future of portunity. [To be continued.] ART. ΧΧΙ. Wa. Appendix to the Memoirs of Baron de Tott; containing an Anime to the Remarks of M. de Peyssonnel, by M. Ruffin: An hito rical Memoir concerning the Drufes, a People inhabiting Moen Lebanon; and a Catechism and various Extracts from their facres Books; which together form a most curious and interefting Ac cou t of this extraordinary People. Tranflated from Drekan Manuscripts by M. Venture de Paradis; and from the French av an English Gentleman at Paris. 8vo. 35. sewed. Robinfons. 1780 M. RUFFIN *, the friend of Baron de Tott, and who accompanied him in his expeditions when engaged in * He is styled by Baron de Tott, in a letter addressed to m the subject of the memoirs, the Secretary Interpreter of the King cl France, 1 1 1 م 1 L ۴ : : the service of the Porte, has here undertaken a vindication of that gentleman, and his writings, in answer to the strictures of Monfieur de Peysonnel *. This critic, according to M. Ruffin, has put a very wrong construction on several passages in the Baron's work, particularly where he accuses him of having contradicted himself, because he (M. de Tott) had afferted in one part of his performance, that "a knowledge of the Turkish language is acquired with difficulty by all persons, and even by the Turks themselves;" while in another part he confesses, that "with the assistance of a Perfian master, who was continually drunk with opium and brandy, he, in a little time, was able to hold a conversation in it without the aid of an interpreter." But this latter affertion, replies his defender, should by no means be confidered as a contradiction of the former, unless indeed the Baron had boasted that he had learned to read-whereas he has only faid, that he had fo far fucceeded as to make himself understood in speaking. 'Nothing (fays Mr. Ruffin) is more easy than to converte in Turkish. This language has only one gender, one declension, and one conjugation. Pure and unmixed with the Arabic and Perfic, it is by no means extenfive. Its fyntax is short; its rules are few, and invariable.'' But reading, continues he, ' is a very different matter. In all their writings the Turks endeavour to remedy the poverty of their language by the entire adoption of the Arabic and Perfic; and the contrivance of five alphabets, the choice of the different characters of which is nevertheless left to the writer,' &c. This very fufficiently explains what we too bad deemed an inconfiftency †, from our ignorance of the language in question. Not one Turk is to be found in our corps. The Baron candidly acknowledges, that he has fallen into a mistake or two respecting the genealogy of the Ottoman princes ; and our Author pertinently afks, where we are to look for the man who is infallible? The other criticisms of Monfieur de Peysonnel are likewise - ably replied to; but our limits will not allow us to particularize We must pass to the memoir concerning the Drufes them. M. Venture de Paradis § has here presented to the world an France, for oriental languages, at the court and library of his * For the Strictures, &c. fee Review for Sept. last, p. 234. 1 See his letter to M. Ruffin, prefixed to the present performance. $ Secretary Interpreter of oriental languages to his moft Chriftian Majefly, and many years his refident among the Drufes.' APP. Rev. Vol. LXXVI. Uu account account of a people very little known, but whose history is not uninteresting. The Drufes refide on the mountains known by the names of Lebanon and Antilebanon. The country they poffefs is held in fief: one part from the government of Sidon, and the other from that of Damafcus. A prince to whom they give the title of Emir, occupies the first station in quality of lord paramount, but his power is extremely limited and confined; it extends not to the making of new laws, or of overawing the people. He is responsible, however, to the Porte for the miri*, or tribute of the mountain, and is therefore careful to exact the payment of it. This tribute is affeffed with equity on all the poffeffors of lands. The Drufes derive their principal riches from their mulberry trees, which are every where cultivated with the greatest fuccefs, and for the purpose of feeding the filk worm. The produce of filk + is faid to be fufficient to pay the miri to the Grand Signior, to purchase rice and linens from Egypt, which are absolute neceffaries; and to procure to the people the several articles of pleasure and convenience with which they are fupplied by the French. "The Drufes hold in equal detestation the principles of Mahometanism ‡ and Chriftianity. • The religion of this people (fays our Author) is an enigma difficult to explain; they keep their doctrines a most profound fecret. Their facred books are preserved with the most scrupulous punctuality; they are even buried under ground; and the explication of their myfteries is known only to a small number of their wife men.' Like the Bramins, however, they believe in the metempsychofis. But according to their system, the tranfmigration of the fouls of reasonable beings has no relation to those of animals, the fate of which is wholly diftinct. They are of opinion that the foul of a Drufe, who dies in ignorance and libertinism, passes into the body of a man deflined to live in indigence and humility; and that the foul of a perfevering fspiritualift, whom they hold in particular respect, enters into that of an Emir, a Chiek, or a rich husbandman, in expectation that the next and last appearance * About eighteen thousand pounds sterling, for the district of Sidon only. + One hundred baies of white filk, of one hundred and fifty pounds weight each, are annually exported to France. Egypt takes two thousand bales; and the rest, which may be eftimated at about one thousand two hundred, are employed in the manufactures of Damafcus and Aleppo. Every bale, one with the other, is worth at leaft fixty guineas. I In other particulars, such as their domestic manners, dress, &c. they greatly resemble Turks. of eir 3 of God and the Prophet will recompence him in a more glo rious manner. This people are remarkable for their love of liberty, and for the care they have taken to preferve it, though furrounded by tyranny and oppreffion. We shall select two or three paffages from Monfieur V. de P.'s book, which will bring our Readers acquainted, in some degree, with the ancient as well as present state of Lebanon. When harmony and concord reign in these mountains, the Druses are in a condition to make themselves respected. They have often refifted, with vigour, the united forces of the Pachas of Damafcus, of Tripoli, and of Sidon, leagued against them by command of the Porte. They had, about one hundred and fifty years fince, an emir named Fakreddin, who rendered himself famous by the wars in which he engaged against the Ottoman empire. The poffeffions of the Drufes under his reign were more extensive than they are at prefent. This Emir had the address to obtain from the Porte the government of all the maritime coaft, extending from Latichea to Joppa; and perhaps he would have accomplished his design of throwing off the Ottoman yoke, and rendering himself independent, had he put less confidence in the auxiliary troops in his pay, and taken care to improve the valour and warlike spirit of his own people. Desertion and treason made him lose by degrees all the low country, and reduced his dominions to their present limits. The Drufian people, fubjugated by these foreign troops, without energy, and without vigour, declined to the most abject condition; and Fakreddin, without resource to repair his misfortunes, purfued by his victorious enemies, was obliged to take shelter in a cave, and at last was betrayed and delivered to the Turks, who beheaded him at Conftantinople, in the reign of Amurath the Fourth. It was this Emir who, during the long quarrels with the Porte, destroyed all the fea-ports of Syria, to prevent the Turkish gallies from landing there. ، The Emir Juffef has held the fovereignty of the mountain for about ten years. He is forty years of age, and had raised the highest expectations before the death of his uncle Manfour, who having only two children, idiots, incapable of reigning, lodged in his hands the fovereign power. But he has not fustained the idea which had been conceived of his courage and talents. During his reign, the Druses have lost much of that confideration they enjoyed in Syria; and fuffering the Pacha of Sidon to seize the government of Baruth, which was become the appanage of the reigning prince, he is loaded with shame and ignominy. For about forty years the Emir at the head of the nation had farmed, of the Pacha of Sidon, for one hundred and fifty purses * a-year, the customs and government of Baruth, which is the only harbour of Lebanon. It was, in fact, his own property, and not The weakness or included in the general farn cowardice of the present Emir, about three years since, deprived him of the mountain. * Eight thousand pounds sterling. of |
