the Saxons and Huns, a representation of the heathen worship of the Saxons, and the conversion to the Christian Faith of their leader, Witikind, who is regarded in history as the ancestor of the third dynasty of French kings. The excesses of the Greek Iconoclasts, the civil and military habits of the Moors in Spain, and the achievements of Roland, and other knights, are likewise introduced into the work. The machinery of the Poem has nothing in it of Pagan Mythology, but is founded entirely on the Ca. tholic Creed. All the principal ceremonies of that religion are successively introduced into the course of the narrative, and made subservient to its developement. The Poem is of consider able length, and is divided into twentyfour cantos. Its composition, and the prosecution of the various studies connected with it, have formed the chief occupation of the author during eight years which have elapsed since he retired from public life. They continue to engage him at present, and many months will not elapse before the manuscript is in a fit state for the press.

A new Life of Nelson is announced by Mr. ROBERT SOUTHEY, in two volumes, .8vo. with Plates.

Mr. THOMAS CAMPBELL is preparing Critical and Biographical Notices of the British Poets, with Occasional Selections from their Works. To be printed uniformly with Mr. Ellis's specimens.

Mr. TURNBULL is printing a new edition of his Voyage Round the World, in a quarto size, with considerable additions and improvements, bringing down the History of Botany Bay, the South Sea Islands, &c. to the present period, and containing the notice of some newly discovered islands.

The GAS LIGHT and COKE COMPANY, seem at length to be maturing, after a series of the most unforeseen difficulties, and the most virulent opposition. By the perseverance, and, we may add, skill, of several gentlemen who are become its directors, the objects of this company, which were some years ago thought absurd and visionary, are now proved both practicable and useful; and, in a few months from this period, parts of the metropolis will be actually lighted with gas. But it will not be confined to the streets. Gas can be so purified, that houses may also be elegantly lighted by it; with a display of taste, and at the same time with an economy, that must insure its general preference.

Mr. PARK's Parochial History of Hampstead is in progress, and will be published early in the Spring.

Sir HUMPHREY DAVY will shortly publish Elements of Agricultural Chemistry, in a Course of Lectures delivered before the Board of Agriculture. ·

The Second Part of Mr. PLAYFAIR'S Outlines of Natural Philosophy, is announced as in the press; also a new edition, with additions, of his Illustrations of the Huttonian Theory.

A new edition of Mr. SMEATON'S Eddystone Lighthouse, is in forwardness.

A new edition of Dr. HUTTON'S Mathematical and Philosophical Dictionary, is prepared for the press: the additions are very numerous, and the work is brought down to the present time.

In the press, and speedily will be published, in an elegant quarto volume, price 11. 11s. 6d. in boards, the History of the Azores, or Western Islands, containing an account of the Government, Laws, and Religion, the Manners, Ceremonies, and Character, of the Inhabi tants, and demonstrating the importance of these valuable Islands to the British empire. Illustrated by maps and other engravings.

Mr. CARSTAIRS announces his intention to deliver, at the King's-Arms Hall, Cornhill, a Course of Six Lectures on the Art of Writing in general, and on a new and universal principle, by which the most incorrect and illegible Penmen may be taught, in six Lessons, a free, elegant, and expeditious hand; and may thus be enabled, with ease and pleasure to themselves, to teach, in a few lessons, their children and their families, the Art of Writing with correctness and dispatch.

A new Mural Quadrant of extraordinary precision, has been erected by Mr. POND, in the observatory at Greenwich; and other new instruments are preparing, most of the old having been in use since the time of Dr. Bradicy.

Early this month, Messrs. LONGMAN, HURST, and Co. will present to the Public, Bibliotheca Illustrata, a Catalogue of Illustrated Books, containing the greatest variety, and most splendid collection, ever offered for sale.

Messrs. BARTLETT and NEWMan, of Oxford, (successors to Messrs. COLLINGwoop and Co.) are engaged in printing an edition of Livy, in 4 vols. 8vo, under the direction of a gentleman of the University of Oxford." It is from the text of DRAKENBORCH, and will contain

Le

the various readings, and the whole of the notes, both of the 4to. and 12mo. editions, of CREVIER. The Note Posteriores will be introduced in their proper places at the bottom of the page. This description of the materials of their edition, the Printers have thought it incumbent on them to furnish, in order to distinguish it from another Livy, now printing at the press of Messrs. N. Bliss and Baxter, in Oxford. Messrs. Bartlett and Newman have the satisfaction to state, that in this undertaking they are countenanced by Mr. Cooke, Mr. Parker, and Mr. Robert Bliss; who have each subscribed for a share. The work is proceeding with as much celerity as the time and attention necessary to its correctness will allow.

Their edition of Tacitus Oberlini, in 4 vols. 8vo. announced some months ago, printed uniformly with the Cicero Er nesti, in 8 vols. will soon be ready for delivery to the subscribers.

In the next number of this Magazine, we shall be enabled to lay before the public an account of the progress of the invention of the Vertical Bond, for which a patent has been obtained by PETER MoonE, esq. the independent member for Coventry. We noticed the patent in our September number, and we now recal attention to it, because we rank the invention which it describes, as highly useful to society, and as the greatest improvement that has taken place in the art of building for several centuries.

The Rev. Mr. MORELL, of Little Baddow, has in the press a small work, entitled The Excursions of Vigilius," which is intended to be published in the ensuing month.

Mr. ALEXANDER BOWER will publish, early in March, a History of the Life of Luther, with an account of the Reformation in Germany.

A Paper on Near Sight, and the best remedies for Defective Vision, was lately read to the Royal Society, by Mr. Ware. There is reason to believe, from the observations of Mr. Ware, that this disease is much promoted by the use of concave glasses; and, that if glasses are not employed, it would soon wear off and disappear. Hence it is much more common among the higher ranks than among the common people. In the regiments of life-guards, Mr. Ware did not find a single person afflicted with the disease, and not above five or six recruits had been dismissed on account of defective vision; while in one of the

colleges at Oxford, consisting of 125 stu dents, no less than 37 were near-sighted!

The Rev. S. CATLOW, master of the academy at Wimbledon, and late of Mansfield, announces a new edition, with improvements, of Collins's Guide to School Books.

A new edition is in the press, with considerable additions, of the Life of AUGUSTUS MONTAGUE TOPLADY, A. B. late vicar of Broad Hembury.

A Treatise on the Motion of Rockets, by Mr. W. MOORE, of the Royal Aca demy, Woolwich, will be published in the course of the month.

We are requested by an experienced dissector to state, that, on lately weighing a number of human brains, he found that some weighed as much as fifty ounces, the smallest forty, and that the average weight appears to him to be about forty-five ounces.

Mr. J. S. HAWKINS's History of the Origin and Establishment of Gothic Architecture, including an Inquiry into its Principles, and an Investigation of the Mode of Painting upon and Staining Glass, which has some time occupied his attention, will appear in the course of the ensuing month.

The third Part of WILD's Cathedrals, containing an Illustration of the Archi tecture of the Cathedral Churches of Lichfield and Chester; on sixteen Plates, engraved in aquatinta, by Dubough; will be delivered in April, price three guineas in boards.

In the Autumn of last year, Dr. THOMSON travelled through Sweden, principally for the purpose of making geological, and other scientific researches. He is about to lay before the public an account of his tour; and, in the present peculiar relations of this country with Sweden, his political observations car not fail to excite much interest.

On the first of March will be published, at Hull, No. I. of the Quarterly Visitor: a Periodical Miscellany, which is intended to comprize original literature, sometimes poetry, entertaining biography, &c. &c.. It will, we understand, be conducted by several gentlemen who have engaged to supply the work with a succession of valuable and interesting matter.

A new Biographical List of the House of Commons is in a forward state for publication.

A new Novel, entitled "The Heart and the Fancy," is in the press.

The following subjects are proposed for

for the Chancellor's prizes at Oxford, for the ensuing year; viz. For Latin verses -Alerander Achillis tumulum invisens. For an English Essay-Etymology. For a Latin Essay-Quam vim in moribus Populi Romani corrigendis habuerit Potestas Censoria. The first of the above subjects is intended for those gentlemen of the University who have not exceeded four years from the time of their matriculation; and the other two for such as have exceeded four, but not completed seven. Sir Roger Newdigate's PrizeFor the best composition in English verse, not containing more than fifty lines, by any under-graduate who has not exceeded four years from his matris culation-The Patheon.

We are informed by Dr. George Pearson, that in one of the midland counties there is at this time a family who have two children with all the characters and features of the Albinos. Neither father nor mother have any such characters. There are many rabbit-warrens in the above country; and, it is said, Albinos are not uncommon in that part, which the commnon people impute to living so much upon rabbits.

A new edition is preparing of Wakefield's Lucretius, in octavo. The scarcity of the original quarto is well known to every classical scholar; and the avidity with which a copy is bought up, when it occasionally makes its appearance in a catalogue, shows bow highly the copious notes of the erudite Commentator are prized by the learned. These, and other considerations, have encouraged the publication of a second edition; and, that it might become more extensively useful, by being more moderate in price, the publishers have printed it in octavo, and in such a manner as to combine elegance with utility.

Dr. BRADLEY has a small volume nearly ready for publication, on Worms and other Animals that infest the Hu. man Body; with the most speedy, safe, and pleasant means of cure.

A Critical and Satirical Exposition of the Errors and Prejudices of Mankind, translated from the French of J. B. Salques, is in the press, and will be published in the course of the present season. It will be illustrated by numerous anecdotes, calculated to display the folly, credulity, and superstition of ancient writers, and of those persons who have improperly obtained the appellation of MONTHLY MAO, No. 237.

Philosophers. The translation will be accompanied by elucidatory and general notes on the errors and prejudices of the English, which have escaped the notice of the French authors.-How can he get them into two volumes?

On Thursday, Feb. 4, a course of Lectures on Materia Medica, Practice of Physic, and Chemistry, will re-commence, at No. 9, George-street, Hanoversquare, at 8 o'clock in the morning, by GEORGE PEARSON, M.D. F. R. S. Se nior Physician to St. George's Hospital.

Dr. REID will commence his next course of Lectures on the Practice of Medicine, on Monday, Feb. 15, at 10 o'clock in the morning, at his house, Grenville-street, Brunswick-square.

It is ascertained that the principal difference between the water of the ocean and that of the Dead Sea, consists in the remarkable circumstances that in the latter the earthy muriates, which give the water its great sharpness and bitterness, exceed the proportion of common salt 4 times; while, on the contrary, the common salt exceeds the others nearly as much in the water of the ocean.

The frequent accidents by fire in manufactories have excited the attention of scientific men. By two papers published on this subject, one in the New York Medical Repository, by Dr. Seybert, and Dr. Coxe, Professor of Chemistry, it appears that a multitude of substances are capable of spontaneous inflammation, and that others evolve gaseous fluids which suddenly inflame on the approach of fire. Among the articles mentioned by Dr. Seybert are the following:

Candle-wick made of hemp-yarn, acciden tally impregnated with oil.

Cotton goods on which linseed-oil had been spilt.

Roasted bran in a linen cloth.

Wet hay, corn, and madder; especially if any portion of iron should be intermixed. Sail-cloth, smeared with oil and ochre. New-cloth, and fire wood soot immersed in hemp-oil varnish.

German lamp-black. themselves, after being pressed. Vegetables boiled in oil or fat, and left to

Heaps of linen rags in paper manufactories. Pyrites, and cinders from the furnaces of glass-works, when exposed to a moist atmos phere.

Cuttings of iron, which had been previ ously immersed in water.

Paint made of Derbyshire woad.
Derbyshi
I

PATENTS

MR.

WILLIAM GILPIN'S (LITCHFIELD), for an improved Method of making Augers

E specification now before us,

without the aid of the drawings attached to it. The general principle of the invention is, that the augers are made by means of dies, placed in a frame, upon which the metal intended for the auger is placed; a heavy block of iron, called a hammer, is let fall on it from a certain height, and thereby giving it the impres sion required. One of the dies is made in the form of the outside of the auger, or other required tool, and the other die is inserted into the hammer, and is of the form of the inside of the tool. The action of the machine is this, (some thing like that of the pile-engine,) there is a stirrup in which a man puts his foot, and by a sudden motion of his body elevates the hammer several feet high as may be required, which hammer, thus elevated, falls upon the metal placed between the two dies, and makes it of the form required.

NR. JAMES NEEDHAM'S (ISLINGTON), for a Portable Apparatus for Brewing Beer and Ale from Malt and Hops. This invention may be thus described: there is an iron frame supported by iron legs, containing in the centre a fire place, a door in front for supplying the fire, and, opposite, a neck projecting, on which is placed a funnel to convey 'the smoke where convenient. Above the fire place is an iron rim with two handles, for removing the whole machine. This rim has a horizontal ledge fixed close to the circumference, a little below the top, on the inside, for the boiler to rest on. The iron cylindrical boiler is tinned within: its bottom is a little convex within and concave without, with a discharging cock near the hottom, and two handles for taking it off the frame. The contents of the boiler, when filled within two inches of the top, are about eighteen gallons to every bushel of malt contained in the cylinder. There is also an iron cylinder to be placed within the boiler, and rauging with the top of it, and to stand about three inches from the bottom of the boiler, having a horizontal projecting rim fixed to its bottom, and

reaching to the circumference of the boiler, but so as to adinit of the cylinder passing easily in and out; and to the extremity of this rim, or a little within,

when the cylinder is placed within, rests upon the bottom of the boiler: there are two handles at the top for lifting it out of the boiler. In the centre of this cylinder is a smaller cylinder without a bottom, fixed to the bottom of the large one; the whole tinned throughout, and the inner and the outer cylinder and horizontal and vertical rims perforated with holes ths of an inch in diameter, and the bottom with holes 4th of an inch, or any less or greater magnitude, so that the malt does not fall through, nor the extraction be impeded; and from 3ths to an inch apart, or any less or greater distance, so that the extraction is not impeded. The relative dimensions of the cylinder to the boiler may be varied according to the proportion of malt and hops to the water. When it is intended to make about eighteen gallons of beer in two worts from one bushel of mait, and one pound of hops, the cylinder should be about ths of the diameter of the boiler, and the inner cylinder about

ths of the diameter of the larger one. There is of course a cover for the cylinder: there are also iron coolers, tinned within, with a plug-hole to let out the wort or liquor; one cooler made to rest within the other, for the convenience of packing or putting away. They have each two iron shifting legs, which pass inside iron coliars, fixed on the outside of the cooler, and have eyes at the top, for the convenience of lifting the cooler, which is inade of sufficient length to admit the legs to lie within it when not in use.

The method of brewing beer or ale with the apparatus is this; the ground malt is put into a cylinder, not the centre one, the hops in the space between the cylinder and the boiler, and cold water poured through the centre cylinder till it just covers the surface of the mali. The fire being lighted, an increasing heat is applied, that it may boil in about four hours, and kept boiling an hour longer, and then drawn off into a cooler. If more worts are required, cold water is supplied as before, and brought up to

tha

the boiling heat, &c. When the extraction is completed, the grains, hops, and cylinder, are taken out of the boiler and the fire withdrawn; and, as soon as the worts are sufficiently cooled, they may be returned into the boiler with yeast to ferment, in the usual manner of working

a tun.

Mr. Needham observes, That his apparatus is also applicable to the purpose of extracting the virtue of grain for wash, and vinegar; the process of which, is the same as brewing beer, omitting only the hops.

1

ME. CHARLES RANDOM DE BERENGER'S (PALL MALL), for certain Methods of producing a valuable Oil; also Soap and Barilla, and a Black Pigment. This invention consists in producing the oil, soap, barilla, and pigment, from the plants or vegetables known by the name of Euphorbias, particularly from the "Euphorbia lathyris." The patentee says, he either cultivates the said euphorbias, or, seeking them in their wild state of vegetation, collects the ripe seeds or fruit, which he presses, in the usual way employed to obtain oil from seeds, and thus obtains the oil that proves useful for a variety of domestic purposes. The pulp or dregs remaining after the oil has been pressed, may be made into soap, by the addition and mixture of barilla, and a little of the oil just referred to, to which animal fat and grease may or may not be added at pleasure. The stalk, branches, leaves, and other parts of the euphorbias, being burnt, produce also a kind of barilla; and, to obtain the black colour or pigment, the dregs or pulp, from the expressed seeds must be burnt in a crucible, watching it carefully, to ascertain its perfection in the usual way to obtain a pigment by burning.

M. LOUIS HONORE HENRY GERMAIN CONSTANT'S (PORTMAN SQUARE), for a method of Refining Sugar.

The method consists in making a very

pare syrup, and causing it to pass slowly through the raw or loaf sugar to be refined. This process is said to drive out the molasses or coloured syrup, while the very fine syrup take its place. The pure syrup is made by dissolving raw sugar in water, heating the solution, mixing it with five pounds of finelypounded charcoal for every hundred weight of sugar, adding the usual proportion of blood, bringing the syrup to boil, stopping the heat by means of a me tal plate drawn under the boiler, and then skimming off the albumen and charcoal, which collects on the surface. This gentleman claims also as part of his invention, the peculiar structure and method of heating his furnace. "I do further declare," he says in the specification, "that, as part of my said invention or method, I have constructed and do use a furnace for heating, boiling, and evaporating syrups, in which I do not only avail myself of doors and registers to the grate, chimney, and ash hole, as used in other works for regulating, damping, and extinguishing the fire; but I do also in particular, and as a peculiar and im portant part of my said invention, construct and use a plate of metal or other fit material, which can be otherwise changed as to the situation thereof by motion upon bearers, or slides, or rollers, or trucks, or wheels, or other similar supports, or upon a joint, or axis, or pin, so that the same plate when requisite or needful shall be suddenly interposed be tween the bottom of the boiler and the fire and burning fewel, and shall imme diately suspend or prevent the effect of the heat upon the contents of the said boiler, and in like manner, by a contrary or different motion, shall at pleasure be withdrawn or restored to the former or original position or situation thereof; and shall again immediately allow the fire or burning fewed to exerts its action against the bottom of the said boiler, and upon the contents thereof as be fore.

T

HE aspect of affairs during a season of hostility is so perpetually changing, that it becomes necessary to take a frequent view of our position; and, if ever there was a period when this was

more peculiarly necessary, it is the present, in which a series of events, occurring in the short space of the few months that have elapsed from the dissolution of the late parliament to the close of the

12

year,