biting more of the martial than of the evangelic spirit, till at length the Duke of Savoy was induced to conclude a peace with them, and to permit the return of their wives and children. Hence the origin of the present race of Waldenses, a population of seventeen thonsand souls. Subsequently to their return, they were long subjected to many hardships. They were compelled to desist from work on the Romish festivals, and forbidden to practice physic or surgery, or to purchase land; and their children were often taken from them, to be educated in the Catholic faith.

The Vaudois inhabit the three Valleys of Lazerne, La Perouse, and St. Martin, containing thirteen parishes or communautés. Their grounds were formerly more extensive; but they have been dispossessed of them; and these three Valleys have been left to them rather as places of exile than of enjoy ment. With the exception of a few spots, it is by dint of hard labour that the barren soil of the sides of the mountains yields the means of subsistence. The principal. diet is black wheat, potatoes, cow's or goat's milk, and chesnuts. The roads wind through rocks, where the noise of the rushing torrent is generally heard; and sometimes the dreadful avalanche overwhelms the traveller, or buries a family in their cottage.

The Vaudois preserve from their forefathers a sincere respect for pure and undefiled religion. Public worship is generally attended; and on the day of celebrating the Lord's Supper, the church was full, and the behaviour of the communicants solemn and pleasing. It is usual, on the winter evenings, for several families to meet together to unite in religious exercises.

Notwithstanding the persecutions they have endured, they are loyal subjects. They rejoiced in the recent restoration of the King of Sardinia; and when at a former period Louis XIV. invaded Turin, Victor Amadeus II. took refuge among them, and remained secure till relieved by Prince Eugene. They are also an honest people. While the country near them is infested by robbers, they devote themselves to useful labour. They shew even a generous disinterest edness, refusing rewards for the services they render to strangers, and exercising hospitality as if they received instead of conferring a favour. If one

The

is ill, the neighbours cheerfully and gratuitously sit up at night in the sick chamber; and there is even a strife among them who shall pay the first and : greatest attentions. If a poor man has met with au accident, a collection is often made for him. Nor do they confine their benevolence to their own sect, but are ready, from their scanty means, to relieve their Catholic brethren also. Their respect and grateful attachment to the English is remarkable. English they regard as their best friends; their chief resource in difficulty: and it is to the British Minister they have now confided their interests at the Con gress of Vienna. "I was forcibly struck," says the author," with the remark of the amiable wife of one of their ministers, who told me that they made a point of instilling into their children respect and esteem for the English, from the very dawn of reason in their minds."

Their manners are in general very correct, though of late injured by their necessary communication with the French. Their great amusements are firing at a mark, with a view to become skilful marksmen; and dancing. This last exercise was prohibited in 1711 by. the Synod, but the prohibition was not attended to..

Their schools were once flourishing. About 3001, sterling were annually sent from Holland for the support of fifteen great, ninety little or winter, and two Latin schools, and for relieving disabled ministers and widows of ministers.Siuce the year 1810, however, only 1001. a-year has been received from this source. The schools have therefore fallen into decay. With the exception of the Latin schools, indeed, they still exist; but barely exist. Our Queen' Mary had also granted pensions to thirteen schoolmasters; but since 1797 this resource has also failed. Each of the thirteen parishes has a minister; and to each of them several hamlets are annexed, in which there are also churches. Queen Mary established grant of 201. annually to each pastor; but of this nothing has been received since 1797. Besides this, there is an annual payment, the product of a collection made in England about forty years ago, which has been regularly received; and from which the ministers and the widows of ministers derive some assistance. From the failure of the Royal grant, however, several of

the ministers (some of them men of taste and learning), and also of the widows of ministers, are reduced to very narrow and even distressed circumstances. The Swiss Cantons for merly assisted in the education of candidates for the ministry among them, which was conducted at Geneva and Lausanne; but it is uncertain whether the same aid will be continued. They have lately erected two new churches; one of which had been destroyed by an earthquake, and the other by hostile hands. In this they were aided by the United Brethren, and some friends at Turin. The ancient Waldenses were Episcopalians. At present a moderator is chosen, who presides over their little Synod. Each church has a deacon, who attends to charitable objects, and several elders; but their discipline is less perfect than formerly The Litur gy used in their churches is that of Neufchatel. The festivals they observe are, Christmas, Easter, Ascension, and Pentecost.

The Waldenses are clearly in want of pecuniary aid; and it cannot be sup posed, observes the author feelingly, that a people "so eminently protected by us in the eighteenth, will be neglect ed by us in the nineteenth, century, There was a time when the Waldenses did not so much receive as impart benefits. Their college of Angrogne sent forth zealous missionaries to convey pure religious knowledge to several parts of Europe, then involved in ignorance and superstition. They were, indeed, according to the import of their armorial bearings, a light shining amidst thick darkness. If, in these latter days, something of the ancient splendour of their piety should, through Divine grace, re-appear, those Christians will have reason to esteem them selves very happy, who, by their geserons efforts, may be in some degree honoured as instruments of the revival. It is unquestionably the duty of be. lievers to endeavour to promote, and to pray for such a revival of vital piety in charches once renowned, as well as the diffusion of Divine Truth aigong the heathen."

“If,” he adds, “instead of seeing the

condition of the Waldenses through the medium of this imperfect Memoir, British Christians found themselves actually in the Vaileys, and, holding a history of the Vaudois in their hands, cast the eye around spots consecrated by the sufferings of so many disciples of the Lord Jesus, they would be filled with esteem for the people, and a desire to promote their happiness. The evening before I quitted them, a solitary walk afforded me full scope to indulge such a train of feelings:-a sacred luxury it may be well termed, since the sensations of delight were really such as neither the treasures of art deposited in the Louvre, nor the stupendous views of nature unfolded in the cantons of Switzerland, had possessed in an equal degree the magic to impart. All around seemed to have a tendency to foster the dispo sition:-a torrent rushed by on the left; the evening was so mild, that the leaves scarcely stirred ; and the summits of the mountains, behind which the sun had just set, appeared literally above the clouds. The emotions produced by the scenery and recollections associated with it, will not be soon effaced: it might be the last time I should see those mountains, which had been so often the refuge of the oppressed—those churches where the doctrines of the Gospel had been so long and so faithfully maintained--and those friends, from whom a stranger from a distant land had received so many proofs of affectionate regard! Full of such thoughts as I walked along, I arrived at length at the house of one of the pastors, to pass the night. The next day he accompanied me to the limits of his parish, on the Col de Croix, which separates Piedmont from Dauphiné. The walk being long and tedious, he had brought bread and a flagon of wine, and observed, as he gave me the refreshment, it was

une espèce de communion'-might be almost considered a sort of communion. We then parted, with expressions of Christian esteem, and, descending the other side of the mountain, I soon lost sight of the lands belonging to the Vaudois-descendants of a class of men who were, for a series of ages, 'destitute, afficted, tormented; but of whom the world was not worthy?'"

for the Vaudois; and should any profits arise from the sale of his publication, they will be devoted to the same object.

The Memoir is published by `Hatchard, and well deserves the attention of our Christian readers.

THE present month has been remarkably sterile of events. The Congress at VIENNA, to which the eyes of Europe are at present anxiously directed, still continues its labours; but we are left in utter ignorance respecting either the nature of the discussions which are passing there, or their probable result. Conjecture and rumour are indeed very busy, and each continental mail is fraught with fresh tales of quarrel or conciliation, of demand or refusal, of renewed hostility or universal harmony. We see no ground for giving the smallest credence to these varying reports. They are evidently fabricated to amuse the public, or to serve some sinister end, In SPAIN the persecution of the patriots continues with anabated rigour, and the state of the country is represented as critical and alarming. We can hardly regret any crisis which shall issue in the overthrow of the Inquisi, tion, and in the punishment of perfidy so black as fras been shewn towards those noble and gallant men, who achieved the independence of the Pen insula, and, in evil hour for themselves and for Spain, effected the restoration of Ferdinand VII. Bonaparte, by the single act of preserving, and at length Kiberating, that Prince, has amply avenged himself on the Spanish Nation.

The Legislative Assemblies of FRANCE have been prorogued to the 1st of May. The 21st instant, the anniversary of the murder of Louis XVI. has been observed as a day of general mourning, and religious humiliation in Paris, and we presume in other parts of France.-The bigotry of the Romish priesthood in refusing the usual rites of sepulture to a tragic actress of eminence, who lately died at Paris, had nearly produced a formidable commotion in that city. The seasonable interference of the Government, in overruling the determinas tion of the Church, quieted the tumult, and prevented the threatened explosion. —A plan is said to have been adopted for founding a free French Colony in Africa, on the model of Sierra Leone, Such a plan must necessarily terminate in dis

aster and failure, if it be not accom panied by the Abolition of the Slave Trade. What the French Government will now do in respect to this great measure, it is impossible to say; but as they must be fully convinced, by the information recently received, of the impracticability of re-establishing the plantations of St. Domingo, they may possibly be more accessible to solicitation on this point.

We are happy to understand that in the Treaty with the UNITED STATES, there is a stipulation binding both countries to do all in their power to abolish the slave trade universally.-No fresh events of moment have occurred on the Western side of the Atlantic. The very great difficulty, however, which is experienced in raising money, and the growing discontent of the Eastern States, afford a strong pledge for the ratification by Mr. Madison of the Treaty of Ghent.

HAYTI is almost the only part of the world which has furnished any, thing very interesting in the way of news, during the present month. We formerly stated, that M. Malonet, the Minister of the Colonies, had sent over to Hayti, before his death, three Commissioners for the avowed purpose of obtaining and transmitting to Government, information respecting its state and the disposition of its chiefs. They arrived in Jamaica in the month of August. On the 6th of September, the Chief of the Mission, M. Dansion Lavaysse, addressed a letter to the President Petion, in which he endeavoured to allure him, in a manner, however, bat ill adapted to the end he had in view, to acknowledge the authority of Louis XVIII. On the 1st of October, he addressed to Chris. tophe, a letter of a very different description, forming a strange mixture of stu pid flattery, and still more stupid intimidation. He threatens him with the united force of Europe, if he refuses to proclaim Louis XVIII. Great Britain, he affirius, is the soul of the confede racy, which has been formed to overturn every ret clutionary Government, and

among the rest that of Haytí, should he be so blind to his interests as not to yield to the invitations of that monarch. The slaves which the French are at this moment purchasing on the coast of Africa, he adds, will be converted into soldiers for the purpose of destroying the refractory. He intimates at the same time, that Christophe is too wise not to prefer becoming a great lord and a general officer, under the great sovereign of France, to continuing in the precarious situation of the chief of a hamber of revolted slaves. The letter is fall of the grossest mistatements of fact, in respect to the recent events which have taken place in Europe, and abundantly proves the entire ignorance of M. Dauxion Lavaysse, and of his master Malouet, as to the state of information in Hayti. Every occurrence which takes place in Europe is as fully known there as it is on the Exchange of London.

This foolish and impolitic proceeding has had precisely the issue which might have been expected. Of the course pursued by Petion, on the occasion, we only know in general, that he has turned a deaf ear to all the solicitations of M. Dauxion Lavaysse, who repaired himself to Port au Prince. There he was almost immediately taken ill; and he still continued so ill at the date of the last dispatches, as to be incapable of attend ing to business. This emissary appears to have been a member of the Committee of Public Safety, under Robespierre; a circumstance which was known to the Haytians, and which was by no means calculated to inspire them with confi. dence in his intentions..

We have received much more ample details from Cape Francois. Christophe, on receiving the letter of Dauxion Layaysse, summoned a General Council of the nation, to whom it was submitted, together with a copy of the same persou's letter to Petion. The Council unanimously voted an address to the king couched in very energetic terms. "The most abominable of tyrants," they observe," when they have wished to impose their oppressive yoke on the people, have employed treachery, and have covered their criminal purposes under some specious pretexts; but the envoy of the king of the French, has impadently dispensed with all disguise. He has dared to propose to a free people, the alternative of slavery or death." Aud to whom do they dare thus to

"The

speak of master and slare? To us, a people free and independent; to warriors covered with noble wounds, gained in the field of honour, who have destroyed, to their very roots, ancient prejudices and slavery; to those warriors who, in a thousand combats, have made so many of these barbarous colonists bite the dust; the residue of whom, escaped from our vengeance, now dare to speak of restoring their abhorred system, which we have proscribed for ever." conduct pursued by the French shews that they place us beyond the pale of nations; for to what other people on earth would they dare to propose conditions so vile and degrading? They contemn us; they are so impressed with the idea of our stupidity, as to suppose, that we want the ordinary instinct which actuates animals to seek their own preservation. Is it in return for the benefits we have received from the French, that we are now to resume the chains of slavery? Is it for a sovereign, who is wholly unknown to us, who has never done any thing for us, and in whose name we are insulted, that we should now change our state? Is it to be delivered anew to torture, or to be devoured by dogs, that we are to renounce the fruit of twenty-five years of battles and blood? What have we still in common with this people? We have broken every tie which bound us to them. We have now no points of union with the French, who have never ceased to persécute us, and whom we abhor. Why then must we be condemned to groan under their oppressive yoke?" "We desire to be free and independent, and ever shall be so in spite of tyrants." If it were a question, they observe, whether they should prefer the renunciation of freedom, or extermination, they would unanimously embrace the latter alternative. But no: they say, that is impossible: "Hayti will be invincible. The justice of her cause will enable her to triumph over all obstacles." They conclude with offering their arms, their lives, their property to the service of their king, their country, their liberty, their independence.

The same packet which brought us this account, brought over also to this conntry several very able Haytian pub

lications. One of these is a refutation

of the calumnies of M. Malouet, against the negro race, and of that minister's defence of the colonial system;nother, a refutation of the letter of Dauxion

Lavaysse; both written by Le Chevalier Prezeau, Secretary of Christophe. These works manifest not only a thorough knowledge of the particular questions at issue, but much general information, and great acuteness of intellect. "I perceive," he says, " in the course of your letter, that one of your great objects is to generate distrust between us and the brave and loyal British Nation, by threatening us with the co-operation of her arms against us. But could you for one moment persuade yourself that we should be the dupes of your perfidy and falsehood, when in the public prints we witness all the efforts which the English Government and the virtuous philanthropists of that nation have been making in our favour? I can, moreover, assure you that we have various extra-official documents, which prove to us that the views of the powers of Europe towards us are very remote indeed from those you would assign to them. Far from having gained your end, see what you have in effect done. You have thrown light on our course. You have given us new motives for attaching ourselves to the great British Nation, and new grounds of execration against you, and for distrusting your criminal schemes."

A General Medina, who was attached to the mission of Dauxion Lavaysse, was sent by him to Cape François, to conduct the negociation with Christophe. He was there recognized as a person who had served in the army of Toussaint Louverture, and who having been entrusted with an important post, betrayed it to the French force under Le Clerc. On this account, and because he was also without any creden

GREAT

The dull uniformity of our domestic history has been relieved only by the extension and modification of the Order of the Bath, so as to embrace a great number of meritorious naval and military officers-and the death of that noted impostor, Joanna Southcott. We have hitherto avoided any reference to that unhappy woman or her deluded followers, feeling that it was a casc equally beyond the reach of reason and 'ridicule. The bubble, however, is at length burst. Her imposture has been 'detected; and the folly of those who countenanced it has been exposed, even to their own conviction, by one to whose

tials from the French Government, he was arrested, and his papers seized, From these papers it appeared that his real mission, which he pretended to be wholly pacific, was to excite discord and insurrection among the Haytians. It is therefore intended to bring him to trial as a spy.

We are happy to observe that the king of France has formally and officially disclaimed any participation in the proceedings of M. Dauxion Lavaysse. His mission is stated to have been directed to the single point of procuring information to guide the deliberations of the French Government. The tone adopted, therefore, in his letters to the Haytian Chiefs is wholly disavowed. We are glad of this, for the king's own sake. But knowing the character of M Malouet, we can have no doubt that the conduct of the agents has been conceived in the spirit of their employers' secret instructions. It has, however, as far as we can' judge, been a very fortunate circumstance for the cause of negro freedom that these instructions were framed with such entire fatuity. It has extinguished for ever the hopes entertained by the Colonists of regaining their ancient footing in St. Domingo. It has confirmed the liberty and independence of Hayti.

The President Petion has testified his gratitude to Great Britain, for the ardour with which she has espoused the cause of the African race, by reducing the rate of duties on British merchandize imported into his dominions to five per cent. instead of ten per cent. which is the rate levied on the goods of all other countries,

BRITAIN.

arguments there is no reply. They have been driven from this refuge of lies; but doubtless the same blind cre dulity and drivelling folly which led them to enrol themselves in the list of Joanna Southcott's followers, will make them fit dupes of the first pre tender to supernatural revelation who may assume the same confident tone, and denounce on all that is superior in rank and station the vengeance of Hea ven. A Brothers and a Southcott have had their day; and it is not a little remarkable that, with few exceptions, the followers of the former have been the most devoted disciples of the latter.