range.

On the western side, there is only soil sufficient to produce different species of moss. The beech trees, which have sparingly taken root, between the fissures, are stunted and unsightly. There are no inhabitants. The few remains of masonry appear to be the ruins of churches, or the habitations of hermits, who buried themselves in that elevated solitude.

In the highest mountains there are no large natural caverns; but we frequently meet with hermitages, and places of refuge, hewn out by the hands of men. Under the undulated granite we certainly perceive some holes, but they are scarcely two or three feet wide; yet it should seem, that the compact granite contains more; for they appear in the sides of the naked rocks, which undoubtedly indicate others. Limestone, particu. larly when it begins to be purer, abounds in the large open holes; and, according to all conjecture, we might search for others, especially where the limestone is ferruginous, and there is no want of water. Yet can the caverns be the only things concealed from our eyes! There are much more important objects on and around Caucasus: but the inhabitants, as well as their neighbours, all equally barbarians, trouble themselves too little about the advantages to be derived from these mountains; and think, that they cannot enjoy the treasures so well in peace, and with industry, as after useless shedding of blood, and unheardof cruelties.

In the primitive and middle mountains are found veins of very rich ore, and springs of excellent quality. In many parts of the promontory, black naphtha rises, and on the S.E. side, white petroleum is found. As the surface of all the foremost, and of most of the middle mountains, is covered with a sufficient quantity of soil,

Every where on Caucasus are to be seen irrefragable signs of powerful and repeated changes, to which it must have been exposed before it appeared under its present form. Granite is certainly one of the most ancient compositions, but I conjecture, that it originated from another substance, which being changed in its essentiality by a very operative power, underwent the first violent change to which this range was exposed. The basaltic columns, the basaltic granitecould they be any thing else but a transmuted, reformed granite? The surface incontrovertably shows, that, before the origin of the basalt, the whole summit was of granite, which apparantly had been heated very hot, and was near fusing. The compact parts of the granite rock suffer more or less according to the different operating power of the fire; yet every time a complete change in their composition, that forced them to a closer and more compact union: when suddenly some opposing power,-cold, or perhaps water, worked upon these heated rocks, and obliged the uppermost, and hottest summits, to fly in pieces; and from thence each part of the whole, according to a more or less determinate equal force, received the form of columns, or of rough fragments, as we meet with them upon the highest ridges.

By this extraordinary change, the inevitable

of them open, and without any covering of earth, or connexion, lie near the sources of the river Xan, and Ghuda, a village in Ghef; whilst others are coated with earth, or carry the appearance of peculiar mountains, owing to a new cohesion of their parts.

The interior of the granite mountain, though not so much exposed to fire, was at least caught by its heat, and changed into another species of granite that underlaid the real granite; for wherever it is found free, this always lies lower than the other. The same cause seems to have produced its undulating surface, and the dilatation of its interstices, which extend to the above mentioned caverns in the compact granite. This, how ever, is certain, that the trapp did not belong to Caucasus before this event; for, at present, it fills up the fissures and more recent-formed interstices of the basalt columns, and in many plaees lies buried even in large pieces of them.

But why do we find trapp only on the southern and south-eastern side of the mountains and on their summits Can it be a volcanic ash that has been thrown thither in a red-hot state, and become indurated? If so, then some distant southern volcanoes, or perhaps mount Ararat, (whose tremendous crater, at the distance of 220 versts from Caucasus in a straight line, no one can observe without shuddering, and which began to smoke and throw out fire on the 13th of January, and 22d of February 1783,) must have driven the ashes on the summit of Caucasus, and set fire to it.

And when the ashes united with the basalt columns, they contained, no doubt, a very great degree of heat; for in the act of induration, the former lost their colour, besides a part of their essentiality.

SCOTTISH REVIEW.

Gertrude of Wyoming; a Pennsylvanian Tale; and other Poems. By Thomas Cambell, Author of the Pleasures of Hope, &c. 4to. 1. 5s. Longman & Co.

R CAMPBELL has now, for some

MR

time, been justly ranked among the first of our national poets; and considered as one whose talents do the greatest honour to his country. The appearance, therefore, after so long an interval, of a volume of poems by him, forms no ordinary occurrence; and we lose no time in gratifying, upon this subject, the curiosity of our readers.

The scene of this poem is laid in the woods of Pennsylvania. There the village of Wyoming formed a spot peculiarly peaceful and happy, till, by the junction of European with Indian arms, it was converted into a frightful waste. The picture of its original state, and afterwards of this fatal transition, forms the subject of the present poem. Its principal inhabitant is the aged Albert, an emigrant from Britain, and his amiable daughter. The first incident is the arrival of an Oneyda warrior with a boy, whom, it appears, he had saved from the fury of a hostile band of Indians, who, after storming an English fort, were butchering all it contained. This child proves to be the son of Waldegrave, an intimate friend of Albert's. The latter, therefore, takes him under his protection. The poem then returns to the scenery and occupations of Wyoming, and a considerable time is understood to elapse, till another arrival breaks the uniformity of the scene. This proves to be Henry Waldegrave, the young man left by the Indian, and who, it appears, had long ago left the village, and been travelling through various parts, both of the old and new Continents. Gertrude and he, between whom a mutual passion had long subsisted, are then united. Three moons

are

are then spent in mutual happiness, when the sad catastrophe arrives.One evening, as they are sitting in their bower, an aged figure, bowed down by poverty and woe, makes his appearance. With some difficulty, they recognize the old Indian, the deliverer of Waldegrave. After the first welcome, he warns them of the near approach of Brandt, the leader of a numerous body of hostile Indians, that had already destroyed the whole of his own tribe, of whom himself only survived. Scarce had he finished, when the cries of the approaching enemy are heard. The party retreat for safety to a neighbouring British fort. Just, however, as they were about to enter, an Indian, who lay in ambush under the walls, fires, and mortally wounds, at once, Albert and his daughter. The lamentations over them conclude the poem.

Before endeavouring to form an estimate of its merits, it may be advantageous to take a general view of the character of Mr Campbell's genius.

His peculiar excellence, we think, is undoubtedly sublimity, and that of a peculiar kind, to which we would give the name of mystic sublimity.His ideas take an immense range, with a certain mist spread over them, which heightens their magnificence, but which is unfavourable to minuteness and precision. Hence he shines chiefly in subjects which have a wide compass; in grand and general views of nature and of human destiny; or, if he descends with success to the delineation of particular events, it is in such as are accompanied with peculiar circumstances of mystery, darkness, and terror; such as the descent of Brama, the midnight assault and destruction of Prague. Upon the whole, he excels in generalities, rather than in detail; and that tendency to ideas of infinity, which is characteristic of minds of the first order, engrosses him to a degree, hardly compatible with the April 1809.

successful delineation of minute parti

culars.

From the view now taken, it will probably appear, that the subject of Mr Campbell's first poem was eminently calculated for giving scope to his powers. It placed him under no restraint; it was conversant rather with general ideas than with particulars; it allowed him the whole range of nature to expatiate in. With regard to any particular scenes or incidents introduced, the selection of them was so entirely at his command, that they could, and naturally would, be suited to the tone of his genius.

We are sorry to say, that we do not think the choice of Mr Campbell, on the present occasion, is b yany means so happy. A domestic tale appears to us to require talents, directly the reverse of those which he so eminently possesses. It must depend for its interest, on pathos, and on the skilful display of minute incidents. The latter, we observed, is not to be expected from our author; and though he cannot be said to be destitute of pathetic powers, yet it is not domestic pathos; it is only that excited by subjects deeply tragic and terrible. The suf ferings of nations," the woes of human kind," he may sing with success, but not the sorrows of individuals, and of private life. We do not see any decay of genius; nay, we incline to think, that passages may be selected from the present poem, superior to any thing in his former productions. But this is only occasionally, when he breaks loose from the fetters of his subject. In general, it prevails over him, and affords slender scope to that wide-spreading grandeur of conception in which he delights to indulge.

From this censure we must, however, except one important department; we mean that descriptive of Indian character, and Indian warfare.— These are drawn in the strongest and

most

most glowing colours, and produce by far the finest passages in the poem.

The beginning, which contains the description of Wyoming, cannot, according to the opinion we have already expressed, rank among the finest of Mr Campbell's poetry. The only passages we can approve, are those which, with a view to the influence of contrast, relate to scenes directly opposite to those upon which he is employed. On the arrival of the Indian, however, the poem assumes a higher tone. The following description of the storming of a British fort appears to us in Mr Campbell's finest style. The two lines in Italics particularly afford a splendid example of that terrible picturesque, in which he

excells.

Nor vistas open'd by the wand'ring

stream;

*

Both where at' evening Allegany views, Through ridges burning in her western beam,

Lake after lake interminably gleam: And past those settlers haunts the eye might roam,

Where earth's unliving silence all would

seem;

Save where on rocks the beaver built

his dome,

Or buffalo remote low'd far from human home.

The following describes the recognition of Waldegrave, who had come to Albert's abode, without at first making himself known.

Pleas'd