The most eminent class of angels consists of four archangels, of whom more hereafter. 32,50

The Turkisk commentary of Ahmed ben Mohammed Amin says, The Jews detest Gabriel, on whom be peace. The red heads (meaning the Persians, whose soldiers wear red caps,) detest him also, and pretend that God ordered Gabriel to carry the gift of pro phecy to Ali, but that Gabriel mistook, and carried it to Mohammed. God forbid that we should believe such blasphemy.'

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P. 87. The author observes that, by the Mohammedan re ligion, it is severely prohibited to make eunuchs, and even to employ them: so that if sovereigns and grandees, out-of pomp, adopt a different usage, it is not the fault of the Prophet.

To the Catechism and Commentary, translated from the Turkish, succeeds the Pend-nameh, or Book of Counsels, translated from the Persian of Saadi. We transcribe a few paragraphs.

1. Forty years of thy precious life, O my soul, have passed away; and thy disposition remains what it was in thy youth Thou hast done nothing but obey thy vanity and thy passions. Thou has not adorned thy days by serious occupations. My soul, trust not in this transient life, nor think thyself secure from reverses of fortune.

2. He who spreads the table of generosity shall become cele brated in the beneficent world. Generosity shall make thee known to the universe, and procure for thee perfect safety. Nothing else can be compared to this virtue; it is the crowded and favorite bazar; it is the metropolis of joy, and the harvest of life. Re fresh by means of it the hearts of men. Fill the globe with the fame of thy munificence, At every instant of thy life exert generosity, since he who gave being to thy soul claims this as the first of his attributes.

3. Whoever is well inspired will choose liberality for his favorite virtue, for it renders man happy. By mildness and munificence, man may make a conquest of the world. Be a prince in the region of affability and generosity. Liberality is the occu pation of sages, and the title of the elect. Neglect not to prac tise this virtue, and you will strike to the goal the ball of bounty. Liberality is the philosopher's stone, which transforms into goldt the copper of vice, and is the elixir for diseases of the soul.

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4. If the globe revolved at the pleasure of the miser; if he held the chain of fortune, and grasped the treasures of Karoon; if a quarter of the world was his own; his name would not deserve to be mentioned. If fortune were his slave, pay no attention to his possessions, speak not of his riches, mention not his property. Even if by sea and land the miser were continually suffer. ing privation, the tradition says that there shall be no paradise for him. The miser, rich as he may be, frets like another whose purse contains only the smallest coin. Generous men feel delight

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in dispensing the income of their wealth, but the miser reaps from his gold only a harvest of solicitude.' (P. 106.), s ge

Of the Borda, a poem in praise of Mohammed, the translation here given originates with the celebrated Silvestre de Saay, whose admirable Arabic grammar, and whose extensive services to oriental literature, are highly prized throughout Europe.

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The Tales, which succeed, are derived from Bidpai, or Pilpay's Fables. As they are already known in our language, we do not offer any specimens.

These volumes cannot but be welcome to the student of oriental manners and opinions. The liberal tone of commentary records every thing with candor, and holds up no feature of the Mohammedan system to unnecessary odium. Polygamy is stated to be a rare practice; and in no other respect do the permissions of the Koran appear incompatible with sound legislation. If the Turkish empire should ever be partitioned by the Christian powers of Europe, this publication will perhaps have led the way to a spirit of toleration conducive to its future tranquillity under the sovereignty of Giaours.

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ART. VIII. Osservazioni intorno allo Stato antico e presente dell' agro Trojano, &c.; i. e. Observations concerning the antient and the present State of the Troad. By PHILIP BARKER WEBB, Esq., Member of the University of Oxford, Fellow of the Lin néan, Geological, and Horticultural Societies, &c. 8vo. pp. 111. Milan. 1821. Sold by Harding, St. James's Street, London. *t.. » 2655 8 0,06 „beuote

TH HIS elegant and ingenious disquisition was expressly writ ten, we are told by the Italian editor, for a foreign journal of some celebrity, the "Biblioteca Italiana," having been translated for that work from the manuscript and under the inspection of the English author. It is a revival of an almost forgotten controversy, raised some years ago concerning the historical authenticity of the Iliad, and the existence of Troy itself, by the learned scepticism of Bryant. The paradox had few supporters, but called forth the ablest heads and the most powerful pens in defence of Homer, both as a poet and an historian: yet it left no small portion of doubt and ambiguity concerning many minor points of the dispute, such as the precise situation of the city of Priam, and the topography of the Troad in general. Every attempt, therefore, to dispel these doubts, must be received with respect and attention by the genuine admirers of the father of poetry; and this description comprehends, we presume, the whole of the literary community

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of Europe. Mr. WEBB's treatise is one of the best, in our opi nion, that has appeared on the subject: the fruit of personal observation and of learned research, animated by the zeal and the ardor which a scholar must instinctively feel concerning all that pertains to the Grecian bard.

Perhaps the existence of Troy would never have been called in question, had not the admirers of Homer furnished his assailants with many reasonable doubts, by contending in terms too general and unqualified for the historical accuracy of the Iliad. That this noble monument of the bard's genius is grounded on fact, we presume, is not fairly to be disputed: but to require in such a poem an exact chronicle, or to expect that all its geographical descriptions should rigidly conform to the precise features of the local scenery, is trying his merits both as a poet and as an historian by too strict a standard. Aristotle justly remarks that a poet is not bound down by facts, but by probabilities only. It is sufficient, surely, that the general features of his local delineations are correct; and it would seem preposterous to deny, with Bryant, that the Greeks ever landed in the Troad, merely because the plain, the fountains, and the rivers of Ilium have not been described with all the minuteness of detail which might be demanded of a modern topographer.

Having made this remark, we shall proceed to the excellent dissertation of Mr. WEBB, and cite from it such topics as we think are most illustrative of a question which is as important as any investigation of a purely antiquarian nature; observing that the opinions and the discoveries of this enlightened traveller, added to those of Dr. Clarke, who explored the same ground, form a body of clear and almost conclusive evidence on this obscure and disputed matter. We entirely concur in the present author's opening observations,

"The question relative to the exact position of Troy, and the antient geography of the Troad, has for half a century occupied the attention of the learned, and exercised the acuteness of modern criticism. After the works of so many eminent travellers, who have visited these uninhabited regions for the exclusive purpose of exploring the spot ubi Troja fuit,-after so many plans, and maps, and drafts, of the places which they visited, it may seem extraordinary to assert that the question is still undecided:- but so it is. The spirit of party, too, which infuses itself into every question, has mixed itself with this. Most of the travellers, who have examined the Troad, have arrived there with prepossessions in favor of some particular system, which they themselves have previously framed, or which they have read and approved in some preceding author. Hence the Grecian plain has been converted into a modern field of battle by the Hellenists of different nations, was and who

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who have carried on their disputes with every weapon that came to their hands, and which fors atque ira ministrat. Even the actual topography of the country was made to bend to the various passions of the conflict; the ponds and ditches were called rivers; and the rivers were maliciously degraded to rivulets,"

Mr. W. then proceeds to state that, anxious to visit every province of the Ottoman empire, he set out on that expedition in the year 1819 with Signor Parolini di Bassano, à celebrated Italian naturalist. In the month of September they journeyed towards the Troad, where they were joined by Messrs. Edmonstone and Curteis, two of the author's fellow-students at Oxford; and Mr. W. acknowleges that his discoveries and investigations in this classic soil were considerably aided by their erudition and sagacity. He then represents with much accuracy the present state of the controversy; noticing the theories and errors of former travellers, from Pocock and Wood to Wheler and Le Chevalier. Of the last, and his celebrated hypothesis, he thus speaks:

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The subject fell into better hands, when Le Chevalier set out on his romantic pilgrimage in search of ancient Ilium. τει Ὤχετ ̓ ἐποψόμενος καπρίλιον ἐκ ονομαστήν, Od. 1. 19. ν. 260. He accompanied Signor Zuliani to Constantinople in 1785; and, having touched at the Troad in the course of his journey, he framed his new system on the spot, and matured it afterward at Constantinople, where he entered into the service of the Duke de Choiseul Gouffier, the French ambassador. He began his mission by converting the other persons who were attached to

bassy; and at last, on a second visit to the Troad, he suceeeded in making the Duke himself a convert. Having propagated his doctrine in the south of Europe, he set off to preach it in the north; and he met with so much success as to gain the ear and faith of all who listened to him. Wood had observed, after Strabo, that the poetry of Homer did not always agree, mathematically with the locality of the Iliad: but the French writer was determined to establish the contrary position. It is," says he, this "It accusation against the poet of the Iliad, which has stimulated and directed my researches." We must not, then, be surprized, if he discovered so quickly, and as it were by inspiration, objects of which all antiquity were ignorant; the city, Pergamus, the Scæan gate, the two springs, and the ange

arentem Zanthi cognomine rivum.

The place, according to him, where all these were found, was the village of Bonar-Baschi, which is always pointed out to travellers as the true scite of antient Troy. This new system, appearing plausible on a first inspection, made no slight impression on scholars, and was adopted without deliberation by the many. "If, however, the theory rests on the interpretation of a single

passage

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in Homer, which is also contradictassage

passage by the context, and if the Greeks themselves interpreted that passage differently, it follows that we ought to 9 pause before we erect on so narrow a base a system that was unknown to the antient

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mers and deduced

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is in direct contradiction to their notices; which from the traditions and monuments of the country, rity was in those times never called into dispute. Of this, however, we will speak more fully in its place. The subject being thus brought into general notice, Bryant published his Dissertation on the Trojan War, to demonstrate that such an expedition was never undertaken, and that such a city never existed in Phrygia, Morritt, in his reply to Bryant, adopted the system of Chevalier, and adduced more ingenious arguments in its defence than those on which it was first ushered into the world. The learned scepticism of Bryant needed no refutation, but the visionary hypothesis of Chevalier derived from such a support a powerful confirmation; and thus the supposed discovery triumphed, down to a very recent period, having been adopted by Gell, and followed by the successive travellers of the Troad; so that to call in question the identity of Bonar-Baschi and Ilium, or even to look for Troy in any other direction, was deemed a heresy by the guides and Ciceroni of the district."

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Dr. Clarke, who visited the Troad in 1807, soon perceived that Le Chevalier's system did not accord either with the antient geographers or with Homer himself? He discovered that the Mender was the antient Scamander; and, with Ho! mer in his hand, but disregarding the authority of Strabo, he looked towards the north-east for the Simois, and unluckily stumbled on the Califatli Osmack, which he took for it. This is now a mere ditch, containing little or no water, and has its source in the plain. Mr. WEBB surveyed it in every direction, to see whether it was fed by any communi'cation from Mount Ida, but found it to be merely a sink, in which the waters of the lesser hills stagnated; while Homer always represents both the Simois and the Scamander as furious torrents, springing from Idæan Jove. Mr. W. agrees with Dr. Clarke that the Palajo Califatli is the true scite of Ilium: but Ilium having been described by Strabo to be on a tongue of land between the Simois and the Scamander, while the Palaio Califatli is neither between Califatli Osmack and the Mender nor has any tongue of land ever intervened between them, he concludes that Califatli Osmack is not the Simois. Mr. Hobhouse took the Gheumbrek for the Simois, and the little river of the village of Atcikevi for the Thymbrius, and placed the Troy of the poet not far northward of Alexandria Troas; which hypothesis Mr. W. satisfactorily refutes. He then examines Dr. Hunt's hypothesis in the first volume of Mr. Walpole's collection; and, from an elaborate review