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October ^r ^ lsmi T H E' I* E A P El 1OB...
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A BATCH OF BOOKS. Monastic Institutions....
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The Fur Hunters Of The Far West. Izfte F...
winter break up ; than the people of each wintering ground leave their respective stations ana repair with all possible celerity to the general rendezvous at h ead-quarters : Some paddle down the rivers in canoes ; some lead a train of pack horses through the rocks and woods ; others in sledges descend the snowy slopes ; Their gathering at Port George , on the Columbia , is pleasant or otherwise , according to the prosperity of the past year . The fur taking season , of course , forms the most adventurous part of the trader ' s life . He either buys from the Indians , or traps the animals himself . The bear affords as much sport as profit . Concerning its habits JVfr . Ross offers a note to a natural historian : — Along Grisly-bear River we shot four elis , twenty-two deer , two otters , two beavers , and three black bears , without stepping out of our way . But the bears were poor , and the only cause we could assign for it was the scarcity of berries and fish ; $ 61 these animals generally frequent fruit and fish countries ; and we did not notice any fish in the river . Tracks of wild animals , wherever the ground was soft , were abundant , crossing the road in every direction .
In one of the thickets , as we passed along , our guide took us a little out of our way to show us what he called a bear ' s haunt , or wintering den ; where that animal , according to Indian story , remains in a dark and secluded retreat , -without food or nourishment , for months together , sucking its paws ! There was nothing remarkable in the place : the entrance to the lair or den was through a long and -winding thicket of dense brushwood ; and the bear ' s hiding-place was not in a hole under ground , but on the surface , deeply imbedded among the fallen leaves . Over the den the snow is often many feet thick , and the bear ' s hiding-place is discovered only by an air-hole resembling a small funnel , sometimes not two inches in diameter , through which the breath issues , but so concealed from view that none but the keen eye of the savage can find it out . In this den the bear is said to lie in a torpid state from December till March .
The red deer , the otter , the black and red fox , the martin , the mountain sheep , the white goat , the badger , the musk-rat , and the beaver , are chased or trapped in the woods and the rivers . The trapper during the hunting months leads a life of fatigue and privation ; his horse , without forage or litter , scrapes away the snow to feed on the withered grass beneath it , and often passe s the winter without drinking , only refreshed by the icicles adhering to its scanty food . He himself , with his heaver trap , engages incessantly in the pursuit of his hard and precarious industry , concealing his stores of skins in snow banks , marked by peculiar signs . Mr . Ross describes a phenomenon in natural history , the poisonous beaver : —
We now turn our attention to Rivifere aux Malades . On reaching the stream we found beaver in considerable numbers : the first lift yielded forty-nine . The prospect before us was encouraging ; but here a misfortune clouded our hopes , and made beaver a secondary consideration . After breakfast the second morning , a number of the people were taken ill ; and the sickness becoming general throughout the camp , it struck me that there must have been something poisonous in our food or water . Not being able to discover anything , I began to inquire more particularly what each person had eaten that morning , and found that all those who had breakfasted on the fresli beaver taken out of the river were affected , whilst those who had eaten other food remained in good health .
Two hours had not elapsed before thirty-seven persons were seized with gnpmgs and laid up . The sickness first showed itself in a pain about the kidneys , then in the stomach , and afterwards in the back of the neck and all the nerves ; and at length the whole system became affected . The sufferers were almost speechless and motionless ; having scarcely the power to stir , yet suffering great pain , with considerable froth about the mouth . I was seriously alarmed , for we had no medicine of any kind in our camp , nor scarcely time to have used it ; so rapidly was the sickness increasing , that almost every soul in the camp , in the space of a few hours , was either affected with the disease , or panic-struck -with fear ! The first thing I applied was gunpowder : throwing , therefore , a handful or two of it into a dish of warm water , and mixing it up , I made them drink strong doses of it ; but it had little effect . I then tried a kettle of fat broth , mixed up and boiled with a handful or two of pepper which some of the people happened to have . I made them drink of that freely ; and whether it was the fat or the pepper , I know not , but it soon gave relief . Some were only sick for part of the day ; but others , owing perhaps to the quantity that they had eaten , were several days before they got over it : and some of them felt the effects of it for a month afterwards .
We then examined the flesh of the beaver , and found it much whiter and softer , ana , the people who had eaten of it said , sweeter to the taste than the flesh of beaver gonerally . As there was no wood about the banks of the river , we supposed these animals must have lived on some root of a poisonous quality , which , although not strong enough to destroy them , yet was sufficiently deleterious to injure us : from this it was that I named this stream Riviere aux Malades . In one expedition , Mr . Ross and his party brought from the Snake Territory upwards of five thousand beavers , exclusive of other peltry . In that country , he says , there is a field large and rich enough for one hundred trappers for a quarter of a century to come . In his most successful expedition , he was accompanied by fifty-five men , of whom only twenty wore to bo reckoned as trappers—so that they averaged two hundred and fifty each ia the season . Such calculations illustrate the character of the industry which confers on the Far West its chief commercial importance . In another district the prodigality of animal life rccals the descriptions of South African travellers : —
We journeyed on to the westward for some time , until wo reached a strong and rapid stream about fifty yards broad , -which empties itself into the Great South branch , called by our hunters Salmon Hiver . 1 thought the more appropriate name would have been Lewis ' Fork , ns it was the first Columbia water » the exploring party fell on after crossing the Rocky Mountains . This stream forced its way through a very bleak , sterile , and rocky part of the country ; yet we crossed it and ascended up the west side for upwards of ninety miles , until we got to a place called Canoe Point , where the different branches from the four points of the compaas form a cross . This stream runs in the direction of north-west . It did not prove rich in beaver , fifty-five at a lift being the most -wo took at one time during our journey on it . Here in many places the snow had bogun to disappear , and tho young graas grew up fast ? and here our hornes fed , for the first time since wo left Flathend Fort , withottt digging in the onow . Tho further wb advanced , tho scarcer tvoro tho beaver ; wo often took no more than twenty a Any . Buffulo wero abundant , immense herds of theao animals being 1 seen in every direction ; but they were not fat at this oeaHon : in one of tho valleya through which we passed , thore could not lmv « been Iohh than 10 , 000 in one herd , out of which our hunters killed sixty ; and we pnased on , leaving thoiii still feeding on tho young tfrasa . Iloro gamo of ovory description wum in tho
utmost abundance , deer were feeding in herda , and wild fowls of every kind covered the waters ; yet we seldom disturbed any of them , except for amusement , for our camp teemed with provisions : nevertheless , so great was the temptation , and so natural is it for hunters and trappers to waste ammunition , that all day , whether travelling or in camp , we heard shots in every direction . __ These volumes have a special as well as a general interest . Their animation , their variety , their graphic and curious details , recommend them to that Reader , who must now be styled—so discursive is he , and so voracious —The Universal . As contributions to the history of Anglo-Saxon enterprise , peopling and fertilising the Far " West of America , they possess a higher value , and deserve to rank with the rich and simple chronicles ia our standard collections .
October ^R ^ Lsmi T H E' I* E A P El 1ob...
October ^ r ^ lsmi T H E' I * E A P El 1 OB 3 _
A Batch Of Books. Monastic Institutions....
A BATCH OF BOOKS . Monastic Institutions . By Samuel Phillips Day . ( Longman and Co . ) - — Observing on the title-page of this work that the author described himself as * ' formerly of the Order of the Presentation , " we felt some natural apprehension of encountering one of those books in which a very large dose of controversial bitterness is grossly recommended to moderate readers by a very small sweetening of useful information . We are rejoiced to be able to acknowledge at the outset that we unwittingly did Mr . Day an injustice by feeling any doubts about his fairness and moderation as an historian of Monastic Institutions . His book , within a reasonable and portable compass , contains everything that the general reader can desire to know on the subject of the religious Orders of the Roman Church generally , and , particularly , of the Orders now established in Great Britain . The history of these is
preceded by a concise and intelligently-compiled account of the origin of the Monkish system , and is followed , in a final chapter , by a statement of " the pernicious tendency of Monasticism , viewed in a social , moral , physical , and political aspect . " This latter section of the work is written moderately , feelingly , and reasonably . Mr . Day has done good service to his cause , and has conferred credit on himself by a complete freedom from anything like bigotry in his tone , by manly fairness towards those with whom his opinions are at variance , and by wise avoidance of sectarian affections and recriminations in appealing to his readers . We can honestly say that Monastic Institutions may be read with profit and pleasure by all classes ; and it is onlyfair to the publishers to add—especially in these days , when cheap publications are introducing so much hideous binding and slovenly printing to the notice of a discerning public—that the book is very elegantly and sensibly got up- _ _ . .
. _ A Visit to the Vaudois of Piedmont . By Edward Baines . ( Lrongman and Co . )—This is the last contribution to the " Traveller ' s Library . " Its subject and its author ' s name will sufficiently recommend it to what is called " the religious world . " To dwellers in general beyond the pale of " pious" society , this pamphlet ( for it is no more in extent ) may be recommended as containing the last experiences of the latest traveller among the small but ancient community of Italian Protestants . If the tone of the work had been less exclusive and the style less conspicuously dressed out in " evangelical" phrases , this Visit to the Vaudois would have been better adapted for the use of readers of all classes to whom the " Traveller ' s Library" is addressed .
Simplicity and Fascination ; or , Guardians and Wards . By Anne Beale . ( Bentley . )—A mild , genial , modestly-written novel , full of every-day scenes and every-day characters , simply and smoothly presented to the reader . Nobody will sit up late to read the book through , nobody will be unpunctual at dinner on account of it : it wiLl be pretty generally " at home" at the libraries ; will be returned , when it is called for , without any pencil annotations praising or blaming any part of it " , will be sneered at by fast young gentlemen and transcendental young ladies ; and will be called " nice , pleasant reading" by all meek , amiable people who like a soothing book and don ' t appreciate violent excitements of any kind . For our own
parts , we are always favourably disposed to a lady ' s novel when it does not contain a strong-minded heroine ; and we very gladly accept Miss Bealc ' s fiction as far superior to many a book of much higher pretensions . We ftel , throughout , tlmt the authoress has conscientiously and curefully done her best ; and we have had occasion to note , in many places , that she possesses genuine feeling . All the tenderer scenes in her book are uniformly the best . A little more compression of incident the next time she writes , and a sterner resolution to separate the parts of a etory which are worth tolling from the parts which are not , will advance her position in literature and increase her chances of success with the novel-readincr world . LU 1 U JLiiuxuilou iiui i ; iiuui < v ; a uji ouuucoo * v mtu i » i ** 3 iiu » wi- » w » u » u ^ cvi ami
Lindon Manor , or Rural Recollections . By William Platt . ( Saunders and Ottlcy ) . — Here ia another book of the simple and genial sort ; not cullin g for nny elaborate criticism or nimitig at any very high mark ; but recommending itself to all who love rural England b y its honest sympathy with country scenes and its loving observation or country characters . Readers weary of clap-trap about the War , and anxious to stop aside for a while from tho whirl of pnsBing events , will find Mr . Plait a welcome companion . They will not bo violently excited or intensely interested by him : but they will find him pleasant and agreeable as a talker on familiur sub jects , mid will not have cause to complain of his detaining them too long . My First Season . By Beatrice lteynolds . Edited by the Author of " Counterparts , " & c ., & c . ( Smith , Jfilder , and Co . )—A volume of impudent nonsense , which no man or woman , with the slightest respect for the vulue of time , would think of reading beyond tho first dozen pages , lwo the
tilings have rather amazed us in reference to this book : —1 ' irst , appearance of Messrs . Smith and Elder ' s names in connexion with iibzolulo trualt Secondly , tho publication of an advertisement in tho daily paper * in wmcu rapturous praisea of My First Season are quoted from review * ol t ie woiK hy some of our contemporaries . If tho public reception ol tbw boofc justifies the advertised reception of it by « omo of our brother critic « , we will undertake to print one complete * cono from the . tor / ( wluchwe warIced on first reading it ) , in order to er . « blo our reader * to e » t imate-lor themielvw tho amount of eenso , taste , and ( rvainuutv to be found in tin * novel .
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Oct. 27, 1855, page 19, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_27101855/page/19/
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