Page:Enterprise and Adventure.djvu/210

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ENTERPRISE AND ADVENTURE.

would it be possible now to repeat it: for disease, and the advance of the white settler, have already carried away many of the tribes. The whole of the curious tribe of the Mandans perished by the ravages of Asiatic cholera, which swept over the greater part of the western country and the Indian frontier, soon after his departure. Mr. Catling's wonderful panorama of Indian life was for some time exhibited in London, and was afterwards conveyed again to the United States.



THE ADVENTURES OF GIOVANNI FINATI.




The adventures of Giovanni Finati, an Italian, as related by himself in a narrative of his life, translated and published some years since by Mr. Bankes, the Oriental traveller, have hardly been surpassed in romantic interest by any work of fiction. Finati had accompanied Mr. Bankes in his travels in Nubia and Syria, and that gentleman had had frequent opportunities of ascertaining the truth of the main incidents of his adventures, which, indeed, bear every appearance of authenticity. He was born at Ferrara, and was educated for the church; but the Italian states being then practically under the sway of Napoleon, he was drawn in the conscription, and called on to serve in the French army. A substitute, whom his parents had provided at considerable expense, after a few months' service deserted; and Finati, by the rules of the army, was compelled to take his place. Detesting a military life he