ces appear to have been
made upon the mother-country, judging from the increasing liberality of
their institutions, the establishment of commercial relations abroad, the
freedom of discussion and influence of the press, the attention paid to
public education (especially of the middle classes) the support granted
to literature and science, and the declining influence of the priesthood
in secular matters. The national character, however, can scarcely be
considered as fully formed; the Brazilians have been too recently
emancipated from the thraldom of a modified despotism to have made, as
yet, any very great progress in developing the elements of national
prosperity and greatness which the vast empire of Brazil so abundantly
possesses, and the foul blot of slavery, with its debasing influence,
still remains untouched.

CROSS THE SOUTH ATLANTIC.

On February 2nd we sailed from Rio for the Cape of Good Hope. The morning
being calm, we were towed out by the boats of the squadron until a light
air, the precursor of the seabreeze, set in. While hove-to outside the
entrance, a haul of the dredge brought up the rare Terebratula rosea, and
a small shell of a new genus, allied to Rissoa. The remainder of the day
and part of the succeeding one were spent in a fruitless search for a
shoal said to exist in the neighbourhood, to which Captain Stanley's
attention had been drawn by Captain Broughton, of H.M.S. Curacao.

At one P.M. of each day, when the weather was favourable, the ship was
hove-to for the purpose of obtaining observations on the temperature of
the water at considerable depths, under the superintendence of Lieutenant
Dayman. As these were continued during our outward voyage as far as Van
Diemen's Land, and the number of observations amounted to 69, the results
will more clearly be understood if exhibited in a tabular form, for which
the reader is referred to the Appendix. "Two of the Sixe's thermometers
were attached, one at the bottom of the line of 370 fathoms, the other
150 fathoms higher up. The depth recorded is that given by Massey's
patent sounding machine. As the same quantity of line was always used,
the difference of depth of each day should be trifling, varying only in
proportion to the ship's drift; yet on several occasions the depth
recorded by the machine gives as much as 100 fathoms short of the
quantity of line let out."*

(*Footnote. Lieutenant Dayman, R.N.)

BOAT CAPSIZED.

While engaged in soundi