The embassador and his suite embarked from Java, on the 11th of June, and arrived a few days afterwards at St. Helena, where the interview with Buonaparte took place, of which an account was presented to our readers in our last number. They left St. Helena on the 2d of July, and arrived at Spithead on the 17th of August following. the baggage and stores. Lord Amherst | under the name of Karamania, or the and the Gentlemen of the embassy pro- southern shore of Asia Minor, comceeded in an open barge to Batavia, prises the antient provinces of Lycia, where they happily arrived, and dis- Pamphylia, and the two Cilicias, topatched assistance to the rest of the gether with parts of Caria and Phrygia. crew, who had entrenched themselves Although, from a variety of circumon an eminence, under the able direc- stances this interesting portion of clastion of Captain Maxwell, against the sical geography has remained almost Malay pirates, whose prows blockaded unexplored, there are few parts which them. possess greater claims to attention, It was colonized by that redundant population of antient Greece which had gradually overspread the rest of Asia Minor, and which had every where introduced the same splendid conceptions, the same superiority in arts, that had immortalized the parent country :-it was at once the seat of learning and riches, and the theatre of some of the Mr. Ellis concludes his narrative with most celebrated events that history una sketch of the surveys, made in the folds;-it was signalized by the exploits Chinese gulfs and seas, by the squadron of Cyrus and Alexander; and was digunder the command of Captain Max-nified by the birth and the labours of the well. As a well written narrative of these surveys has since made its appearance, (which will be noticed in our next number,) we do not think it necessary to enter into any further detail. Some general observations on the Chinese, derived from a perusal of some missionary communications, and an appendix of documents, terminate this volume; which is illustrated by two maps, several pretty engravings, and, what is of no small value with a copious and accurate index. Considering that little more than two months elapsed between the author's arrival in England and the publication of his narrative, the public are certain-service to Capt. Beaufort, who comly much indebted to Mr. Ellis, for so speedily gratifying them with an authentic account of Lord Amherst's embassy. Karamania; or a Brief Description of the South Coast of Asia Minor, and of the Remains of Antiquity. With plans, views, &c. collected during a survey of that coast, in the years 1811 and 1812. By Francis Beaufort, F. R.S. Captain of his Majesty's ship Frederikssteen. 8vo. R. Hunter, London, 1817. The tract of country, described in this very unassuming but valuable work * See LIT. PAN. for Nov. p. 275, 278. illustrious apostle of the Gentiles; yet with all these claims to attention, excepting a few imperfect notices of some modern travellers, our knowledge of this interesting region was almost wholly derived from the accounts contained in the writings of the antient Geographers; and of the coast, there were no charts whatever, by which the Mariner could steer his course.' The Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty being desirous of filling up this very serious chasm in hydrography, determined to employ a frigate on a survey of the coast, and confided this manded the Frederikssteen, then stationed in the Archipelago. In the course of the years 1811 and 1812, Capt. Beaufort accomplished his survey, from which a set of charts has been constructed; these are now engraved by direction of their Lordships for the use of the Navy. To settle the hydrography and to ascerwas the main tain the naval resources, design of the expedition; and the multiplied labours attendant on a survey of such magnitude, added to an excusable impatience for the final accomplishment of the task, in order to resume the more natural pursuits of a cruising frigate, allowed but little time for indulging in the examination of other objects. Yet the venerable remains of former opulence and grandeur, which every where forced themselves into notice, were too numerous and too interesting not to have found admission among the more strictly professional remarks; and indeed they were often necessarily combined with the operations of the survey. From such materials the following brief sketch has been compiled: slight as they must necessarily be, yet as they were acquired in the public service, and as they relate to a country of which there is so little known, it seems to be in some measure a duty to Jay them before the public; not indeed with the vain expectation of satisfying curiosity, but rather in the hope of exciting further inquiry. What facts could be collected are faithfully, however unskilfully, reported: if they throw but little light on antient history, or add still less to modern science, they may perhaps rouse others to visit this, hitherto, neglected country, whose leisure and whose talents are better adapted to those pursuits. The professional duties and habits of a seaman, preclude that fulness of detail which the artist and the antiquary alone can supply. On this simple and modest statement we have only to remark that Capt. Beaufort has fully accomplished the task he assigned to himself, and in a manner which reflects the highest credit on himself as a scholar, and as a diligent observer of the remains of classical antiquity, Our author's operations commenced at Yedy-Boorooner the Seven Capes, a knot of lofty and rugged mountains, which appears to have been the antient Mount Cragus of Lycia, the abode of the fabulous Chimæra. At no great distance from these mountains, near the sea shore, stands the ruins of Patara, once celebrated for the oracle of Apollo, but now uninhabited. From this place Capt. B. proceeded along a high and rugged shore; and after examining several barren islands the ship anchored off the harbour and town of Kastelorizo which is chiefly inhabited by Greeks, on the eastern side of a large rocky island of that name. The harbour, though small, is snug; merchant ships of any size can moor within a hundred yards of the houses; and on the other side, they may even lie so close to the shore as to reach it on a plank. Two old castles command the town, the harbour and the outer anchorage; but in Russians, and almost destroyed. From the a former war they were taken by the uppermost, which stands on a picturesque cliff, the muzzles of a few small cannon still weakness, allow no strangers to enter. On project; but the Turks, to conceal its the summit of the island, which is about eight hundred feet above the level of the sea, there is another small ruined fortress, which from its situation muɛt have been impregnable. Vertot says, that the knights of Rhodes kept possession of this island for a long time; these castles and fortifications, which appear to have the character of the European architecture of the middle ages, may have been their work, solutely nothing; meat, fruit, corn, and The island of Kastelorizo produces abvegetables, all come from the continent, which, though barren, and devoid of culinland, it is said, many spacious and proture in its external appearance, contains ductive vallies. It, therefore, requires some time for a ship to procure a supply of prosmall bullock of about three cwt. cost eight visions, and especially of live stock. A dollars: and brinjoes, grapes, water-melons, and pumpkins, were proportionably cheap. from the valley of Patara to the river of Water is scarce on this part of the coast : Myra, an uninterrupted range of mountains, abruptly rising from the sea, forbids the cease with the rains; and from April to passage of any stream: the winter torrents November, the inhabitants have no resource but in the capacity of their reservoirs. In summer, therefore, ships are very reluctantly allowed to fill their watercasks. Greeks, but under the government of a The town is principally inhabited by Turkish Agha, who is dependant on the Bey of Rhodes. Pilots may generally be met with here, for vessels bound to any part of this coast, or to Syria, and even to Egypt; for Alexandria being supplied, in a great measure, with fuel from the woody mountains of Karamania, there is a constant little port. intercourse between that place and this Excepting several catacombs or sepulchres excavated out of the rock, and containing numerous cells, this place offered but few antient ruins worthy of notice. Passing therefore Kakava Bay, we follow our author over the plain of Myra, the Cape of Phineka, and the Cape and islands of Khelidonia, to Deliktash, a small village near the sea coast, behind which a mountain of the same name rears its lofty summit. From inflammable as he describes them. The late Colonel Rooke, who lived for many years among the islands of the Archipelago, an antient inscription discovered by Capt. Beaufort, there can be very little doubt but that this was the antient Olympus. In the vicinity of this far-informed me that high up on the western mountain of Samos, he had seen a flame of the same kind, but that it was intermittent. famed mountain he met with a very singular phenomenon, which he thus describes: We had seen from the ship the preceding night a small but steady light among the hills; on mentioning the circumstance to the inhabitants, we learned that it was a yanar, or volcanie flame, and they offered to supply us with horses and guides to examine it. We rode about two miles, through a fertile plain, partly cultivated; and then winding up a rocky and thickly wooded glen, we arrived at the place. In the inner corner of a ruined building the wall is undermined, so as to leave an aperture of about three feet diameter, and shaped like the mouth of an oven:-from thence the flame issues, giving out an intense heat, yet producing no smoke on the wall; and | though from the neck of the opening we detached some small lumps of caked soot, the walls were hardly discoloured. Trees, brushwood, and weeds, grow close round this little crater; a small stream trickles down the hill hard by, and the ground does not appear to feel the effect of its heat at more than a few feet distance. The hill is composed of the crumbly serpentine already mentioned, which occasioned loose blocks of limestone, and we perceived no volcanic productions whatever in the neighbourhood. At a short distance, lower down the side of the bill, there is another hole, which has apparently been at some time the vent of a similar flame; but our guide asserted, that, in the memory of man, there had been but one, and that it had never changed its present size or appearance. It was never accompanied, he said, by earthquakes or noises; and it ejected no stones, smoke, nor noxious vapours, nothing but a brilliant and perpetual flame, which no quantity of water could quench. The shepherds, he added, frequently cooked their victuals there and he affirmed, with equal composure, that it was notorious that the yanar would not roast meat which had been stolen. This phenomenon appears to have existed here for many ages, as unquestionably this is the place to which Pliny alludes in the following passage :-"Mount Chimæra, near Phaselis, emits an unceasing flame, that burns day and night." We did not, however, perceive that the adjacent mountains of Hephaestia were quite so Capt. Beaufort appears to have prosecuted his hydrographic labours without far as cape Avova; interruption, as when his operations were suspended by a circumstance that is too honourable to the character of our brave seamen, to be passed in silence. The neighbouring city of Adalia having been surprised by a rival bey, and recaptured by the former Pasha, the unsuccessful party were flying in all directions. While Capt. B's men were taking in wood and water. A large body of them came down to the beach abreast the ship, and begged of our watering party to protect them from the fury of their pursuers. This was of course refused: we had no right to interfere in their disputes; and I determined neither to involve his Majesty's flag, nor to expose our operations to interruption or failure, through the resentment of a Pasha, whose government extends along so large a portion of the coast. Exhausted, however, as the fugitives were by fatigue, hunger, and wounds, I could not resist their importunity for a little bread, and for surgical assistance. But the refreshments that we sent were accompanied with advice, to escape while there was yet time, into the woods, where cavalry could not pursue them; and in that case, with an offer of sufficient bread to carry them out of the province. They replied, that to escape would be impossible; there were no roads open to their retreat; a price was set upon their heads; the want of success had now rendered all the inferior Aghas hostile; and that their religion taught them to rely upon God for their deliverance, or to submit without repining to their fate. Some hours after, a large sailing launch was seen drifting out to sea, without any person on board: our boats towed her along side, and as he horse-patroles of the victorious party were already descending into the plain, I proposed to these poor wretches to victual that vessel, to repair the oars and sails, and to embark them in her, ready for the land-breeze at night. This also they declined-none of them were seamen; they knew not how or where to steer and if their hour was come, they preferred dying like men, with arms in their hands on shore, to being | umbrage, he refrained from investigating murdered by the cannon of the Pasha's the various remains of antiquity which cruisers, by whom they must ultimately be it still contains. overtaken, Things remained in this state till the next morning, when one of the Pasha's armed ships was seen rounding the cape; and the party of cavalry, which had, till then, been checked by the appearance of our frigate, now crossed the river, and surrounding at some distance that part of the beach which was occupied by the fugitives, seemed only to wait the approach of the above vessel to close upon their victims. This was the crisis of their fate. That fate depended upon me. Cold and calculating prudence forbade me to interfere; but, I could not stand by, and see them butchered in cold blood! My decision once made, there was not a moment to be lost. Our boats were dispatched, and in a few minutes I had the satisfaction of rescuing sixty fellow creatures from immediate slaughter. Since the rejection of their entreaties on the preceding day, they had betrayed no signs of despair or impatience: they had neither reproached our obduracy, uor murmured at their fate: and when our boats landed, they were found sitting under the shade of the neighbouring trees, with an air of resignation that bordered on in- | difference. They now displayed neither exultation nor joy; they came on the quarter deck with manly composure; they were perhaps grateful, but their gratitude did not seem to be addressed to us; in their eyes, we were still infidels: and though the immediate preservers of their lives, we were but tools in the hands of their protecting prophet. Having resisted all the wily applications of the successful Pasha, to procure some of these unhappy victims of party feuds, Capt. B. proceeded first to Makry, and thence to Rhodes, with the view of landing them. But finding the influence of the Pasha of Adalia too predominant, to leave them with safety, he sailed to the island of Cos, where he landed them. Of this island we have a short but interesting description, which, together with some other interesting matter, want of room compels us to pass in silence. Of Adalia (the antient Olbia) which had been the scene of contention between the rival Pashas, our author has given us an ample and interesting account; although, to avoid giving unnecessary The port is inclosed by two stone piers, which once had towers on the extremities; but they are now in a ruinous state, and the inroads of the sea unite with the neglect of their present possessor to insure their destruction. The gardens round the town are beautiful; the trees were loaded with fruit; every kind of vegetation seemed to be exuberant; and the inhabitants spoke of their corn grounds as more than commonly productive. The soil is deep, and every where intersected by streams loaded with calcareous matter: for the daily sea-breeze sweeps up the western side of the gulf with accumulated strength; and at night, the great northern valley, which appears to traverse the chain of Mount Taurus, conducts the land wind from the cold mountains of the interior. Upon the whole, it would be difficult to select a more charming spot for a city. The population of Adalia probably does not exceed 8000, two thirds of which 1 understand to be Mohammedan, the other third Greek. These Greeks are acquainted with no other language than the Turkish; yet, though some of their prayers are translated into that tongue, the principal part of the liturgy is repeated in Greek by the Papas, or priests, of whom the greater number are as ignorant of the meaning, as their congregation. Chandler mentions a similar circumstance at Philadelphia; and in some of the other inland towns of Asia Minor, where the proportion of Greeks is but small, the language of their masters prevails as it does here. It is a singular fact, however, that at Scala Nuova, a considerable sea-port near Ephesus, the contrary takes place; few Turks there speak Turkish fluently; even the Agha and the Janissaries conversed with each other in Greek, and explained themselves imperfectly to our Turkish interpreter. The influence of commerce on this coast has been but little felt till lately; but the immense demand for wheat in the British garrisons of the Mediterranean during the war, and the failure of a supply from that once plenteous granary, Sicily (now hardly adequate to its own consumption) had given such a spur to the enterprizing islanders of Patara and Hydra, that in search of it they that sea. ransacked the whole surrounding coast of With dollars in their hands, every creek was explored; and a few quarters gleaned from each valley soon completed a cargo. The exportation of corn is prohibited throughout the Turkish | to the uppermost seat is 79 feet. It contains dominions, under penalty of confiscation and slavery; but this extreme severity only serves to give fresh activity to the traffic: for, the Aghas, being exorbitantly paid for their connivance, have a direct interest in promoting it; aud no Agha in the empire is proof against self-interest. In populous countries, and in poor soils, it may be a slow and difficult process, to push the sudden culture of corn beyond its accustomed limits, or to divert the necessary capital from other pursuits; but in the rich and thinly inhabited valleys of these countries, a single year is sufficient to produce exertions, which the stimulus of a free trade is alone wanting to perpetuate. The great plain of Adalia had begun to feel the effects of this impulse; and even from distant parts of the interior, camels, horses, and asses, were daily bringing in their separate ventures, to load the Greek vessels which lay in the port. forty-nine rows of seats, in two series; twenty-six below, and twenty-three above the Diazomatos or broad platform, which forms a gallery of communication round the interior. This gallery and its parallel corridor, which is vaulted and carried round the whole extent of the building, are on a level with the surface of the ground at the back of the theatre, and with which they communicate by twenty-three arched passages or vomitories. Another but smaller corridor surrounds the thirteenth row of the upper division of seats, and opens to it by seven doors. Seven staircases connect these two corridors together, and branches of them continue up to the top of the building. Five miles from Adalia stands the ruins of Laara, (in all probability the antient Attalia), now wholly abandoned passing these in an easterly direction and leaving behind him the antient Cestrus and Eurymedon, two considerable rivers, Capt. B. at length arrived at Esky (old) Adalia, the antient Sidé; of which a superb collection of ruins still remains. These are described at considerable length and illustrated with two very neat plans. The most curious object is the theatre, of which the following description will convey an accurate idea to our readers. The theatre is the most striking feature of Sidé: at the distance of a few miles from the shore, we had mistaken it for a lofty Acropolis, rising from the centre of the town. As it is by far the largest and the best preserved of any that came under our observations in Asia Minor, a short account of its form and dimensions may be acceptable to the reader, who will, it is hoped, excuse any want of perspicuity in details which are so foreign to the general pursuits of a seaman. Situated on a gentle declivity, the lower half only of this theatre has been excavated in the ground; the upper half is a great structure of masonry. It is shaped like a horse-shoe, being a segment of a circle of about 220 degrees; or, in other words, the circumference appears to be one-ninth greater than a semi-circle. The exterior diameter is 409 feet, that of the area 125, and the perpendicular height from the area The internal communication is formed by narrow flights of steps, each half the height of the seats. They are disposed in equidistant radii, ten of them descending from the Diazomatos to a platform, which interthe area; and twenty-one flights ascending venes between the lowest row of seats and to a platform, which encircles the summit of this magnificent fabric. The seats are of white marble, and admirably wrought; they are 16 inches high, and S2 broad; but as they project over each other S3, the breadth in the clear is only 24 inches. The front of each row, which was occupied by the spectators when seated, is raised an inch, so as to leave a free passage to each person's place, and also to serve as a channel for the rain water. Now supposing that the antients sat as we do, with the legs pendent, and not crossed under them like the modern Greeks and Turks (as Dr. Chandler seems to have thought) and therefore taking eighteen inches as sufficient for each person to occupy, this theatre would contain 13,370 persons, when regularly seated: but, in crowded exhibitions, many could sit on the flights of small steps, or could stand on the upper platform, and at the back of the broad Diazomatos without incommoding those behind them; these may be estimated at 1,870 more, and would together make the enormous aggregate of 15,240 spectators. The area of the theatre is now overgrown with bushes, and choked up with stones and earth; in digging through which to ascertain the lower level, we discovered some inscriptions and several pieces of sculpture. One of the least injured of these was the statue of a clothed female figure, executed in a good style. While our author was unremittingly occupied in executing his survey, a party of his officers explored the ruins |